IABSM3 play test

Over the weekend of March 3-4, I got to enjoy another game play test of IABSM3.  Steve was trying out a scenario for playability and wanted to see if the scenario was too unbalanced.  Steve ran the game, Curtis was playing the Germans, and I was running the Russians.  The scenario was set in 1941 with a Russian armor force attacking a German armor force.  I don’t want to give too much detail, as there some scenario specific events/conditions that in the game and I don’t want to ruin anything for the actual players when this game is run officially.  Later, when the game is actually played as an event, I will give a proper AAR.

The system went rather smoothly, even with the amount of armor on the table.  The Russians have a major disadvantage of be poorly lead and trained, but have numbers and decent guns for anti-tank abilities.  The Germans are better lead and trained, but lack numbers.  I played a rather brash leader and failed to do over watches, as I was hoping that a continuous rolling push would get me to the objective and then I would sit it out for a gun battle with the Germans.  I could have worked, but cards came up right for the Germans and they successful destroyed the armor unit that came close to seizing the objective.  The battle shift heavily towards the Germans then, but by then I had stopped my advance with the remaining forces and battled it out with the Germans.  In that aspect, the trade off was more even with the loss in vehicles.  But I could not make up for the loss of my lead force, so it was a hands down German victory.  But I could take some pleasure in knowing that the German tank ace was killed by the Russian Big Man, who was still alive at the time the game was called.  But he ended in a dangerous spot, so it was very possible that I could have lost him in another couple of turns of combat as well.

Anyway, Steve was fairly happy with the scenario, but plans to tweak a couple of things before we run the game officially at a specific upcoming event.  Once the officially game is run, I will hopefully get a bunch of pictures and will write up a better AAR on it. 

Steve reviewing the charts

An End to an Ace

Well painted Panzers

 Next week, if all goes well, I plan to visit the Missouri Historical Museum in St. Louis and see the “Civil War in Missouri” exhibit.  I am getting my shutter finger ready to be a picture taking fool there!   I still have to sit down and edit, as well as identify/name, my thousands (I am not kidding here) pictures from my sightseeing tours from the last few years.  I need to start posting these up on my travel web sites for those who can’t get to some of these out of way places.

Other than that, I know that I stopped with my book reviews as I just ran out of time to type up reviews for the blog and I didn’t want to go back after a long period of time to do one for each book, as I have finished off probably close to a dozen since my last review. But currently I am reading “Blackhorse Riders: A Desperate Last Stand, an Extraordinary Rescue Mission, and the Vietnam Battle America Forgot” by Philip Keith. I am not very far into it yet (maybe 20% of the way in), but it is not a bad book. In a nutshell, the book is about a battle that the paper work was missed filed by the Army and eventually was recovered almost 40 years later. The battle was so significant, once it came to light, that President Obama issued one of the two cavalry troops that made the daring rescue with the Presidential Unit Citation in 2009. Alpha Troop, 1/11th Armored Cavalry Regiment and Alpha Troop, 2/8th Cavalry drove deep into the jungle near the Cambodian border to rescue Charlie Troop, 2/8th Cavalry for being eliminated by a North Vietnamese force that outnumbered number them somewhere between 4:1 and 6:1. Had they not broke through and rescued Charlie Troop, it would have been the largest US defeat in Vietnam with the loss of an entire company of men in a battle. It is well worth picking up if you are interested in Vietnam. Depending on how things go, this might be my Fall Recruits scenario in a cut down version of the rescue mission with probably two platoons of each for the Armored Cavalry and ‘leg’ Cavalry as I already have one armored cavalry platoon and two infantry platoons. I need to read some more about what engagements they hit on the way to the rescue before making up my mind. But as of right now, I am planning to do another Operation Cedar Falls game (or two) at the Fall Recruits. I might even do a Falklands scenario if I get the hills finish for Recruits.

Be seeing you

Cheers

20mm Falklands Project

As you know, I am pushing to get my Falklands stuff done, especially with the 30^th Anniversary of the Argentine invasion being this April 2^nd.  I will not be able to get in a game in on that weekend as I am planning to go to Recruits in Lee Summit, MO, for that weekend.  But I should be able to get a couple of games in before June 14^th, which would be the date the Argentine forces surrendered.

