The cutting of the corners

   Hobby time has been rarer than purple hydra droppings of late, I have however managed to grab a quick half hour to conduct a little experiment.

 First I think a small sprinkle from the shower hose of context may be in order. As all three of my regular readers will know I do like to bodge together my own settings in which to game. One such setting that I keep returning to is that of Olde Albilande. Now I may not have been able to physically hobby lately but the tiny squishy pile of biological matter I call my brain has not been idle oh no, it's returned to this festering isle with some quaint remodeling and ideas for campaigns yet to be played. Now this is a good thing (to me at least) but would require a bucket load of painting to be done. The thing that has always hobbled my plans to make this kind of thing a reality is the volume of miniatures needed. In my normal choice of miniature scale that is...

  But there exists a scale where painting up an army or two in a matter of days is very achievable, a scale in which I have dipped enough toes to have a decent working knowledge of just how wet with possibilities it is. I speak of course of 2mm, where all men are modelled equally (tiny) and impressionism is everything!. My arrival at this decision went like this:

 Brain (B):dooldalbilande,dooldalbilande,dooldalbilande,dooldal...etc

Me: Eh, sorry I wasn't listening.

B: you never do, that's why your life is such an utter pile o...

Me: Shut up or I'll start drinking again, see how you do with even less cells.

B: Bloody charming!. That's why I never talk to you anymore.

Me: did you want something?.

B:Yeah actually, I was saying dooldalbilande,dooldalbilande,dooldalbilande,dooldal...

Me: This again?, Look I can't be bothered to paint 4 whole forces just to play a campaign.

B: 6 forces.

Me: what?

B: 6 forces, I made some changes.

Me: well definitely not then, think on you useless  squidgy tosser!.

B: You never do what I want.

Me: that's because all your ideas are mental, listen to me: I DO NOT WANT TO PAINT FIFTY BASQUILLION MINIS!.

B: You don't  have to I have a good idea.

Me: For once.

B: Piss off, no you can do each army in 1:1 scale in no time.

Me: Have you been drinking?.

B: No just listen for once. What about 2mm?. You can paint loads of them.

Me: You may have a point there... I'll alert the media.

B: oh do fuck off, it's a good idea though isn't it?.

Me: maybe...

And on it went. I did however have some reservations. I can do lots of pretty cheap forces in no time but if I'm doing this I'm doing it in 1:1 scale and I'm taking time to do it to the best of my abilities (which isn't saying much!). 

  I went looking for inspiration and stumbled upon this post on the rather good Roundwood's world about modeling and painting some thirty years war forces. Now this approach to creating bases in 2mm really caught my interest. So the above experiment happened:

Some bases in the Roundwood style. They are ment to be from Old Albilandes early pike and shot period (about 1570 in our time, sort of after the Italian wars but before the Thirty years war)

Two infantry units, a mix of pike and handguns. The first has pike blocks between ranks of shot with two small 'folorn hope' units out front (in Albilande these units are normally made up of the least popular handgunners). The second is more of a loose formation with shot out front and on the wings. 

A unit of 100 Knights (the nobles still insist on charging about on horseback like it's the thirteenth century or something)

  A unit of  reiters in three ranks ready to unload a barrel of caracole on someone.

 I snapped these while the glue was still wet but hope to get them painted up soon. I'm pretty happy with them so far, I think a table full of these could look rather great so long as I manage to paint them effectively. The idea is to do the required forces in this scale to game some big battles then maybe do smaller forces in 10mm (or maybe even 15mm) for in between battle skirmishers.  Well that's the plan anyway...

...'till next time...

