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.