Painting and planning

There is some excitement in the wargaming house today as two units of significance leave the basing department and march into barracks.

First up are two Wars of the Roses bases. All the figures are Perry plastic. One is a bill unit, the other archers. Both are in the colours of Lord Stanley and the billmen base is adorned with a rather splendid banner from Pete’s Flags.

The two bases will join two other Stanley bases completed recently to provide a Lord Stanley retinue, which has a role in the next part of the Piggy Longton Chronicles.  

Being Lord Stanley, it is hard to say at the moment which side he will actually end up fighting for! 

This action will be fought soon with the Hail Caesar 2nd Edition rules ……. It’s been a long time!

The other is a unit of French Old Guard grenadiers. The figures are from Victrix, again in plastic. 

Considering these are dressed in greatcoats, I am rather pleased at the way they have turned out, quite eye-catching and a determined looking bunch. The flag came with the Victrix set.

The significant bit is that this unit becomes the 6th painted French unit for my 1809 project and so for the first time, I have enough painted units for both sides to put on a Neil Thomas sized scenario from his One Hour Wargames book.

10 of the 30 scenarios will work with 6 units on one side and 4 on the other. This is a nice little milestone to have reached along the way to my Battle of Auberge project and a game will likely see the table some time today or tomorrow.

My chosen scenario is one that I have not played before, called 'The Last Stand' (Scenario 30) and it is the only scenario in the book that allows for a game with 6 units Vs 3.

The defenders, which in this case are the Austrians, are behind a river with two crossing points. They also have a hill with a redoubt on it.

So I have dug out my scratch built redoubt, which when built was designed to take 2 x 50mm artillery bases. Unfortunately, these fine chaps are on 60mm bases, so there is a bit of a squeeze.

Anyway, the Austrians are acting as a rearguard to a routing army. This small group of 3 units are elite. The pursuers (French) have 6 regular units, but as a unit is destroyed, it is returned to play and placed back on the French base line.

This truly is a 'last stand' scenario as an elite force in a fairly good position, faces potential overwhelming numbers.

I am really surprised I have not gamed this scenario before, or at least if I have, it has slipped from memory.

This should be a fun game and allows an ongoing project to get a first reward by getting all the figures painted so far, to the table.

Not wanting to interrupt the work flow of painting for this project, Austrian Grenadiers have already moved onto the painting sticks. 

What a great hobby!