Portsea Island Beer Festival - 2018

It's that time again..  hurrah!

Our (8th!)  yearly amble to the Groundlings Theatre (venue for the beer festival) coincided  with a bout of fine weather int he UK - not often I get to cycle to the event in weather warm enough for a tshirt and shorts but so it was this year..

Started off with a fine full English breakfast (even the hash browns were nice and I normally avoid them like the plague) in the historical surroundings of the Ship Anson pub on the Hard in Portsmouth..

Interesting history...  been there since the 18th century - the picture dates end of the 19th - this was known as the devils acre back in the day - 50 yards to the left of the picture is the main gates for the dockyard and there were thirteen pubs in a row all vying for the money of any matelot or dockyard worker who needed something to take their mind off, well, anything really ...  the Victoria and Albert is now a newsagents..  the Ship Anson bought the pub next door (right) and knocked into one...  the London Tavern was done for by the Luftwaffe in 1941 and is now the beer garden/patio for the Anson (where I put my bike while having brekkie)..  apocryphal or not - the London Tavern is also where they reckon the term "the King's Shilling" was coined...  the landlady used to slip a shilling into the beer pot and when it was drunk you were said to have taken the shilling and therefore carted off to army or more likely navy (as a youngster I was always fascinated by the fact my Dad had some pewter tankards with glass bottoms - that was why... )  Funny to think I was sat in the window to the right of the door eating sausages  - the things you could have seen through that window if you had a time machine!

Anyway - breakfast consumed it was time for some beer..

Not a bad year this year - ie. better than last but still not outstanding..  the smaller festivals still seem to be struggling to get beer from the majors onto the list..

Bear with me on the following - one of the jolly boys poured a whole half pint over my program by accident so I'm going from memory!

Brewery (clickable)	Beer (click for more info)	ABV	Notes (from brewery website)	What I can remember...
Lincoln Green	Quarterstaff	5%	"Stout of heart and nature. A rich, full bodied stout with flaked barley and generous blackcurrant hop bitterness."	I've had a few beers from this brewery as they are based in Hucknall in Nottingham and having relatives who live there and know I like beer, so they often get me a few bottles from here for Christmas - either way I hadn't realised it was a stout when I first ordered it but it was still one of my favourite beers of the day... delicious
Brunswick	Triple Hop	4%	"A straw coloured ale, and like the name suggests, three hop varieties used in three separate stages. Dry, with a bitter astringency".	Despite the blurb I found this decidely average - maybe I should have had it before the stout?
Kelchner	Black IPA	4.8%	"A black IPA that is brewed with a multitude of hops and sits comfortably on a roasty base of dark malts. Dense citrus, coffee and chocolate notes with a dry and resinous finish make this a dark beer for those who don’t want to leave the hops behind."	Also known as "After Dark" on their web site...  OK - but not as good as the Quarterstaff...
Slaters	Haka	5.2%	"Haka is an award winning New Zealand Pale Ale that is dry hopped for three weeks".	Unexceptional I'm afraid despite the three weeks - though some of the guys particularly liked it...
Triple FFF	Lady Eleanor	4.6%	"Fruity with a robust bitterness"	My beer of the festival - nice enough I had two or three of these - strong taste of fruity bitterness, very drinkable - head and shoulders above everything I had apart from the Quarterstaff - recommended
Urban Island	High and Dry	5.5%	"A juicy and intensely hopped American IPA with an earthy herbal base and citrus finish."	Tasty ale this one from a local brewery, and another of my top three for the day..

Think that was it... 

Happy times...

..we're just entering a golden period of historical fiction...   don't miss out..  most of these are out next month...  

Abundance Farm... Game

Apologies for the delay in posting..  way too busy, especially given it was Colours the next day, and then some sailing, and then some etc etc etc...  

So first things first - to name my sources this is the "La Granja de la Abundancia" scenario from the Albion triumphant booklet for Black Powder.