Again, due to my work schedule, I have been contracting out my painting to Northumbrian Painting Services, which painted up all of the figures in this entry.

But first up is a picture of my cards for the Falklands, using the Too Fat Lardies, “I Ain’t Been Shot, Mum!” (IABSM) rules and the Falklands supplement from their Season Special.  As I mention in one of my previous entries (link), I was using a company called ArtCow to make these cards.  I am happy with them and like the finish product.  See below for a picture of the final product and these links to see what cards I designed into the decks (link) & (link).

Also, I finished my Blinds for hidden movement for the Falklands.  I printed them off and glued them to heavy card stock, the type used for comic books & magazine storage.  You will noticed two sizes.  First is the 8” wide, which is the recommend width for IABSM.  They are taller then what is recommended, but I like the oval aspect for visual appearance.  The second size is 3” wide.  While it is not in IABSM rules, in their B’Maso supplement, they recommend 3” blinds for squad size elements vs. the 8” blinds for platoons.  So I am taking that suggestion for the Falklands too.  Also, you probably noticed that I have made blinds for Chile and one with penguins on it.  That is because, I will probably get around to doing some figures for the Chilean army to fight my Argentine troops for either the Beagle Conflict in 1978, or a possible assistance to the British in 1982 with the Chile blind.  The penguins are an unknown faction to both sides – it might be a group of penguins waddling through or a lost patrol of Argentine troops that either side knew were there.  There was several incidents of both sides seeing the troops from the other side, but not sure who they were or even though that they were friendlies.

This first group pictures are from the Argentine 1^st Amphibious Commandos Group, specifically the 16 man team that attacked the Governor’s House on April 2^nd.   They are the old Hotspur miniatures.   I have also bought, but not assembled the Governor’s House model kit from Card Models by Tony (link).   I hope to have that assembled by the end of Spring.

Next few pictures are of miniatures that are done to be either mixed in with my Argentine conscripts shown on previously (link) to have a unit from the 5^th Marine Infantry Bn, or to be used separately to represent the troops for the army’s 601^st or 602^nd Commandos.  The size of the force was decided on based on the force at the skirmish at the Top Malo House.  They are all Hotspurs, except for the surrendering figure at the far left rear of the picture.  He is from Platoon20.  The next picture is one of the two 1/72^nd Altaya AAV7A1 amphibian tractor that I got off of EBay.  This is the closes model that I could find of the LTVP7 that the Argentine Marines had for Operation Rosario.  The only thing noticeable wrong is the headlights and the need for a proper paint job.  Finally, the last picture is of the card model kit from Card Models by Tony (link) of the Top Malo house, which these figures will be defending.   I got mine, but once again, I still have to assemble it.

I only had a few British figures done specifically done for the Falklands this time around.  The following pictures are of those figures.  The first picture is a Blowpipe anti-air missile gunner and a Forward Observation Officer.  Both are from Liberation Miniatures.  The second picture is of the Liberation’s Falkland / Cold War SAS set.  The final picture is of the Hotspur’s Falklands SAS set.

These last set of pictures are of 1/144^th scale models of aircraft for the Falklands.  There really is a gap of models available for the Falklands in “game” friendly scales.  By that, I mean kits that will small enough to not take up a lot of room on the table, but also look right with other figures.  Yes, I know that there are 1/72^nd scale kits and that they fit with the miniatures, but I rather not have something as large as a 1/72^nd scale Pucara balanced on a small metal pole over my game table.  It is too big and probably out of balance.  Anyway the first one is a kit of a Sea Harrier from Academy / Minicraft.  I actually have had this kit for many years and never got around to even opening it.  The next one is of a Pucara (!).  This is available through Small Scale Shop at Shapeways (link).  It is available in the two different versions (one flying & one landed).  Everything from Shapeways is done by 3D printing on various materials.  But what is impressive is that is one piece!  The landing gear, the propellers, everything is done on the single piece, in case of the landed version of the Pucara.

The model’s surface is rough, but should be easy to sand down. Also there was a lot of oil on my kits, so they will need a good washing as well.  

