Hold the Line!

A few weeks ago I ran a little Naps game at our sunday HQ , Ricks been on at me to post some sort of report so here it is at last!

Scenario was simple- A Portuguese and Spanish force have to hold the line Long enough for British reinforcements to arrive and save the day against a massed French attack.

Chris Fazey and  commanded the French, Dave and Ian S commanded the Anglo-Iberian force

 I supplied the figures and terrain except the battlemat which the Deeside defenders kindly lent us, 3 battalions of French infantry borrowed from Rick, and Daves 3 British Battalions.

Loyal Lusitanian Legion hold the village and the woods,
 Spanish troops guard the road beyond.

Battalions of the Garda Real, Irlanda and Zaragoza regiments await the French.

And here they come! The French infantry advance!

The Loyal Lusitanians refuse to give  ground in the face of overwhelming numbers...

So the French moves all their strength to the right to break the first line!

They march straight into the waiting Spanish. Despite the odds against them
 the Spanish hold, and the impetus is knocked out of the French attack

HURRAH!..

The British arrive, and begin the long march up the table.

Except for the Brunswickers who spent most of the battle marching in circles.

The British arrival is most timely, as the Spanish give way. The French regroup
for the next phase of the attack.

The British intend to deny the French time and space to regroup-
Their light cavalry brigade charges to disrupt the French, whilst their infantry forms up.

On the right the Wurzburgers try and keep up the attack but struggle to make
headway against the 50th foot.

Chaos reigns on the left as exhausted infantry
struggle to push back the Light Brigade. 

With superhuman effort they succeed on both flanks and swing round the base of the hill to fight the
 Redcoated infantry, but the cavalry did their job- The French are exhausted and can do no more.

As the French army broke itself in its final assault on the waiting redcoats the British gained the field- oh for another turn or two before the British had arrived to regroup and we'd have done it! We only had one more line of troops to break through. Alas, for they were fresh, and our foremost units were shattered!

a collection of painted things.

So Ive been doing some painting but neglecting putting pics on the internet , so I thought I ought to rectify that.  Apologies for the quality of the pics- I couldn't find my camera, so I had a crack with this new fangled smart phone thingy...

To begin with some tents and a gun-

The tents are the renadra ones, and I rather like them. Might get some more, and will do nicely for any games where a camp is required.  You might have seen them tucked away in the corner of my first post.
The gun is the plastic Victrix british set, the horses are Warlord Games. Ive painted them up as a Loyal Lusitanian Legion gun to support my two battalion of the LLL. Not the most accurate of representations ever -in fact the only thing correct about them is that the gunners wear green! But I like the overall effect. Oh, and I went with the warlord horses because I happened to have a bunch of them I picked up in a sale. Enough to pull all three guns in the victrix set in fact, which will be painted in due course. The only modification I made to make them in artillery horses was a green stuff horse collar...

Next- ww2...

Been trying to make some of my FOW companies more usable in early war- Thus these A13 mkIV cruisers by Zevezda when combined with my handful of Crusaders to field a crusader company. I could still do with some AT  rifles and light mortars for both Brits and Jerries to make everything multi-period..
The two opel blitz lorries will go into my anglo-german-whatever else I can find motor pool to provide transport for whichever of my forces needs it.

Found two 1-1200 scale warships in the loft. Half built, bits missing.

So I finished 'em off as best I could and painted 'em up! I rather like them . No idea what ships theyre supposed to be models of. Think one might be Graf Spee.  On the look out for some more ships of that scale now...and why not eh?


And finally- reinforcements have arrived for the Republic of New New Maryland!

Ive added a little more to this force but thought Id show the whole lot.
A few months ago some of the chaps at the deeside defenders were showing me collections of random toys- trucks from poundland, tanks from supermarkets- repainted and tooled up and ready to fight anywhere from 21st century africa to the battlefield of the far future. I just had to have a go so I kept my eyes open and raided the bits box and for only a pound or two per vehicle have put together this little quasi-modern/near-future army to defend the Republic of New New Maryland!
The Infantry are Old Glory ww2 Brits- Because they sell them in packs of 50 I had loads of PIAT, Light Mortar and HMG teams in the bits box. With a little work and some bits of wire and metal and plastic rod the PIATs have all became modern-ish assault rifles with Susats, and undeslung grenade launchers! Some LMGs have been made out of spare Brens and a couple of 50cal toting HMG teams can be seen. Various figures made like ammo and tripod carriers made it in to the force with minimum conversion. In total I converted a Rifle platoon of 3 x8 man squads (lmg in each) two 50cal teams, and 3 light mortar teams. Theres a few spare guys as well.
The infantry go to battle in APC's- In Morrisons supermarket I found 4 Matchbox Blockade Buster tanks for £1.25 each. The turret looked stupid but I figured Ive I ripped them off, but a hatch in the turret rung (the PSC PanzerIII turret hatch fitted perfectly!) and a 50cal on the ring theyd make great APC's!

The other vehicles are from a variety of sources- the four light tanks on the left are the Corgi Challanger with the PSC Sherman 76mm Turret with greenstuffed reactive armour, and the challies gun. 50cals and crews were added from the bits box. The Corgi challie is a bit too small to be used as a challanger in 15mm but works fine as a light tank.
On the Right we have the recce section- a pair of Corgi Jackels, a Matchbox Oshkoz M-ATV and some sort of APC, (Looks soviet but I dont know if it has an actual prototype) which I found on a market stall in warrangton. It came with another tank (not shown 'cos I didnt like it much) for £2. Crew and guns are a old glory/PSC and from my bits box.

Finally at the back are two gun trucks- I saw a thing on the news about the current fighting in the middle east  and the footage shown had these big'ol trucks with artillery mounted Portee style on the back, a regiment or so of them in column on a road. Was rather taken with these gun trucks and set out to build my own. Found a couple of spare Matador tractors (Zvezda) and raiding my bits box for crew found some old glory 17pdrs. Didnt need any more for my ww2 forces so I cut down the barrel and trails to fit them on the back!

Air support is provided by Corgi (the Gazelle)and Revell (Tornado, Hornet and Apache)- I was rumaging through some crates in the loft when I found these (along with the ships shown above!), half built and with bits missing. Raided the bits box for whatever spares I could find and provided them with flight stands! Need to come up with some markings for them now.  Suspect this sort of air support is a bit advanced for most counties currently- just the sort of thing you might pick up on the 2nd hand market in about 75 years though!

And there we are. I am assured this force is more than suitable for games like Ak47 republic and tomorrows war. Not actually gotten around to playing either of them yet, or even buying those rules, but hope to try them out soon.

Well thats all for now, the painting table beckons- reinforcements for my AZW British have arrived- Durnford and some Volunteer Horse and a Gatling gun!