Zulu War progress

Zulus

I have been very lucky with the accumulation of additional 28mm figures such that I now have enough for two 24 point field forces for playing The Men Who Would Be Kings.

I have six Zulu units of 16, 3 12-man units of British Regulars, a Gatling (?) team, 8 Natal Mounted Police or Carabineers and enough spare Zulus to field a unit of Natal Native Contingent. That gives me some choice on the British side.

The figures are a mix of Renegade and Black Tree. The scale mix is just about acceptable IMO but I will need to be careful not to add any figures smaller than the Black Tree ones.

British

The figures are painted to different standards, some a lot better than I would have attempted, some not as good.  I may add some staining and paint here and there if I can be bothered. The bases obviously need finishing and some of the Zulus are missing weapons, but the armies are ready to transport and use.

There was a time when I  would have wanted to paint all my own figures, or, at least, have them painted for me to a tight specification, but I've grown out of that. Once the bases are complete the figures should present a reasonably unified appearance and feel like they're mine.

2018 Interests

Talking of 'plans' seems a little too optimistic after last year's meagre achievements, so I'm just going to use the word 'interests' to describe this year's possible areas of activity.

Bac Ninh Byakkotai

The Men Who Would be Kings

I'm still building up my 28mm Anglo-Zulu War forces for The Men Who Would Be Kings as fast as I can see and buy them second-hand, and I'm also looking out for Egyptians for the Urabi Revolt and Pathans.

Quite a few of the Zulus I've acquired have been in groups of about 16 and painted with different shield colours, so they have very readily been organised into TMWWBK tribal units.

With my last purchase of the year I now have enough figures to field 6 Zulu and 4 British units, but I'd also like to acquire some mounted figures and some Natal Native Contingent.

Doing the Anglo-Zulu War wasn't originally my first preference, but it seems to be the most popular Colonial subject and therefore the easiest to collect second-hand.

In keeping with my enthusiasm for the offbeat, I've also been looking at the Boshin War - the civil war in Japan  between  the Tokugawa Shogunate and the Imperial Court (1868-1869). The war featured an interesting mix of modern, Westernised, forces and traditional but unarmoured Samurai using archaic weapons. Some very characterful 28mm figures are available from Bac Ninh Miniatures but the range is currently lacking in the more archaic types.

Rommel

I should of course focus on painting my recently acquired 3mm armies for Rommel, but I have to confess that TMWWBK is currently consuming the time available and will probably make for a more readily doable and popular club game.

Chain of Command by
TooFatLardies

Chain of Command

I've hardly mentioned them before, but I also have some 28mm WW2 figures and die-cast tanks for the Ardennes campaign. I got as far as undercoating the figures and making some snowy scenery but that was a few years ago. Recently I noticed the Chain of Command WW2 skirmish rules so these armies might get pulled out of the lead mountain. CoC is very interesting and innovative, but it seems to require quite a learning investment.

The Battle of Sablat (Záblatí), 10 June 1619

The Thirty Years War

The Thirty Years War continues to haunt my imagination - periodically - but I've made no final decisions about rules or scales. Amongst other things I'm currently waiting to see the pike-and-shot version of Twilight of the Sun King and I might knock out some counters or blocks for temporary use to try out various options.

Unit cards for The Men Who Would Be Kings

While playing the Samurai skirmish game, Test of Honour, I was struck by how discrete unit cards are much better than rosters for reading and absorbing unit data.

I had also seen the excellent unit cards for The Men Who Would Be Kings on the Shed Wars blog. After struggling with Excel and Word, I once again decided to create an Access database. The cards (a 'labels' report) were much easier to configure and I can quickly add new unit types to the underlying table.

The cards aren't as nice as the Shed Wars ones, but I could improve on them later by adding images. I'm indebted to Shed Wars for showing me the way.

Rebasing 28mm figures for The Men Who Would Be Kings

Based and ready to go

So here I am with a growing collection of second-hand Zulu War figures from different sources, all based individually but not in the same way. Rebasing is a priority, mainly so they can be safely stored, transported and used, but also to give the figures a more common look (once textured and grassed).

First step is to remove the existing bases. Card bases are easily weakened by standing them in water, but other bases have been an absolute pain to get off.

The new bases are simply 2p coins. These cost, well, 2p, and are cheaper than steel discs or even MDF. 'Copper' coins were originally bronze but since 1992 they have been copper-coated steel and are attracted to the magnetic plastic sheets which I use to line my storage containers - A4 Really Useful Boxes. 

At some point, of course, I will be adding filler, sand and foliage, but the figures are ready to use. All I need now is more of them.

28mm Zulu War figures for TMWWBK

Playing  the Colonial skirmish game The Men Who Would Be Kings has been on my wish list since the beginning of the year. Other members of my wargames club have tried it out and liked it, so I am encouraged that it will see some play.

Zulus

I had originally favoured doing the Boxer Rebellion or the North-West Frontier, but I recently accumulated some Zulu War figures when a friend was sadly obliged to retire from wargaming. These have since been supplemented with a couple of eBay purchases.

British Regulars and dismounted Natal Mounted Police

Some of the British figures could also be used for the Second Afghan War or the Urabi Revolt. I don't have enough for a game but it's a good start. The figures are 28mm. I'd be very interested to know the manufacturer(s) and will update this post accordingly.

More Zulus

The picture immediately above shows the figures from eBay. These will need to be rebased and could benefit from a stain.

UPDATE

The figures have been identified as Redoubt Enterprises and very nice they are too. Redoubt is another company which Is underselling itself because of lack of photos in its online shop.