AAR Seven Years War With Maurice

Last month at Curt’s request I ran a test game of Maurice using my SYW collection.  We had the French attacking the Anglo Allied army defending a hill, based on Scenario1 from Grants Programmed a wargame Scenarios.  It was a long affair ending after midnight in a narrow French victory.  Photos are in no particular order.

The French close on the allies.  There is a series of hills on the right.

Advance!

The expected Sylvain flanking manoeuvre 

Stacy advances the French lights on his left.  I needed to amortize my windmill investment 

Sylvain makes plans for an Anglo Allied counterattack 

French command and traffic control 

Early on, Stacy advances the French light troops.

Maurice has a number of innovative ideas, many of which I quite liked.  Overall, they won’t be the go to SYW rules.  They weren’t Toy Soldierish enough and some commands spent a lot of  sitting while other commands were activated.  I think with more games we’d get the hang of getting all the cylinders to fire in sequence but it might be too much work for a Friday night.  Still, worth a look for diseases and flavour.
 

AHPC Painting Burgermeister and Pig Ladies

First up is a short hop from Coruscant to Vlogsphere.  One of the proposed themes for this planet is Bureaucracy and I present the Burgermeister Ruprecht Von Wichtiguerin, accompanied by his flunky nephew Ernst, the regrettable offspring of his unfortunate sister.  For his part Ernst knows that he should have done better than take the job from Uncle Ruprecht, but law and business are hard work.  Besides it's lazy work that keeps him in bier and Strudel and leaves him his evenings free to moon over the lovely Katja down at the Schnitzel Haus.

 Figures are 28mm from Wizkids and might actually find use in a Seven Years War tabletop.

Hear ye, hear ye to his excellency's decree.

There is quite nice detail on this figure, although the clothing looks way too late for the standard DnD campaign settings.  Ruprecht is looking exceedingly self important here.

My wash gave Ernst a pleasantly grubby face but I'll have to go back and revisit the lacework.

My next stop is Noel's comet, which requires a trip on Lady Sarah's Star Yacht.  I have a couple of Land Army Girls (or land women of a certain age) with piglets as long as Sarah doesn't mind the smell.  Figures are from the Bad Squiddo games Kickstarter that I backed a couple of years back.  Pig farming is not quite as glamorous a role as a lumber jill, but they are very nice figures.  I really cannot say enough about the Women of WW2 range, there was a lot of research, respect and love that went into these figures.

The drab and grubby clothing required fairly heavy handed shading which looks fine a a proper distance.  I did try to give Miss Piper (see below) a pair of shiny black Wellies. 

Miss Piper and her little swine Ray.  The sculpts have mangled to capture a certain pride of accomplishment in the faces.   

I have not named the other lady pig-wrangler on the grounds that the other women in the challenge live locally and therefore can easily track me down and hurt me.

Points wise the base is four 28mm foot figures for 20 points.  I am not sure how to score the pigs (are they animals or equipment?) and two of them would count as prone, but maybe 5 for the set of three.  Plus I am hoping for 20 points for Vlogsphere and the Star Yacht.

Navarre Regiment SYW

I am working away on my task for the Snowlord, but also have some bits and bobs from stuff left mostly completed before submitting.  In this case I had all of the figures painted before I hit the summit, but I hadn't based them.

In my terms this is a paint bomb, maybe my largest ever point total.  It's a full 24 man battalion of the Navarre Regiment from the French Army for Seven Years War project.  Navarre was one of the oldest regiments in the French army, dating back to 1558 but not joining the French Army until Henri IV because King.  They served in Western Germany from 1757-1762 and took part in most of the big battles.

He doesn't show well here but I really like the Crusader drummer.  The  standard bearer in the front rank is from Front Rank

Close up of the Grenadiers.  The NCO pointing is Front Rank.

You can see the variations in Crusader's marching figures.  The office waving his hat  is FR.

Normally I roll my battalions out in three lots of 8 so as to keep up the image of progress, so a 24 man posting is rare for me.  I had planned to do the same here, but when I finished the first lot I realized that I was out of the bases I use for this project.  Challenger Byron of https://northernlightsterrain.com/ sourced me some free of charge (thanks Byron) on his most recent trip to Regina, but which time I had all 24 set to be based.  My Sarissa order has since arrived so I'm now Covid-19 prepared with bases.

