Dawns and Departures AWI Campaign

The redoubtable Andrew Parkes has volunteered to umpire a Sharp Practice campaign using the Dawns and Departures campaign rules. This is very welcome. Coincidentally the equally redoubtable David Lambert had organised a Sharp Practice day at Pendraken Miniatures on the outskirts of Middlesbrough, so it seemed a good idea to combine the two and get some campaign turns in 

Three (I think) days in and the Tyrannical British have attacked the brave freedom loving Americans at Hymer's Farm. There was a small force of Continentals there, augmented on the day by some irregular skirmishers. 

Initially the Continentals, with support from locals harassing from a nearby orchard caused some casualties to the British Light Infantry that were covering the main advance.

The Yankees made the Redcoats fight hard for the farm, but were eventually forced to withdraw by overwhelming numbers back along the road, leaving the farm to the depravations of the Brits. 

A good little fight and got us back into the rules. Thanks to Andy for umpiring, David for organising, and Paul for opposition. 

A theoretical two thirds.............followed by a very real and nice three and a half

So today I finished (almost) the group of "third Rank" skirmishers. That means, if you squint, I've completed two of the three units in my Sharp Practice Austro-Hungarians. The catch is the final third is another big unit of fusiliers, 24 foot plus two officers.

Here are the skirmishers - as you can see they still need the basing doing but I think I'll do the whole force at once to keep some visual homogeneity. 

This doesn't mean the project is getting to an end. Once the core force is complete I'll need another 16 points of supports to use depending on scenarios. "Luckily" the core force is about 64 points, meaning I'll normally not need much extra if facing the French forces which tend to be quite low on base force points. I figure a unit of artillery and maybe some Jager is 14 of those 16 points, leaving a few spare for the odd or scenario supports.

As an aside I had three and a half pints of Elland 1872 Porter, Champion Beer of Britain five times and one of the nicest \ strongest beers I've had in a long time. Sadly the brewery closed it's doors this month so that will most likely be the last I ever get. Sad really.

Before the beer hit me I did manage to stick together the last of the fusiliers so I will hopefully not have too many halts once the production line restarts.

I stuck together 24 Fusiliers (only 16 in this pic) plus a drummer (Musician), NCO , Colour bearer and Pioneer. They will all come in useful as support options.

Tomorrow I'm attending a Sharp Practice day at Pendraken Miniatures, hopefully my Rebellious Colonists will throw off the oppressive yolk of Perfidious Albion! 

Cheers

  

 

General Update - Get off your keyboard and man your brush!

I'm trying to spend time painting rather than playing games on the pc. Turns out this makes my modelling more productive - who would have thought?

Having finished the first unit of Austrians I ran into he soft sand a bit. Basically my desire not to get put off by a large pile of unpainted plastic and lead meant I only assembled enough to do the first unit. Now that is done I discovered I had a few issues.

Firstly I didn't have any assembled figures - easy enough to fis there are boxes of then in easy reach (gulp)

Secondly I didn't have enough 20x20mm mdf bases for a second unit anyway.

Thirdly, I've lost (or possibly used?) the white rattle-can I am using to undercoat them

This has caused an unplanned pause. Luckily I also had spent a little time ruminating over the Austrian list for Sharp Practice and decided I would like to get a group of "Third Rank" skirmishers in the basic force. Historical side note - The Austrian-Hungarian Infantry Battalions of the Napoleonic Period were a little different to many others. The Battalions didn't have a designated Light Company as seen in contemporary British and French units tasked with skirmishing. Instead the Austrians relied on taking troops from the third rank of formations and sending them out to skirmish. It's not an ideal solution to say the least. Mulling this over, I thought it would be more appropriate for my main force to use these as my skirmishers rather than the original Grenzers or Jagers. So I ordered a pack from Perry's along with some extra command etc. These arrived yesterday as I was heading out for the other supplies. I went to Pendraken for some more bases, and picked up some spray paint, so the wheels are back on. 

I've decided its easier to base and put some sand \ grit on the bases before starting to paint - part of the changes I made to the process of painting based on the first unit. 

So the next unit on the production line is the Third Rank skirmishers. I have one group of six which in true Austrian fashion is totally inadequate to screen the main unit in line but I'm thinking that is a bonus as it will encourage me to deploy in columns, at least while I try and manoeuvre.  To be honest this is probably going to be necessary anyway as the 24 man units in line are a bit unwieldy if there is any terrain or obstacle in the way. Memo to self - reread the section in Sharp Practice about changing formation!

Anyway that's all for now - I feel obliged to include a pic so here is the next group of line infantry assembled and ready for undercoat

Cheers! 

     

Austrian Update - First unit done!

 A fortnight after buying them and the first unit is (almost) done. I still need to work on the bases a bit and get some movement trays, but here is the first 24 man line Infantry unit completed. I'm quite chuffed!

