As the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812 approaches, I'm slowly getting my ducks in a row to run a bunch of DBHx games. I decided on 1/72 figures (it seems the right scale to my eye for AWI and War of 1812) and have been slowly painting up the forces. I rebased a bunch of
US militia at Christmas and have now moved onto painting up their formed troops.
These are HaT 1/72 Belgium and somethingorother infantry. They have plain uniforms which seems right from what I can tell. The lack of good source materials has frustrated me several times. I finally bought two books by Stuart Asquith on gaming the War of 1812.
There is the hardback
War of 1812: Campaign Guide To The War With America which contains lots of nice colour plates, including re-enactors. Then there is the softcover
Scenarios for the War of 1812-1815 with scenarios and many of the same plates, but smaller. I was a bit annoyed by how much of the text from the campaign book appears in the scenario book. And also how vague and general the scenarios were.
Anyhow, using the colour plates I painted up two batches of American troops. There was so much change and diversity in uniforms, I decided to do two schemes, both early war. These fellows are done in a winter of 1812/13 scheme. The coat is actually a bit bluer than the figures show. The next batch (maybe posted Friday?) has a summer scheme with a bluer coat, white pants and slightly different shakos.
Overall, I'm happy enough with these fellows. I could use some skirmishers, dragoons and cannon, but the core of the army is done. Now onto the British!
Up next: A game tonight with Bruce. And then the rest of the War of 1812 guys. Then a hundred odd 28mm goblins are milling about on the painting desk.
These are HaT 1/72 Belgium and somethingorother infantry. They have plain uniforms which seems right from what I can tell. The lack of good source materials has frustrated me several times. I finally bought two books by Stuart Asquith on gaming the War of 1812. 
There is the hardback War of 1812: Campaign Guide To The War With America which contains lots of nice colour plates, including re-enactors. Then there is the softcover Scenarios for the War of 1812-1815 with scenarios and many of the same plates, but smaller. I was a bit annoyed by how much of the text from the campaign book appears in the scenario book. And also how vague and general the scenarios were.
Anyhow, using the colour plates I painted up two batches of American troops. There was so much change and diversity in uniforms, I decided to do two schemes, both early war. These fellows are done in a winter of 1812/13 scheme. The coat is actually a bit bluer than the figures show. The next batch (maybe posted Friday?) has a summer scheme with a bluer coat, white pants and slightly different shakos.
Overall, I'm happy enough with these fellows. I could use some skirmishers, dragoons and cannon, but the core of the army is done. Now onto the British!
Up next: A game tonight with Bruce. And then the rest of the War of 1812 guys. Then a hundred odd 28mm goblins are milling about on the painting desk.
Nice looking troops!!
ReplyDeleteNice looking troops mate. We've recently dipped into the War of 1812. Normally we do DBHx, but this time we've gone for the John Bull Rules by the Perfect Captain. A nice change.
ReplyDeleteI must admit I found Stuart Asquith's books to be very good, but I know what you mean about replication of the content.
All the Best
MrF
http://mrfarrow2udba1519k.blogspot.com/
Thanks guys. Yeah as basic introduction the books are fine. The repetition (given the cost) put me off some. I just find the scenarios maddening. The maps are impressionistic and the suggested victory conditions are a bit vague. I get that scenarios are hard to do when you don't choose a rule set to attach them to, but then maybe don't do a scenario book! Fortunately I have McFarlane's Rockets Red Glare which has clearer scenarios.
ReplyDeleteYou already know, you're right. Most blog feedback DO suck.
ReplyDeleteI enjoy what you guys are up too. Such clever work and exposure!
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blogroll.
Only some posts from Jon himself have more!
ReplyDeleteHey there! I realize this is kind of off-topic but I had
ReplyDeleteto ask. Does running a well-established blog like yours take a massive amount work?
I'm brand new to writing a blog but I do write in my journal every day.
I'd like to start a blog so I can share my personal experience and
feelings online. Please let me know if you have any kind of suggestions or
tips for brand new aspiring blog owners. Appreciate it!
Thanks Anonymous. I don't find the blog takes a lot of work: I do two posts per week and it takes about an hour a week to take pictures, edit, and post (plus whatever painting I do). If you were looking for suggestions, I would say (1) have a clear objective (mine is to record my gaming and painting), (2) set a realistic schedule (a schedule is good discipline, I try for two posts per week but sometimes drop below that, especially in the summer), (3) think through what kind of posts you might make (I do one painting and one gaming per week), (4) write up a list of 10 posts of each type you might make to get yourself started, and (5) understand the scheduling feature of your blogging software so you can store up posts when you are prolific to run when you are not prolific.
ReplyDelete