Hello to my regular readers, and a quick apology for the lack of posts over
the last week or so... the season of festivities fast approaches, and as a Dad
of two, all of a sudden my time begins to disapear rapidly, somewhat akin to a
"black hole"
...just been away for a few days in Bath, which is somewhat of a tradition in Steve the Wargamers house... my wife and I get Garndparents to come and baby sit, and we slide off for a few days of drinking good beer, eating way too much, and finishing off the Christmas shopping... pure bliss, and this trip was no different....
..on the beer front the beer of the trip is always the
..being a predominantly wargaming kind of a cove, the trip wouldn't be complete without some form of military activity and this time it came courtesy of a little shop called "Bonapartes" that I always try and go to when I'm visiting.
Bonaparte's is more military miniatures & models than wargaming, but he has some lovely completed models to look at, and sells paints & brushes, but my main reason for going is a huge second hand collection of books... this time round I purchased these two volumes... I was really chuffed to find them, and they're an excellent starting point for the newest (secret no longer!) project that I alluded to back in August.... I've started to build the project Blog and will announce here once it's published (Jeff, just one comment - man cannot live by Tricorne alone.... J)
...next - I've just heard from DG that he's making one last visit to the area to see family before Christmas, and happily has time for a game, watch here for the report, but we're playing on Saturday evening, and it will be War of the Spanish Succession (with Blitzkrieg Commander/WWII for the first game in the new year) - I suspect it will be one of the Teasers, but to be honest I also like the look of the latest one in "Battlegames" issue 10....
....few other brief updates (told you I'd been busy, plenty to document no time to do it!) for the Marlburian forces Meredith's foot is now half completed and destined to join the British ranks - all I need is a couple of hours of painting time.. I've also taken delivery of a coulle of other wargmaing classic books, first "Wargames though the Ages : Volume 3" by Featherstone, but the other is the much discussed (on TMP and the "Old School Wargaming" Yahoo group) re-print of "The War Game" by Charles Grant (picture following is courtesy of the Ken Trotman site and will take you to the order page) - first impressions following a quickish browse are that it is very good - I've always wanted a copy but never had the lottery win to be able to afford it! I'll put up reviews of both at some point in time in the near future...
Hi Steve, great to know you've enjoyed Bath, and especially, the "Old Green Tree", which must be one of the few city centre pubs I can't remember visiting. The Saracens Head round the corner used to be one of my regulars in my student days.
ReplyDelete"The Wargame" is a great book and still a treasured part of my book collection. So I'm sure you'll enjoy it.
On your recommendation I'll try and visit Bonapartes the next time I'm in Bath visiting my parents, although it may cost me!
Will
Steve,
ReplyDeleteI do in fact game in other non-tricorne periods . . . but I confess that the 18th century is one of my favorite periods.
I have found that it is often nice to have a good "contrasting" period to my main one.
So, while the nice regular units of tricorned figures is my current primary focus, I contrast it with the almost skirmish nature of Colonial period gaming.
What rules are you planning to use for the ACW? It has been ages since I've gamed in that period. We used JOHNNY REB back then . . . but found that it bogged down for us when battles got beyond a certain size.
FIRE and FURY had just come out when we stopped playing ACW, so I never did play it (I think it is currently the most used set of rules -- but I could be wrong).
Anyway, I hope that your Holiday Season is a wonderful one . . . and look forward to your WSS report.
Looking back, as you may know, we just finished playing Teaser #3 three times and had previously played "The Wagon Train" four times . . . so it is time for us to look at a new Teaser . . . hmmm . . . any suggestions?
-- Jeff
Hi Jeff - only joking - I guessed you might like some of the other periods of history as well... :o)
ReplyDeleteI discovered a set of rules called Mr Lincoln's War via some of the guys on the Old School group - bought them at Colours back in August and liked them enough after reading them to think about pushing some bits of cardboard around to see how they actually play...
I'm determined that with this period/project I'm going to be "organised".. so rules first before painting & basing figures starts....!
With regard to suggestions for Teasers, I'd go for the "Ambush" one that I played solo not so long ago.. having said that, when DG comes round this evening I'm thinking about the Teaser in this months Battlegames (which is a "flavour" of Wagon Train)