They're Back!

Here they come again! 

At last! The more things I get squared away, the closer I get to what I thought I would be doing now, playing 40mm Toy Soldier games. I had been making some progress but it took a delightful game on Steadfast Tin Soldier to spur me to action, along with finally starting in on my patient copy of Malleson's  book on the Indian Mutiny. I might have started earlier if I'd realized he was such a readable author and that he had been in the thick of things at HQ in Calcutta. Just the thing to inspire some games. (Don't get excited in the back, still not going to India.)

After my Crysler's Farm game I was sold on the strip basing of my toys to allow them to have the narrow frontage I wanted without losing stability or being forced into permanent ranks.  I can't remember why I chose 3 figures, possibly because I was thinking of 12 man units and also thinking 4 stand units for Hearts of Tin but it threw my tiny brain into a tizzy when I contemplated the current dysfuntional version of HofT which only allows the front stands of a unit to shoot and MacDuff which has 4 man firing groups. Now there is no reason why 3 man stands can't be used with 4 man fire groups but for some reason it irks me. This is why I used improvised thin cardboard test bases for a change. Some pleasant time was wasted exploring 2 man bases and deciding that they are just right. I also found that on a painted surface, the individual figures actually stand quite well on their own bases.

So today, I cleared the table and began the last game, hoping to prove that 4 x 5 is big enough if the regiments are based tightly enough. That illusion was shattered before the end of set up. The previous 5x6 is the smallest I can work happily with unless I go to a grid for all non skirmish games. I'll need a different solution to the lack of off table maneuver room between games but that is in the hands of the chief engineer as we speak and having consulted myself, I am convinced the new plan will work and eliminate the difficulty of taking pictures towards the windows.

The game was going to be MacDuff but after looking at the ranges, and the whole card draw, variable moves and so on, it just doesn't didn't seem right for a game with over a dozen battalions trying to maneuver over a mere 20 square feet. So I decided to give Rattle of Dice a go. Then I tweaked it abit for the mid century, and soon I found that I had reinvented the version of Hearts of Tin that I was using last year. The one used for Kinch's charge. Oh. Oh well good then! I didn't like the intermediate one but haven't had time to work on it while I sorted out the whole Square's issue. This is not the original element based one but the one which translated things like "1 die per stand" into "1 die per 4 figures" so I could use figures on bases or not on bases. It does use inches like the original rather than trying to be flexible. 

So far so good. The game will hopefully resume on Thursday, I'm off to have a social lunch and then sink some ships tomorrow. 

The game begins. Blue has launched yet another surprise attack on the Red Queen's territory,