Photos of Our Recent Convoy Action

British Convoy en route to the Med.  Stacey nicely convoyed gluten free provisions visible in the background.

Convoy from down low

The might of the Italian Navy at sea!!

Fortified by wine, Stacey plots his move.

The fleets converge (I'm not sure why either side tried to close so much, but who am I to argue)

There's a gonna be a fight here partner.

Sylvain mulls over his options and his wine.

Smoke - a dastardly British trick!

Getting closer while Sylvain gets closer to the snacks.

The sea is really rolling at this angle.

Red arrows mark the British torpedoes - red smoke from the Trento signals a hit!  I'm not sure of the wisdom of the DD captain who turned back towards his own fish trails.

Same scene from above.

Italian Attack on A British Convoy

It's been a long time since I put on a miniatures game mostly due to REAL LIFE imposing it's ugly head on my important business.  Well last night I brought out my 1:2400 WW2 ships and we fought a convoy action.  And I have to say that my rustiness showed - but we did get a good if much bloodier game than I expected.

Sylvain took the Royal Navy side and was assigned a small convoy of 5 merchantmen escorted by;

• HMS Carlisle an old WW1 cruiser refitted with 4" AA guns
• HMS Manxman the fast minelayer/AA cruiser/fast transport/jack of all trades
• 3 H class destroyers
• 3 Hunt class destroyer escorts
• Readers with keen memories might recognize this as the covering force that Curt used when we fought our larger convoy action against the Kriegsmarine.
• Originally I had intended to have a covering force of 4 RN cruisers and 6 DDs (3 Tribal and 3 J class) to play the part of the cavalry and arrive part way through the action.  However this was downsized to 2 cruisers on sober second sight when I starting laying the ships out on the table and these never made it on table.

Stacey took the Italian Side with the following forces

• the cruisers Gorizia, Trento  (both 8") and Bande Nere (6")
• 3 Soldati class DDs
• 3 Navagatori class DDSs
• Again readers might recognize this force as being approximately 1/2 of the forces from the Savos Island games.  
• Once again, the other half of the Savos Island RMI forces were intended to be on table but got downsized on reflection.

The RN arrived on the east end of the table and were intercepted by the Italians from their Northwest.  The convoy had to get across the table to exit on the west edge.  The RMI were given orders not to take serious damage, and couldn't follow off the west edge for fear of land based air on Malta.

Rules were of course GQIII and despite my rustiness, the lads made a good fight of it.  In the end the two sides closed far too close with the Italians trashing most of the escort at the cost of hull damage to 2 cruisers and several destroyers.  At this point I ruled that both sides would retreat, the convoy back to the east to fall back on the distant escort and the raiders to nurse the cruisers back to home ports.

Photos to follow…oh yes the action included a collision between two cruisers and an intention ramming attempt.

The Defeat of the Auld Enemy

I should have posted this last week.  Readers will be glad to hear that my wife took the initiative to dispatch the cabbage while I was at work and the cabbage rolls were in the oven when I came home.

The cabbage rolls were delicious and no actuaries or wargamers were injured in the process.

The Return of the Auld Enemy

Yes it's harvest time so this week at the market I got another killer cabbage for cabbage rolls.  Wish me luck as I prepare for the upcoming knife fight with the beast.

OMG An Actual Miniatures Game!

After what seems like an eon, I finally played a mini game this week.  Pics and story over at Curt's featuring his lovely SCW figs.

We took  my daughter off to Halifax to install her in residence on the Labour Day weekend.  It was a hectic week since we picked Katie up from work at 4:30 Wednesday and caught the overnight flight at 7!  We spent the week buying stuff for residence and trying to navigate narrow Halifax streets in our rent-a-mammoth SUV.  We flew out the next Wednesday so that I could stagger into class on Thursday am.

Donald Featherstone RIP

I've noted a number of blog postings this morning about the passing of Donald Featherstone at 95.  Like many others, my introduction to wargaming came from Don's books which appeared on my library records many times during my teenaged years.


On other fronts it's been a busy few weeks with family stuff, but things should return to something close to "Normal" now that the Fall semester is starting.  I played one game in the last 6 weeks, but hope to have more to blog on shortly.

Colonial or Funny Little Wars Inspiration

Quality is not great I am afraid - taken on my IPhone, it was hot and there was sangria involved!

Contrary to what some wags would say this is not the latest in Canadian Military fashion and weaponry.  Those are bolt action rifles and a MLR artillery piece dating from the 1885 Northwest Rebellion.

It's been a busy musical period in the Queen City this past 10 days.  Last Friday - Sunday it was the Folk Festival with some pretty good headliners.  We passed on this as we had McCartney tickets, but caught Neko Case and Rosanne Cash in a free set on Sunday pm and they were both wonderful.  Wednesday was Sir Paul and then yesterday was the Regina Symphony Orchestra's free outdoor concert in the park.

Which brings us to the photos above.  The concert ended (as always) with the 1812 Overture which requires things that make large booms.  Most years the RSO gets help from the Army lads (although one year they gave the audience members paper bags to burst in unison on cue).  This year however, the bangs came courtesy of the RCMP who arrived in full dress.  The RCMP has both it's training depot and its Heritage Centre (where the MLR lives) in Regina.  This is still the dress uniform and we do get to see it reasonably often in Regina - often at the airport when new officers meet their parents arriving for graduation.

Hat's off to the guys and gal, who were happy to pose for photos, interact with dogs and kids and made appropriate bangs for Mr. Tchaikovsky.  And most of all managed not to keel over from heat stroke since it was 35C with 50% humidity.  My wife and I were melting in loose cotton and the RCMP was in Red serge, leather knee high boots and leather gloves.  The only thing remotely climate appropriate was the hat which while felt at least kept the sun out of their eyes.

Anyway it was a nice afternoon out - we brought a yummy picnic including sangria and met up with our daughter after her work shift ended.