El Cid Tribal Skirmishers

I've been concentrating on some new projects of late like the Battle of Keren and Spanish Civil War stuff, but the lead mountain also contains plenty of figures from older projects that need painting.

I made a start on the first eight of 16 Gripping Beast Tribal Skirmishers last weekend and put the finishing touches to the last eight yesterday. I finished off the bases and gave them a blast of varnish today.

They were a real speed painting job and only took about three hours for the lot. The flesh colour is Vallejo Chocolate Brown and the clothing is either Pale Sand or Black, the spears are Green Ochre and the shields Beige Brown. After a coat of Sepia Wash they were highlighted.

Here are a few close ups that really show off the sloppyness of the speed job I did on the,

Tumbling Dice B-24 Liberators

In a post on the Lead Adventure Forum Axabrax asked about the Doms Decals Nose Art decals. I had some left so he can have some.

Here are some of them applied years ago on some Tumbling Dice B-24 Liberators:

The Falange have a first outing

Yesterday evening I James and I had a game of Spanish Civil War using Chain of Command and I got to use both the recently painted Falangists and the flexible gaming mat I made for the first time.

First of all, that gaming mat, I pretty much used the 'recipe' that Tobi detailed, apart from rather than canvas I used black-out material and rather than bird-grit I used fine granules of cork. I think it came our pretty well and I plan to use it in the Spanish Civil War game that I am putting on at Partizan on September 7th.

We set up the table as per the aerial photograph and were on to the game. I would be using my Falange Espanol, while James was using his International Brigade, picked from the EPR list. As there was a force difference of 4 I boosted my troops with a Flag and the Cara El Sol option.

We decided to randomise the mission and rolled up the Probe and randomised that I would be the attacker. This would be an experience, attacking with Green troops - gulp!

I rolled a five for force support and chose to add a section of trusty Moroccan Regulares, to cries of 'crutch' from the peanut gallery. James spent his two points adding an LMG to each of his sections. I rolled up Force Morale 10, James rolled an 11 - bugger.

The Patrol Phase was played out and the Republican jump-off points are shown in red while the Nationalists are shown in blue.

The Republicans double-sixed their first phase and were able to get a solid defensive line in place before the Nationalists were even on the field of battle. I rolled my first phase and deployed the Sub-jefe and a section of Falange on the left out of site of the Republicans. I was not getting much joy with the Command Dice, that section on my left continued to advance through the woods while the Moroccans were deployed from the jump-off on my left and were soon ensconced in the hedge bottom trading shots with the two Republican LMG teams. As they were in the open, one of the LMG teams was soon destroyed, but the casualties were mounting on the Moroccans - lots of sixes being rolled on the casualty table. Soon one of the Moroccan squads was broken and the Sergento was dead. My Force Morale started to plummet.

The Command dice rolls for the Nationalists did not go very well at all this game, although the Republicans also had some dreadful rolls - in fact all game I never maintained the phase once.

The second section of Falange were finally deployed on my left to support the section that was now deployed at the wood edge and engaged with the Republicans to the front and their right flank, organising the troops the Sub-Jefe was shot down dead and I had to use a Chain of Command dice to avoid the Force Morale test. The Jefe ran over to the Moroccans to rally off some of the shock and merge the survivors together but was hit and took a wound for his efforts.

Things were looking bad, I was reduced to Force Morale 4 while a series of rather excellent Force Morale test rules meant that the Nationalists were still on Force Morale 11! With the Sub-Jefe down one of the Jefe de Falage took the initiative and launched a charge against a section of Brigadiers who had backed away from the hedge-line they were holding. In the ensuing combat the Republican Sergento was killed and their team broken, but the Jefe de Falange was killed and the team wiped out. The Nationalist Force Morale collapsed and it was time to put the toys away.

Here are some more images of the game.

War and Conquest Round Two

On Tuesday Nick and I had another try at War and Conquest. During our initial game, I had expressed some dissatisfaction with the army lists available for the Age of El Cid. Well those spiffing chaps at Scarab have released some shiny new lists that fit the bill much better - download them from here -  thanks Rob!

