Keep Your Powder Dry

Firstly a big thank you to Warlord Games who sent me a sprue of their new Pike and Shotte Epic Battles infantry. (You can see how I got on with the cavalry sprue here. ) I will try and look at these figures from three different angles: the first impression of someone completely new to the period, the button counter’s standpoint, and then from a seasoned wargamer’s point of view. In all cases I'm looking at these through Wars of the Three Kingdoms spectacles. (Wars of the Three Kingdoms is a more accurate name for the conflicts that were fought in the British Isles in the mid seventeenth century. The English Civil War was just one of these conflicts.) The obligatory next to a ruler picture (the ruler is lined up with the soles of their footwear) The 'new to the period' view This one sprue provides enough figures for one unit (a Regiment of Foot or RoF). Figures look very detailed, moulding is clean and crisp with no flash and only minimal mould lines. The pikes look a bit d...

After much prevarication I finally took the plunge and purchased the Steel Fist commanders packs to boost my command figures representations. A gentle reminder that these figures are true 15mm sized; the names given but figure manufacturers and sculptors is 'nominal' at best, as they are too small to look definitively like portraits of the people that they are supposed to represent. Whilst some of the Steel Fist character figures do have more than a passing resemblance to portraiture, they can represent whomsoever you jolly well want them to be - very few will have any idea, and the few that do, probably don't have a magnifier with them. These figures are tiny. With this in mind, I have picked my Fantasy Football League team of Royalist command figures... Steel Fist list their Royalist command figures (pack ECWH 22) as King Charles I, George Digby Earl of Bristol, Sir Jacob Astley, officer with telescope, aide delivering message and standard bearer. The standard bearer woul...

I must not write "don't tell him your name Pike".  I must not write "don't tell him your name Pike". Oh damn! Pikemen figures come in two varieties, with cast on pikes, and open handed. Having previously owned 6mm ECW pikemen armed with pikes which quickly turn to overcooked spaghetti, I went the open handed pikemen route.  For those of you who choose this path, open handed pikemen raises two questions: how long should a pike be?, and where can I buy pikes from?  All this gives me an excuse to have a closer look at the 'queen of weapons'. How long should a pike be? You'd think that this question would be fairly easy to answer, it is in fact more than a little problematical. Pikes were between 15' and 18' in length, which should be quite easy to scale down, or so you would think. Sir James Turner  (Pallas Armata p.176) and General Monck (Observations p.26) both stated that the proper length for a pike should be 18'.The 1639 Direction...

As I have recently reviewed Field of Glory: Renaissance , it is only right and proper that I review FoG:R's forebear De Bellis Renationis (henceforth DBR) DBR grew out of De Bellis Antiquitatis (DBA) a hugely successful set of rules for ancient and medieval game play. DBA has spawned a whole host of variants which are collectively referred to as DBx. The rules were originally written by the Wargames Research Group (WRG).  It has been hugely influential in wargame rules development, as so many rules clearly show that they share DBA DNA.  For the English Civil War gamer the DBA variant volumes that are relevant are:- De Bellis Renationis - the core rules DBR Army Lists Book 2 De Bellis Civile 1642-1643 - scenarios for the English Civil War De  Bellis Civile 1644-1645 - a second book of scenarios Both the scenario books are published by Keep Wargaming (no relation), who regular readers will know have a few remaining packs of Naismith ECW figures listed for sale on thei...

As I appear to have run out of things to paint, I have started revisiting stuff to make things look better. Or should that be 'slightly less worse'? Every ECW/BCW/Wo3K gamer should own a sconce. It is the law. Some time ago I took the easy route and bought two halves of a 'star fort' from Magister Militum (now sold by TSS). And it was okay. Had a few problems, but was generally okay. But deep down I knew that it wasn't. For a start it was built of stone. Had two entrances, and was much too Vaubanesque. So, as regular readers will imagine, it has been bugging me for a while. So after a good coat of thinking about it I set to work. I took the plunge and removed it from its base. A quick Dremel cutting session would remove one of the entrances. But my Dremel appears to have magically been broken - I think somebody might have some explaining to do when they next come home from uni! So I decided to use my angle grinder. Not the delicate implement I would have chosen for ...