A Sandbox

These were just a chore! And there's still one left to do. One of them had to be done as a crashed one when I lost the tail fins and wheel struts. Still, they are a good addition to my Soviet Naval Infantry forces. Flight stands are small GW ones. 

With the commencement of both the Six Nations rugby and the Winter Olympics, combined with the continued inclement weather plus an upcoming half term week off, I am hopeful of getting a fair bit of painting done. There's plenty of Real World projects to be getting on with, but I'm preparing a to do list of jobs to get off my Paint Station over the next month. So, while I became an armchair expert in Mens Skistyle and Big Air snowboarding this Saturday afternoon and the murk, must and drizzle made outdoors not very enticing, I finished the Italian CO unit for my East Africa 1941 side project. It could serve in Libya as well, if I fancy doing the early desert war.  Baccus WW1 French Command pack repurposed plus an H&R radio vehicle. 

A reasonably quiet month, hobby-wise. Lots of post-Christmas tidying and a return to work that has been increasingly exhausting. However, I've managed to get this regiment of AWI militia off the To Do pile. Next up will be a classic Space Marine captain..  January has been a long month of grey skies, bleak weather and dark evenings. But this was a surprise this morning, even for our lofty fringe of Sheffield! 

My To Do pile has included Trumpeter Helix helicopters that I was gifted by m'colleague Andrew. They have been, frankly, a right royal pain to assemble and paint! There are 5, but the spindly undercarriages are so frail and seem to be made of a plastic designed to resist any and all adhesives, that I have lost some and so will have to model one as a crashed example and cannibalise it for parts for the other 4. I already have 2 H&R examples anyway. But they can provide some transport for my Soviet naval marines and some light attack capability as well. Although I gave up in fury on trying to add the side rocket sponsons and pods. 

I bought a copy of Adeptus Titanicus a while ago, having always wanted it. Me and Andy had huge forces of Eldar, Orks, Imperial Guard, Dark Angels and Space Wolves for Space Marine in its second incarnation and played a bit of Epic 40K although I never got to grips with that last version, although I'm sure it warrants revisiting. So, once we'd cleared off the 18th century forces and the farmhouse, we got an Eclipse and a Death Bringer Warlord and a brace of order counters and had a quick Duel to the Death in a game that we haven't played since Friday night games at our school Wargames club in 1989!  i got the worst of it in about 4 moves. The Void Shields were stripped out by auto cannon fire, then the generator was destroyed, followed by the defence laser. I tried to close the range to bring it's las cutter to bear in close combat, but the damage rolls turned to critical and then the Mind Impulse Units burned out and the crew were killed or turned into gibb...

Andy T made the trip over the passes from the Palatine County to South Yorkshire. We had a game of Maurice planned and used the scenario from the last issue of Wargames Soldiers and Strategy magazine of the Battle of Hubbardton - part of the Saratoga campaign.  We fudged the forces to suit our favoured ruleset of Maurice. I was the Americans, with a force of 6 Regular line battalions and 3 Irregular skirmishers (1 of which was represented by some Woodland Native Americans). Andrew brought a force of Brunswick grenadiers, British regulars, some light Highlander infantry and skirmishers plus a cannon. We added some Notables to represent the traits of the various forces. More details of his own account of the ection will be found on his  blog Lavrenti accompanied one of the skirmisher units who had a range of 6 BW's, which was to prove incredibly useful.  The Earl of Bragge was somewhat incongruously attached to a unit of American regulars. Who knows ...