New Sharp Practice Army Lists

So with the kind help of Richard Clarke of Too Fat Lardies fame, I've managed to put together army lists for the South American Wars of Liberation to go with the realease of the wonderful new set of rules "Sharp Practice 2."  The list give you many variations for both Patriot and Royalist forces fighting in the Northern Campaigns of Simon Bolivar in Colombia and Venezuela (1817 - 1824)

You can find them here:

http://toofatlardies.co.uk/blog/?p=5829

Coming up next will be photos of the two armies from these lists and some first games.

I have some new figures out

If anyone is interested, they can view some new figures that I have released, over at my Orinoco Minatures blog: http://orinoco-miniatures.blogspot.cz/2016/02/llaneros-and-other-packs-now-available.html

If I have time, I'll try and get some painted up for the Analogue Hobbies Painting challenge.

What can we expect in 2015

Well January flew by in a flash. I thought I would have a brief review of 2014 already posted up by now. Needless to say, 2014 turned out different to plans. Lots of things didn't get off the ground, blogging slowed to a halt, and painting virtually evaporated. Though there were a few positives, such as Chain of Command, which proved to be a great discovery, along with getting a British and (soon to be) Soviet platoons painted up late in the day.

The Analogue Painting challenge was entered, with a less ambitious target, though even that may prove elusive, given the hours I'm putting in at work. A few entries have gone in already with more on the way.

The good news though is that I now have another large batch of figures for Orinoco miniatures ready for release (peasant militia, and more Gran Colombians). With these and a few ancillary packs soon to be completed, I hope to have all the figures to put on a key battle from the Wars of Liberation (below you can see the very first preview of some of the new figures).

Putting on the Battle of Ayacucho is the ultimate aim, but for this year it will probably be one of the smaller battles in the north for the liberation of either Venezuela, or New Granada/Colombia.

In regard to battlefields visits, I did manage one very interesting walk during a short working holiday to Crete in September (that is, the family were on the beach, while I sat in the apartment and worked). I'll get round to writing it up, along with several overdue posts on other battlefields I've visited (including Vimeiro, Bussaco, Rolica, as well as the Italian front battlefields from WW1).

I also paid a visit to the Hussite's main town of Tabor, and actually got to bump into a bunch of them celebrating their 600th anniversary in Prague! (Indeed the Hussites are alive and well in Bohemia. Thankfully time has mellowed them a tad, so all we saw was some small Hussite jazz ensemble, which was a very absurd moment.)

On the up side, the stalwarts that are the Prague Wargames Club, proved to be as reliable as ever, and a constant source of new ideas and hobby inspiration. From a humble start back in 2003 when myself and a friend (Nick Dorell) tried to kick off a few games at a small table in a local hobby shop, we now have nearly 30 members, and a permanent clubhouse.
Plenty of games were held during the year, my personal favourites being some Mud and Blood battles from 1914 (the "Race to the Sea" scenario). 

Also, it was great fun getting to grips with Chain of Command; really and excellent set of rules.

The large summer Napoleonic game was also a winner. The good news is that we will attempt most of the Waterloo battle in 15mm using the "General de Brigade" rules in the summer.

So plans for what's left of 2015, well a house move is still on the cards, as are more figures for my Orinoco range. The Auterlitz/Slavkov battle may yet see the light of day in a smaller format, as with the South American Liberation Wars battle. Certainly more games would be welcome, especially Chain of Command. I'm also intrigued by the recent WW1 adaptation of these rules, and scenarios for the Kaiserschlacht campaign of 1918. As for more blogging, let's hope.

As usual, we'll be going on our annual pilgrimage to Salute again this year with other from the Prague Club. Salute 2014 was excellent, and the bloggers meet up as enjoyable as ever. So obviously I'm looking forward meeting some of you again this year at Salute.

Painting Challenge - The Final Push

So now we nearly are down to the last week of the Painting Challenge, and the final push to get myself over the 1000 Points mark. Arrayed on the table are enough in-progress figures to get me over the finish line. I won't say more about them until the photos are submitted to Curt.

I also have a tray of half-finished figures from my Orinoco range, though I doubt they will be done in time. I'll take more time with them for a photo shoot later in the month. Wish me luck.

Chaco War photo shoot

Just trying out a new setup with the new miniature photo studio, a bit of terrain and the new Chaco war figures. The idea is to try and represent the "Green Hell" of the Chaco Boreal, which was dry jungle, scrub and cactii. I took these snaps about 20 minutes ago. I hope you like them.

