Clockwork Goblin are a relatively new miniatures company who produce a range of 15mm figures based on the alternative history premise that WW2 continues into an age of powered armour, walkers, zombies and super-boosted humans.

I am going to use the US forces to combine with my existing WW2 US forces for Invasion Earth! style scenarios using Quadrant 13. Here's a review of what the Clockwork Goblin US range consists of so far. Click here or on the picture to read the review, or on the Q13 logo to go to the TFL site to buy Q13.

After Action Reports

First Outing for the British Infantry

IABSM: A Proper Try Out

A couple of after action reports from the Christmas period. First off, Katzenstein uses his British infantry for the first time and, apparently, and unlike whenever I put any newly painted troops on the table, they seem to have won!

Secondly, Sergeant Steiner tries IABSM for the first time. 

Armies Gallery

Later War Germans

And still more of the Forged in Battle late war Germans: this time it's the SdKfz 234/2 Pumas from the Panzerspahkompanie's heavy platoon.

I've always thought that these were a must for any later German force, but apparently only 101 were ever produced. However rare, however, these are very nice models: the crew figures painting up very nicely as well.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Armies Gallery

Later War Germans

More of the Forged in Battle late war Germans: this time it's some of the half-tracks from the Panzergrenadier Schwerer Zug (Heavy Platoon).

In a genius bit of packaging, the FiB set comes with two SdKfz 251/2 (81mm mortars) and two SdKfz 251/9 (75mm gun): all you need for a standard schwerer zug. Each vehicle comes with crew and, as is normal for FiB, has an integral base.

Only one small problem: they are considerably shorter than my Plastic Soldier Company SdKfz 251/1 models, which is a bit of a pain no matter which manufacturer  has their models scaled correctly. No matter, however, I am sure the difference won' t be too noticeable on the tabletop.

After Action Reports

The Centre of Yelna Day 2

Those of you who follow this site regularly will remember that battle four in Benito's Vyazma or Bust! campaign had ended in a draw. Votes were called for, and the overwhelming response was for Benito to play the game again as if the Germans had renewed their assault on Yelna the next day.

Here's the report of what happened. Another close game!

I've added four army lists to the site: the Space Bugs from Highlander Studios; Spugs from Spriggan Miniatures; WW2 Americans with experimental weapons from Clockwork Goblin; and the Vornid from Khurasan. I've updated the Ursid list as well.

Either click on the logo to the left to go to the Q13 Army Lists page, or click on the images below to go straight to a pdf of the relevant army list.

Quadrant 13 is now out and available to buy!

Here's the blurb about the launch from The Miniatures Page:

Lovers of science-fiction gaming are in for a real treat with the latest arrival from TooFatLardies. Penned by Robert Avery, Quadrant 13 are rules for company-plus-level actions in a science-fiction universe, using 6mm to 15mm figures. So, what are they all about?

As lovers of science-fiction gaming will know, the boom in the last couple of years has been the explosion of superb ranges of 15mm and smaller sci-fi figures and vehicles from a whole swathe of new companies with great ideas. What has been missing, for us at least, has been a "generic" set of science-fiction rules which can allow us to create our own worlds and cultures which we can then populate with these great new ranges.

But what do we mean by generic? Well, over the years, we have seen lots of sci-fi rulesets which are tied to a specific backdrop created by the publishers. Often this has involved a large slice of background "fluff" which is really only relevant to that particular universe. What we wanted to create was a set of hard sci-fi rules which were totally generic, allowing the gamer to develop his or her own setting using whatever races or technology levels they wanted. And Robert Avery was the man for the job!

Robert has worked with us to produce many scenario supplements in the past, and has been a long-time sci-fi gamer with a leaning to the hard side of the genre. He wanted to put together a set of rules where the gamer was in charge, and where the mechanisms were there to allow them complete freedom in their game design. Quadrant 13 is the result. 

Borrowing the game engine used for Charlie Don't Surf, our Vietnam rules, and I Ain't Been Shot, Mum!, our WWII rules, Robert took Quadrant 13 and applied a whole new layer of technological detail and sci-fi feel. Now you can field forces of differing technologies with a whole raft of settings. Quadrant 13 is a stand-alone game: no other rulebooks or supplements are necessary to play. The rules contain a guide to creating your forces as well as a scenario generator and several army lists. 

