Bolt Action Battle Report: Winter War Meeting Engagement

I finally had my first game of Bolt Action recently, after years of wanting to give it a try. My friend Seamus agreed to show me the ropes using the Winter War forces I have painted. It worked out to about 630 points on each side, made up entirely of infantry. I fielded the Finns and Seamus commanded the inexperienced Soviet horde. We played the fairly straightforward Meeting Engagement scenario out of the rulebook. In this scenario, any forces not held in reserve would move onto the table in the first turn, and one victory point would be scored for each enemy unit destroyed. It turned out to be a pretty exciting and dramatic battle. Have a look below to see how it went.

Warlord Games plastic Soviet Infantry painted for Winter War

Back when I pre-ordered my copy of the 2nd edition Bolt Action rule book, Warlord Games were giving away a free box of infantry with pre-orders. Unfortunately the Winter Soviet Infantry weren't an option, so I went with the regular Soviet Infantry box. I figured, given the supply difficulties the Soviets had at the start of the Winter War, it would be fine to have a couple units in the army without greatcoats. A lot of the options in the box aren't useful for a Winter War force, but I tried to get the most I could out of it, mixing in some extra heads I had from the Baker Company Winter War Kickstarter.

What I ended up with is three units. I made one unit of 12 in padded jackets and helmets, including a light machine gun. I made one unit of twelve in caps, a few with molotov cocktails. This will act as the "free" unit of green infantry with anti-tank grenades allowed in the Soviet army list. I also made one unit of NKVD border guard with three sub-machine guns. Have a look at the results below and let me know what you think.

Leven Miniatures 6mm ACW Buildings

I recently finished painting up a few 6mm resin American Civil War buildings produced by Leven Miniatures. I bought mine from The Wargaming Company booth at the Little Wars Convention.

Since my American Civil War miniatures are 10mm, the 6mm buildings do represent something of a compromise between the figure scale and the ground scale. Because of this they look too small for the figures, but take up a more reasonable amount of space on the table. I thought 10mm buildings would just take up too much space and dominate the rest of the terrain. Even with 6mm buildings, obviously each building needs to represent more than one building given the amount of ground it takes up. For convenience, I intend each building to represent enough buildings to be occupied by one regiment during a game.

I think the end result looks pretty good, given that there is almost always going to be this compromise between figure scale and ground scale for buildings. Even playing games in say 28mm where each figure represents an individual, buildings tend to be in scale when it comes to height, but take up a much smaller footprint than the actual building would.

This was my first time painting small scale buildings, and it was a challenge. I'm sure there are just some different techniques that could be used to make small scale buildings look a lot better than these, but I'm not sure what they are. Below you can see some pictures of the newly painted buildings along with some of my roads, fields, and an infantry regiment. Have a look and let me know what you think of the painting and the scale difference.

Black Powder American Civil War Battle Report: Daybreak at Hangman's Creek

I finally got around to trying out the American Civil War scenario from the Black Powder rulebook. Daybreak at Hangman's Creek sees a small Confederate division advancing on the town of Hangman's Creek at dawn. A small Union division is in the area, but they are not expecting trouble and most of them start off the table. All of the Union officers start in the town, and they will have to scramble to get their brigades moved up and deployed once they realize they are under attack. To the Union left of the town is a large Union camp. To the right, across the river, is a gun foundry. The Confederate objective is to capture the camp, town, or gun foundry, with a greater victory earned by capturing two or all three of them.

At the start of the game, one Union regiment is deployed in skirmish order in the fields north of town. They are allowed one free initiative move each turn until they are given an order, but the Union commanders (in the town) are not allowed to issue any orders or move until the alarm is raised. The alarm is raised at the end of any turn in which any unit fires or fights a round of close combat. The Confederates split their forces to attack all three objectives at once. They will need to advance quickly on their objectives before the Union officers have a chance to organize a proper defense if they are to secure victory.

Baker Company Winter War Soviets First Wave

My first batch of Baker Company Winter War Soviets (from their long-ago Kickstarter campaign) are finally finished. Below you can see pictures of the finished first wave (consisting of 6 squads of 10 infantry each and an officer with three infantrymen accompanying) plus two commissars and a standard bearer from the second wave of stretch goal extras. If you're interested in how I painted them, you can find all the details in my previous post: Painting Winter War Soviets. I came up with a pretty quick method that allowed me to paint this many infantry relatively (for me) quickly. Since what is pictured only amounts to about 600 some odd points for Bolt Action, I still have quite a lot more painting to do, including all the other Kickstarter extras. Let me know what you think so far.

