A Sandbox

I realised last weekend, during the Crisis Point games of Maurice, that I had no areas of marsh or rocky ground. These can feature in the set up or can suddenly appear on the battlefield if a player uses one of the Event cards to stymie an opponents movement plans. So this week I have been trialling some techniques to make marshes. I settled on a simple one of painting an MDF base in brown then adding sand round the edges for the solid ground areas. I used a mix of French Mirage Blue, some black and a little bit of a brighter blue to take away some of the grey shade for the water. A wash of Agrax Earthshade followed. A gloss varnish was then applied. The tufts are from Army Painter. I think maybe a more brown shade for standing water in future, but they'll do for now. The rocks are cork, painted and dry brushed. More terrain and finishing off a unit of 7YW British for Maurice will be my plan for the Easter weekend. 

An excellent weekend in sunny Dungworth again, hosted by Richard C and family. As has been mentioned by Andy T in his   blog  we were called upon late on Friday night to come up with a game and felt that an encounter between the Honourable Black Sea Company, envious of the success of the EIC in south Asia, thought to gain a foothold in Andreivia. The lure of the trade in pork, bear fur and cheap wine was enough for shareholders and the British Government of the day to finance a company army with some support from regular British forces. Naturally, the locals were not keen on handing over money and power to these foreign adventurers and so the Royal Andreivian Army reached for their pikes and called upon their French friends and 'advisors' for help.  The hill which saw Company infantry struggle towards, especially not helped by an Event card that saw a Confused unit splash through the stream, get Disrupted, then suffered some effective musket fire that fin...

I bought these on eBay a while ago and they've been sat with a spray grey undercoat in my To Do pile since then. This week I have based them, using masking tape for texture around the building base and added some cars and scatter as a garnish. Happy enough with them, they'd do as a housing estate on the edge of a big city, somewhere in 1980s West Germany. 

In their drive to the capital, the Cacadores of the 1st Independent Mechanised Brigade are tasked with finding a path over a ridge line to drive on to Bodoni. Initial Recce reveals that a force of San Serriffe infantry with some armour are holding the ridge. The San Serriffe forces are ordered to hold the ridge at all costs. Programmed responses are diced for, they will respond to the central attack by pulling in flanking forces if possible, but no ground is to be given.  initial deployment, the first company of Portuguese infantry in M3 Panhards APCs with M60A1 tanks on the right. The Portuguese ran straight up the road but the second company was slow to deploy, and when it did, around turn 4, it was less than dynamic until a Command Bonus got them closing to bayonet point.  San Serriffe infantry and a T34/85 (the promised T55s were instead guarding the division field kitchen and wine cellar.)  82mm mortar, infantry and armour on the h...

Busy day IRL. Builders, ongoing care requirements for family, the kids being off on their Easter holidays, all conspired to keep me busy today. So I have got the forces prepared and written out the Red Force (Portugal) orders as well as the programmed instructions for the defending Blue (San Serriffe) forces.  The map was determined as per Grants instructions and it turned out to be the 3 central sections of the map, as pictured below: Using the CWC recommendation of 1 infantry stand=1 platoon, 1 tank = 1 platoon/troop, the forces are as follows. San Serriffe forces : 1 infantry company  1 infantry platoon  2 T55 tanks 1 Reece 1 122mm (off table) Portuguese forces: 1 infantry battalion (-2 platoons) 2 M60 tanks 2 Reece 1 105mm (off table) 1 25pdr (off table) The preprogrammed nature of Blues forces should make this an interesting encounter. 

At some point in the 1980's, the ex-Portugese colony of San Serriffe, an island archipelago in the Indian Ocean, underwent another rebellion from the Peoples Liberation Front, with support from most of the army, on the promise of weekend passes to the resort town of Ems, known for it's free and easy attitude. Seeing an opportunity, the Kremlin has supplied the rebels with arms and equipment, thinking that the islands might make a useful base for the Soviet navy.  The 1st Independent Mechanised Brigade of the Portuguese Army, in a last hurrah for colonial expeditionary adventures, has been despatched to return the pro-Western genaralissimo to power, via some requisitioned cargo ships.  Little is known of these islands, although the Guardian newspaper ran some in depth coverage of it in the 1970s, which did much to promote tourism there. A map is provided for the reader.  further information on the islands can be found here: https://wikitravel.org/en/San_Serriff...