Figures are Crusader mostly with a few Front Rank command figures.  I've done most of the unit with turn backs but added a few figures with coats undone for variety.  There's the normal command treats, two drummers in King's Livery, two flags (sourced from a gamer blog and printed at home) and a grenadier stand.  The grenadiers are over represented in the unit as there should be only 1-2 in the 24  man unit but I like the bearskins. I like to think that fusiliers were detached to guard the camp, perform picket duties etc upping the proportion of grenadiers in the main unit.

The Crusader and Front Rank figures both paint up nicely.  I like the Crusader private soldier figures with their subtle mix of related poses and the drummers are nice.  However, Crusader's officer, NCO and and standard bearers are a little static and low key so I often sub in replacements from Front Rank.  The two companies work ok to my aging and fading eyes.


Points wise that's 24 figures @ 5 point a pop for a grand total of 120, which leaves me almost exactly at my Challenge target of 500 points.  There's more stuff in progress plus the Snowlord's Challenge so I'll make my target with some room to spare.

AHPC X 28mm Hanoverians

So far my posts have been mostly focused on my odd little naval projects plus other odds and sods.  This time a round I am returning to the project that occupied almost my entire Challenge IX the Seven Years' War. 

For Sander's Sand Dunes the requirement is RED and it think that these 8 Hanoverian infantry men fit the bill.  These guys are from Hanoverian Battalion 4B known by the inhaber's name, which was Marschalk until the end of 1760 and Crashaur after that.  I tend to complete these units in three batches of eight, and this is the third batch stated but the second completed for the regiment.  Batch 1 was posted late in AHPC IX.  Batch 2 was primed in time for that Challenge and started over the summer but languished about 75% done by the start of this year's affair.  Hopefully I'll get them finished once this year's madness is over.

Once again these are 28mm Front Rank SYW figures and very nice to paint up.

That's 8 28mm foot figures @5 points each plus the location bonus for a 70 point total.  Plus I get to update my map...

And my scout badge collection...

More 18th Century Civilians

Another quick and small post from me, two 28mm foot figures.  There are another pair of 18th Century gentry from Front Rank.  As with my previous post these were great to paint and I had a lot of fun on these two.

I've christened the fellow with the stein JP which can represent Jean Pierre or Jan-Paul depending on which side of the Rhine we're fighting over.  The name comes from a JP that my Dad and I met in the bar of Dad's sailing club (although I think that similar characters inhabit bars of course clubs, cricket fields, dart clubs and rock hound club houses).

Nothing much to add, I dressed these two less ornately than the lady and gentleman in my prior post.  The figures were cleanly cast, had the right level of detail for me and were easy to pose together.

Anyway that 2 28mm figures for another 10 points as I crawl towards my 500 point goal.

18th Century Vignette for Curtgeld

Over at Challenge Island, one can hop between locations using Sarah's Balloon service for the ticket price of a female miniature.  Here's my entry to hop from Cook's Crevasse on the west side of the island to Sanders Sandunes on the east coat.  It also serves as my "curtgeld"  or entry fee for the challenge and as such will be the prize for some unfortunate who completes the Snowlords Challenge.

I have two 28mm figures from Front Rank to serve as both my balloon ticket and my entry fee.  I don't have a whole bunch to say about these.  I really like Front Rank's figures, they paint up really nicely, and I had fun doing picture searches of Reynolds and Gainsborough portraits doing research on them. 

I'm not sure that Mademoiselle is having any of Monsieur's nonsense.

I intended these to be any generic Europeans.  However my better half (who has costume knowledge) informed me that the gold was more likely to be found on the French.

Funny perspective here.  It looks like M. is down on one knee from this angle.

Another stop on my island tour.

And another merit badge for my sash

I offer the above proof that my wife and I had a glass of prosecco last night in honour of the balloon ride, and because it was dang cold.  Unlike others in the Challenge I know where the champagne flutes are kept.

