Monday 3 October 2016

We came back with medals.......

Well, we are all back safe and sound from our weekend at Derby World Wargames 2016. Yet again the boys from Derby put on an excellent and well attended show. We chatted to lots of people over the weekend, some old friends and some new faces, and it was good to put a face to people previously only 'met' over the ether of the internet. Thanks for stopping by to say hello.

Here are a few shots of the game. I've only picked out one or two of the best of a lot of blurred (no tripod) photos, but it will give you an idea of how the game looked on the day. 




Victory on this occasion went to the Austrians. The Prussians didn't manage to push the Grenzers off the Lobosch and the Prussian cavalry was all but destroyed in fruitless charges against the sunken road - though Pennavaire did come mighty close to breaking through at one point, and the Garde du Corps were simply heroic.




During the battle there were several events of note, including Frederick legging it after failing Major Morale when the Prussians had lost seven units; Radicatti failed to get out of the way of a charge by the Garde du Corps and got squashed; a Prussian cavalry unit, in disorder with casualties, was taken in the flank by a unit of elite squadrons - the Prussians beat them off by rolling better twice, first with D6 Vs D12+3, and then D6 Vs D12+1 - and overall I don't ever remember the Prussian cavalry fighting with such valour throughout an entire battle.




Anyway, as I've said, a good weekend was had by all. The game came in, by popular vote, joint 1st with The Boondocks Sayntes' fabulous Zulu War game and we split the prize money between us (though given the amount of red they drank on the Sunday they might need to be reminded of it).

Thanks to Jeff Berry of Obscure Battles for allowing us to use his description of the action as our table side brochure. His work, and attention to detail, was much admired.

Thanks also to the guys from Barely Legal Wargames Club, who had the table (Battle of Carabobo 1821) next door to ours, for the Black Powder tutorial. As usual, though I intended to take photos of  other games, I forgot, or those I took are too blurred to publish but, thankfully, at least this one came out OK. See you next year boys.



For once I even came back with a goody bag. I bought a copy of Pike and Shotte to try for the Italian Wars, a second hand copy of Atlas of the Crusades that was going too cheaply to pass up, and a very nice engineers wagon (with load) model from War Bases. A client also kindly bought me a present of Wellington Invades France (thank you J. W.) which I look forward to reading.

Speaking of War Bases, I had a chat about the possibility of a generic pontoon wagon and Martin said he was already thinking about doing one. I've always wanted a couple for a pontoon train so I'm very much looking forward to buying what he comes up with.

18 comments:

marinergrim said...

a superb looking game and thoroughly deserving of accolades presented.

AJ (Allan) Wright said...

Any awards that game received were well deserved! Beautiful figures and terrain.

Peter Douglas said...

Great looking game, table top and figures. Well done on the win.
Cheers, Peter

Mad Padre said...

Not surprised you won medals. Your SYW figures and games are the gold standard in SYW 28mm gaming. Well deserved.
Thanks for the lovely photos.

Oli said...

A very well deserved award James, well done.

Steve J. said...

Well deserved on your joint 1st place and on a fabulous looking game. I hope to be able to attend this show one year as the quality of games looks to be high.

Neil Scott said...

Superb looking game

Fire at Will said...

A superb looking game as always, but Rain 1632 looked good as well,. I would have said hello, but you were deep in conversation at the time. So thanks for documenting so much on this blog.

David said...

Very well deserved accolade James, even though you were AWOL when I finally sat down to take in the splendour of your game in depth.

JAMES ROACH said...

I'm afraid I do tend to go AWOL from time to time, especially to talk to traders who find it even more difficult to get away (or occasionally for beer). David, next time just say "Oi, where is the bugger" and they'll know exactly who you mean and fetch me.

Likewise, even when "deep" in conversation, give me a nudge. I'm normally boring the cr*p out of someone anyway and they'll probably see you as a white knight coming to their rescue; shortly afterwards you'll be looking for one.

Thanks for the kind words guys, and next time,

James

Der Alte Fritz said...

Fife and Drum has generic pontoon wagons for the 18th century. Check with Graham at Crann Tara for availability in the UK.

Nice looking game as always

Jim

Rodger said...

Now, that's the way a wargame should look!

Carlo said...

Wonderful looking game James and I never get tired if looking at the wonderful pool table baize and what you have done to it. Always looks spectacular!!

Colin Ashton said...

Beautiful game and well done on getting the award. It's one of my favourite battles to wargame and I think I'm due another attempt at it soon.

Keith Flint said...

Can't add much to what's already been said - a tribute to the hobby.

An interesting idea to start the battle with the left wing Austrian cavalry already heading back to the centre, thus allowing you to miss off a bit of terrain on the southern end of the battlefield. Congratulations on joint first, maybe I'll see you at the show next year.

JAMES ROACH said...

Thank you all again for your kind words.

Keith, you make a very good point. The cavalry could arrive as off table reserves and I did think of that, but why bother when that part of the battlefield is pretty 'safe' for a timed arrival. Too often, I think, we are slaves to 'the map'. Space is very important to gamers and at Derby we had table space on which to put this command, but as its first moves would be to get into the positions we started them anyway, an activation turn seemed frightfully more appropriate. I'm glad you think the set up was at least novel, and I hope you approve of the approach to make the table three feet less wide (IMHO, apart from a start point, that table would be a waste of space).

Keith Flint said...

'Approve'? Of course I approve - a very sensible idea! If I ever play Lobositz again I'll almost certainly steal it.

rct75001 said...

Brilliant looking game - congratulations James

Richard