And so It begins (Sailing Saturday Starting positions)

Well today sees the start of my first (and I hope not last) Play by blog game.

So lets, start with the scenario. Or the reason for the battle.

Sit Rep:

The Game set up in my shed.

The Year is 1803 and the British have been blockading Spanish ports. Trade has been suffering and the Spanish Navy trapped in Narrow harbours and inlets Safe and Protected by shore batteries they may be but they are unable to bring any positive action either on this continent or on the “New World”. The Spanish crews are well rested, well fed but bored of waiting on their wooden worlds. The British fleet are equally bored but not quite as well fed or rested.  Shore parties have been sent inshore to forage but generally they have not been as successful as hoped.

The Spanish Fleet
Attempting to slip past
The Blockageing British.

Last night saw a severe summer storm and the British fleet blocking this port sailed to deeper water for fear of being dashed on the rocks. Now is the time for the Spanish fleet to strike out from their safe harbour and make for the New World to bring back trade goods and gold from the colonies.

The British fleet despite being scattered by the storm is larger but the Spanish will not get a better chance and risk being confined in harbour for months to come. If the Spanish Fleet can either escape or fight off the British fleet all British Merchants in the Atlantic and the Mediterranean will become Vulnerable and the Admiralty will be displeased!

 

British Players.

Admiral Ray Rousell  Commands a 74 gun ship of the line.

Captain  “Lucky”Lee Hadley Commands a 64 Gun Ship of the line "HMS Pachyderm."

Captain Edwin King Commands a 64 Gun ship of the Line "The Inconsistent"

Captain Peter Douglas Commands a 64 Gun Ship of the Line

Captain Curt Campbell Commands a 64 Gun Ship of the line.

There are also ships of British nationality converging on this port after the storm. (This allows me to introduce new players should more want to join mostly as Captains of Frigates.)

Spanish Players.                                              

 Admirante Francis Lee Commands a 74 Gun ship of the line.

Capitán Mr Lee Commands a 64 Gun Ship of the line

Capitán Michael Mills Commands a 64 Gun Ship of the line

Capitán Phyllion Commands a 64 Gun Ship of the line

Capitan Andrew Saunders a 54 gun ship of the line (starting 1 turn Later)

There is a 54 gun ship of the line (3^rd rate) Known to still be in the port as well as a number of smaller ships Including at least 1 Heavy Frigate as well as a number of Frigates.

 

They all have permission to rename their ships as long as they are sensible NO "H.M.S. Floating Turd" for example. Or to stick with their character/real names as they see fit. Once that is established I will print out some proper name tags for each ship. (Yes My printer broke this week and No I do not want to buy a dodgy printer that had 1 previous owner).

 

So leading out the Spanish Fleet is Michael Mills. Followed By Fran then Mr Lee and Pyllion last in line and shutting the back door.

 

The British are scattered. Closest to the start of the action Is Lee Hadley (he can thank me for this later). He's still a couple of turns away so has time to act before the Spanish Juggernaut gets within Firing range.

 

On the First Picture he's closest to the shore on the right.

 

 

 

Also to the Right are Peter Douglas and Curt Campbell. There is a small shoal about three turns away 60 Degrees to Curt's front left. So No immediate danger.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ray and Edwin King are to the left of the board. About as far away as Curt and Peter.

 

The observant will note that they all have large wake markers behind them indicating that they are all at full sail. As It will take them 2 or three turns to get into any action. This should give all the players a chance to both manoeuvre and to get used to how I am going to run the game.

 

 

 All the Models are 2400th scale and sit on 40mm by 20mm mdf bases.

 

Later this morning I am going to make the trip to Gravesend and play a game with only a few of the Rejects. And Sunday I have a club Game, so I will post again on Monday with an AAR and maybe on Wednesday with a different AAR as well.

 

Until then Have a good weekend and enjoy yourselves no mater what you are doing. And Think of me sweating my nads of in Postie's unventilated Shed of war.

 

Take care all Cheers Clint

 

1 day early!

Oh look a real one!

As I do not think I will get the opportunity to blog now until Saturday (best get something done for then). I thought I would get tomorrows blog done today! Yeah it's a crazy mixed up world!

So today (or Tomorrow if you would rather I have been progressing my Soviet 1985 (ish) Airborne Desant forces.

Yes that picture is a real one!

Here is my company of ASU-85's. The ASU 85 is actually and assault gun. Originally based on a PT -76 chassis but without the amphibious capability and now withdrawn from service in Poland and the Russian Federation.

My Airborne Desant force would be allowed to field up to 2 Divisional Assault companies. But as I only have one I will only field one, although I do have a couple spare so I may expand then to two in the future.

A Company consists of a Single ASU-85 to act as a company headquarters and up to three platoons each of three vehicles. For a total of 10 vehicles.

