Monday 30 October 2017

28mm Sudan project - More Ansar & Khartoum Walls part 3

Good Morning All

This weekend I was able to crack on and finish a load more Dervishes and start on the walls of Khartoum.

If you want to see the previous post in this project head here

Up first we have the latest Dervish units painted with the first lot I completed last week - that makes a total so far of 35 bases (each with 8 warriors) - 280 figures

I have also tarted up the bases with some tufts from Warpainter sourced on ebay



There is another 100 or so foot still to be painted


These are all being stored in the A4 plastic file boxes - 50 figures to a box


Aside from painting up this lot I was able to start the walls of Khartoum - these are just regular fortified walls constructed from foam core. Four 30cm lengths have been completed and I have made a start on a tower.



I'll be putting together a full posting on this terrain project once it is complete

part 4 can be found here

http://shedwars.blogspot.co.uk/2017/11/28mm-sudan-project-ansar-infantry-now.html

More soon


Tuesday 24 October 2017

28mm Sudan Project - First Fuzzies completed part 2

Morning All

Just a small post today to confirm that I am cracking on with my Sudan project.

Part 1 can be found here

First up a big thank you to a couple of folks from the Lead Adventure Forum who heard my call for 28mm Sudan Campaign figures. Both Orctrader & Harwood Hobbies offered some deals that were too good to miss and fees were duly paid.

As of today I now have around 380 Dervishes on foot, a battalions worth of British Infantry and several horse, camels and command figures. Enough to keep me going for the next few weeks.

By my reckoning I am going to need a hundred or so more Dervish, several cavalry and of course Camel to complete the Mahdi forces. Once these are done I'll turn my attention to the British and their allies. I have also started to think about terrain - I am going to need a river (the Niler) - at least one gunboat and some dhows - and a fotified town. Some of this should start to take shape in the coming weeks.

In the meantime I am proud to present the first 96 Dervish warriors - I still mneed to tart up the bases (waiting on tufts) and of course some flags.

These have been a very simple paint job - a base primer of Halfords Matt Camouflage Brown followed by a highlight of leather brown on the skin. The hair is matt black and the robes and loincloths are a mix of browns, yellows,  whites and creams. The figures were then wasjed with Army painter dip (strong) and then matt varnished.

These have all been based individually on steel washers and then set in movement trays (warbases). The edges of the trays still need to be blacklined and as mentioned above tufts added.

These are not going to win any prizes but look pretty good en masse






A couple of work in progress shots - the next 96 are painted and are awaiting final base treatments


and this little lot have just been sprayed





More soon !

Part 3 can be found here

Wednesday 11 October 2017

Brand New Project - 28mm Sudan - part 1

And so a new project begins….

Back in 2016 I decided that I wanted to recreate sufficient forces for the Shed to play the Anglo Zulu War in 28mm.

If you have been following this blog you might recall that at the start of the project it was my intention to not just fight the Zulu wars of Victoria's empire but also feature the other major wars.

As of today I can announce that my take on the Sudan Wars of the late 19th Century has begun. This does mean hundreds of menacing looking tribal warriors up against a smaller well armed, highly disciplined colonial army. It also means cavalry, camels, river boats and fortifications. So where do I start.

Fortunately Perry miniatures offers the discerning wargamer a range of options with which to build his force. These figures will no doubt be augmented with other manufacturers once I had had the chance to to asses their compatibility, price and availability. In the coming weeks I will be happy to share this analysis.



To kick things off I needed lots of Dervishes (Fuzzy Wuzzies as Corporal Jones called them) so a trawl of ebay quickly found several of these boxes (6 in total). Each box contains 40 multipart figures and over the weekend I assembled the whole lot in several sittings. These have all been mounted on my preferred option of the 25mm steel washer base. I think it’s safe to say that I have become quite adept at assembling plastic troops en masse.


Believe it or not that is 240 Dervishes - I will need more


Quick tips for anybody else wanting to attempt this laborious task –

1.       Remove body from sprue, clean up flash and superglue to base
2.       Remove all heads – glue heads to body
3.       Remove all Right Arms – glue right arms…

I think you probably get the drift

Unlike the Zulus where I based them in 12’s on movement trays I wanted these to be consistent with the TMWWBK – so I have elected to base these on the eight slot zombie trays from Warbases. Two bases gives me 16 figures for one of their warbands.

The next step is to get this lot primed.

part 2 can be found here

Friday 6 October 2017

Battle Report from the Peninsular War

Morning All

Well on Monday night we finally got round to playing a proper game in the shed and what better than throwing out 40+ units Napoleonic troops.

Once again I would play the allies to be joined later in the evening by Rolf. The French would be commanded by Alastair and Mark. To create some randomness we each received 22 units (as defined by cards) from the deck and had to build six brigades. The Brigade had to have a minimum size of two and max size of five. Most brigades were 3 -4 units in size. The cards also illustrate the  units stats.

