Carronade Pics and Swag

Today myself, Davey, YD, Paul and Cameron took the trip up to Falkirk for the Carronade Show. As usual it was a big show and seemed very busy.

There were a lot of really cracking displays and games - I took pictures of some but not all of them. There were a lot of very nice games in progress. I stopped to talk to a few people about their games who were both very knowledgeable and very engaging.

Glasgow District Wargames - Spanish Civil war in 28mm using Bolt Action rules. Great looking game.

Glasgow District Wargames - Spanish Civil war in 28mm using Bolt Action rules. Great looking game.

Charlie don't surf - not sure who the group were but I had seen this display at the Stockton show I was at in October and it really is a great display. I'm not sure if there was a game in progress.

More 'Charlie don't surf' - 28mm Vietnam.

Love the surfers....

A very nice ACW game, also in 28mm. I'm not sure the group, but I think it was a Dumfries based club. Using the Fire and Fury rules (I think) it looked pretty fast paced and the guys were very friendly and knowledgeable - even putting up with questions from a non expert like myself.

A great looking table - as I understand it was also historically accurate. The Battle of New Market perhaps?

LRDG attacking a airfield somewhere in the desert - 20mm I think. Not sure of the rule set.

A HUGE table - Waterloo? in 15mm?

Close up of some of the Naps on the Waterloo table

Hougoumont?

There were a lot of really great tables that I didn't take a picture of - apologies to those groups running them, no slight was intended - I just kept forgetting to get my phone out to take pics!

So, onto swag. this year I didn't feel I had come away with as much as I did last year. I did manage to find one single stall that had a very very slim selection of FoW miniatures. The first pack I looked at was a Sherman I and I immediately found another.

So these two Sherman I's help fill in some of the missing spaces on my Armoured Squadron list. Technically, they mean I will be able to field a whole FoW list. However this shows that 144RAC (and armoured brigade units in general) had a Squadron HQ consisting of an ARV and 3 Sherman I's (SHQ, 2IC and a spare). I assume in FoW the 3rd Sherman would be a nuisance (it would muck up the 1IC and 2IC independent rules). So whether I get this final tank or not really comes down more to completeness than having the list for FoW.

Of course you, gentle reader, know that being the fool that I am the final tank being missing will bug the hell out of me... and I will end up buying it.

Next up came a purchase I am really pleased with. At one stall I spotted some Epic 40k and had a look but wasn't going down that particular rabbit hole. I got chatting to the chap and mentioned my interested in Battlefleet Gothic. 'Aha!' says he, and he hands me a load of boxed BFG ships - all very reasonably priced (including some cruisers, SM Strikecruisers, a Battleship and a couple of escorts). Then a chap further along the flea market stall starts shouting that those mini's were reserved, that he was in 'negotiations' for them and that the chap who I was talking to's brother - who was away from the stall. I offered to pay the prices on the boxes there and then, with no negotiation required. The annoying loudmouth continued to loudly protest and in the end the mini's got put back awaiting the brothers return. I checked back later, but no luck.

Anyway, that was a prelude. Thoroughly disappointed and annoyed I was standing near another flea market trader who was putting some nicely painted 28mm WW2 and 15mm Naps out on his table. I asked if he had any WW2 15mm Brits for sale. We got chatting and it looked like I was out of luck again. The I spotted in his bag (still to be put out for display) a box with 'BFG Imperial Fleet' on it! I asked if I could have a look, and while passing it to me the chap said he had another box as well. £40 later and I had both in my possession.

Now, that seems like a lot of money, but:

Specialist Games 'Rogue Trader' Cruiser - not a very common ship with a Ebay retail price of (I think) around £40

4 Cobra Destroyers (Ebay value £25 ish for 4), 2 imperial Cruisers (£20 for 2 on Ebay?), 3 Sword Frigates (£20 ish for 3?) and a Dauntless Light Cruiser (£20 ish on it's own?)

Very nice paint jobs, minimal damage. One cruiser unpainted and needing some lance turrets, and a couple of minor bits of chipped paint and broken aerials.

The fleet assembles!

So my £40 purchase was actually a really good value buy - and provided me with a mini I wanted (the Rogue Trader Cruiser) without having to pay Ebay prices for just one ship.

I've actually now amassed quite a large Imperial fleet for BFG/the Rogue Trader RPG. I'm missing a few ships I would like - mainly the RT Escorts, some transport ships, a Grand Cruiser or two, various uncommon Navy escorts... etc. Basically the dream would be to have models to make a coherent fleet but also allow me to represent most ships on the gaming table if I ever get the players to run a Rogue Trader RPG game. This also explains my recent purchases of Chaos, Ork, Eldar and Space Marine ships...

Other than these ships, I got a book on the 8th Airforce for £1 and literally as I was walking out somehow accidentally bartered someone down from £7 to £2.50 on a complete AD&D 2nd Edition Monsters compendium folder. And I mean complete - and accidentally! Cameron had been looking at it and the lady had asked for first £7 then £5 for it. He declined and we all turned to leave, I apologised and said I only had £2.50 left (I genuinely only had that amount left in my pocket), and the lady said I could have it for that then. What her husband thought about that when he returned, I don't know! Anyway, I paid and had a quick look. Got home and called my GM who I remember had mentioned years ago that his copy was incomplete. I took it round and he seemed very pleased, especially as it had Volume 1, 2 and 3 + the Faerun monsters appendix. All in great condition and in alphabetical order!

So a good show, although quantity wise my swag haul was rather less quantity wise, the quality is superb.

Thanks to Davey and YD for the lift and the company.

Actual modelling progress (aka take that #6MMRPC!)