Finally, with the 1/144^th scale Pucara, I think the Pebble Island raid is very do-able on.  Several Pucaras on the table will look decent and they will not take up an acre of space.  As you can see from the picture below, the Liberation’s SAS miniatures and the 1/144^th scale Pucara don’t look all that bad together, even with the Pucara being half the size that would be if it was to scale with the figures.

Well, that finally leaves my entry on the IABSM3 play test to still do.  I didn’t get many photos that turned out, so it will be a very brief report.  Keep your eye out for it.

Be seeing you

Cheers

20mm Anarchy in the UK project

I have spoken of this project before, but I am just going touch on it again.  This is a project heavily inspired by the “Winter of ‘79” blog, as well as my interest in “The Troubles” of Northern Ireland and media like “V for Vendetta” (link), “A Very British Coup” (link), and “Lightforce” (link). Plus it gives me another use to use my Falklands British troops and all of the Hotspur’s Urban Operations line figures that bought back in the ‘80’s.  I am not going to create a detailed background of why the Anarchy broke out, other than it just does.  The background will change as I need it to for the scenario.  Most of the scenarios will be involving a section (8-10 men) or two against a similar size force.  But there will be some larger games, mainly riots & sole-sucking space vampires and their victims, which looks oddly like zombies miniatures.

Again, I had commission to have these figures painted by Northumbrian Painting Services.

The picture below is what I am calling the “Home Defence.”  This is mostly local and non-military force that will stand up to whatever the threat maybe.  While my figures are very heavily armed in the picture, that is because these figures will be mix and matched with the other groups below to create a more rag-tag image of an irregular force and not as a grouping as shown in the picture. 

As I see things for my Anarchy games, the Home Defence will be a motley crew that only assembles for combat when action is imminent and not capable for any lengthy battle.  Their overall quality will normally be poor, but morale could be very high especially if defending their homes from a much hated enemy.

In this pictures are eight Liberation miniatures (3x Sterling SMG, 2x GPMG from the UKMELTSUP pack, 2x Milkor grenade launchers from the UBR11 pack, and 1x M16 rifleman from the UBRM16 pack) and two Hotspur miniatures.  They are wearing mostly civilian clothing with some old bits of Battle Dress uniforms.  I need to find some more figures will more "civilian" weaponry that would probably be more realistic for what they would have been armed with, like shotguns, target rifles, and left over WWII weapons. 

This next picture is what I am calling the “Militia”.  The Militia is better equipped with military clothing and kit then the Home Defence blokes, but not as good as the standing military elements.  If you will notice, there are no support weapons in the picture.  That is because I will be mixing some of the Home Defence figures with this group during the games.

The idea behind these guys for my games will be that they are a large group of willing civilian volunteers, beefed up with recent ex-service members or a few Territorial’s & Regulars that came out and join whatever militia organization that they represent.  While they are better equipped, but still suffer shortages and a lack of a decent logistical supply chain.  They are capable of fighting lengthy battles and even campaign for short term operations, but can’t operate too far from supply bases and always lacking heavy support weapons (AT missiles, tanks, air support, etc.)

All of the figures are from the Liberation’s Australian SAS in Vietnam pack.

Next up is what I am calling “Terrorists / Freedom Fighters”.   One can argue when is a Terrorist, a Freedom Fighter, and vice versa, but I am not going to go there.  They could also be undercover SAS operatives operating behind the rebel Bedford’s Communists Militia lines.  These guys are a mixed bag of equipped individuals.  But the one thing that almost all of them have in common is their Balaclavas keep their identity a mystery so that after their raid / assassination operation, they can blend back into the local population and hid among them.

All of the figures are from Liberation, but are made up from several different packs: URBAK, URBBARR; URB14, BALAK, and BALRPK

Now, to face up with that last group is our Boys from Hereford.  You don’t have to worry about these blokes not knowing the colour of the boathouse!  These figures are Hotspurs and are geared up for Operation Nimrod, or as it is better known the Iranian Embassy Siege in 1980.  There are five poses and four doubles.  Four poses are armed with H&K MP5’s, but one of them has it slung over his shoulder and using his pistol instead.  The fifth pose is the SAS operator that was stationed on the ground outside of the Embassy and was coordinate everything with the Police while manning a radio.  The only thing that I did not like of these figures is that the radio operator has a drawn pistol, but I understand that it is for dramatic reasons. 