They come with two Leaders, an Officer and an NCO. I'm not sure if this is a good thing or not. I suspect the NCO will be useful once the action starts but as a junior leader all he can do is rally shock really. Anyway here is the boss

Almost certainly a Prohaska

I'm pretty sure I need to keep the momentum up but I need more 20x20 bases so I think the next unit will be either the Jagers or the Artillery unless I can make a quick trip to Pendraken in the next few days.

Hornblower update - Go Big or, OK just go Big

I mentioned the Napoleonic Naval Landing Party (Royal Navy of course) I was putting together for Sharp Practice. 

One of the units I think I'll take is an artillery piece. This is not much of a revelation as it's a staple of the Hornblower stories, a naval gun landed to support the sailors ashore. I have a 28mm gun on a naval carriage ready to go, which I'm classing as a "light" gun. I suspect this is actually a 6 or 9 Pdr so is possibly a medium gun in Sharpe Practice but there is a bonus in flexibility I suppose.  I based it on a 40x20mm base (just the gun) with the five crew on 20x20 bases, and chuck in a bit of based scatter gives me enough bases to fill a standard movement tray from Warbases which I like using to speed movement up. 

I was digging through the spares box and found a rather larger naval gun. This came originally from (of all places) a Dungeons and Dragons miniatures blister pack. No idea why they did it but gift horses etc. This got me thinking. In Sharp Practice you can get bigger guns, and the big ones are very intimidating indeed on the receiving end. The other factor involved is no matter the size, in game terms they all have five crew - a box I have already ticked. I figure if I can get the big gun on a 40x20 base I can swap it out with the same crew so I have the option of a heavy gun!

There is rather a lot of handwaving and fast talking that will be needed at this point as to how \ why such a big gun is ashore, as it looks like it may even be a 24 or 32 Pdr

and I will probably have to put some planking on the base to at least show willing that the crew have thought about the size and weight of the thing. 

Next I'll have to think about Deployment Points........

Hornblower update - a bit of a rethink

My initial thoughts on the makeup of my Naval Landing Party for Sharp Practice were as follows:

1 unit of 3 bases of 8 Royal Marines

1 unit of 6 skirmishing sailors with muskets

1 unit of 12 sailors with mixed weapons - boarding pikes, pistols etc.

1 Light gun and crew - I have a couple of bullocks to stand in as a limber team

The Marines were to be classed the same as normal British Line troops. The skirmishing sailors as Irregular skirmishers, and the other sailors as "Tribal" massed infantry with tomahawks as suggested on the Lard Island forum. So far so good. The sizes of the units is based more on what is available in the blisters from Perry Miniatures as much as anything else.

I've been rethinking this a bit. The proportions feel a bit wrong, particularly the preponderance of Marines over sailors, so I an thinking about a reshuffle. I'll reduce the Marines to only 2 bases of Marines and possibly using the excess to form a unit of skirmishers (Do RMs train as skirmishers???), and adding a second group of both musket armed sailors and melee types. That will change the mix up a bit and give me some options for some support points. This is all dependent on Andy Parkes agreeing to paint some more figures to match the ones he already has done, but he is a Fine Chap so I have some hope there.

What do you think?

Not getting even a bit distracted honest.................

I'm still making progress on the Austrians for Sharp Practice, and in the next few days I'm going to be working on some sailors to help with the Naval Landing Party - Hornblower et al.

However I've got an invite to Pendraken Wargames on Saturday 24th February where there is going to be a Sharp Practice day. There is no real chance of the Austrians making it in time, nor the Royal Navy, so I'm taking my AWI Continentals to face off again against Paul's Redcoats. Checking the list it's clear I really need a Deployment Point - actually I need a DP and a mobile one for my Continental Light Infantry. The first will be this nice little camp scene I've just finished, the second will probably be a Light Infantry scouting party or similar assuming inspiration strikes.

Anyway here is my Deployment Point -  a camp scene complete with small dog. 

Dogs are of course essential and this one is based on my pet mongrel from my youth. It's a well travelled dog as it was rescued from an earlier camp that I painted many years ago and he's been hanging around waiting for a new role. 

Back to Austrians - only four rankers and two Leaders and the first unit will be ready.

Cheers 

Progress on Austrians

Quick update. I'm wary of my history of starting many projects but ending few. The issue is painting - sometimes fatigue, but sometimes just being put off by the magnitude of the task.

To try and avoid this I'm deliberately breaking the Austrians down into small and hopefully easily digestible batches. My initial thoughts were doing them in groups of eight, which coincidentally match the size of a group in Sharp Practice. I did complete a group, but found it to be a bit of a slog, so I think I'll try groups of four moving forward.

Anyway here is my first group. Sharp eyed among you will identify them as IR Nr 4 in homage to my old friend John Henderson, who was one of the first "proper" wargamers I got to know and something of an inspiration.

