Partisan 2025 and a sacrifice to the carpet people

So I stirred my stumps and drove down to Newark for this years Partisan show.  I was a little later than I had hoped and some 1,200 gamers had already arrived before me at 11.45am and some had already made their purchases and were heading for home.  As always the first impression is one of the scale of the show and how busy it is.  It is a show which tends towards some huge display games and this year's show is no exception.

I was slightly disappointed that many of the large games were simple table edge to table edge lines of troops as that gives little scope for doing anything other than an advance to contact and slugging or shooting it out.  I like a bit of space around the troops as the real world rarely has hard edges you can use to shield the flanks of your army!  One game really caught my eye though, as being the exception to this.  This was the Tradeston Wargames Group presentation of the Battle of Rocroi 1643.  Even better the team running this were chatty and keen to explain how the rules worked unlike some other display games.  The game was using a set of rules I don't know much about 'Through the Square Window' and the author, Gordon Crawford, was on the team so we were able to have a good chat about the mechanisms and concepts.  I was rather taken with the system and went back later to buy a copy of the rules, which I will review in a later post (spoiler alert; I rather like them).

Rocroi using Through the Square Window rules

Close up of the Spanish Infantry in the Rocroi game

Next up was a trip to see that honest purveyor of wargames figures that is Peter Berry at Baccus 6mm.  I splurged on figures here as I needed to buy castings to complete my Moorish and Gothic armies.  Funds didn't permit me to add the additional Hunnic cavalry I need so there will be more splurging to come. 

This was followed by a quick chat with old Sealed Knot friends Paul and Christine Eaglestone of Empress Miniatures although I managed to avoid the temptations of their western gunfight range this time.  I did mention to them that I had an issue with their figures as they are far betting castings than I really know how to paint!

While I was doing the rounds I also had a chat with my old gaming friend Graham (Trebian) Evans on the Northamptonshire Battlefields stand where I picked up a copy of their 'Wargamers Guide to Edgcote'.  I didn't take a turn at the display game of the battle as I have played it a couple of times before and there was lots more to see. It seemed to be keeping Graham busy though without my trade.  The game is fun and a great introduction to Wars of the Roses games so if you see it while it's doing the rounds I strongly recommend giving it a try.

The Edgcote booklet is a rather useful item nicely illustrated in full colour with a really welcome section covering the heraldry of the combatants and a set of entry level rules as well as an explanation of the military background to the fight.  It's a great companion to Graham's earlier work 'The Battle of Edgcote 1469 - Re-evaluating the evidence' which is also a rather useful volume to have on your bookshelf if you have an interest in the Wars of the Roses.

My last purchase was from Warbases who now do a range of pre-painted buildings under the banner 'Table Ready Terrain'.  I bought another store for my town of De Lancy, Texas.  This was the Trading Post kit.  I have to say the colouring is really well done and I will be adding some more of these to the collection at some point.

Pretty sure I know who and what this game is.  It was nicely presented

I missed recording whose game this was, but this is what I mean by edge to edge deployment

So having spent my filthy lucre, I took myself around the display games.  First port of call was The League of Extraordinary Wargamer's Wake Island game.  I know a couple of these chaps from the SK and they are as mad as their selection of headgear for this game suggests.  The game looked pretty good too.  A fictional attack by the Japanese in the mid 1920's.  It gives a good excuse to get some toys on the table that were too late to see action in the First World War and were obsolete by the start of the Second.

Wake Island, Houla Shirts optional.  The outfits did make sense honest!

I was quite taken with the selection of oddball topics to be found.  Witch Racing around Ankh-Morpork looked fun and the figures being used were straight from the Josh Kirby cover art for the Discworld books.  How you stop Granny Weatherwax winning or Nanny Ogg cheating I couldn't tell.  There were also pig mounted Hobbits having jousting fun available on the next table.  Elsewhere there were a number of very large games on big tables not all of which I got details of.  

Gladiatorial Combat with a very nice amphitheatre

Racing around Ankh-Morpork.  Apologies to the presenter who clearly had just lost (again)

I couldn't resist this shot, a banjo playing Nanny Ogg rides again

I did stop and chat with the Doncaster gamers who were putting on a Gun Fight at the OK Corral game using Deadman's Hand rules.  Given the amount weaponry being displayed on the side of their table I doubt there would have been much debate about the rules.

After a good three hours I headed home and had a pretty clear run back to home.

