Saturday, March 24, 2012

Battle for Pohlman Hill







I've been a bit quit recently, lost the painting motivation but doing research for the next proper army I'm about to start. More detail on that later but I'm about to make an attempt to built a 1800-1806 French army after I finish some Mexican/American skirmish units.

Anyway, we had a good ACW game recently using Guns at Gettysburg. We decided a while ago that for every game someone of the group would create a scenario and be the game master for the day. I must say this is really paying off adding a lot of fun and making the games much more interesting (as the discussions before and after). And if you wonder, couple of years  ago we usually showed up, looked at the troops we brought, put everything on the table and played a couple of turns before we packed and went for refreshments.
We are getting better at this each game and my thinking is that preparation is key for an interesting game.

This time it's Jacco's (Jake) show. The following is the information I got after the game. Before I only received my OOB and some background for the day. He created the map in Powerpoint.




POHLMAN HILL
March 10 1863

Background
In a period of relative inactivity following the Battle of Stones River, a reinforced Union infantry division, under General James S. Wadsworth reconnoiter south toward Columbia. Four miles from Pohlman Hill, Coburn attacked with his right wing, a Confederate divison under General John Bell Hood; he was repelled. Then, General John Bell Hood seized the initiative.

Mission
The winner is the side that has possession of Pohlman Hill.

Deployment
Union: deploy 5 US Battery D and Vincent’s brigade anywhere within three inches of the western short edge of the table.
Reinforcements are diced for at the end of the to arrive in the move phase of the following at the western short edge of the table.




Brigade
2D6
Meredith (with Wadsworth)
2-5
Robinson
6-7
Ward
8-10
Stewart
11-12

Confederate: deploy the 15th Arkansas Volunteers anywhere on Pohlman Hill. The rest of Wofford’s brigade anywhere within 3 inches of the eastern short edge of the table. Reinforcements are diced for at the end of the to arrive in in the move phase of the following at the eastern short edge of the table.


Brigade
2D6
Anderson (with Hood)   
2-5
Benning & Henry
6-7
Hampton
8-10
Perry & Haskell
11-12


On the 6th turn all reinforcements that are still of table will arrive in the move phase.


Terrain
The hill lightly wooded and the hill does not otherwise impede movement. The Creek can be forded at any point on a throw of 4+ (D6)








As said it was good fun and in the end the Rebels could secure the hill helped by the terrain and better artillery positioning (canister works:). I only took some pictures at the start and near the end of the game unfortunately. We never learn.


GameMaster Jake (who also played Union)is  looking to see if he can change the scenario to secure a blue win.





Battle for the light woods





Reb cav about to charge and get slaughtered

Rebs taking the south flank
Pohlman Hill secured

Jakes freshly painted Brigade

All the pictures of the day: link

Thursday, March 8, 2012

SAGA extras, baggage train and fatigue markers


Painted this baggage cart for SAGA's escort scenario which requires three bases of baggage or anything that deserves to be protected. Enough finished so it's time to get a couple of games and depending on how much fun we have I will do some more points or another Warband. First game end of the Month where I will be trashing Rene from Paint-In.

Models from Gripping Beast with the except for the Viking dragging the poor woman with him. I gave the celebrating drunk a small treasure chest I found in the lead mountain.

Fatigue Markers, with decals from Little Big Men Studios



Experiment with a different background, easy to do once you know the trick but I'm not sure I like it?






Thursday, March 1, 2012

Vikings for SAGA point 6: Archers



Not overexcited with the idea of having to paint the archers I got the job done. While I have collected hundreds of Vikings over the years I had a hard time finding twelve archers I could use. This is a mix of 5 manufacturers and I ended up doing a very simple conversion on a Foundry Bondi figure giving him bow, arrow and a quiver to get to twelve.
Warband is done now and I'm currently painting a baggage train for one of the scenarios. At least one game of SAGA and an ACW battle this Month and I'm looking forward to that. Last week we had a WWI game using Mud & Blood which was great but unfortunately the pictures are unusable.




In the meantime the group decided to start yet another project so I'm currently in research mode for figs and history. This time we found another nice niche: Mexican American War in 28mm. We are fully aware of some great 18mm and 40mm ranges out there but because we have a lot of  unused scenery in 28 we decided to use what we have and stay with 28mm. We will use So Far From God by TooFatLardies as our ruleset for the period. Now let me see if I can find some cool figures I can use...


Viking Gallery