French Napoleonic infantry regiment no 105 ,some command and another Blackpowder game Napoleonic 20

 Here we have a unit of Victrix Napoleonic French 1807-1814 , they've actually painted up rather nicely and I am pretty happy with them, although I can not erase the memory of assembling them and how the air was turned blue by the vast amount of clean up every single component part required, which when you are doing 120 of them can be soul destroying! By contrast I have cleaned up rather more of the same  period French infantry plastic by the Perry's and they we're actually pretty pleasant to do. The Victrix figures have got really characterful faces and managed not to suffer the fate of newly painted figures, hanging on till the bitter end in the latest game. 

I know I need to touch up the flag edges, I've also tried to speed up the basing mixing the sharp sand in with pva and the emulsion basing colour, not entirely successful but not too bad when you're in a hurry! The casualty marker is a Perry plastic casualty figure from their French heavy cavalry horse sprues with a warbase square surround for a 7mm die.

In addition I  needed to paint up two French command stands and an Austrian, these chaps were rapidly knocked out on the Saturday night before the Sunday club game, I also finished off the French unit, having a quiet night in ,while my wife went to the corn exchange to relive her youth watching Suzie and the budgies  and  The Cure cover bands at least I felt better the next morning! 

We tried out a few more rules,and had a first go with built up areas,it was a close run battle, all the French cuirassier brigade were on zero stamina by the end but the Austrians ended up with two broken brigades and  couldn't last out, we adopted the rule that infantry can not do a triple move and shoot( thanks Norm!) Although thinking about it, it might have happened anyway and I think some others from Chasseur's blog and we used cm instead of inches which was beneficial on a 6' x4' board and still gave a good game.

John supplied the fencing and walls, I was thinking that the buildings aren't Germanic enough, I've got some stuff to make some late 18th century Southern German built up areas but I fear it will have to wait until after the Christmas game, unless I find I have lots of time!

The two French commanders are Perry and the Austrian is Eagle maybe? I picked him up at the last Salute as the stall stocking Perry metal figures didn't have enough space, so didn't bother with Napoleonic Austrians , which was made more irritating by the show being half empty! The Perry figures are excellent as always and I think the Eagle figures paints up well enough? I have some more Austrian 12lb cannons from Eagle to paint up at some point as Perry don't do any.

Next up, probably more Austrians, then more French and French allies as they're a bit faster than French line and as my Austrians will be added to my nephews British and Russian at Christmas, the French will definitely need reinforcing!

All the best 

Iain 

A first game of Blackpowder

 Des was coming over so we could have a go at Blackpowder ,with the various Napoleonic figures I've painted up ,on Saturday evening, the trouble was it turned out Hayseed Dixie ( who we both like) was playing in the local corn exchange, less than 10 minutes walk away, so we ended up having a bit of a game followed by going to the gig.

I think we were both surprised we hadn't actually played a game of Blackpowder but having played plenty of games of warlords Pike and Shot and also Hail Caesar it was all pretty straightforward ( no doubt we got lots wrong!) and a good exercise before the big multi player Christmas game in France, it  has also given me additional impetus to get some more figures painted, always  a happy byproduct of a  game I find! 

I set up the French and Austrians on a clear plain, actually a deep cut mat , I've bought some to travel to France for the Christmas game and thought we may as well test that out too, three brigades a side. I was a little short on command so there are three Covenanter commanders in for the eagle eyed amongst you! Not terribly balanced, a lot of cavalry on the French side( we press ganged a French hussar unit into the Austrian force to try and even it up a bit)

Des chose the French and we had a turn each , running through moving, shooting, charging and forming square, due to some terrible dice rolling on his part he managed to lose four cavalry units by the time we needed to leave! No result but great fun, we will have his British ( taking the part of the Prussians) Ben's Russians and my Austrians versus my French at a rough go at Leipzig, I need to get some more French painted!

I'm really happy with the casualty markers   ( which is I realise an odd phrase!) but it keeps the clutter down a lot, I need some disorder markers and some white 7mm dice for the Austrians, as Rob pointed out in March and I am in total agreement with! Otherwise all good, maybe next time with a bit more terrain, Des brought over his 28mm terrain as he doesn't have room for it and we tend to play it at mine, two more churches to add to the three I've got and the sixth I'm working on!  Plus bolt action burnt out houses and hedges/ fences. 

In other news I'm prepping loads of Napoleonic figures and actually painting some which should be finished soon 

All the best

 Iain