The Almohavid lines

I picked a couple of armies at about 2300pts each:

Christian Spanish

• Characters: Rey, Captain, Personal Standard
• Cavalry: 12 Noble Knights, 12 Noble Cavalry, 12 Noble Cavalry, 9 Jinetes
• Infantry: 21 Guard Spearmen, 21 Peone Spearmen with 7 Archers, 21 Peone Spearmen with 7 Archers, 7 Skirmishers

The Christian lines

The Almoravids

• Characters: Warrior Emir, Sayyid, Imam, Personal Standard
• Cavalry: 9 Berber Horse,  9 Berber Horse, 
• Infantry: 21 Berber Spearmen with 7 Berber Archers, 21 Berber Spearmen with 7 Berber Archers, 21 Berber Spearmen with 7 Berber Archers, 21 Berber Spearmen with 7 Berber Archers, 21 Berber Spearmen with 7 Berber Archers

After watching the England vs Costa Rica game we sauntered on down to the club and had a bit of a late start. As it was getting on, we decided to play the standard 'Pitched Battle' scenario and deployed units in turn as per the old WAB way. We added a small wood to the table to break up the monotony. As usual Nick played the Amoravids and I played the Christians.

I formed a solid line of infantry with the guards in the centre, on their right a single unit of Caballeros held the line in skirmish, on the left a unit of Jinetes were supported by Caballeros and Caballeros Hildagos.

We were soon getting to grips, on my right both Nick and I capitalised on the 'skirmish/formed' rules for our horse and soon the Caballeros were dancing with the Berbers. In the centre the infantry advanced on each other. My Jinetes made a dash through the gap towards the Almoravid rear.

The cavalry continued to dance, with the Berbers getting the better of the missile duel but eventually the Caballeros charged home and scattered them. The Berber foot in the centre fell upon the poor Peones but the Spanish were performing well and soon one unit of Berbers had been routed and another was being ground down by the Guards.

With the Jinetes reformed in is rear and the clock calling time the Christians were at a definite advantage, only four turns had been played but it was time to put the toys away.

I have still not purchased a copy of the rules and really ought to as I keep relying on Nick to do the hard work, this game did not seem to flow a well as the previous one, maybe we were questioning things a bit to much. For example, when do you take a combat morale test, after combat or during the resolution phase. Also, if something routs during the resolution phase can it rally during the same end phase.

I forgot my camera, but it seems that my shiny new iPhone 5S takes much better pictures than the old iPhone 4. All the figures are mine and were painted by myself. The Christians are Perry Miniatures and the Almoravids are Gripping Beast.

Luftwaffe FlaK 18 plus some additional Wehrmacht anti-tank crew

Chum Tony asked if I would paint him the Empress Miniatures 88mm FlaK.

It is a lovely model that comes complete with six crew, the limber and a whole load of accessories like shell cases and rounds. After a bit of head scratching I managed  to put it together as a FlaK18 without gun-shield with the aid of a guide from Paul at Empress and then give it all a coat of Halfords grey primer.

I then started on the painting. The gun itself is quite a simple job being a single colour. The whole thing was painted Vallejo German Grey and then washed with Vallejo Sepia Wash. Once dry the German Grey was repainted and then some highlights done by adding a small amount of Vallejo Pasted Blue each time. Once dry it was given a light dust with a Tamiya Model Master weathering kit.

As for the crew, the trousers and uniform jackets were painted with Vallejo Luftwaffe Uniform while the shirts were painted Pastel Blue, the helmets were done in the same manner as the FlaK18. After the Sepia Wash the Luftwaffe Uniform was highlighted by adding small amounts of white as was the Pastel Blue of the shirts.

I then assembled the cruciform on a custom made 150mm MDF circle from Warbases while the limbers were assembled on another  Warbases base. I then textured using Pumice Gel, leaving holes for the crew to fit on. Finally I added the ammunition boxes etc. before adding tufts, clumps and static grass to the base.

Tony also sent me three anti-tank gun crew to paint. The uniforms were done in Vallejo German Fieldgrey which was highlighted up by adding Vallejo Pale Sand.

Here are some more close-ups of the assembled 88, the limber and the anti-tank gun crews.