I'm not sure whether it was having the day off, the nice weather or the fact it's the Carronade Wargames show this weekend (Scotland's biggest). Whichever it was I got myself organised and actually did some hobby related work.

The first was cleaning all the vehicles I have been prepping over the last few weeks. I had meant to do this on Saturday and then Sunday...

Several of these blisters have more than one vehicle in them. Not a huge amount of work to clean them all, just time consuming.

I have seen a bit of discussion recently on one of the FoW Facebook groups on whether there is a need to wash your mini's. Honestly, if you saw the colour of the water after washing this lot you would clean all your mini's. I have no idea what effect all that crap has on the painting, but I don't want to find out!

Then I decided to spray some models - this became a bit of a job as I first tried the Plastic Soldier Company British Armour spray directly on to my Forged in Battle Universal Carriers. The FiB Carriers are a white resin, and the spray just did not go on properly. Now, this may be an issue with the spray or just with the colour of the resin. I dug around and found a can of Black (a Armypainter one) and gave them a skoosh. Then went back with the Plastic Soldier Company green. I also did the Churchill Croc I had done before as I wasn't happy with the tone of the green going on without a black undercoat.

So that's 12 Universal Carriers (+1 that was almost ready to be sprayed, I think it might end up being the 4.2" Spotter carrier), 1 Churchill Croc and 3 Wasp Carriers.

Then, since I had sprayed stuff and it was still nice, I decided to try my Dark Tone Army Painter dip. Slight issue with this since I left it sitting out open last summer, it's gone very thick and I may have to replace it. Still, I decided to do a tank or two, and a few hours later...

I'd done my whole winter backlog.

'A' was a little miffed to come home to me and the kitchen stinking of turps tho!

One thing I have discovered with the Army Painter dip is that previously I had just been dabbing off the excess and having to do a bit of work afterwards due to the amount of dip still on the model. Now I splodge it on, leave it a minute or two then dab off the excess. I then wash the brush in turps again, wipe off most of it leaving the brush a little wet, and do a 'reverse drybrush'. The turps still on the brush takes the dip off the higher points and makes the details 'pop' a bit more while still giving shade where it's needed. Hopefully that's not compromising the varnish, but I'm pretty sure there is turps in the AP.

So, that was my May bank holiday!

Battlefront's Berlin book lists

Hi folks, I downloaded the newest Wargames Illustrated today, and it has some details on the upcoming Berlin book for late war Soviet and German lists - I thought it would be worth sharing for those of you who don't buy WI.

Image from the Flames of War website.

Berlin will have 3 Soviet lists:

- Hero Gvardeyskiy Tyazhelyy Tankovy Polk (Hero Guards Heavy Tank Regiment). Representing the Guards heavy tanks. Units are smaller but have 'gained much expenience' and support platoons have been 'combed for replacements for tank crews'. The IS2 obr 1944 (FA 11) makes an appearance. No mention is made of ratings.

By the sounds of it, this list will be a small number of heavy tanks with limited support. To coincide with the release, new plastics will be coming for the IS2 and ISU heavy assault guns, Soviet infantry and guns.

- Hero Tyazhelyy Samokhodno-artillyeriyskiy Polk (Hero Heavy Self-propelled Artillery Regiment). ISU-122 and ISU-152 units that are 'wiser but more skillful' and 'casualties have left their mark'.

Again, by the sounds of it a higher rating but small force with potentially limited support choices.

- Hero Strelkovy Polk (Hero Rifle Regiment). These infantry lists are based on Regiments rather than Battalions due to the casualties preceding the attack on Berlin. Featuring Strelkovy Battalions as combat platoons - these will be smaller 'more compact' units with 13 Rifle/MG teams plus options HMG and Panzerfausts.

Post Publishing Edit: The advert in WI states that the Rifle Regiment has Hero, Guards and Red Army options, including options to field customisable specialist street fighting groups.

New Corps support has 160mm obr 1943 Heavy Mortars, Hero Inzhenerno-Saperniy (Fearless Vets) and Fearless Vet Tank Destruction Company.

All three lists benefit from the Hero special rules, and there is mention of some other rules about the infantry list having a Red Banner. This makes them always attack, gives the unit carrying it Quality of Quantity and means that if the Banner is within 4" of an enemy objective the game does not end if they lose their own objectives. If the Soviets win with the banner on an objective they get +1 vp and the opponent -1 vp. If the soviet player loses this is reversed.

The German list (yes, just one list) seems a bit different from any other FoW lists. The article mentions troops from: Wehrmacht (army, navy and airforce), the Waffen SS, Volkssturm, Hitlerjugend, Polizei and RAD. Lists are made up of a combination of these - or a focus on one or two types of troops. These troops can have different ratings and are not treated as allies. It mentions that these troops can vary from Fearless Veteran to Reluctant Conscript troops. Fearless and Confident troops have 'enjoy the war'. Support includes fortifications and the usual range of big cats.

The Waffentrager (8.8cm) is mentioned, as is the Kleinpanzer Wanze or Bedbug tank hunter (demolition carriers with banks of Panzerschreck rocket launchers).

The article also mentions more intelligence briefings will be released for the digital app and Forces of War covering troops of the Berlin offensives and the fighting outside the city. So expect more super dooper German lists that let you play with all your Fearless Vet toys.

The book sounds interesting but it is another example of where the Early/Mid/Late split falls down. These really are Late Late war - fielding Normandy Ally lists against these forces seems a little... suicidal? I understand that there is always a power creep - and arguable there is a historical reason for this. But there still seems to be so few interesting Late Late war western allied lists, and those that exist seem focused around specific equipment (the Comet and Perishing). The British Rifle list in Nachtjager was just so generic...

Hopefully this was useful - and please excuse my own ramblings!