What is more, there are plenty of other lists are available on the author's own site. 

Quadrant 13 is available in printable PDF formt or as a navigable PDF designed for use on the iPad or similar tablets for just £9.50 GBP. If you'd like both, the bundle for both editions is £12.50 GBP.

Armies Gallery:

Later Germans

I've been wanting to get Forged in Battle's StuG support set for some time:  I love collecting the 'tail' elements of an army as well as its 'teeth'!

The Warfare show in Reading (well, Caversham if you want to be precise) gave me the opportunity. Even better, the stand they were on (West Wind Productions I think) had a five for four offer, so I bought the StuG support vehicles, some Hetzers, some half-tracks, some Pumas and some Marder IIIs.

I've only had the opportunity to paint the first lot of StuG support vehicles and the Hetzers and I must say I'm very impressed. I like the integral basing (all my vehicles are based: mainly for protection when handling and in transit), and the models take paint very well indeed.

After Action Reports

The Bridge at Urk

Everyone is going Vyazma or Bust crazy! Not only do we have Benito submitting battle reports faster than I can get them  loaded up, but here's a great report by Brian Weathersby from a game featuring scenario 2A: the Bridge at Urk.

Soviet Gallery

Fallschirmjaeger Gallery

I haven't had the time to do any actual gaming recently, what with getting Q13 ready and real-life work, but I have been painting a little.

First up, the excellent 15mm KhT-26 flamethrower tanks new from Zvezda. These cost only a couple of quid each, snap together in seconds, and paint up really easily. I'm a big fan of the Zvezda kits, and these babies will give the evil Germans a very nasty surprise!

Next, here are a couple of Fallschirmjaeger-manned 2cm FlaK 38 guns for the Germans. I haven't got many anti-aircraft assets for my WW2 armies, as IABSM doesn't really emphasise that aspect of things, but these two are a start. They are Battlefront models: easy to put together and paint...although I hate the way they don't sit flush to their bases. I might glue them down in a moment!

Oh, and the observant amongst you will note that I have the mounting stand round one way on one base and the other way on the other. Not intentional, I assure you, and a lesson to be learnt in paying attention!

After Action Reports

The Centre of Yelna

Back to Benito's Vyazma or Bust campaign. This time the action moves into Yelna, and street fighting occurs.

Well, with a fair wind, Quadrant 13, my new company-sized sci-fi rules based on the Lardy systems should be out this week. We're just waiting for the normal pdf to be converted to an iPad friendly version.

Here's a piccy of the front cover:

After Action Reports

The Battle for Neuville

Benito returns to I Ain't Been Shot, Mum! with an AAR taken from the Where The Hell Have You Been, Boys? scenario pack: the Battle for Neuville. 

After Action Reports

Fix & Destroy

An excellent Charlie Don't Surf AAR from Benito and his friends in Spain. Some lovely photos.

After Action Reports

Vyazma or Bust 02:

Belyj

Vyazma or Bust 03:

Pochinok

Well, Benito and his friends in Spain are playing through the Vyazma or Bust campaign almost too fast for me to keep up with their battle reports!

Here are the AAR from the second and third games in the campaign.

First up is Belyj:

And then comes On The Road To Pochinok:

After Action Reports

Vyazma or Bust! 01:

Izdeshkovo

Benito turns his hand to the Second World War, and the first scenario from the Vyazma or Bust! campaign: Izdeshkovo. 

Not a good result for the Germans!

Armies Gallery:

Soviets

US Leg Infantry

US Armoured Infantry

Later Germans

The last of the Soviet 'planes from the Old Glory Lil' Flyin' Fokkers range: the MiG 3 fighter.

The Engineer Support Platoon for the Americans.

A set of three Jagdpanthers for the later Germans. Here I think I used the wrong yellow as my dunkelgelb colour, so the tank hunters have come out in a rather funky pattern!

After Action Reports

Firebase

An excellent Charlie Don't Surf AAR from Benito and his friends in Spain. Some lovely photos.

After Action Reports

Avaux

Vyazma

A couple of battle reports from Norseygamer. These are both played solo in 20mm on an enormous 8" by 4" table!

Both are from scenario packs. The first is our first AAR from the new Blenneville or Bust! supplement (see below): British tanks and infantry attempt to capture Avaux.

