Vietnam Ford Mutt and Update

As you know from the previous post, our family life made a nasty turn last Christmas, disrupting our normal routine and curtailing my time (and appetite) for wargaming activities. Not that the situation is now solved (the doctors remain cautious about my father in law illness) but we are slowly adapting our lives at home to the new environment.

Epiphany Day Presents

This post was written early this morning, when the news broke that mother in-law has suffered early today a brain-stroke, at this time we don't know her condition; this follow the cancer surgery undertaken by my father in-law just before Christmas Eve, with an unclear diganosis right now, and probably the stress that my mother in-law underwnt explains the stroke. This situation is causing a significant disruption to our family and therefore it is very likely that this is my last post for an extended period, as I will have to take a break in my wargaming life for an unknown time. Not good-bye but hopefully "hasta pronto". 

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Despite the increasing "americanization" of our country, I'm yet resisting to wipe out totally the Epiphany Day (January 6th) at home, the traditional date in Spain to exchange the Christmas gifts. This year on Christmas Eve I got some Vietnam reinforcements but now the theatre of operations moved to the first half of the 20th century and got a box with three 1/72 Hanomags from the Plastic Soldier Company...

A Young Padawan Joins the Dark Side...

"Ha,ha, ha" (throaty laughter heard in the background).
"My evil plan looks working and the young Padawan is irresistibly attracted by Dark Side ...of the hobby"

Yes!!! I tempted my son with a basic box of X-Wing on Christmas Day and finally yesterday we spent the full New Year Day afternoon fighting against each other in a far away galaxy... and he really enjoyed the experience, to the extent that we have another game scheduled this afternoon.

Little Luke Skywalker chasing Imperial baddies

First "wargame" for Alex, and a great victory to the father, considering that I have to fight vs Black Ops in the PS3 and the Magic cards addiction.

Seriously, I'm very happy with the experience. The game is really good and visually engaging. He very quickly grabbed an understanding of the main game mechanisms and, after the second game, he started developing some tactical sense of the game on his own. In fact I won the las game by a very short margin and after a very lucky last move: with only one of my Imperial Tie fighters on the table, and 1 hit point away from being defeated, I managed to put my ship on his flank and put a blast of my laser guns on him and ... kha-boom!!

Hopefully, a historical wargame would be the next step in the ladder. Now, for the expansion kits and deep space matt to play on it.    

Happy 2013 and New Year Resolutions

With just a few hours away in Europe to conclude 2012, I'd like to wish my fellow world wargamers and bloggers a most fruitful and successful 2013... and for the rest of mortals, hopefully some enlightment to the gang of useless politicians governing our countries (not just talking about mine, but overall). As for my resolutions and projects, I aim this new year at a twofold objective: to consolidate some of the wargaming activity developed in 2012 and to start at least one specific project.

Probably not very ambitious, but surely there will be new temptations arising along the way: the dark side of señor Clarke from TooFatLardies makes him unpredictable, and he's already tempting me with a revised "Algeron", a WWI plane game rules, and the long awaited "Chain of Command", the platoon-sized WWII rules to replace the ageing Troops, Weapons and Tactics that should be ready "before Easter" ...hopefully of 2013, although he did not make a specific statement :-)

Gallipoli Campaign # 1 - Red Beach

In the heels of the very successful Stalingrad campaign, my wargaming group is now undertaken another major project around the campiagn in Gallipoli. The first game of the campaign was played on Friday night but quite unfortunately I could not attend due some family committment. For this hgame we are using the WWI rules "Through the Mud & the Blood" from the TooFatLardies factory with some adaptations to the historical context of the game.

This game started with the landing of a contingent of Australian troops aiming to secure a beachhead from where to launch the offensive into Turkish territory. Despite facing some low quality units, the news I got from the battle indicate that the first Australian waves were mowed down by the deadly fire of the Turkish HMGs, tainting the snad in red... although the following waves are starting to consolidate a foothold in the contested beach.
The next game is scheduled for Friday January 11th. I leave you now with a nice recollection of photos from the battle yesterday.

German Platoon Command Vehicle

I did not have anything specific planned for Christmas on the wargaming side, but the campaign of Vyazma or Bust has triggered my appetite to paint some more early war German vehicles and figures to reinforce my troops. These are the last additions, a Platoon command vehicle SdKfz 251/10...

 

... with a Pak 36 on top. This is an old Esci model that has been lying around since the early 80s. The kit is generally OK except for the tracks.

I aslo made some progress with a flamethrower stand, that will be attached to a combat pioneer unit in the near future, and tank-hunting team 

 I need now to work on the bases for the ATG team and the Hanomag. I also need to find a nice command figure to ride on the half track. Im the meantime I continue with the painful rebasing work (... the wargamer's curse)

Taking Stock of 2012

Following this post by Dux Homunculorum, and with the year about to close, it is a good momment to assess my performance as wargamer  in 2012 vs the initial plans. True that I wasn't too ambitious in my targets for this year, as my main and only objective was to start playing with IABSM... target accomplished  but I failed miserably in terms of both timing (I started with the rules only in November) and specially with the period  played (I was planning to concentrate my playing time around the Spanish Civil War period, and I finally ended focusing on the early WWII Eastern Front period).

However reviewing my blog, I can only express my satisfaction with my achievements over this period. The five most relevant personal aspects, hobby wise in 2012:

1. Vietnam engagement: top in the list just by browsing in the blog and all thanks to Charlie Don't Surf, so far (at least for me) the best rules set released by the TooFatLardies factory. In this year I have consolidated a nicely devoted group of players at my club, and significantly expanded my armies (the last batch of reinforcements arrived on Christmas day!). I also built a nice library of Vietnam related reading that you can consult in my Shelfari link (at the blog's left column) or reding in this post. 
2. I Ain't Being Shot Mum: a late start but gaining momentum, it has  revived my appetite for WWII and new reinforcements are coming ...as well as forcing me to undertake some nasty rebasing work of my old BK Commander stands :-(
3. Salute: meeting face to face many bloggers and  Richard Clarke, one of TFL's brains, was really good. Visiting some of the military museums with my club mates and friends... had no price.
4. Maurice: another major discovery in 2012, for a period (XVIII century) that always attracted me but never found the right moment to play. I'm not planning to do any painting job as many of club mates have beautiful armies already, but I will keep playing in 2013.
5. Dark Ages: the publication of both "Duxes" this year attracted a lot of my attention and I even invested some money in one British-Romano army; the project has lost steam but it is a clear candidate for a revival in 2013. The book published by TFL, Dux Britanniarum, in particular is a joy to read and the rules hooked me from the very first moment I started reading it,  similarly to what happened when I bought Charlie Don't Surf.