This was a straightforward engagement with the battlefield characterised by a number of my new Iberian village squares. For those of you not familiar with built up areas inb Black Powder these are tough nuts to crack. One area can only hold one battalion and that unit effectively saves on everything bar a one !


So battle commenced with each brigade dicing to arrive on the board in march column.slowly and steadily the forces arrived. First up for the allies was their left wing - a brigade of infantry and cacadores support.


The British centre emerged  it was a bit crowded - a british line battalion quickly siexzed the firsat farm house


By now the Frogs had arrived and soon poured forward in the same old usual way. The elite Swiss battalion took up residence in the central farmhouse


The French commanders survey the battlefield



By now all the units were on the table - the British heavy cavalry dominating the centre


French Light Cavalry screened the advance on the right wing. These guys soon came into contact with the Allied light horse opposite. Honours were even as both brigades broke themselves on each other



A series of poor command rolls along the centre of the Allied lines meant they weren't going forward


Eventually Wellingtons orders were received and the Allied line advanced


The Brits siezed the third farm. Digging in for a hostile reaction




By now the Brits on the left flank had advanced and were engaged in a furious firefight with a battalion of french occupying the farmstead on the extreme allied left flank. The Cacadores chareged and bounced off - these built up areas really are tough nuts to crack


Across the centre the French line marched forward - a foray by English horse soon put them into square but with no infantry or artillery support the attack was wasted,, in the distance Brigadier Rolfs infantry were fighting hard against the french column. A single highland battalion routing two french columns in quick succession


The centre was in a stalemate position - the French decided to release their infantry (light in skirmish fomation to goad the allies into action. The British horse took the bait but just didn't charge.


Rolf was having much better luck on the French left flank - his redcoats had all but destroyed two further battalions and very soon the French left collapsed


The centre still saw little action - but the French skirmishers were taking a toll on the allied lines. Very quickly the massed formation of voltiguers drive off one british line battalion and injured several portuguese allies



Fearing the British cavalry might eventually come out to play the skirmishers moved to their right and opened fire on the farmhouse with six shots - four hits, Was I worried no - my brave boys only had to avoid rolling ones...oops - three casualties (given i'd already suffered one a break test was called for) and guess what the battalion was routed. Add this rout to the other suffered from skirmish fire half my infantry in the centre no longer advanced.


If i thought my British had a bad time spare a thought for Alastair - his entire French command on the french  was broken - the plucky chaps in redcoats had delivered a pretty bloody nose to the French


Brigadier Rolf had won the game for the allies





A fast and furious game full of drama, suspense but best of all a British victory

thanks for following

until next time


Thursday 5 October 2017

Peninsular Village part 3

Hi Folks

When I left you last I had completed 3 of the boards for my peninsular village - if you want to go back to that post you can find it here


So the next job was to finish off the remaining 5 boards to complete the village block of nine squares - this would give a footprint of 90cm x 90cm.

Once again each board was given the eva foam flagstone treatment and those areas uncovered by paving were covered in sand and ballast. Once this was all dry the ground work was painted in brown paint (an emulsion mix I had made up for me when I did my desert boards, the brown was originally based on GW Khemri brown). As soon as was dry all the ground work was drybrushed yellow ochre followed by a dry brush of titanium buff. It works really well as an arid groundbase.

The paint treatment starts


The boards themselves were then treated to a smattering of static grass and a few trees from my very large collection. I dont think you can have too many trees.

These are nearly finished.

I now need to complete some scatter terrain (carts, fountains etc) and a single board for a town square.

At the moment the tower is still freestanding. It maystill gets its own board

So onto some pictures - if you look carefully you might even see that the town is being investigated by the 95th !


My peninsular village is taking shape



A different angle


A birds eye view



I can see movement....









A view up the street



Another birsdeye view of a 2 x 4 sized town

Here comes the 95th !



In my next post you'll see the some of the boards in action...

so next problem where am I going to store this lot

more soon

Sunday 1 October 2017

Peninsular Village Part 2

Managed to grab some time over the weekend to try and almost finish off three of the Peninsular Village Boards.

These were the walled complexes/ farms. I have a game planned on Monday night and they will be needed.

If you missed the previous post it is here
http://shedwars.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/28mm-village-for-my-napoleonic-project.html

As you can see from the pictures below I have not only completed the groundwork but have also added trees, static grass etc. I realised that as soon as these were complete I hadn't taken any work in progress photos so these will have to wait til next time - apologies


Building 1

The trees are from one of the Chinese sellers with the trunks lopped off






The tiles have come out really well...

Building 2

A little more upmarket  - it has a balcony




Here they are side by side




up next is Building 3 - this is on a 60cm x 30cm board


- I think of it as the Monastery




All three boards together...




I'm on a roll now and want to get these finished pronto...

more soon

part 3 here