Anyway, enough keyboard action, time to grab a brush and make a start on the second group

Cheers

Project 2024. Austrians for Sharp Practice

I went to Vapnartak in York on Sunday. The cunning plan was to pick up some Austrians to build a Sharp Practice force, using Perry Miniatures. This is going to be my main project for 2024. There is no "official" SP Austrian list but there are a couple of suggestions on the Lard Island forum and I'm going with what looks like a boring but reliable core force as follows:

Austrian Infantry Column 1809+

Leader III (Hauptmann/Captain)

Leader I (Fähnrich/Ensign)

3 Groups of 8 Line, Musket (German or Hungarian)

Leader II (Oberleutnant/1st lieutenant)

3 Groups of 8 Line, Musket (German or Hungarian)

Leader I (Unterleutnant/2nd lieutenant)

1 Group of 6 Grenzers, Musket

64 Points ( I need to check that). That gives me two very solid infantry units and a small group of skirmishers. I think theyre going to be solid but not very flexible, but I can add some variety through the support options. One drawback with the Austrians is their Level 1 Leaders are not able to command other units. That's a problem because they're not very versatile, but on the other hand it does mean they're available to keep their units together when the crap starts flying. 

That was the plan, but as folks know, plans never survive contact with the enemy and this was no exception. 

The first problem was the 48 line infantry. Perry's do a box of plastics containing exactly 48 models. Sadly this includes a colour party, some officers, musicians etc. All essential for "normal" games but extras to a SP list. I suppose I could have picked up an extra sprue from somewhere but I figure a second box will give me options to expand later to do Grenadiers etc. So two boxes of Austrian Infantry. This isn't so much of a problem as convention stalwart Dave Thomas always does deals at his stall, in this case 3 boxes for £55, rather than the £22 each, so it would be rude not to.

Next up the Grenzers. I intended to pick up a blister of skirmishing Grenzers - that would be six figures. I'd need a figure for the Officer but it seemed a stretch to buy a Command pack.  As it happens this was not a problem, or rather it was, because Dave T didn't have any with him. I did a quick rethink and bought some Jagers and Command - I was going to get some as support options anyway. Jagers are very good but expensive, basically the same as British Riflemen.

Speaking of support options, I fancied an artillery piece so picked up a 6Pdr Wurst (horse artillery). The only problem here is there are only four crew in the blister - SP artillery needs five, but I'm sure I will be able to find a stand in somewhere.

Lastly - the third box to get the deal - I picked up a box that can be built as Dragoons or Cuirassiers.

All in all that should give me plenty of troops to build my force, with a  fair choice of support options. 

After getting home I had a bit of a rethink and decided to change the core force a little. I'll totally drop the Grenzers and replace them with "Third Rank" skirmishers. Austrian Battalions didn't have a designated Light Company like the British and French. Instead they were supposed to provide a skirmish screen by detaching men from the third rank of their three rank formation. In SP theyre not very good, but they're really only there to screen the main force so that's not a disaster. So my plan will be to replace the Grenzers with these "Third Rankers" Perrys do a pack of fusiliers skirmishing, and I could pick up a Command pack which would give me some spare officer types which will provide some different poses to the plastic ones. 

So that's the plan. Let's see if it holds together, particularly when I start to try and paint all those white uniforms!

Hornblower?? Royal Navy Landing Party for Sharp Practice

I was looking at another blog (see the follow list over there on the right somewhere) and saw the guy had put up a list of current projects. "That's a good idea" I thought, so I pinched it. Then I needed to put some detail in and that's when I realised I still had some work to do.

I was asked to do a demo of Sharp Practice for one of the guys in the club. I only have AWI Yankees (interesting aside, this is I think the only American force I have properly built for any game system, other than for demo purposes. I think that makes me Antiseptic in Cockney Rhyming Slang !). Anyway I dusted them off, got on the table and thoroughly enjoyed myself. Inspired I decided to run through the list and see what else I needed. Not a lot is the answer - well ok that's never actually true but the only real gaps in the AWI were deployment points. Still working on that.

OK nothing to do with Hornblower so far but I'm getting there. A while ago I tried to run a Sharp Practice campaign based around the Penobscot Expedition - there will be some posts from pre Covid days somewhere. I thoroughly enjoyed it, thanks mainly to the excellent roleplaying by Paul,  Dave, Malcolm and Mark. The campaign fizzled out as these things do, however as part of the prep I had bought some armed sailors from Perrys, and sort of went OTT and got some Napoleonic Royal Marines as well. Then I went through a very non productive phase and ended up handing the sailors off to the talented Andy Parkes to paint. Looking at the Marines I think I will have to sweet talk him to do those as well - I cant paint red to save my life!

I already have a scratch gun crew with a naval gun, and yes, I painted them myself. I will now start looking for some Naval Officers ........ and then I can go and do heroic things to Old Boney's Empire.

Going to need a suitably risque name for my main Officer \ Character in true SP fashion though - any suggestions?