What is also nice about this is that Card Models by Tony (link) has a 20mm paper model of Embassy building that is designed to be similar to the Iranian Embassy from 1980.  Both of these pictures are from his website.  I still have to assemble my Embassy.

The next couple of pictures are of a pre-painted OO scale Railroad building set from Hornsby, the Water Purification Plant.  There are the three separate kits that make the plant:  the station house, the chlorine tank farm, and the water treatment tank.  Needless to say, having a source to potable water is very important and that can need to some interesting scenarios.  As you can see in the second picture, things will not be going good for the government player for leaving a single unarmed constable to guard the this water purification plant.

Finally, I want to add the following picture of some non-painted figures, but give everyone a notice of what is going to get worked on next.  The following are 20mm UK soldiers in riot gear for the 1970’s or early 80’s.  They are from Eureka Miniatures and have to be specially requested as they are not listed in any of their catalogs or website.  Nic with Eureka was great to deal with for them.  There is only the single pose available.  The figure is armed with a baton and the opposite arm is done so a shield can be cut out of plastic and attached.  The figure is wearing a respirator and the M1944 helmet.  When they are done, they will look great staring down civilian rioters or zombies.

Well, the next blog entry will be over the additional Falklands figures that I had painted up.

Until then,

Cheers

20mm Post Apocalypse and "Dark Days in America" projects

Hello, again!  This blog entry will be about some side projects that I am slowly getting miniatures painted for, but have not really done much towards it otherwise.  Due to my demanding work schedule, I find it very hard to paint my own stuff anymore.  So I have been contracting a UK based painting service to paint my figures, Northumbrian Painting Services.  I have been using them to paint almost all of my 20mm figures.  Everything in the next few blog entries were painted up by them.

The first line up is my 20mm Post Apocalypse (PA) project.  Why 20mm PA?  Well, I already have the figures and I like the whole Mad Max, Road Warrior style stories.  I will be able to use most of these figures as well as my 20mm buildings and some vehicles from the “Anarchy in the UK” & “Dark Days in America” projects without any troubles.  I should only have to have a few vehicles or structures that will not work for one of the other projects.  The PA project should be under 100 figures and vehicles for everything. 

The figures shown below are all out of the Out-Of-Print (OOP) Citadel’s Dark Future (DF) line for the Games Workshop’s (GW) PA car wars game.  They are lovely figures sculpt by Alan Perry.  It is a shame that GW dropped the line (as they do with anything I like from them) and that the Perry’s never did anything more for it (I am still hoping that now that they have their own company that maybe, just maybe…). I have a bunch more of the DF figures that I will be getting painted soon.  Currently, the only companies that make 20mm PA figures that I am aware of are Stan Johansen Miniatures (link) & Aberrant Games (link).  As for PA ‘car wars’ style cars, both companies have some models, but also have bits to convert Matchbox ‘Hot Wheels’ die cast cars into vehicles for the PA theme.  There is also a few other companies, like Jada Toys 1/64^th scale Battlecars (link), which only make ‘car wars’ style PA vehicles.

These next two pictures are of a couple of terrain pieces I picked up on EBay a while back.  I don’t know who makes these or who painted them, but they look nice enough.  I am especially happy that the green car is a right side steering, so it will work fine with my other UK vehicles.

The next set of pictures is for a 1970’s / 80’s US based project, “Dark Days in America”.  This project will be the same as my “Anarchy in the UK” project, but in the USA.   This project, like Anarchy, will be directed towards smaller skirmish actions (squad size – 12 figures or less per side), or possibly a larger action for certain game scenarios. It will take place in a darker version of American history of the 1970’s & early ‘80’s.  The games will be police / criminal actions (bank robberies, etc.), terrorists / insurrection (Symbionese Liberation Army-like groups or Right-Wing Militia groups), riots, and zombies (during their proper time period!)  

I already had many of the figures from years ago and plan to down scale various paper gaming model buildings from the WorldworksGames’Mayhem City line (link) & Microtactix’s Twilight Street line (link) from 28mm to 20mm.  Civilian vehicles are going to be very hard to find, so I am just going to have to accept the fact that this US has a large amount of UK imports.