The second is from the Vyazma or Bust! supplement: the climatic battle in the campaign set on the outskirts of Vyazma. The Germans are attacking, and get a bit of a shock when the Soviet armoured train de-cloaks!

Click to Buy Scenario Packs

You can buy Blenneville or Bust by clicking the link, above, or from the TooFatLardies website.

If you buy it from here, I'll e-mail you the pdf (just under 10MB); if you buy it from the TFL website, it's downloadable.

Comments on TMP:

"Already got mine – fantastic – can't wait to get them on the table. Well done Robert!"

"Downloaded mine to my tablet over lunch today and started to read it over. It's absolutely terrific. This is a campaign I'd love to get going on. All I need is a couple of enthusiastic players. Great work by Robert Avery."

"Just got it. The amount of work that has gone into this is incredible. It can quite easily be the basis of a 'finite' project if there is such a thing in our hobby. The blinds are provided to print out and there is a table detailing how many of each troop type is required for the whole campaign.
All the tables look to be 6x4 too. Superb"

"I agree …after a quick look over it looks absolutely brilliant…love the maps and scenarios and would be easily adapted to any system. Hugely professional looking product in keeping with everything I've got recently from the TFL"

My latest scenario pack for IABSM is now available to buy!

At 300 pages and 97,000 words, the Blenneville or Bust! campaign pack for the I Ain’t Been Shot, Mum! company-level WW2 rules is a whopper!

Blenneville or Bust! is a collection of fictional late war, western front scenarios set in a valley just south of the Normandy beaches a short time after the D-Day landings. US and British forces are attempting to drive through the German defences in the Ribeaux valley in order to break out into the open country beyond, the Germans are trying to stop them.

The pack contains thirty-one individual scenarios set up in a five-step pyramid campaign i.e. scenario 1 leads to either scenario 2A or 2B; the result of this second game leads to one of scenarios 3A, 3B, 3C or 3D; and so on until scenarios 5A to 5P. Although written as a fictional campaign booklet, no two scenarios are the same: each is unique and is also designed to be played as an individual game.

No need for any preparation: each scenario contains a full briefing for the Umpire and for each player. All you have to do is print out the three briefings, set up the table according to the map, make up the deck from the list of required cards, break out the figures and dice, and start the first turn.

The campaign is structured so that you'll get maximum use of the standard forces presented in Battle for Liberation, with well-designed and balanced scenarios for IABSM, or indeed any company level rule set you happen to game with.

Blenneville or Bust! contains an introduction, details of the campaign structure and forces involved, fifteen different maps (some games are played across the same terrain, albeit in a different direction), thirty-one different scenarios, and a collection of templates allowing you to print off Blind markers as appropriate. Please note, you don't need to print this out like a book (although you can if you wish): Blenneville or Bust! is designed to allow you to just print the scenarios as you use them.

Sample Briefing:

Armies Gallery:

Soviets

Two more 'planes from the Old Glory Lil' Flyin' Fokkers range: the Polikarpov biplane that I remember fondly from Johnny Red and the Ilyushin IL-2 Sturmovik which I suspect will appear more often than the others.

After Action Reports

The Great Rice Hunt

Combat Engineer

A couple of Charlie Don't Surf AAR from Benito and his friends in Spain.

Armies Gallery:

US Leg Infantry

Filling in a gap in my US forces: 3" anti-tank guns.

Armies Gallery:

Soviets

Old Glory advertised their "Little Fockers" range of 15mm aircraft on TMP a couple of weeks ago, and such is the power of advertising that I couldn't resist buying the four different WW2 Soviet 'planes that they do.

First to leave the painting table is the teeny tiny Polikarpov I-16 fighter: very dinky!

Three more to follow!

After Action Reports

Outflanked!

North of Caen

A couple of AAR that I have finally got round to copying, both using figures smaller than the 15mm that you'll usually see on Vis Lardica.

First off, Chris Stoesen gives us our first battle report from the Campaign for Greece scenario pack: scenario #05 Outflanked!

Then Mike Whittacker chips in with two battle reports using the North of Caen scenario from the IABSMv3 rulebook.

