Memoir Star Wars

The EWG's MayDay convention is just around the corner and I offered to run an open participation game. I chose Star Wars (because everyone likes Star Wars!) and will use the Memoir '44 game as the basis of rules (because it is teachable in about 5 minutes and plays quickly).

With my car in the shop, Bruce dropped by last night and we gave the game a couple of plays. The scenario was the rebels defending a series of ridge lines (and ultimately a quarry) against the imperials. I gave the rebels a pair of captured AT-STs and a laser cannon to supplement their troops.

The imperials had two AT-ATs, a speeder bike, an AT-ST, some bounty hunters and a buttload of storm troopers. I did some straight across conversions (infantry as infantry, bounty hunters as special forces). The AT-ST were tanks, the AT-ATs were elite tanks and I made the speeder bikes light tanks (two hits to eliminate). The laser cannon was artillery. I also added generals (they add one attack die to the unit they are with) and otherwise play as generals in CCA.

The first game was exceptionally close, with Bruce driving the imperials around my left flank. I managed to hold them off for awhile but then ran out of left and centre cards and had to start pulling  troops to the edge of the right side to prop stuff up. At this point, Bruce then launched an attack at my nearly vacant right flank!

The second game saw the rebels win with an aggressive defense of the centre of the board. A double envelopment by the imperials just took too long to get set up and this was a major bloody nose for the imperials. Overall, this is ready to go for MayDay.

Up next: I have some 28mm renaissance guys ready to paint (halberdiers) in the basement and I may get to them tonight. Between the garden and cycling, it has been a busy weekend. And kids soccer starts soon so I expect May and June will be slow on the painting front.

28mm renaissance musketeers

I finished nine 28mm renaissance figures this weekend. These are older GW empire troops I got at a swap meet a year or so ago. I did two bases of musketeers and one command stand. 

I've tended to paint the renaissance figures in a mix of colours so I chose a theme for these fellows, thinking they might make a useful troop in quasi-livery. These are on 60mm frontages for HoTT.

I also put together about another 20 renaissance fellows I found (more GW empire) and have those primed. I will putter away at those over the next few weeks, although I find the good weather, my garden and my bicycle to be highly distracting!

Up next: A game of Memoir 44 using Star Wars with Bruce on Tuesday. Then perhaps more renaissance fellows--we'll see what looks interesting. I'm getting down to the bottom of my paint pile so my selection is getting thin. I may pick up a few fellows at the MayDay silent auction, though.

Miscellaneous 6mm buildings

I play a fair number of hex-based games and picked up a bunch of cities on 4" hex bases a couple of years back on TMP. I've painted up some before and I'm now working my way to the bottom of my project box so I did a few more.

I knocked these two off in about an hour the other night while waiting for some glue to dry. Nothing fancy but good enough to give the board some life when I need to represent a built up area.

Up next: I finished some 28mm renaissance musketeers and the wash is drying now. I hope to have them based tomorrow. After that I will move on to something else--maybe more renaissance--we'll see what else is kicking around in boxes and drawer. I also keep mulling painting my Battlelore figures.

April 17 EWG Club Night

We had 10 guys out for the second last club night before MayDay and two games ran.

Dave hosted an ECW game using a version of Warhammer. No idea how this turned out but they were done in two hours and I heard Dave say "I've never seen that happen before" to Terry. Looks like Dave's game is ready to roll for MayDay! I believe Chen, Will and Guy also played in this game and Kevin popped in for a visit.

I hosted Alan, Scott and Bruce in a game of 1812: The Invasion of American. We played 3 on 1 in the first game and I thought things were going well for the Americans as I pressurized Montreal. But then Napoleon gives up the ghost early and things started to go downhill.

Oddly, a small battle at Oswego cost me the game as the Canadian militia rolled south and bagged one of my deployment zones. This was a terrible, terrible drubbing!

We played a second game and, near the end, the Brits were up four objectives to none. Then suddenly Alan and Scott catch fire, grab a bunch of territory and play their last truce card. Sonofabitch, I lose again! A good time and I much appreciated the patience of the players with my rules knowledge (and poor play!)

Up next: Some 28mm renaissance have the base colours blocked in so I'm moving onto the fiddly details. I may also have a 10mm commission inbound. And I might do some terrain work on the weekend.

A few Star Wars odds and ends

As I've been prepping for my MayDay Star Wars game, I have been adding bits and pieces. I picked up three Titanium series AT-STs. These are about 15mm walkers (at a guess) and fit in with my gaming space a bit better than the proper 25/28mm AT-ST I'm looking to sell.

They are still slightly too large to go with the AT-AT (which is a 10mm or so sculpt), but are close enough (there is not a lot of options that scale well). Overall, I'm quite happy with vehicles being at a smaller scale than the infantry (element-based gaming is abstract anyhow).

Again, a bit big compared to the snow speeders (also scaled at 10mm), but I can live with this.

Up next: Some renaissance guys are built and primered. And I need to prep my Tuesday game of 1812: The Invasion of Canada for the club.

FS 28mm Star Wars vehicles

I have for sale five 28mm Star Wars vehicles. I picked these up awhile back as part of a project and have either replaced them or decided I don't need them so I'd like to move them on. All have been washed and based on 60mm frontages. I would expect they would come off their bases with a quick soak to loosen the white glue.

First up are two speeder bikers. These are metal from the Titanium series. The riders are roughly  consistent with the new Star Wars plastics (about 32mm?) that have come out and are a bit bigger than the old WEG Star Wars figures.

There are also two AT-RTs. Again metal Titanium series figures. These fellows are slightly smaller than the guys riding the bikes and match (almost exactly) the new Wizards Star Wars figures.

Finally there is this 28mm AT-ST. This is a plastic vehicle and has nice battle damage painted on it.

I'd like $55 OBO plus shipping (about $15 in Canada or to the US) for the lot. I'm not prepared to break this lot up. Offers to bob.barnetson@shaw.ca.

Entrenchments

Last night, I finished off a small experiment with making some entrenchments. I need a few for a MayDay scenario I am running using Memoir 44 as the engine. I also often find myself needing camps and whatnot for other hex-based games systems.

I grabbed some Crayola air-drying modelling clay and knocked off two proto-types. The first is a gun emplacement suitable for the AWI and War of 1812. It is a bit under-scale for the 1/72 figures in the photo as I might use it with smaller models. I might make other ones with a higher berm and one or two more rows of tree-trunks for retaining walls.

I was thinking that two of these (placed on opposite sides of the same hex) would also make a useful indicator of a "camp". I thought about doing some with a wooden palisade on the top but I think that would make an already delicate structure prone to breakage. Now, if I make a hex-shaped base and dropped the structure on top, that might be better... .

I also made a few sandbag emplacements for use in my MayDay Star Wars game. These are not fancy (or even very good!) but they will do for a one-off game.

Up next: Some 28mm renaissance is the most likely project to come to fruition. Still building the fellows. Thereafter, I'm not too sure--I need to get my MayDay games together and the club meets on Tuesday for our usual evening.