[General Slade]

Don’t strip them.  Don’t repaint them.  Stripping and cleaning up 15mm figures is a miserable task.  Badly painted troops fight just as well as well painted ones.  And if the way they look really bothers you, don’t wear your glasses when you play.

[General Slade]

I’m not really into toy soldiers either (at least not that kind of toy soldiers) but I did find it fascinating looking through what is being sold.  It is an incredible collection.  And this particular lot did introduce me to the existence of the Kerrison Predictor, something I had never heard of before:

https://auctions.dunbarsloane.co.nz/1711/catalogue/0194

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerrison_Predictor

[General Slade]

A hood and a neighbourhood?

I’ll be leaving now.

[General Slade]

But two Hoods are better than one.

I’ll get my coat.

[General Slade]

I don’t know whether it is of any interest to you Not Connard but Keep Wargaming has got a single Navwar 1/3000 HMS Hood for sale for £1.50 and their postage and packing is incredibly reasonable. Their stuff comes in a box and I think the charge is about £1.50.  I have bought loads of stuff off them over the years and their service is second to none.

https://www.keepwargaming.co.uk/navwar-13000-ww2-warships-n1152a-hms-hood-post-1941-refit-x-1-7557-p.asp

[General Slade]

Not Connard Sage wrote:

General Slade wrote:

Is French ‘light infantry blue’ actually a thing?

Nope.

I’m glad about that because I have long since repainted my light infantry in the ‘right’ colour.

[General Slade]

Is French ‘light infantry blue’ actually a thing?  I thought the idea that they wore different colour uniforms to the line just came from the notorious Osprey, ‘Napoleon’s Light Infantry’, which persuaded a generation (me included) to paint their lights in mid-blue uniforms.

[General Slade]

Jim Webster wrote:

General Slade wrote:

Mike Headden wrote:

If you have a Bren Carrier and the enemy has no armoured vehicles then MGIAT!

I’m in total agreement with this. What does MGIAT mean?

My God It’s A Tank

Excellent.  If that’s what it means I am in more than total agreement.

[General Slade]

Mike Headden wrote:

If you have a Bren Carrier and the enemy has no armoured vehicles then MGIAT!

I’m in total agreement with this.

 

 

 

 

What does MGIAT mean?

[General Slade]

Like Montgomery, I’m aware of the risks and I’m willing to accept one hundred per cent casualties.

[General Slade]

Guy Farrish wrote:

How about taking a look at that big sign in red reading: ‘Here be Dragons’ and avoid that 44 page dead end? But if you must – an armoured vehicle intended to take ground in the face of the enemy and engage and defeat enemy armour. Tracked – possibly but what about some French stuff? Turreted? – Swedish S Tanks? Irrelevant. We know a British tank when we see it. It has kit for tea making.

So we’re agreed?  A Bren Gun Carrier is a tank, right?

[General Slade]

Maybe we should decide how we are going to define ‘tank’ and work backwards (or forwards) from there?

[General Slade]

For me, the Bren Gun Carrier (or Universal Carrier if you insist) is the iconic British vehicle of WWII.  It’s not exactly a tank but they have got them in the Tank Museum and if it’s good enough for them . . .

[General Slade]

Hi Buck,

I don’t think the Kagan book is what you are looking for. I don’t have the book in front of me but from memory it deals with the diplomatic and strategic aspects of the conflict rather than the tactical.  I think it is well worth a read but I don’t think it will provide any inspiration for creating wargame scenarios at the divisional level.

Then again, it has been a long time since I read it, so hopefully someone who has read it more recently can confirm or deny this.

Best wishes

Stephen

[General Slade]

That makes sense.  I still think I would need to hire someone with a steadier hand, better eyesight and a lot more patience to succeed though.

[General Slade]

OB wrote:

Minifigs are particularly difficult to drill. I’ve never managed it successfully. However, on occasion I’ve ended up with the front of the hand removed by the drill. It is possible to file in a bit deeper so it will accommodate a spear/pike shaft. I added a micro dot of green stuff, more blue than yellow. Let it be for 1o minutes and then shaped it with a scalpel and indented for the fingers. It worked. I wouldn’t like to do it multiple times.

Nor would I.  I think it is going to be one of those things that has to wait until I win the lottery and I can afford to pay some poor unfortunate to do it for me.

The only problem is I don’t do the lottery.  But apart from that it’s a solid plan.

[General Slade]

Thanks for the link Mike6t3.  It actually includes advice specific to Minifigs.  Unfortunately, I don’t understand the technique.  The author suggests removing the top half of a spear but not the bottom half, flattening the hand with pliers and then drilling through that.  I don’t understand how you would do that with the bottom half of the spear still attached.  Or am I missing something?

[General Slade]

Deleted User wrote:

Is it the drilling hands or the piano wires that was unsuccessful?

It was the drilling I couldn’t get the hang of.  I was trying to repair some old Minifigs but the hands are pretty small in the first place, plus the shaft of the pike is often attached to the body of the figure at some point so I ended up having to carve away at the figure as well as drill the hands.  So I started with a bent pike and ended up with a total mess.

[General Slade]

Mike wrote:

Surely the amount of glue needed to make any appreciable difference would be such that the weapon looks like a blob?

That’s rather what I thought. I’m clutching at straws here because my attempts at drilling the hands of 15mm pikemen and replacing their pikes with piano wire have been totally unsuccessful.

[General Slade]

The previous heading (Leib-Uralsk Century) is about cavalry but it all comes under the main heading of ‘Leib-Garde’.  If you look at the next sub-heading –  ‘Metalwork’ – Pavlovsk miter plates are mentioned, which is clearly a reference to infantry.  Also, the cavalry were armed with carbines not muskets and, as far as I am aware, the cavalry regiments didn’t have centre and flank companies as such (though lancer regiments did have a small number of men on each flank who were armed with rifled carbines).