Points wise I believe this scores as

• 2 28mm foot figures = 10 points
• Curtgeld bonus =25 points
• Sarah's Balloon Service =30 points
• Bonus for prosecco =5 points
• Total 70 points

Two other notes.  I will leave it to Curt to choose the short straw to see who gets these figures.  Also I would like balloon transport to Sanders' Sanddunes please.

SYW Action - Battle for Windmill Hill

Last week I put on a SYW action using my 28mm toys and using Honours of War for the first time.  This featured mostly units that i had put together in the past two editions of the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge and the first action for a lot of the units on table.

The opposing forces were as follows
British-Allied
CinC General Mohr (Jeremy)
Infantry Brigade (dithering)

• Royal Welsh Fusiliers (superior), Keith's Highlanders, Hessian Erbprinz Regiment, Hessian Garrison  Regiment Kutzleben (small)
• Hessian light artillery battery

Cavalry Brigade (dashing)

• 15th Light Dragoons, Hanoverian Luckner's Hussars (inferior)

Detached unit Hessian Jaegers light infantry with rifles

French 
CinC General St-Andre (Stacey) 
 
Infantry Brigade (dithering)

• Grenadiers de France (superior), Touraine, Diesbach, Nassau Royal-Louis
• Light artillery battery

Advant-Garde (dashing)

• Orleans Dragoons (inferior), Bercheny Hussars (inferior)
• Chasseurs de Fischer light infantry

Detached unit Volontaires de 'lArmee light infantry 

Each side deployed 6" on the table with the objective of taking Windmill hill in the centre.  Terrain wise the hill was gentle,  I counted the windmill base as light cover but not as a BUA and there were some BUAs and woods and a stream on the flanks and back table edges.

The table after one move, Allies on the left and French on the right.

The French deployment with Curt looking on philosophically

Allied deployment

The start of the cavalry clash.  This ended up with the French routed and the Allies victorious in no state to continue without rallying

Infantry scrum with Diesbach fighting the highlanders with Grenadiers and Fusiliers in support.  On the right Touraine has force the Hessians back and captured the battery.  On the left the Voluntiares charged the Fusiliers in the flank to remove their support from the Highlanders.

Later in the action with both sides taking casualties, retreating and/or routing.  Fischer have occupied the windmill and force the Jaegers back.  On the far right the cavalry battle continues towards it's bloody conclusion

I'll put some thoughts together on the rules.  In general the gave the right result and were easy to pickup, but felt too mechanical.  

AHPC Curtgeld

Lighting's not the best.  I may need to touch up the facial details too, he's looking too mono-hued here.

Time to pay the piper, so here's my Curtgeld for the Ninth Challenge.  He's an officer from the French Dillon Regiment from the SYW.  The figure is by Front Rank and I really love the pose with hat off and sword out.

Front Figures paint up very nicely.  The raised buttons and lace work are very much appreciated.

Dillon's was a famous regiment in the 18th century, part of the Irish brigade formed after the Glorious Revolution (or War of English Succession depending).  recruitment cam originally from Irishmen wanting to change the British Monarchy back to a Catholic Jacobite, although the percentage of actual Irishmen diminished over time.  The colonelcy passed down through the family and many officers were Dillon's themselves. After valiant service in the Wars of English, Spanish, Polish and Austrian Succession, the SYW and the AWI, it was disbanded after the French Revolution.  Incredibly some officers then formed Emigre Dillon's regiments paid by George III and serving with the British.  So Irishmen who joined the Irish Army to overthrow George III, ended up serving George III to defeat a Republic and reinstall the Bourbons.  The intellectual contortions required for this defy me.

Beyond the regular Curtgeld tradition, there is another challenge tradition that seems to have fallen by the wayside over time.  There have been several cases of Challengers Curtgelding Cut with figures representing Bob Dylan, despite (or perhaps because of) Curt's fervent anti-Dylan hatred.  To rectify the recent tailing off of the tradition, I therefore present Robert (Bob) Dillon as my Curtgeld for this challenge.

By my count this will take me over my 500 point Challenge Target with 3 weeks left to go.  This figure also adds 5 points to my BP side duel total,