Ah but what about the sacrifice to the carpet people I hear you cry?  Well once I got home  I decided to dry fit the parts of the Trading post kit and so popped them out of their frames.  The fit was perfect (as if I expected anything different) so I popped them onto my book purchases to carry to my hobby space.  I got up there and turned to put the books on my desk and 'pop' the book flexed and all the parts headed floorward.  I could see where they landed so down to my hands and knees I go to pick them all up (down is easy getting back up is the real trick).  Except two window frames and an awning support were nowhere to be found.  This morning I have turned my office upside down but can I find the little blighters?  Nary a trace to be had.  I checked my route from downstairs several times to no avail, moved the furniture in my office, nothing and even cleared my desk in case they were buried in one of the deeper dust drifts!  So I can only assume that the carpet people got them or that they are nestling deep within the dog, and I'm not looking for them there.  So I'm off to scratch build replacement parts now.

Damn Battleships Again...again

So I played a test game of DBSA this week using my 1/4800 home made ships.  One thing I learned is that naval wargame pictures at that scale are pretty boring...lots of blue and a few tiny ships!  So I'm sorry if the pictures don't inspire you.  For an opening game I kept it pretty simple and played a fictional River Plate based game set in 1904 during the Russo-Japanese war.  One Russian pre dreadnought battleship the Pobeda v a Japanese cruiser squadron consisting of one armoured cruiser the Azuma and two protected cruisers the Kasagi and the Chitose.   The Pobeda is escaping from Port Arthur and has been separated from the rest of the Russian force, so is heading south looking for safety in a German naval base.  The Japanese squadron has steamed to intercept and delay pending the arrival of heavier elements of the Fleet.

The table is open sea and covers an area roughly 14,400 yards long by 7,000 yards wide (roughly 7 Nm by 3.5 Nm).  The two sides enter via the opposite short edges and already have sight of each other's smoke.  The Japanese are in line astern.  There are four hours until sunset and the sea state is moderate with a moderate breeze from the North West.  Each game turn represents 15minutes of action.  Shooting into the sunset will be penalised for the 30 minutes prior to sunset (deemed to be shooting into an arc from SW to NW of the shooter's position).   The Pobeda needs to exit the opposite short table edge to gain safety the cruisers to inflict sufficient damage and delay to allow the fleet to come up the following day. 

The Pobeda enters in the centre of the North edge of the table (a narrow edge) and steams due south at maximum speed.  The Japanese enter heading North East also at maximum speed.  At this point the range between the lead cruiser (Azuma) and the Pobeda is 11,000 yards.  It quickly dawns on me that the range shortens very quickly with the combined closing rate being 2,000 yards a turn if both side head directly at each other.  Extreme range for the Pobeda is 6,000 yards while the Armoured Cruiser can also reach out to the same distance the chances of it doing any damage before closing to Long Range of 4,800 yards is slight.  The Protected Cruisers have no chance of hitting until within 4,800 yards and ideally would need to be within 1,600 yards to have any chance of damaging the Russian.  The tactical position is simple the Japanese need to use their speed to close the range and the Russian wants to keep the cruisers at arm's length.

The range closes until at after 45 minutes steaming at full revolutions the range closes to 6,000 yards and the Azuma open fire, but no hits are observed and the Pobeda's reply is also ineffective.  Movement is IGO - UGO but both sides shoot in both players combat phases, with the phasing player firing first. The effect of any hits scored being applied before the second player replies.  Torpedo attacks happen in the same sequence but are resolved after all shooting is dealt with as torpedoes take longer to reach the target. .  This leads to some interesting manoeuvring to try to cross range thresholds in your own turn so as to get first chance to cause damage at the more effective shorter range!  

The Russians now close the range further and initiate a further exchange of fire from 5,100 yards with neither side scoring any hits.  The Japanese cruisers, still in line astern close to 4,400 yards for the Azuma at least as the trailing protected cruisers still being out of range. The exchange of fire is now scoring hits but with no damage (I decided that an equal result for adjusted shooting and defence dice scores meant a hit but no significant damage simply to help build a narrative for the game) neither side has their shooting heads on it seems.  The Pobeda continues to close and fires again at 3,800 yards on the Azuma, again the exchange of fire has no effect.  The Japanese aware that their current course will not close the range enough to allow effective shooting turn towards the Pobeda and fire a salvo at 2,600 yards and hit the Pobeda but again do no damage.  The Pobeda returns fire with no effect (I'm beginning to wonder if either side has actually loaded live shells!).  The Pobeda now turns away from the approaching cruisers to maintain the range.

