Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Ripples

This week, what time and energy I have been able to spend on my hobby, in my war room, has been spent taking down shelves, moving furniture, putting shelves up and pushing things about  trying to fit 6 quarts into a gallon container and trying to sift the overflow of junk that I might be able to use one day or have nostalgic ties to into stuff I can pry out of my fingers and throw away, give away or sell as appropriate, and stuff whose time has still not come yet.

At least its given me a chance to handle nearly 1/2 the miniatures I own.Well by weight anyway. Have hardly touched any of the 20 or 54mm plastic figures stashed away in the cupboards. Also many books, I find handling books to be a slow process, they keep opening up and trying to show/tell me things. Anyway, after a several month hiatus, I now have a full time painting desk again, or well almost plus a work table for basing, scenery etc ( and for boxing up ebay stuff).

All this has not, however, stopped my mind from thinking hobby thoughts, just interfered with doing something about it. One result is a new version of my ancients game which I can't wait to try out once the table, which was being used as a way station,  completes its  re-emergence from under various piles. This is of course a ripple from trying out Bob Cordery's gridded wargame.

More ripples from that experience as well as the inevitable ripples from playing Charge!, even in a siege guise and from reading various memoirs, (I highly recommend Twelve Years Military Adventures in 3/4 of the Globe)  by John Blakenston, an engineer on Wellesley's staff with a bad habit of getting mixed up in cavalry charges and the like, very entertaining ) have led to a revival of  the 19thC wargaming single figure vs multi-figure debate now flavoured by the semi-skirmish vs battle and unit vs element debates.

I really love/hate debates over issues that don't really have answers, only choices but this does help explain the sudden return to ancients. :)

I haven't quite got it all sorted yet, so for now I will leave you to ponder the difference  between wargaming Assaye or the Mutiny at Vellore, and various ways of trying to do either or both.

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6 comments:

  1. Ross, you have convinced me; and if I ever get around to giving my 1/72 plastic infantry a real paint job, I am going to pull them off their 4-man cardboard bases and mount them individually on 3/4-inch washers, then make multi-figure bases of refrigerator magnet material, so that I can use them either as individuals or elements -- or even elements that lose figures for casualties. I might even use them for Memoir '44 then.

    So at least your agony has done someone some good. ;oP```

    Regards,
    John

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  2. Ferryman, I did exactly that relatively recently (see recent blog post). It's a lot less fuss than individual chaps while still allowing you to mess around with single figures when you want to.

    Ross, I experimented with our kitchen table last night and horror of horror discovered its too small for my "Big Memoir" mat. I have a wargaming guest coming soon. I better get weaving.

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  3. John, so you're saying that now I can add guilt to my angst? :)

    Actually, its not really about the basing, stay tuned!

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  4. Conrad, so how big is the floor? :)

    For years I used to play on a piece of plywood laid on a kitchen table.

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  5. Ross,
    Guilt?
    Bah!
    I take full responsibility for my wargaming addiction/hobby. It's captured more of my thoughts and dreams in the last 43 years than any other aspect of my life. Such as it is.

    John

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  6. Me too John. (and I really was kidding about the guilt thing)

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