HMGS MidWest Little Wars 2017 Convention

I attended the Little Wars 2017 convention in Lombard Illinois on April 28th. Unfortunately I was only able to attend on the convention on Friday. There were a lot of events I was interested in scheduled for Saturday and Sunday as well that I had to miss out on. Even so, was able to play in two games: a Hail Caesar game of Romans vs Britons, and a Black Powder game of Poles vs Russians set during the Polish uprising of 1794. And I found some bargains in the dealer hall and flea market. I also took some pictures of the other games that were set up Friday morning. Have a look below for my general pictures of other games, followed by pictures of the two games I played with details of the how the games went.

Painting Winter War Soviets

I have finalized my process for painting my Winter War Soviet infantry. There are a lot of steps, but most of them go very quickly and don't require careful painting or much skill, so I was able to get my infantry painted relatively quickly using this process. The paints I used are mostly out of print Citadel paint colors, but hopefully by looking at the pictures below for each stage you can figure out an equivalent color to use, if you want to follow a similar process.

Here is the full list of steps. Further down I have close up pictures showing the results of applying each step. The order can be changed around on some of the steps, and they are actually in a slightly different order in the pictures. I primed some of the models white and some grey, and it didn't seem to make much difference, so either is fine.

1. Codex Grey - basecoat greatcoats, equipment, M27 caps, bases
2. Adeptus Battlegrey - basecoat black boots and rifle metal
3. Fortress Grey - wet brush greatcoats, M27 caps, and equipment
4. Fortress Grey - highlight boots, rifle metal
5. Skull White - dry brush greatcoats, M27 caps
6. Mechrite Red - paint collar diamond patches and cap patches
7. Nuln Oil - wash coat, cap, rifle metal, black boots, and bases
8. Calthan Brown - basecoat belt, ammo pouches, rifle wood, blanket roll, gloves, entrenching tool handle, brown ankle boots, khaki pants/puttees/helmets, and NCO fleece cap (this is the hardest step, and I actually broke it up into multiple steps when painting up 30 of these guys at a time)
9. Desert Yellow - edge highlight rifle wood, wet brush gloves, blanket roll, brown ankle boots, khaki
10. Bleached Bone - paint rifle straps, dry brush khaki and cap fur
11. Devlan Mud - wash blanket roll, gloves, rifle wood, belts, ammo pouches, and brown ankle boots
12. Sea green (don't know the actual name of this paint) - wet brush backpack, gas mask case and straps, bottle cover, and entrenching tool cover (don't forget the straps around the blanket roll)
13. Athonian Camoshade - wash backpack, gas mask case and straps, bottle cover, entrenching tool cover, and khaki
14. Tallarn Flesh - basecoat faces
15. Elf Flesh - wet brush faces
16. Dwarf Flesh - paint lower lips
17. Chainmail - paint cup, rifle bolts, and belt buckles
18. White - paint eyes
19. Black - dot eyes

Baker Company Winter War Finns First Wave

My first batch of Baker Company Winter War Finns (from their long-ago Kickstarter campaign) are finished. The sculpts aren't great, and I think some of the casting on these was rushed and they suffered some issues as a result. However, I did get a lot of Finns and Soviets for my money. Below you can see pictures of my first batch of Finns, consisting mostly of the basic infantry squads with a few extra things thrown in. There's still much more to do. I came up with a painting method that was pretty fast so I could batch paint these to a decent enough standard fairly quickly. If you're interested, you can see all the details of my paint scheme in a previous blog post: Painting Winter War Finns.

Unfortunately, the pictures didn't turn out great. I don't know if it has to do with the lighting, or how much white is on the miniatures, or more likely the glare from the transparent bases. Many of the pictures came out dark and a bit blue-ish. I'm not sure how to fix that, but hopefully these give a decent impression of the results I got with my batch painting method.

Painting Winter War Finns

I have finalized my process for painting my Winter War Finnish infantry. There are a lot of steps, but most of them go very quickly and don't require careful painting or much skill, so I was able to get my infantry painted relatively quickly using this process. There are also some steps (like numbers 14 and 20-24) that could be left out without making too much difference from a distance, but I thought they added enough to the overall look to be worth the little time they took. The paints I used are mostly out of print Citadel paint colors, but hopefully by looking at the pictures below for each stage you can figure out an equivalent color to use, if you want to follow a similar process.

Here is the full list of steps. Further down I have close up pictures showing the results of applying each step.