As the Russian battleship turns away the Japanese decide to split their squadron to try to hem it in.  The protected cruisers make a turn to the west while the Azuma continues directly towards the  Pobeda.  At 1,400 yards the Azuma opens fire again but the Chitose and Kasugi are still not within effective range as they are over 2,000 yards from target.  They fire but don't score any hits.  The Pobeda continues to turn away and fires another salvo which hits and finally inflicts damage on the Azuma, the return fire from her also scores hits and causes damage.  So both the Pobeda and Azuma are damaged.  In the basic rules hits are cumulative, multiple damage results make it easier to score a crippled or sunk result.  How easy this is depends on the size of the ship being hit.  As with DBA 3.0 rules the adjusted attack and defence dice scores are compared and a defence result of less than the attack score but more than half causes damage or if a third damaged result a crippled result.  If the defender is doubled then the target is immediately crippled and if tripled it explodes and sinks.  Torpedoes and mines create a greater risk of a straight crippled or sunk result.

Things are hotting up now but the Japanese have to get closer to have a serious chance of any hits doing damage.  The damaged Azuma closes to 1,600 yards and scores a second hit, the Pobeda is also getting the hang of things now and hits the Azuma again.  All of which means a second damaged result on both vessels.  The protected cruisers are closing in too, but at a range of 2,000 yards don't hit the Pobeda.  It's a big ask for the protected cruisers as they are on an attack score of zero until they close to under 1,600 yards, the battleship has a defence of four and with no dice adjustments likely, the dice would have to be creating one - six split in favour of the cruisers to damage the Russian.

The Azuma now goes for broke and closes to close range of 600 yards to launch a spread of torpedoes along with her gunnery attack  Sadly for the Azuma everything misses, unlike the Russian response which hits and cripples the Azuma.  The Azuma is now dead in the water.  While this is unfolding the Chitose and Kasagi close to under 1,400 yards and fire a salvo neither scores a hit.  The Pobeda now turns into the oncoming protected cruisers while firing a broadside at the crippled Azuma.  Hits land and the Azuma starts to sink!  The closing act after two and a quarter hours is for the Pobeda to turn further into the path of the protected cruisers and engage the lead ship.  The dice are not kind and the leading protected cruiser is crippled.  With this the remaining undamaged Japanese cruiser makes maximum speed and passes the Russian battleship heading for safety.  The Pobeda in a rare act of gallantry does not fire on the retreating ship or it's crippled sister ship instead opting for a run for safety and neutral German port at Tsingtao.

I quite like the free flow and simplicity of these rules but have a few little niggles that some house rules will easily sort out.  These are mainly centred around the damage and crippled status and how they impact on gunnery and movement.  I also want to incorporate some of the Hong Kong Wargame Society house rules as well as those from Rob's RJW campaign amendments.

1/4800th Russo-Japanese war battlefleets

Well if I'm honest only roughly 1/4800th and vaguely like the Russian and Japanese ships (think of them as caricatures).  On the other hand they are scratch built from cardboard and odds and ends I found in the bits box.  They are a step up from counters (just) and for me are part of a long history of making stuff from layers of cardboard.  It started when I was young (stop laughing at the back there, I really was young ...once) when my then best friend and I were playing a sort of proto-wargame based on a comic strip from the now long defunct boys comic/magazine Ranger.  This was 'The rise and fall of the Trigan Empire' a sort of science fantasy adventure story with some strange looking aircraft involved.  Of course our beloved Airfix didn't make any of these, so we had to make our own.  The first ones were created by my friend and I very quickly jumped on the idea.  Light and Heavy Fighters and bombers soon appeared but we never really came up with anything like a set of rules to use them.

A sample page from the story, the art work was actually pretty good

Over the years I have used the same techniques for any number of things but I have to say that it does work rather well for cheap and cheerful ships or space ships.  I think this is because once you create something remotely resembling a deck plan and give it a bit of texture and height the eye sort of fills in the rest.