The first picture is of some criminal elements, most likely bank or armored car robbers.  This group is a mixture of manufacturers.  In the back are three figures from Stan Johansen’s J2022 Terrorists set.  One is armed with a pistol, another with a double barreled shotgun, and the third is carrying a pump action shotgun and a money bag.  In the front row, the two to the left are Hotspurs.  The far right figure is from Platoon 20.  I am happy these miniatures actually look like robbers instead of terrorists or irregular soldiers with webbing or other light kit.  It would be nice to see more of this type of figures for a “Geezers! Shut It!” style game armed with melee weapons (axe handles, knives, etc.)

The next two pictures are US SWAT teams from different time periods.  The first team is for the 1970’s, which I asked to be painted up in the spirit of the old TV show, S.W.A.T. (link)  They are also in similar to the SWAT team in the opening of the 1978 movie, “Dawn of the Dead”(link).  All of the figures are Hotspurs, except for the sniper on the very far left.  I don’t know what company he came from, but I had him for many, many years.  He might be from the long OOP Grenadier ’s Twilight 2000 line from back in the mid ‘80’s.  He fits in perfectly with the Hotspurs for size, style, and uniform. 

Anyway, the figures are heavily based on the original SWAT team from the Los Angeles Police Department from back in the 1970’s (which is what the TV show was based off of too.)  There are six different poses, of which there are five more doubles for the whole team. The sniper is armed with a bolt action rifle with a scope.  Then there are three poses that are armed with M16A1’s automatic rifles with pistols in their holsters.  Next is a figure that is armed with a pump action shotgun and a pistol is his holster.  Finally, the remaining pose is an officer holding a revolver with a tear gas gun slung over his shoulder.  I really like the fact that these guys are very 1970’s in style. 

The original LAPD SWAT was created to be a “true” para-military unit.  The city was convinced that the radical left wing movements or a race riot would breakout into a sort of Hue City battle in LA, so they create the SWAT team to combat this threat and not to carry out arrest or hostage rescues.  Most of the original SWAT members were ex-military and trained to use the sewers to infiltrate and carry out combat operations behind “enemy lines.”  They eventually realized that this would not be the case and got into the police role that they are mostly used for today.  It is keeping with the original intent of the SWAT that plays into my “Dark Days” project.

The next picture is a SWAT team for the 1980’s.  As the role of SWAT was realized that they were for short duration arrests or rescue operations in a contained urban area and not long term urban combat over a vast area, that the weapons and tactics changed.  As one can see with these miniatures, the bulky M16A1 rifle has been replaced with the compacted H&K MP5 submachine gun.  Also gone are the revolvers from the previous set to be replaced with semi-auto pistols.  The SWAT members wear mask and goggles for protection of their face and their identity, as well as to cause a more imposing image to frighten the criminals. They lack the heavy body armor and helmets that would start being available by the mid to late 80’s, and would be a common scene on all SWAT teams by the 90’s. 

All of the figures are Hotspurs.  There are five different poses and four doubles.  Three of the poses have officers armed with the MP5 SMG and pistols.  One of the three is aiming with his pistol instead of his MP5, which is slung over his shoulder.  The fourth pose is an officer holding a pump action shotgun.  The final pose is a sniper with a rifle and scope.

Next up is the some Very Important Persons (VIPs) and their bodyguards.  They could be a high ranking politician and assigned Secret Service / State Police bodyguards, or maybe a corporate CEO and some hired civilian contracting agency.  The bodyguards are armed with semi-auto pistols and Uzi SMG’s.  Again, all of the figures are from Hotspur.

Finally, while they don’t fit in the time frame, they do fit in the mind set.  The following two figures are a pair of FBI agents that travel around the US investigating unusual criminal cases, which sometimes have a tint of the supernatural about them.

“Agent Anderson, take a look at this.”

“What is it this time, Dutch, a werewolf on a cruise ship?”

Both figures are the OOP Citadel’s Dark Future figures.  I did trim off the pony tail on the male figure as there is no way J. Edgar Hoover would allow one of his men to wear a pony tail.

Next blog entry will be over the newly painted figures for the “Anarchy in the UK” project.

Cheers

C'est le Congo Pt II and what is going on with me

Well, first I am sorry that I have not been updating my blog or doing much towards gaming, including gaming.  But work has my sole and my time.