1. Chaos Black - undercoat/basecoat everywhere
2. Adeptus BattleGrey - paint winter camouflage coat/pants and helmets, hats, gloves, black boots, bases, and NCO pants, leaving black in recesses
3. Fortress Grey - wet brush winter camouflage coat/pants, leaving some Astronomicon Grey at edges (AVOID boots, bases, gloves, hats, and NCO pants)
4. Fortress Grey - edge highlight black boots
5.  Codex Grey - dry brush NCO pants, black gloves, and cloth hats
6. Codex Grey - edge highlight cloth hats
7. Skull White - lightly wet brush winter camouflage coat/pants, leaving some grey at edges
8. Catachan Green - basecoat bread bags and straps
9. Salamander Green - paint helmets, paint wide stripe on NCO pants
10. Tallarn Flesh - basecoat faces
11. Gretchin Green - wet brush bread bags and their straps
12. Badab Black - wash black boots, bases, black gloves, helmets
13. Elf Flesh - highlight/wet brush faces
14. Dwarf Flesh - paint lower lips
15. Calthan Brown - basecoat rifle wood, brown leather boots, belts, mittens, and rifle straps
16. Calthan Brown - wet brush ammo pouches, beards, hair, and cap fur
17. Desert Yellow - wet brush/highlight rifle wood, brown leather boots, leather pouches, mittens
18. Bleached Bone - highlight/dry brush mittens, wet brush rifle straps, beards, and cap fur
19. Ogryn Flesh - wash rifle wood, brown leather boots, ammo pouches
20. Adeptus BattleGrey - highlight gun metal and bayonets, paint helmet straps
21. Chainmail - paint cap buttons, edges of bayonets, rifle bolts
22. Skull White - paint cap badges and eyes
23. Sky Blue - dot center of cap badges
24. Chaos Black - dot eyeballs

Black Powder American Civil War Battle Report: Surprise in the Forest

A Union division and a Confederate division approach each other cautiously through a vast woodland. Each commander is performing a reconnaissance in force, probing the wilderness for signs of the enemy. As such they don't know where they will encounter the enemy or in what strength. In addition to seeing off any enemy they encounter, they will be well served by occupying and holding onto any tactically valuable positions in anticipation of a potential escalation in the fighting.

Simple 10mm Roads and Fields

I have needed some dirt roads and farm fields for my 10mm American Civil War games for a while now, but I generally find it hard to get excited about making terrain. With my limited hobby time, I didn't want to spend a ton of time making roads and fields. However, I really needed some to make convincing layouts for my games, so I decided to just try something really simple and see how it turned out.

I had a lot of felt stored up, in green and a few different shades of brown. So I figured I'd see what I could do by just starting with that as a base. With very little time or effort, I ended up with something that looks convincing enough. Not only was it quick, it was also easy enough that my almost 3 year old daughter could help with it, which meant I could actually find the time to do it.

Black Powder - Glory, Hallelujah! review

Since the release of Black Powder by Warlord Games, I've been using it to play games set in the American Civil War without difficulty. Still, I was looking forward to the release of their American Civil War supplement book, "Glory, Hallelujah!". I was interested to see how they suggested handling some of the defining aspects of the war that aren't particularly reflected in the main rules. These aspects include the different role of cavalry, presence of river gunboats, susceptibility of brigade and even division commanders to falling casualty, and varying sizes of artillery batteries (some 4 guns, some 6) and infantry regiments (which could vary greatly in size). Also, having more scenarios never hurts, though I already have plenty of scenarios I haven't played yet from other sources.

Black Powder American Civil War Battle Report: Blow the Bridge

A Union infantry division under Major General Winfield Scott Hancock has been sent to secure a strategically important bridge. The Confederate army on the other side of the river is not ready for an engagement, and needs time to either redeploy and dig in or evacuate. They have sent Major General James Longstreet with two brigades of infantry to delay the Federal advance and blow the bridge. The Union division arrives before the explosives are ready, and now the Confederates must scramble to delay the Union advance long enough to blow the vital river crossing.

4Ground pre-painted MDF Russian Rural Cottage

I saw this pre-painted MDF building kit from 4Ground on sale, and decided to take the opportunity to give MDF terrain a try. This was my first MDF terrain kit, and I was interested to see how easy it would be to assemble, and what level of detail was possible. Read on for more pictures, assembly tips, and my review of the kit.

Horse and Musket Bolt Action - with Cavalry Rules

I've taken a first pass at writing some cavalry rules for a Horse and Musket era version of Bolt Action. I have also cleaned up some of the other rules to make them more clear, and included it all below so everything is in one place.