The current Russian Fleet

You can see how a bit of texture makes them come alive (Russians again)

Any way, back to the Russo-Japanese war at sea.  Rob of the Cabinettewars blog has been good enough to supply me with his version of Damn Battleships Again as well as his campaign rules and map for that war.  I also have the Hong Kong wargaming society's additional rules some of which will be incorporated alongside Rob's rule additions.  The ships are fairly easy to create although the funnels are a bit fiddly.  Basing is on transparent plastic with some wakes and bow waves added.  I can knock out half a dozen in an afternoon pretty easily (I of course actually mean lovingly craft and not knock out).  Terrain is easy as its mostly sea which is basically flat and blue grey coloured with the odd island or coast line which is more lumpy and green-brown coloured.  You can tell I have studied this stuff extensively can't you?

The Japanese opposition

You can see how crude the models are if you zoom in on the nearest line

So far for the Japanese I have three battleships, one armoured cruiser and three protected cruisers while the Russians boast four battleships, one armoured cruiser and one protected cruiser.  I also have three bases of torpedo boat destroyers currently unassigned.  They may look outnumbered but the Russians have four more battleships awaiting funnels and a coat of paint and hulls for three protected cruisers are cut out and awaiting some superstructure.

RAF museum Hendon

Albatros DVa.  I started with this image to avoid the next one being the headline

Just back from a week long stint of looking after two of our Grandchildren.  The older of the two decided that he wanted to go to the RAF museum (without any prompting from me I must add).  So last Wednesday after lunch me, my son and two grandsons set off for the short drive from Watford to Hendon.  Well it would have been short had it not been for the small matter of an overturned lorry and a couple of cars all blocking the M1 for almost two hours.  Should have used the A41 I suppose but that was the way the sat nav said was fastest and I wasn't the designated driver for the trip.  

At least we were only in a queue, poor devils in the crash were much worse off

The result being that rather than a leisurely stroll around the museum, which it really does deserve, what we had was more of a fast trot or at least as fast as a five and eight year old can be persuaded to move when there are screens and buttons to press!

The lack of time was a real shame as there is a lot to see and do at the Hendon museum and it has grown since I last visited around 15 years ago.  There is a lot more interactive stuff both linked to the physical  displays as well as standalone stuff.  The later is mostly by the gift shop on the way out.  New from my last visit is the Short Sunderland flying boat, the expanded Second World War display and the World War One section.  A big hit with the tinies was the small airplane themed play park.

Tank buster Typhoon

The museum itself is free to enter, a donation of £6 is suggested, but car parking has to be paid for although coach parking is free.

I managed a few photos but not as many as I would have liked.  I will be going back next time I'm down there with the intention of making a longer visit.

SE5A with an DH4 (I think) hanging partly out of shot

Sopwith Triplane

BE2C slow and stable, so stable it was Eindekker fodder

Its DBA Jim...but not as we know it!

No it's Phil Barker's 'Damn Battleships Again' a pre-dreadnought naval ruleset using some DBA mechanisms.  I was rooting around following links from wargaming websites and I came across a set of AARs for a Russo-Japanese War (1904-05) naval campaign using these rules and my interest was triggered.  The rules were drafted around 2003 but never made it to a final publication and it seems almost everyone who used them had house rules.   Now naval wargaming is an area I have dabbled in once or twice over the years but without ever finding a set of rules which really grabbed me.  Typically this time around I have found a set that seem like they may actually be interesting enough to make me play a naval game but they are twenty plus years old and not fully finalised!  What was worse was that at first I couldn't find a copy anywhere.  Then I found a post with a link to the Internet Archive's Way Back Machine where I was able to see a copy of the rules and another link to the Wargames Society of Hong Kong with their house rules and amendments.  Of course I immediately started thinking about what changes I might want to make!

Damn Battleships Again (lets call it DBSA for short) is a deliberate attempt to create a simple set of pre-dreadnought naval rules.  To do that they assume that all ships of the same type are identical.  Which to be fair is not too wide of the mark.  Warships are split into battleships, three classes of cruiser, submarines, torpedo boats and torpedo boat destroyers.  There are also armed merchant cruisers and raiders which are classed as cruisers plus some merchant ships.  Each warship has four arcs of fire forward, aft and port and starboard broadsides.  They have a single combat factor which reduces with range and for larger ships can split fire between two arcs but at reduced effect.  Combat is resolved in the usual DBA way by comparing attacker and defender dice rolls.  Unlike DBA there are step reductions showing levels of damage but no recoils or flee outcomes.