addressing the elephant

You know, when i got back into the toy solder pushing manchilding action a few years ago i did so without some things i took for granted in my youth. For example i am married to the wonderful Mrs Sprinks, (center of my world and crochet expert to the stars!). I also have 3 wonderful (and mental) kids to be all responsible for. All this requires a degree of wage slavery during the week to ensure they have a shack to wreck and food to complain about!. Now this, i am told is adult life, and in my book its rather the bind (not the wife and kids bit obvs!). I find that my younger self would be astounded at the time he had to waste on BUGGER ALL compared to this tired and burned out shell that is sitting writing these bitter words!. So coming back into 'the hobby' i had to work out exactly what i had time to do and what i enjoyed most, i elected to be utterly selfish and please myself entirely and to do it 'my way'!. What i finally decided on can be found in the 'nonafesto' ( or 'wrongafesto if you will........god im a twat at times!) which can be found here. Some of the things that went were collecting armies only playable in one rule set (army books my arse!), being dictated to by any company as to what was cannon or 'legal' (see last brackets!) and spending silly money on hobby related bobbins (i still wont pay more than 50p per 28mm mini for example, i will kit bash anything i cant afford! ).
Now if you have read any of my previous posts you will know there is also something else that i decided to forgo in my relapse into plastic army madness......painting!. This has oft been remarked upon in many a comment on blogs and forums and is something that in the war games world is seen as a bit odd by most it seems. Now i would like to say at this point that i love painted figs that are done to a good standard, it can be amazing to see what some painters can achieve on a tiny lump of plastic/metal. I have a full appreciation for the art form (for that is what it is) and wish to in no way seem like i am anti-painting. The fact is, i just dont enjoy it, never have done.

When i first got into the hobby way back at the end of the 80s me and my mates were turning on to warhammer in a big way, white dwarf was mana from heaven and games workshop could do no wrong. I collected as much of an army an pocket money would allow ( Dark elves if your wonderin) and we all got stuck into painting are forces up ready for battle. Even at that age i loved pouring over the rule books and warhammer armies, loved writing army lists and trying to come up with fun ways the forces could meet on the table top. I enjoyed planning my next shopping spree to ogle the blisters and complete units. The idea of putting minis on the table and creating epic stories (for epic read stupid!). ....and i still love all those things. However painting just never got me. I dont know why, i just found it tedious (dont lynch me!), it never felt in any way relaxing or exciting to sit and paint. I soon realized that i was only doing so because i thought is was 'what you did', part of the 'done things' of gaming. I tried to enjoy it but always found i would rush it just to get it done. Soon enough like most teens the lure of peers, girls and 'cooler' past times dragged me away. Fast forward almost 20 years and im back at the table top only this time with more cash and a lot less time. I can finally put together the vast forces that fueled my teenage imagination and have the wisdom to house rule and bodge to fit my own template of what i want. I also remember the feeling of what was to me the 'chore' of having to paint all the minis just to be 'allowed' to put them into battle. So i simply added painting to the list of stuff im not going to worry about!.  I guess what im trying to say is i dont paint my minis for no other reason than the fact that i havent got time to spend doing something i dont enjoy, thats massively counter productive in my eyes!. And secondly, gaming is full of the right way to do stuff but also the pressure to do it the right way!, this to me is a bit silly, its a hobby after all not a day at the office!, do what you want with your toys however you wish to do it so long as it is the best way for you personally to spend your hobby time!. Have fun with your solders and game/paint/collect/build/write/lurk/window shop/and/or other  to your hearts content but remember, there is no wrong way to do it!.

good natured rant over.........anyway, till next time!

Why Wronghammer?

So another blog by a wargamer?, hey sprinks this had better be bloody good, a bloke only has so much time to read blogs and procrastinate each day and the list is already longer than the great wall of bloody china with a mirror leaned against one end!. Make it good you time wasting parasite!. Well hello to you too sir (or miss, its the 90s after all!). First let me welcome to you to my blatherings about war gaming from my personal perspective. 'And what is your personal perspective?' i hear you cry, well glad you asked, this is my first post so i thought i would use it to underline my own unique (many would say stupid...or silly...or pathetic.....er......etc) take on this hobby with (wait for it)..... a bullet point based manifesto!.

. Wargaming should be fun. If your not having fun you are defeating the object of hobby time!. If you cant be bothered to make scenery that's fine. Short on cash, fine buy plastic army guys (i know i have!), cant/wont/hate painting/gaming/modeling o.k. drop that part and do the bits you enjoy.
. Use whatever you have to acheive the objective above. Do not let cost, confidence, ability or whats available and to hand hinder this.
. Rules are a starting point not the end. They are a tool kit to be mashed up, house ruled and rebuilt to fit what you wish to do. If you want to play rallyroundthefantasyhammerrampantwarlordofthethings40,000 more power to you!. Oh and point systems are a handy guideline not God himself!.
.Whats right depends on who's doing it. There is no such thing as the wrong minis, wrong scale, wrong uniform or approach to modeling. If in doubt refer to point 1 above.

That in a nutshell is my personal approach to gaming and the guidelines to what you will get in these poorly presented pages.My own games are normally like this:

Cheap, quick and dirty...........Which was almost the name of the blog!.
Anyhow till next time......