Cavalry

Cavalry models act the same as Infantry except as noted below.
Cavalry can mount or dismount using 6" of movement. While mounted, the following rules apply:

• Orders: They cannot go Down voluntarily. They can perform an escape move when assaulted by infantry, like a recce vehicle.
• Movement: They can Advance 12" and Run 24". They cannot enter buildings. They ignore obstacles, unless deemed impassible to Cavalry.
• Shooting: Shooting attacks against them receive a +1 to hit modifier. They suffer a -1 penalty to hit rolls when shooting while mounted. When firing on the move (with an Advance order), the only weapons they can fire are those that have the Cavalry type. The only weapons they can reload while mounted are those with the Cavalry type.
• Assault: Assault damage rolls against them receive a -1 penalty. They cannot benefit from using two assault weapons together.

Horse and Musket version of Bolt Action

I was thinking lately that I don't want to have to learn a lot of different sets of rules for playing different historical periods at the same scale/level of game. That will only discourage me from getting miniatures in new periods that I don't have rules for. So I'm thinking about adapting the Warlord Games "Bolt Action" World War 2 rules to earlier periods, such as the "Horse and Musket" era, approximately 1700-1900 AD. Before getting into my specific modifications, here are some things in Bolt Action that I think need to be addressed.

1. The long reload time of muzzle loading weapons needs to be represented.
2. Rifled weapons should be more accurate than smoothbore.
3. In Bolt Action, the roll to cause damage is based on the training level of the target, which I don't think makes sense for Horse and Musket periods. Aside from being behind cover, which is already represented by cover modifiers, I don't think soldiers were trained to avoid being shot.
4. I want to be able to represent some troop types being slightly better or worse at shooting, or slightly better or worse in assault. In Bolt Action, most individuals are pretty much equal in offensive ability, but I want Grenadiers to be better in an assault than Militia, for example.
5. Assaults should probably be less instantly decisive. With the need to reload most weapons after one shot, there wouldn't be as much shooting at point blank range to end things quickly. Having to beat each other with rifle butts might cause an assault to drag on longer.
6. There needs to be some detailed rules for cavalry. I don't think cavalry is addressed in the Bolt Action rules, though there may be rules for it in one of the army book supplements. Even if there are some cavalry rules, they probably aren't to the level of detail that would be desired in a game where cavalry would be more important and prevalent.

If you can think of other areas where the Bolt Action rules might need to be altered or amended, let me know. I think those six points cover most of what needs to change, at a minimum. With the exception of cavalry rules, which I'm not sure about yet, I think all of those points can be covered with a few simple rules change, a few modifiers, and some new weapon and unit stats. My proposed changes are listed below.

Painted GHQ 10mm Civil War Confederate Stonewall Brigade Regiments

I recently finished the last two regiments I needed to complete my 10mm Confederate Stonewall Brigade. These will represent the 5th Virginia and 27th Virginia Infantry Regiments. Those designations are basically arbitrary, though. I haven't labelled the units in any way, so they could really be any Confederate regiments, except that one of them has a Virginia state flag. The pictures are below. As always, click the pictures for larger versions.

Black Powder American Civil War Battle Report

The Confederate Division under Major General James Longstreet has successfully held their position on the battlefield, while unfortunately the rest of the Confederate army has fallen back. The swift but somewhat disorganized Union pursuit of the fleeing Confederates has put Longstreet's division in danger of being cut off from the rest of the army. They currently find themselves surrounded by Union forces, and must attempt to break out and re-join their retreating army. The game was played using the Breakout Scenario I have previously posted on this blog.

Black Powder American Civil War Battle Report

The Story
This was a pretty simple concept. Forward elements of the Union and Confederate armies have encountered each other, and both are now rushing to claim the best ground before the enemy can take it. There is a large hill between the two forces that is the obvious choice, so both sides are attempting to control the hill and drive off the enemy. It turned out to be a very dramatic and fast-paced game that came right down to the wire.

Painted 10mm GHQ Confederate Stonewall Brigade Regiments

Today I've just got some pictures of two recently finished regiments to add to my Confederate Stonewall brigade. The miniatures are 10mm GHQ from the pack "Marching in Shell Jacket & Forage Cap (CSA)", with some command figures from other packs. I still have two more regiments to finish before my Stonewall Brigade is complete. I've already done the Rockbridge Artillery and General "Stonewall" Jackson himself.