The Hong Kong society additional rules assign individual factors to ships rather than have all battleships and cruisers given the same stats.  They also add torpedo gun boats (the precursor to torpedo boat destroyers) and allow capital ships to fire torpedoes.  There are combat deductions for three or more ships firing at the same target to simulate difficulties working out fall of shot for individual firing ships, changes to torpedo attack rules and the interestingly named 'Windy Corner' rule.  Windy corner is the point where a group of ships in line astern turn in sequence on reaching the point where the lead ship turned.  shooting at ships passing through that point is not subject to the multiple shooter deduction as fall of shot isn't as important when targeting an area rather than a single ship.

So I have a set of rules that look interesting but no ships; what to do?  You know the way I think.  I have cardboard, plastic broom bristles, clear plastic sheet and glue, lots and lots of glue, result teeny tiny ships!

Trial run.  It's more of a marker than a model

I'm aiming for 1/4800th scale or there abouts.  The models will be a very rough approximation of the ships they represent but the prototype is good enough for me purposes.

With a ruler to show the size I'm working at

That model is the IJN battleship Mikasa.  Armed with a pair of twin 12" guns in turrets fore and aft and 14 x 6" guns in barbettes and deck mounts.  On top of which (like all capital ships of the period) she mounts multiple smaller calibre quick firing guns as defence against torpedo boat attack.

The tactics of the pre-dreadnought period are interesting.  Other than a straight stand up fight with other major warships attack by a swarm of torpedo boats was the biggest risk to battleships and cruisers.  The initial defence was to have a lot of smaller guns to lay down a hail of fire before the torpedo boat reached firing range.  as torpedoes improved that firing range increased from a few hundred yards to over a thousand yards.  The solution moved to having small fast boats tasked with destroying torpedo boats further out first torpedo gun boats and then the torpedo boat destroyers.  The torpedo boat destroyer also replaced the torpedo boat in the attack role and hey presto the destroyer was born.  Torpedo boats became an obsolete concept until the advent of fast patrol craft like MTBs, MGBs, PT boats and of course the E-boat in the Second World War when the wheel once again turned full circle.  Modelling those little beasts is going to be a bit of a challenge!

Megalomania strikes again!

When I first started to collect 6mm BCW troops the plan was to play Marston Moor using the Forlorn Hope rules.  I don't think I really had a grasp on how large the armies would need to be to do that!  The plan stalled for various reasons, but as a result I had a decent number of Scots Covenantors both painted and lurking in the lead pile awaiting attention.  I also had a number of Highlander and Irish figures which are now just screaming Montrose at me!  That would have the advantage of needing rather less units for the actions from the 1644-45 campaign in Scotland than Marston Moor would require and gives a use for all those Hodden Gray hordes!  With that in mind I painted up some of the lead mountain refugees as O'Cahan's and Laghtnans Irish regiments, using some IM Irish pike and shot castings I found in the depths of the lead pile.  Yes it's a new rabbit hole to go down folks!

Two of the three Irish Brigade regiments plus some Highlanders

Of course that hasn't stopped me drooling over Marston Moor!  I need to organise my troops so I may as well use the Orbat for Marston Moor for that, don't you think?  I'm not overreaching honest!

Byron's Royalist Cavalry Brigade  (poor iPhone image soz)

I'm working on a rough (very rough if I'm entirely honest) 200 men per full base or 100 for a shot half base (as seen in the Irish Brigade).  I'm making no attempt to show proper pike:shot ratios as those differed across the period of the war.  Instead I will have a note of the actual number of pike and shot for each unit for use in combat calculations.

The rebasing project has also set me on a path looking for a set of BCW rules that is flexible on unit sizes versus the actual number of men in the original unit.  I suppose I could adapt my own set or use 'In Deo Veritas' but my curiosity has been peeked by the 'For King and Parliament' rules and you can never have enough rules; right?  Reviews online seem positive but what does the assembled brains trust think of these rules, anyone played them?

Irregular Miniatures 2mm and 6mm ranges update

Some good news to share.  Things have moved on at Irregular, Ron has retired at the grand old age of 98 after a mere 44 years of building up the business, Lawrence and Tara are moving on and Ian and Anne have decided to concentrate on the 10 mm to 54mm ranges.  The 2mm and 6mm ranges have been taken in hand by Nas Bat an ex-Irregular employee who will take on casting and handling orders for those ranges.  He currently has the 2mm moulds and some of the 6mm ranges.

More information at IRREG-2mm