Gallery

The Harook

My latest sci-fi army added to the Tentacle gallery. The Harook are six foot tall birdmen, ably supported by grav tanks from Top Gun Marketing.

After Action Reports

Bird's Dogged!

A battle report featuring the bird-like Harook versus the dog-like Protolene Khanate. Read about how my seemingly unstoppable Harook came very much a cropper!

Armies Gallery:

German Gebirgsjaeger

The final two units of the Gebirgsjaegers company:  the third platoon, and an anti-tank gun zug from Regiment. 

Again I'm struck by the contrast in quality of figures from Battlefront. The anti-tank gun team are works of art: a joy to paint and come our brilliantly. The infantry are manikins:  horrible compared to the ATG crew. 

Ah well: just a few Peter Pig skiers to paint to finish the project, and then on to the Harook: bird men with guns from Mad Robot!

After Action Reports:

Shadow of Gallipoli, 1969

A long and bloody After Action Report featuring the Australians in action in Vietnam.

Participation Game Pictures

Three  great shots of the excellent "Indian Country" demonstration game put on by  the Abingdon Wargames Club at Colours 2012. Pictures from the Paint It Pink blog:

After Action Reports

Action at Galmanche

North of Caen

A couple of 'first game of IABSM' battle reports featuring scenarios from the IABSMv3 rulebook.

After Action Reports

Battle for a Bridgehead

A quick battle report from James Mantos featuring a great looking bridge.

After Action Reports

Let's Get The Bastards 1

Let's Get The Bastards 2

Let's Get The Bastards 3

Let's Get The Bastards 4

Let's Get The Bastards 5

More from the extremely talented Sergeant Perry: this time it's five different battle reports featuring the same scenario from the Welsh Guards scenario pack played at the same convention.

Just count those Churchills:  I think they needed a bigger table!

After Action Reports

Action at Galmanche 1

Action at Galmanche 2

Action at Galmanche 3

"Sergeant Perry" is a long time contributor to the TFL Yahoo Group. He plays IABSM in 20mm with a stunningly beautiful collection of figures, vehicles and scenery.

His After Action Reports are always very picture heavy. Here are three featuring the same scenario from the IABSM v3 rulebook: Action at Galmanche.

Armies Gallery:

German Gebirgsjaeger

More Gebirgsjaeger: this time the MMG platoon. I'm very disappointed. The casts from Battlefront were very poor, especially on the chaps actually firing the machine guns. If you look closely, you can actually see that one of them is missing half his head!

Well, Rob, you may say, why didn't you just get them to send you some more: they're very good at that sort of thing. 

Well, I'd reply, they're very good at that sort of thing because they have plenty of bleedin' practice! If they had the quality control to start off with, then I wouldn't need to bother! I love BF stuff, on the whole, but sometimes they do themselves no favours.

No, the bad casts can stay up here for all to see: I'm bound to buy the three MMGs I need for the Schwerer Zug anyway so, assuming they are of respectable quality, they will be the ones I eventually use on the tabletop. Pity it's only Battlefront who do Gebirgsjaeger in 15mm. For now! Plastic tank anyone?

I'm just back from holiday: two weeks in the Nederlands. Whilst I was there, I managed to get over to the Murphy's Heroes club in Delft for a game of IABSM.

An excellent late war game put on and refereed by Dick Bax, set somewhere in Poland, where  I played the Soviets attacking Derk Groeneveld's Germans.

Modesty forbids me from mentioning who won a glorious victory (!), but a big thank you to Dick and Derk, and the rest of the Heroes, for their hospitality.

After Action Reports:

A Canadian VC

Paul Scrivens Smith with a great AAR of a game from one of the scenarios in the IABSM v3 rulebook. Plenty of excellent pictures!

Armies Gallery:

German Gebirgsjaeger

The second Gebirgsjaeger platoon has now been painted:

Armies Gallery:

German Gebirgsjaeger

More Gebirgsjaeger painted: this time it's the mortars. Three in the Kompanie HQ, and three more in the Schwerer Gruppe (Weapons Platoon). Click on the link to see the units, but here are a couple of individual shots:

Sorry about all the errant flock...I always forget to brush it off until after I've photographed the figures!

After Action Reports:

Vyazma or Bust 3D:

On The Road To Pochinok

Great game using a scenario taken from the Vyazma or Bust scenario supplement: