I'm still around, just thinking about going Old School

But not posting much, obviously. Things were fairly hectic in the past month, and if the hobby time is a choice between painting and blogging, painting wins I'm afraid.

In the meantime, I've been looking at the cabinets and making decisions about what I really want to do from here on in. The result is a decision to try and concentrate on just a couple of key projects. The first is Ancients, and in particular, the Roman Civil Wars. This is to be in 28mm, using Warlord plastics and the Clash of Empires rules. I've looked at Warhammer Ancient Battles and War and Conquest as well, but CoE is the ruleset that appeals the most. I've already got 2 armies worth of Romans, although there needs to be much gluing of the plastic before they get anywhere.

The second, more immediate, decision is to expand the Spanish War of Succession project from a skirmish game using Pikeman's Lament into a full blown army game. I've been inspired by Old School Gaming and reading through some of Charles Grant's Tabletop Teasers using his imagi-nations. Now I'll never end up building 48 figure battalions, but I am going bigger than I normally would with 20 figures to a battalion. 8 figures to a cavalry unit, which follows the organisations laid down in the ruleset Honours of War. I'm not necessarily going to use those rules, I have a plan to write my own Featherstone style set, but I do like the visual result of battles that use them.

I tossed up whether to go completely Imagi-Nation, naming fictional regiments etc., but when it comes down to it, I really enjoy the research that goes on around historical armies. And given the paucity of info on the Spanish campaign in the War of Succession, there is a quite a bit of imagination needed anyway. So I've set a plan in place to build two sides reflective of forces in the Peninsular 1706-8. I've kept the Spanish in Tercios with their coats of many colours before the big chnage to white in 1707, but the Allies have some Imperial troops in their OOB that didn't show up until 1708. Both forces will have imaginary commanders in an imaginary campaign in an imaginary province which borders the Pyrenees. I've finished the first unit, the Spanish Valencia Tercio already.

The full 20 figure regiment

Close up of the command with hand painted flags. Information on the standards is quite sparse, and often conjectural, so I just did one 'King's Colour' in white and a Colonel's Colour' in the colour of the coats.

Green stuff was used to put the fur on the grenadier caps.

The planned armies are:
The Two Crowns
Spanish - Tercios Sevilla, Valencia, Murcia and Spanish Guard. Mahony Dragoons, Poco Blaco Horse and Granaderos a Cabello.
French - Orleans, Royal des Vaisseux, La Couronne and Berwick Regiments. Tessé Dragoons, La Reine and Berry Horse.
The Grand Alliance
British - Foot Guards, Rivers' Foot, Royal Dragoons and Killigrew's Dragoons.
Dutch - St Amant Regiment, Drimborn's Horse
Palatine - Leibregiment zu Fuss and Frankenberg's Horse
Imperial - Stahremberg and Osnabruck regiments, Jorger Dragoons
Spanish - Catalonian Guard and Zinzendorf Dragoons

Yes, there are Spanish on both sides. The result will be some extremely multicoloured armies.

I've also been doing some painting for others, in particular Geoff. Here's the latest:

Border Reivers

And he can't get enough zombies!

I've played a DBA game where the Athenians defeated the Spartans, although I haven't had time to write it up. I also had a game of Songs of Broken Legions with Adam, where he took the Romans and crushed the Celtic warband. I need to go back and rework the stats for the poor old barbarians...

And finally, something I thought you'd never see on this blog.

Pure yellow trimmings - we don't do any of that brass rubbish around here!

I've tried to add some battle damage, so he isn't too shiny

I gave up on Games Workshop a long time ago as their prices went ridiculous and the rules alienated me. Kill-team has got me interested, and Dan made me a Kill Team and sent it to me all the way from Australia. It's going to be 90s style Ultramarines (the last time a played the game and enjoyed it). Adam is very keen on playing, so why not?

Next up I have some Hitler Youth for Geoff to do tonight, a British 6 pounder and crew for Craig, and a bit more work on my Ultras. Tomorrow my first Army Box of Warlord Marlborough's Army should show up, so assembly will be the priority.

Nate