New Chaco War figures

  

Just to let you know, a new range of 28mm figures have been released by Orinoco Miniatures. You can read more about them on the Orinoco Miniatures Blog

 

I think the war is really facinating and has great wargaming potential. Anyway, I hope you like the figures.

Happy Christmas / Vesele Vanoce 2013

Happy Christmas to all from a sunny, but misty and cold Prague. We're just back from a stroll by the river in the centre of town with the in-laws, and of course some welcome hot wine. Now at home and preparing the traditional Czech Christmas day dinner of carp (but salmon for me as I can't abide carp - a dreadful fish). (Given the context, all the Christmas card images are from the Czechoslovak Legion when in Russia).

Then it's Irish Christmas Day tomorrow, so the kids get a great deal with two Christmas Days (but not two rounds of presents...).

It's been a great year for painting and other figure adventures. I'm looking forward to 2014, more new figures (on the Orinoco front), and getting on with the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. We'll see which of last year's resolutions get completed before year's end, and see what's realistic to commit to for 2014.

So best wishes and seasons greetings to all who happen to stumble across this blog from time-to-time, and may your lead mountains continue to dwindle :-)

New Spanish Infantry with an ink wash

As promised, here are the new Spanish Infantry after an ink wash to bring out the details. I'll be painting these beauties up for the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. I hope you like them.

The figures can be purchased directly from our webstore here:  

http://www.orinoco-miniatures.com/

More "ammunition" for the Painting Challenge

So the Czech Post Office has been busy this week. Various reinforcements for the painting challenge arrived during the week. I was especially pleased to get some inter-war tanks and tankettes from Warlord Games. Above you can see the Vickers  twin-turreted tank and two Carden-Lloyd tankettes (the fore-runner to the Bren Carrier).

 Also, thanks to the boys and girls at UPS (below), I received a large 17kg box of metal loveliness from my casting service. This includes nearly 1000 figures for the new Spanish packs from my South American Wars of Independence range. I'll ink up some of these and post up the pictures later on so that you can see the detail. Needless to say there will be a lot of these painted for the challenge (along with British Legion and Gran Colombians).

I also received two large packs of some new figures I've had produced. These will be launched in the coming weeks as I don't want to muddy my marketing waters with too many releases at the same time. I think it will be a range that people will find slightly unusual but I believe will like (from a fascinating conflict). Any guesses... :-)

Now I am just looking forward to getting started. I'm still painting stuff, but this is not challenge related as I have to get images from the figures range up on the website, so you'll see a few painted shots of the new figures over the next week. Roll on 15th December!

New figures from Orinoco Miniatures, and new wargame scenarios

If anyone is interested, over on my Orinoco Miniatures blog you can find details of new 28mm Spanish figures which will be released tomorrow. I hope you like them. There will also follow news of another exiting range next week.

Also on the blog I have started the first of what will be several wargames scenarios for the South American Wars of Independence. These are primarily for use with the General de Brigade rules, but are easily adaptable for any other early 19th century/Napolenic rulesets, as the tactics and formations used were all Napoleonic, and many of the veterans in both armies had fought in the Napoleonic wars a few years before. The first is for the Battle of Sombrero (1818) between Simon Bolivar's Patriots and the Spanish Royalist Army. The next scenario should follow in a week and will be the battle of Vargas swamp (1819), part of Bolivar's campaign in New Granada (present day Colombia).

The figures can be purchased directly from our webstore here:  

http://www.orinoco-miniatures.com/

Getting ready for the Analogue Hobbies challenge

I thought I'd just post a quick update on the priming orgy that's going on in Wilde Goose Mansions at the moment. A nice rule, that is, in the challenge, where all the figures can be prepped and primed before the painting onslaught begins on 15th December.  Prepping is a chore at the best of times, so it's good that this can be dealt with beforehand, and not spoil the painting mojo.

I have put myself down for 1000 points which works out at about 200 x 28mm figures. Now as part of our project to run a small Battle of Austerlitz scenario, I already have about 6 battalions of Austrians and 12 battalions of French (plus artillery) to paint up, so this would easily get me over my quota.

Into the mix I've thrown a side project of late WW1 Brits and Germans, which I'd also like to get finished. I also have quite a lot of the Orinoco Miniatures figures primed, but I aim to paint some of these up before the competition (for marketing purposes), the rest will be painted during the competition.

Now I've been fiddling around for a few months trying to find a decent approach to taking photos of miniatures at home. Needless to say, I am not happy with the results of my efforts. So below is an experimental purchase that I hope will allow my figures to see the light of a decent photograph, and be used for all the painting challenge submissions... wish me luck.