British SAS and LRDP

My latest efforts are British SAS and LRDP figures.  These are from Artizan's 28mm line.  Basing was accomplished with pumice, then completely covered in fine-screened aquarium rocks.  When that dried, I applied a watery umber coating, followed by watered down PVA.  When all that dried, I drybrushed with Vallejo Middlestone, then Dark Sand, then White.

Playing Around with a New Camera

So my wife the photographer got a new Canon Rebel T2 and I inherited her old Rebel T1.  Still a big jump up for me.  I took first set of photos with the new camera.  Much better I think.  The first photo uses the standard 18-55mm lens and the rest use a 60mm macro lens.  I like that macro lens.  Unfortunately, it was a loaner and I need to buy my own if I want to use it regularly.  Given the large 10+Meg picture sizes, I dropped them all to 640x480 pixels before uploading to this site, so they may lose something on zoom, but in the original photo I can zoom and crop and still have very good resolution.  And it looks like I need to adjust the white balance further on some of the images.

 
Miniatures are 15mm Battle Honors tanks and Resistant Rooster 15mm (really about 18mm) Fallschirmjager.

Black Death!

WWII Soviet Naval Infantry Brigade, 3 battalions strong with AT, artillery, SMG, Pioneer, and Mortar battalions attached.  15mm Battle Honors figures based for Command Decision Test of Battle (one stand = one platoon/battery).  The Naval Infantryman wore the distinctive black trousers/ dark blue tunic/black peacoat.  Their dark attire and zeal (some unit cohesion and often fighting on their 'home turf' naval base) when committed earned them the sobriquet "black death" from the German Army. 

A good link for some reference material.

German Forces, 15mm

 New German troops.  Battlehonors/Quality Castings 15mm.  Black primer, Panzer Grey, camo, black ink wash, highlights, lightt brown drybrush, light sand drybrush.  varnish.

Narva 1944, A Command Decision Scenario

Ran a Command Decision scenario this weekend at our local game club.  Went pretty well as a first run so I thought I would make the scenario information available to all.

Narva February 1944

The scenario uses information pulled from Wilhelm Tieke's book "Tragedy of the Faithful" and a sprinkling of information from various other websites and reference books.  You have the III SS Panzer Corps holding the Narva River line under some particularly stressful conditions in February 1944.  The Soviets have pushed infantry across the frozen Narva into a small bridgehead at a critical point near the German supply route.  The Germans are at their improvisational best scraping together a counterattack.  Otto Carius of the Tiger Tank fame leads the 502nd Heavy Tiger Battalion, reduced to only a few tanks, as part of the counterattacking force.

In the game we played the Soviets managed to get up the steep slope and also managed to knock out Carius' Tiger before it could do any damage.  Night time was falling as the game ended in a marginal Soviet victory as the bridgehead still existed.

Forest Templates for Wargaming

The last few weeks I've been constructing forest terrain as shown in the "Architect's of War" How-To site.  These are sized for 15mm miniatures using 2 1/2" roofing nails.  Basic process is cutting the the top and bottom templates, spreading caulk on the ground template, securing the nails, adding sand/grit/pebbles and allowing to dry.  Build the canopy template next by hot gluing Woodland Scenics "clumps" to the black foamboard.  Then I lightly spray the clumps with 3M spray adhesive and sprinkle on a little flocking.  Going back to the now dry ground template I paint with dark to light shades of brown followed by dark gray over the "tree trunks" and a light gray drybrush over the rocks and trunks.  Done.

Pre-Game Recon Battle

I’m always thinking about ways to add player-controlled variation to wargaming scenarios.   Player-control variation as opposed to random variation is my preference.  Random variation requires no thought or planning input by the player and would include such things as rolling for a unit in a scenario order of battle to see if it shows up or not.  The player has no input to the result though he does have to respond to the condition.  My preference for player-controlled variation would still have variation but would have some input from the players so the variation is not completely random.  One such player-controlled variation method I’ll detail below.

Let’s call this technique a “recon game.”  Other game systems I recall use a “recon game” such as Poor Bloody Infantry from Peter Pig, but the one I’ll describe has Command Decision-Test of Battle (CD-TOB) in mind as the game system.

As with a normal scenario, both sides would have an order of battle and set-up restrictions from the scenario designer or game master.  For this recon game to work, the set up areas for the players need to require main force set-up area  and a recon zone in between the opposing main force areas.  For example, on a  five-foot wide table, the attacker could set up within one foot of his friendly edge and the defender within two feet of his friendly edge.  The two foot area in between would be the recon zone.

The “recon game” would start with each player placing recon markers to denote the area of the pre-battle recon and patrol efforts.

First the defender would then determine the number of recon markers by a roll f a d6 adding one for each recon-rated stand in his order of battle.  The player could modify his order of battle to create patrol stands from full sized stands per the CD-TOB rules.  The penalty being that patrol stands created must start the battle as patrol stands though they could recombine during the course of the game as the rules allow.

The defender would then place the recon markers per his setup restrictions.  The intention from placing the markers is to deny areas to the enemy player for set-up, establish a skirmish or outpost line and screen any vulnerable flanks or attack routes.  The markers would be placed either within line of sight of the friendly main force set up area or within sight of another marker and not in the enemy main force area.

Next the attacker would create patrol stands and determine recon markers the same as the defender.  He would place the markers within line of sight of his main force set-up area or within line of sight of another of his marker and not in the enemy main force area.

Now resolve any conflict where one sides markers are within 8” (line of sight not necessary) of an opposing marker.  Assume fire is simultaneous between the markers and each side automatically achieves a hit.  Roll hit effects.  Ignore forced back results and continue in rounds until one or both markers are eliminated.

The defender can now setup his forces in his main force area and out to a line connected by his recon markers.  The only restriction is that main forces cannot setup within line of sight  or an enemy marker or 4” if the marker is not in LOS.

After the defender sets up, the attacker may set up with the same restrictions as the defender.

I plan to try this out at our next CD-TOB game.