For this game I re-attempted the overhead shot method I tried with the War of the Spanish Succession game I played a few weeks ago..  have to say slightly less spectacular results as the table is bigger so the camera was higher and etc etc..  but there were enough to give a flavour of the ebb and flow of this cracking little battle (well  it was for me, anyway - DG was just ruing the say he threw a 5 on the OOB table! )

Move 1 (following) - first units on the table and as a reminder British/Hessian to the left, American to the right..

Not surprisingly I opted to bring both cavalry regiments on first, and went pell mell for the farm..

Move two... DG is sending his lights forward aggressively to counter my cavalry.. my main force is looking to secure the T junction hill (and I had plans on DG's hamlet) - first points are won equally - the two lower hills are taken by each side...

Move 3..  and it looks like DG is going all out for the farm which I have now taken ownership of in the name of the Crown - he is probing forward with his Lights through the woods.... 

Couple of moves later -  I have T junction hill..

...while DG's first cautious probes with his light infantry towards the farm have been dealt with roughly by the Death or Glory boys..  one light battalion sent scurrying in some discomfort (left below - red dice = rout)...

Few moves later and my 3rd Brigade is destined to strengthen the farm as I don't think they'll be needed for the assault on DG's farm/hamlet, and it also looks like DG's main feint is also the farm..

Same view at ground level..



A few moves later and those Lights of DG's have recovered (left below - in front of the unit with the blue star banner) with the assistance of a passing Brigadier to put some backbone into the dice throw.. 

...another move and battle has ensued at the T junction with both sides exchanging musketry and attempting to close to melee...  DG is forming a major assault on the hill..



Few moves from the end - following - and apologies for the slight blur, I was holding the camera above my head - only excuse I have..  



DG has switched focus to the T junction hill and has made the first of at least two or three assaults..  my artillery on the hill is doing great work - canister will always ruin your day...  To the bottom of the picture, near the farm, DG has halted -  his idea was that they would hold my cavalry in position, which they did, but the farm was still mine...

...and so we enter the final few moves..

...better shot at ground level.. British forces in strength and hold the line...  DG conceded on turn 12..

Overview..

Post match analysis:

• First off, "Cheers, John!"
• A good scenario but ensure that either, both sides are equal, or at least that both sides have the same amount of cavalry; keep the table but throw one and both sides have the same, perhaps..
• Agree in advance whether cavalry can hold a building type area when your rules don't allow cavalry to enter buildings..  we agreed that in this case the British held the farm but DG's valid point was that the cavalry didn't actually enter the farm so did they hold it? I held to the "sphere of influence" position...  not surprisingly.. you'll now understand the significance of those dismounted dragoons in my loot pile from Colours..  
• A monumental tussle, I had forgotten how good more than 6 units a side looks..
• We'll replay this one at some time as DG has unfinished business...  Warfare weekend perhaps..
• Refreshments on the evening was the awesome Hobgoblin IPA

I have been to.. Colours '18

So before I put up a post on the JC Memorial game just a brief review of the Colours show which I attended Saturday.. this was my first wargame show in 10 months, as I purposely missed Salute this year (I think I'll go next year by the by, as I've worked out that a show is much more than a big bunch of traders and hygienically challenged fat blokes with pony tails -  it also helps to fuel the enthusiasm, and general wargaming mojo which was much missed this year)

Big crowds of people - no decline for this show, but again, apropos of nothing, every time I go I''m amazed at how much more ground has been sold and turned into luxury flats looking over the race course..  so the old car park is now a block of flats, and the new parking is in the centre of the course..  bit of a frisson walking across the race track to get to the stands..  I'm amazed how long the straights are..

First point of call the Art of War t-shirt stand on the top floor - big Lee clued me into these guys on one of his posts, and I put in a trial order for their Shieldwall t-shirt - which i was very impressed with - good fit, good quality, so I was going to get another tshirt today - the Raven banner one this time. I recommend them completely and without reservation...