Anyway, I got a chance to take some pictures of the miniatures that I had painted up from my last batch finally, as well as some EBay or other purchases that I have made recently towards gaming.  But there is quite a bit to do in one blog, so what I am going to do is break them down into several blog entries over similar topics.   

Also we had another play test of IABSM3 that I will be covering along with some pictures.  But it might be a few days between each entry as my work schedule is still staying in high demand. I will try to type them up on Word and later cut & paste them over on to my blog (which means I might even get two entries up the same night, but don't count on it.)

Unfortunately, I forgot to take my camera to the play test game and had I done so, I would have realized that my camera’s batteries were dead before I started taking pictures late that night.  So I had to use my crappy cell phone’s camera and that is why the pictures are not very good.  Remember to click on the picture for a bigger version.

First up – 15mm "C’est le Congo"

I already have quite a few miniatures for post-WWII African conflicts, which can be seen on this blog under the "tag" of "B'Maso" for the name of the rules set that I will be using for the Congo games.  I did sold off a large number of my stuff 2 or 3 years back, but I still keep a pretty large force both painted and unpainted miniatures.  This project will actually be started in 2013, but I am going ahead and picking up some of the figures & vehicles I need this year.  To meet that goal, I bought some 10 figure, 20mm circular mob bases from Litko.  I will be using these bases to move the various tribal / irregular mobs with as you can see with this picture below.

Peter Pig Militia miniatures on a Litko base

As you can see, I am remounting my figures on to pennies as well so they can be used with the mob bases.

Before I go any further, while I really, really want to do the 1960’s Congo Crisis, (I have been amazed by that conflict since a child after watching Dark of the Sun (link) on TV) but the proper vehicles for the period for the UN (which was heavily involved in the fighting) and civilians are just not available.  I am going to start contacting various companies to see if I can convince them to make some models just for me or as release if I get enough support (like S&S Models 15+ Club).  So, I am going to do a faux African country in an unspecific year for my games, but heavily mirrors the history of the 1960’s Congo Civil War (so it is possible for Hind gunship to pop up in the games.)  But I still really want to do the ‘60’s.

So with that noted, I made the following purchases off of EBay and Hobby Link Japan for the following jets for the Congo game.  For the Katanga “Rebel” State, I was able to buy an old Out-Of-Print Heller Starfix model kit of a 1/100^th Fouga Magister II. 

1/100th Fouga Magister II from Heller

Towards the beginning of the 1960 Congo Crisis, the Katangan Air Force had three Magister jets converted to be ground attack aircraft.  Due to various reasons, they only had one functioning jet by the time the conflict begun broke out between the Katangan forces and the UN.  The lone Magister was flown by the mercenary pilot, Joseph Deulin.  He flew unchallenged for quite some time as the UN failed to bring any fighter jets with them to their Congo mission to control the air.  It was not until the UN’s Ethiopian F-86’s and the Swedish J29’s showed up, that Deulin was finally check in his daring raids.  And speaking of the Swedish J29’s, I was also able to buy from Hobbylink Japan a 1/144^th J-29B with UN decals from Fairy Kikaku.

1/144th Swedish J29 Fighter with UN Markings

I am not concern that the two kits are not in the same scale as for 1) Neither where involved in dogfights and 2) unless I go to 1/72^nd scale, there are no other kits of both planes in the same scale.

10mm Vietnam

My plan is to run at least one Vietnam game for the Fall session of Recruits this year in Lee Summit, MO.  I will be working on re-basing some stuff, making new blinds for hidden movement, and painting up more NVA.  The reason for me to mention about this in this specific blog entry is because I also bought from Hobby Link Japan a 1/144^th Japanese Ground Self Defense Forces in the 1950’s kit set.  In that set is a M42 Duster and a jeep with a 106mm recoilless rifle, both will work for my 10mm Vietnam, especially for convoy actions.  I forgot to take a picture of the kit…sorry!


If everything goes good, the next blog entry will be about my upcoming 20mm Post Apocalypse and 1970's / '80's "Dark Days in America" projects.  These projects will be small in size for number of figures and will have some figures double with my "Anarchy in the UK" project. 

That is it for now.

Cheers