[General Slade]

I assumed this only referred to light infantry regiments (or were you making a joke and I missed the point? – always a possibility).

[General Slade]

I haven’t played them but the Perfect Captain website offers a set of rules designed specifically for hoplite warfare: http://perfectcaptain.50megs.com/hoplomachia.html

[General Slade]

Thank you so much for making this available.  Reading the history of ‘ Hyboria – the campaign that grew’ in Military Modelling was my introduction to wargaming and it is still the kind of wargames campaign I aspire to running one day (I don’t suppose I ever will but a guy can dream).

[General Slade]

I’m actually always interested in hearing about the mechanics and find it a bit frustrating when the AAR just provides a narrative without reflecting on how the rules determined the outcomes.

[General Slade]

Damn!  Now I’ve got to repaint half my cavalry!

[General Slade]

Not Connard Sage wrote:

1. General Slade wrote:

   Aurore is definitely Vallejo German Orange. That’s the colour on the shabraques and holster covers of my Grenadiers à Cheval so I would say that is definitive. Mind you, the jury is still out on Polish crimson . . .

It’s deep pink. Humbrol Authenticolours can’t be wrong!

This is true. Otherwise they wouldn’t be allowed to call it ‘authentic’. But I use acrylics these days and finding a perfect match for the Humbrol version is proving a lifetime’s work.   At present I favour Gamecraft Coral but I would feel much more confident if they had called it Polish Crimson:

And why couldn’t they call their dark green ‘French Dragoon Green’ so I could be sure I was using the right colour?

[General Slade]

Aurore is definitely Vallejo German Orange.  That’s the colour on the shabraques and holster covers of my Grenadiers à Cheval so I would say that is definitive.

Mind you, the jury is still out on Polish crimson . . .

[General Slade]

Not Connard Sage wrote:

And what hue is aurore anyway?

That’s an easy one.  It’s Vallejo German Orange:

[General Slade]

Hi Bandit,

The position of flag bearers in Russian battalions was covered in detail on TMP a few years back and ‘Le Breton’, who posted most of the information, certainly seems to know his stuff:

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=451338

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=478396

I am interested in the idea that the Austrians placed their standards at either end of the line.  Are you at liberty to reveal a source for that?  A while ago I tried to discover which company in an Austrian combined grenadier battalion carried the colours but I came up blank on that one.  I thought it would probably either be troops from the battalion commander’s regiment or those from the numerically senior regiment. However, at the time I asked even Dave Hollins, an expert in all things Austrian, wasn’t able to help me on that one (it was a while ago though so he may have uncovered something since).

Edit:  Here is a link to a discussion on the subject. It turns out Mr Hollins gave me rather more information than I remembered and it seems likely that the standard bearer came from the same regiment as the battalion commander.

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/generaldebrigadefr/viewtopic.php?p=35756#p35756

[General Slade]

That is a very good-looking dinosaur.  I think I might need one of those.  I’m not sure what I’ll do with it but that doesn’t stop me needing it.

[General Slade]

Hi Jim, I really enjoyed your article and found it inspiring. I also had the John Tunstill and Tony Bath books (sadly the Tunstill book has long-since disintegrated – the spines on those Shire books weren’t in it for the long haul) but I wasn’t familiar with Bill Lamming’s Medieval Campaign and Battle Rules.  However, I have tracked down a copy and it is winging its way to me.

[General Slade]

I have never actually played Warhammer but I have heard Bob Mortimer discussing it with football manager Roy Hodgson.  Liberal use of the F and C words so don’t click on the link if you are a child or are at work or are a child at work:

[General Slade]

I ought to be able to answer that question because I have read Kagan’s book and it is very good.  Unfortunately, I read it fifteen years ago and the memory is not what it might be.  From what I recall Mack was inept but he received precious little support from leading elements in the Austrian high command because they thought he was a bit common and so wanted to see him fail.  Plus, Archduke Charles was going round telling everyone ‘we’re all doomed’, which can’t have done much for morale.  Then, that Napoleon chap moved much faster than anyone expected – so it wasn’t so much that the Russians turned up late as the French turned up early.

At least, that’s how I remember it – which might not be how it happened.

[General Slade]

It’s working in this corner of Blighty.

[General Slade]

Thanks Mike,

That works for me.  Hopefully Jonathan will be able to find a new host soon.  It is a wonderful site and I refer to it often.

[General Slade]

Now it’s disappeared again for me and I’m getting the same message as you Mike.

[General Slade]

It’s working for me again, both going from Greystreak’s link and my old bookmark.

[General Slade]

It must be something like that because I could call up the page successfully two minutes ago but it has now disappeared completely.

[General Slade]

It’s still there.  You just need to click on the link at the top of the landing page.  Or you can go directly to the page here: https://kiver.000webhostapp.com/allfacings.html

Edit: That’s odd – when I click on my own lick the page isn’t there.  But I can still get it when I use the book mark in my browser or click on the link at the top of Greystreak’s link.

Another edit: Now I can’t get it at all.

 

[General Slade]

I don’t think I really have managed to answer my own question because I still don’t understand how they went about reducing the number of companies. For example, were men retrained and re-uniformed in order to expand the flank companies?  Usually, in a British battalion the light company would make up one-tenth of the numbers but here it may be that the light company formed a sixth of the battalion.

I think in most Napoleonic armies companies were administrative rather than tactical because in the field the battalion had to be divided into sections of equal numbers in order to manoeuvre.  For example, the six company KGL battalions would presumably be using the same drill as when they were ten company battalions and in order to do this I think they would both have been broken up into the same number of sub-sections.

[Author]

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