The 85mm cannon on each assault vehicle was able to fire HE, Heat and HVAT rounds which would afford it some armoured piercing capacity especially in the era it was first designed (Early to mid 60's) but not powerful enough to take a Leopard, Abrams or a Challenger which were the front line tanks of NATO in the mid 80's. But as the Desant force has missiles for Anti Tank Proposes These would hardly ever be needed for that role.

Well folks that's it until Saturday, have a few good  days and see you soon.

All the best Clint

Post Script: Those that have signed in for the navel game. I will send out more details Things like how to write orders I will understand and a Situational report before we start to play hopefully tomorrow or Friday. That will give you a 7 day window to ask questions and get back to me in with your first turn.

And cheers Guys for some great emails from you. WE have 6 players at present and me as Ref so It is quite balanced to begin with. But I will allow new players to join at any time by simply giving them a lower class ship of the line or in the final stages or if anyone is knocked out a Frigate IF they want to continue playing.

Post Post Script: Now Up to 7 Players and me as a Ref. PD Joined while I was typing this post! So hence the Amendment! (Gosh that sounds Posh!)

Growing horde.and PBB Opertunity of a game.

The whole lot so far.

Goodness me! more painted zombies from the "Zombies" game. As you will recall these are all the same pose and I have a few more 64) to do.  The shambling horde is increasing.

I am now up to 36 and am approaching critical mass for a game. Yes I know that from a game point of view more is better and that you can never have enough zeds! But 1 is far too many in real life.

They're coming to get you!

6x6= 36 Zeds

So I thought I would briefly mention why I am painting them. Well last year I was lucky enough to play in an online Play by mail game. Hosted by Shelldrake. It was a zombie game and only open to those in the Zombie bloggers association. So this year I thought I would repay that kindness and host a Zombie game of my own online. I expect this to start in a couple of weeks from now and will run as 1 turn a week. This will be as much roleplaying as wargaming. And I am pleased to say that I very reached capacity on the number of players I could handle for this game. All Zombie Bloggers and all members of the board of the living lead. 

So unfortunately there is no spare capacity in this game but you will all be welcome to follow their progress once it starts. I will probably send them out character generation info in the following week.

Pressgang!

Totally unrelated to the Zombie Game.

I am willing to recruit for a different Play by blog game though. Let me Explain! Having spoken to Ray on the Phone on Sunday night he has not managed to get very much gaming done at all this year. So I have suggested that I can referee a Naval game (in the Age of Sail) and run it on a weekly turnaround. Players need not know the rules as I will take car of all the bookkeeping and fiddly bits. They will be responsible for their ship movement choice of targets [both ships and hull or rigging] and damage control parties. They will be told how effective their gun fire has been, in the abstract only. But no indication of what has been achieved unlit it becomes visible! Such as fires, explosions (very rare), loss of a mast etc. This should not be a drain on your time too much as I am thinking that each player would control a single ship of the line.

The fleet captains will be Ray and Fran (I suspect you have all heard of them as they are quite notorious). And players are under no compunction to obey any orders Issued by them. [I know I wouldn't]!

I hasten to add that players need not know the rules. But for the tabletop application I will be using "Blood Bilge and Iron Balls." with some slight amendments to make it possible to play on a Blog as opposed to tabletop face to face.

So if this sounds like something you might be interested in leave a comment. Or email me on

Clintburnettagain[at]Hotmail[dot]co[dot]Uk

either for more information or for a place in the ship game or just a chat.

Ok folks have a lovely couple of days and see you all soon
All the best Clint

Paint Monkey Sunday.

Looks like I shall turn "Paint Monkey " into a semi regular thing. Yes more painting for my mate Matt. And yes some more North West Frontier troops. I have no idea how many he's got now, but I do know I shall  be starting some more today. ( I am putting off doing the ones in Kilts!..... where I have to paint tartan) Yes I realise that will make you all want to see them more and that I should not have mentioned them. Oppsie!



 So any way here are 6 more figures that I have had to repaint for him. I suspect he got them on evil Bay. I am not saying they were badly painted or in the wrong colours or anything like that but there was no shading or highlights. So I did what I would normally choose to do if they were my figures and over paint every part of them. The bases also needed a bit of work so they were re done as well and they should fit in with the rest of his North west Frontier troops.

The Weather has been too hot for painting (ok not what we are used to here in the UK) for other parts of the world you are probably laughing at that statement. It has meant that paint was/is drying on the brush before it gets onto the figure! Enough of this wingding Pom malarkey, shutting up now and getting on with it.



 That's going to be it for today, I shall now go and prep some figures and get them primed before the thunder and lighting return.

Take care all, have a good Sunday and if you do anything I wouldn't do please don't tell me I may get jealous!

All the best Clint

Post script. http://www.newlinedesigns.co.uk/ have got a sale on. It's worth checking them out. Not only do they do 10mm stuff (a growing range) but also some other scales including 28mm pulp  figures if you look hard enough.