Job done I then wandered off to have a look round the show -  wads of twenty quid notes widely seen so people clearly not short of money - didn't really sense a trend this year, lots of MDF of course but that's not new, didn't really sense a new period coming to the fore, or any new 'go to' rule sets..  lots of shopping going on though..

What caught the eye? Some very nice and very reasonably priced resin boats on the Games of War stand the boats [clicky]in particular were very nice and very reasonably priced.. I also liked these which I thought were brilliant and hugely affordable - I may well invest and replace those ratty old home made terraces I use for 15mm WWII skirmish... they are separate as well so roof and upper story can be removed..

Booty then? The aforementioned t-shirt, some additional mini dice for the AWI collection (to show unit status), a book on the Earl of Essex that I've had on my to 'get list' for a while (my ECW project is based round Edgehill so this will fit the bill nicely) and for the first time in an age some little metal men - dismounted dragoons who are destined for the AWI project - enough for two units, one of them will be British for sure, the other I can paint as the American 4th Dragoons - if they work I'll get some more to represent the other units I have. These were from Eagle Miniatures and very reasonably priced..

...and so on to the games...   not going to a wargames show for 10 months is good for the soul - it refreshes the taste buds and allows you to enjoy games that if you were going to lots of shows you'd probably ignore ("meh" as the young people like to say)

So I have four games to feature from the myriads of games being shown..  and in the usual manner, in reverse order, they are..

Fourth.. "Operation Goodwood" by the Friends Who Like Rapid Fire... shed loads of 20mm goodness, and everything I like and dislike about Rapid Fire on a single table...  

...everything I like and dislike about Rapid Fire...

...modelling was magnificent, vehicles and terrain lovely, but..  you knew there had to be a but...  wall to wall cab ranked tanks...  it looked like a Sherman NCP car park on a busy Saturday morning at the local shopping centre...  it called out for just one carefully time fighter bomber sweep...  I know, I know, it's an operational level game, but it would have been infinitely better looking if a smaller scale had been used so the the vehicles could have been spread out a bit...  10mm perfect, 15mm better..

In third place, not my period, not my scale, and hex terrain (though DG thought they weren't using the hexes for movement measurement?) but I thought this game was magnificent..  "Blood and Bridges", a cold war game in 1/200 scale (tick) by Chris Wykes and Friends..  now this is a miniatures version of the board game (Lock ‘n Loads World at War series) and is a fictional 3rd World War encounter between British/NATO forces and Russia..

..loved the helicopters..

Simply superb..

Cab ranked tanks again, but in this scale they work..  yeah, I'm weird..

...and in second place... "The Race Across Idlib Province, 28th October, 1918" by "Adrian Shepherd and Friends".

...so the background to the game is that the British are attempting the capture of the last remaining Ottoman/German airstrip in northern Syria (a collection point for serviceable aircraft) ...  and it was the aircraft that caught the eye for me...

..."Krak des Berger", a ruined Crusader castle scratch built  for the game by Adrian Shepherd....

...game information presented on A3 laminated sheets made to look like old newspapers from the day - very clever..

Rolls Royce armoured cars and Model T's ..  what's not to like!

Loved the Triplane as well

...and that Fokker DVII is good enough to eat..

...other blog posts [clicky] would confirm the British failed in their objective on the day, but a good time was had nonetheless.. 

So without further ado..  in first place...  Simon Miller's "To The Strongest" English Civil War game, "Soggy Bottom", which was wall to wall beauty, and a joy to behold..

Parliament left, Royalist right

...Cromwell and the lads looking for a good time..

Old Robin's own..

More Parliamentary horse - left flank..

Royalist horse - right flank

...I bet Archer liked custard as a child...  how GOOD are they?

Stunning flag..

...final view.. one day...  one day..

Superb show..  roll on Warfare...