2018 - Year in Review

So what did I (and didn't I) get up to in 2018?

Painting

The original plan called for 3 sessions (months) on each of 20mm Napoleonic, 20mm ECW and 20mm WOTR, each of 3-4 units. As it was I only completed the Napoleonics (contractual obligation - see below) with 2 each for ECW and WOTR. I find both those two hard going as a) the figures are mostly just shades of brown and b) you have to think so much about which shades of brown to use to make it look random. I'd hoped to do a catch up session in December for half-and-half WOTR and ECW but was later starting the Napoleonics and they take priorty (and still wont be finished by 1 Jan).

However alongside those were:

• All the Desert War 1/300th for Blucher and terrain
• 15 Albedo figures and terrain (see below)
• A sample couple of sections of WW2 Brits and Germans in 10mm. A new scale for me but after IASBM I decided that 6mm was just too small for tactical infantry. Also though now very tempted to look at 10mm Napoleonics....

Anniversary Battles

2018 should have seen 2/3 1798/1808 battles, but in the end was spent catching up on the 7's battles as I managed to do only Friedland. Bailen and Vimiero get pushed into 2019, which has lots of its own 9's battles to do as well. I did like trying a different rules set (Snappy Nappy) for Friedland, and will probably alternate SLS and others in 2019.

ECW fared no better with only Hopton Heath being done (with Warlord Pike & Shotte), and Roundway/Newbury/Adwalton being pushed on.

No WOTR battles done.

Campaigns and Other Battles

Stalled a bit here. Nick and I had the 1st and 2nd Battles of Sombreffe as part of the 100 Days campaign, with Alan sadly dying between the two. Still need to finish the campaign, but both sides are now fairly brittle.

Rules

Slightly more successful here. My rule is to not buy a new set til I've played the previous one, so I bought and played for the first time IABSM, Rommel, Snappy Nappy and Black Ops.

Of course the last one was part of my mega-skirmish test which got out of all proportion and is responsible for lack of progress elsewhere. The table had basically one set-up on it from August to December! I did though play 12 different rule sets!

Left Field

Albedo Combat Patrol 164 came totally out of left-field - I never expected it to happen, and was almost surprised that there were other gamers around with found memories of the comics and the old RPG game - thanks Chris for making it happen. And it meshed neatly in with my modern/SF skirmish try out (Buck Surdu's Combat Patrol rules were on my list). Looking forward to the full rules and the rest of my figures in 2019. It may also have pushed me up to 28mm for some skirmish gaming - yet another scenery scale to get.

Battlefield  Walks

Managed only a couple of trips to Worcester and Powick related to the AR app I'm working on.

Odds and Sods

Other bits and bobs:

• Skipped Salute but really enjoyed UK Expo (remember it when it used to be in Harborne - my how it's grown up!). Bought one Kickstarter as a result (Robot Royale - delivery soon)
• Went to a very snowy West Midlands Military Show, but not other shows - must do better
• A great Leipzig mega-wargame in a barn
• Bought a 2' x 2' square grid mat at Expo for skirmish and RPG use
• Bought a 4' x 6' 4cm hex mat for desert (and SF?) games, seen a lot of use and will add a green one in 2019
• Bought, based and played WW2 North Africa 1/300th for Rommel, then rebased instantly onto 4cm hexes once I decided Rommel was not for me. Waiting for BKC4/CWC2 but beginning to look like that might never come so time to get my own set finished.
• Finished my 15mm Hougoumont model thanks to a series of birthday/xmas presents from my brther over the past few years (we play sub-scale buidings for 20mm)
• Started to look at how to get cornfields onto hexon - covering whole 6-hex modules or as a sqaure over 1-2 modules
• Painted up some 20mm Napoleonic dead to acts as 4-damage markers
• Tried IABSM at 6mm, and decided that 10mm might be worth looking at so bought some samples at WMMS. IABSM not bad, but not ideal.
• Bought wood for some new baseboard (NOT terrain boards) but not yet built!
• No articles written :-(

So apart from the lull in games, especially mid year, not too bad a run. Roll on 2019!