ROLL CALL: Latest Update: 5 May 2025: An illustrated intro to my current collections and some memories of past ones.

These are the 8 Miniature Wargame collections or periods that I plan to focus on for 2025, both for painting and playing. My goal is to play more games with fewer periods and fewer, and more stable, rule sets and to empty the cupboards and shelves a little.

My 3 Primary/Active Collections (in chronological order)
(I expect these to appear on my table several times a year and to have figures added.)

1. In the Days of King Arthur.  

Last played 13 Dec 24 (click)

 

Set in Post Roman Britain, inspired by Rosemary Sutcliffe's books, Prince Valiant, and the Elastolin 4cm figures. 2-6 games a year. figures to be refurbished or added as I feel like it. I have decided to roll this back to something more like "Skirmish" games rather than "Battle" games, with an emphasis on story line, characters and game narrative. I've also decided that I don't want to follow the Fantasy distraction and will consciously eliminate it.

Sail in Sight! To Arms!

Supply Train Mayhem July '24

Barbarians At The Gate.

5 Oct 21 Ellie's First Action.

and like his forerunner, Prince Valiant, our hero will cross the Atlantic one day.

2. Fight For A Continent:   Or, as other countries call it, The French and Indian Wars. Using mostly Prince August castings, often converted, this will largely be inspired by historical campaigns in Acadia and New France, including the failed 1746 Duc d'Anville expedition, but eventually I may venture south of the border to look for inspiration, Ticonderoga, Monongahela, etc., maybe, but will also contain 'what if' or fictional campaigns as well. This began as a 40mm skirmish game in the 1990's and has slowly become more of a 'small battle' game. 

Last Played:     4 May 

Encounter near Pisiquid

The Ford  

 The Relief Column 

14 Nov 21: With MacDuff To The Frontier scenario using the rules as printed in the Courier Magazine.

3. Wars of The French Revolution: From Flanders to Brittany, The West Indies and Syria
Last Played: 11 Apr '25

 
42mm, using home rules (depends on the day apparently...)  

1793: Somewhere in Flanders

31 Dec 24  West Indies Ambush of a convoy.

There's the bridge we need to take Sir.

I think that the French Revolution is the ideal "Horse and Musket" wargame period due to the wide variety of settings, tactics and uniforms but what is now Canada had no part, except perhaps, some privateering, and I wanted to focus more on local history and settings.  I'm also short of storage space so...........when I get organized, I MAY start looking for new homes for these armies, but almost every figure is homecast, most converted, many, if not most, with my own original heads.

Packing up at Huzzah! 2023: Syria, 1799: The French broke the Turks on the last turn, forcing Lt. Tootler to retreat with his party of sailors and Marines.

A solo test of a game planned for Huzzah 2023 in Portlane Maine.

Battle of Ville St. Etienne: 26/27 Dec 21

First Charge of the York Hussars.

A shot from a Virtual Huzzah, remote multiplayer game, May 2021.

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My 4 Secondary Active Collections

(These will be played and/or be added to when I get the urge. If they go 3 years without hitting the table, I'll reconsider)

4. Land of the 4 Winds.  OS-25mm metal & 1/72nd  Medieval Fantasy using figures added over 50 years of wargaming. A semi-active collection kept largely for nostalgia so 1 or 2 games most years. I think I'm going to start getting serious about dealing with the horde of figures in the cupboard that need work. Making the armies bigger won't increase my pleasure but emptying the cupboards and reducing the "to do" list probably will and may get what's left, out on the table more. See my Gathering of Hosts blog.

Last played: 30 Aug 24.

5. The Wars of Henry VIII. 40mm 16thC including a large proportion of original homecast figures, as well as many by  Elastolin, Doug Miller, and a few others. I have an emotional attachment to these, partly because the first army I built largely using figures I had sculpted and cast, partly because Rob Dean & I were awarded the "Best in Show" award at Cold Wars in 2005, and partly to family history of the period where some historians say the charge of the rather tardy Macfarlane contingent into the rear of Queen's army was the tipping point in the battle of Langside,  A game or two every couple of years.

Last played: 21 May 24 (Click) 

Anglo-Scots Battle. 18 Nov 22

Rough Wooing Anglo-Scots game Oct 2020

6: Oberhilse and Faraway Early to mid 19thC fictional campaigns inspired by the War of 1812 and the various 1830's rebellions in Canada and by generic Horse & Musket scenarios. Last played 29 Oct 24 (click).    

https://gameofmonth.blogspot.com/2012/10/blue-river-rebellion-incident-at-rhed.html

Aroostock War, Huzzah! 2011 using what became the Oberhilse and Faraway armies.

7: American Civil War  

1/72, mostly Airfix,  ACW.  1-4 games most years. Still more recruits waiting  in the cupboard but more terrain is the big thing now.  Last played, May 2024.

May 2024

 

1 Mar 22: ACW Scenario and brief report. 

 April 2021.

 

 

1 Mar 22: ACW Scenario and brief report. 

 April 2021.

8. Atlantica: The NorthWest Campaign 1870's 54mm, fictional teaser style games (54mm mostly homecast). This exists largely due to nostalgia for my old toy soldiers, some of who have been refurbished and take the field again.  The rest are largely homecast figures with many conversions. This collection is being downsized but will be kept and used.

Last played: 29 Sep 24  

Below: 1 Jul 24 game. 

Last game of 2022

Played indoors....or out!

Battle of Plum Run Hill (Sep 2022)

or on the road!

The 1/76  Battle in a Box Version

Memories of a handful of Retired Collections

Over the last 20 years I have let go of more figures than I have kept but I haven't forgotten them and the good memories of games and friends. Here is just a tiny glimpse of some of the more recent retirees.

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3.  WITH MACDUFF TO THE FRONTIER: The Anglo-French Struggle for America & Not Quite The Seven Years War (when I don't have enough room to play Charge!). 
40mm, single figure skirmish rules. mostly home cast,  mostly Prince August, including conversions, using With MacDuff to the Frontier rules, largely as published in the Courier. 

The Defended Border: The War of 1812. 40mm Scruby + various homecast figures.  The Sash & Sabre 40mm figures were sold off about a decade ago. The rest have been merged into active collections.

Pre-blog 40mm 1812 battle of Maguaga, multiplayer game on my old 6'x8' table. 

Fort Meigs test game.

Huzzah 2013: Fort Meigs. Last appearance for my 1812 armies.
Stout Lads that they were (at least the S&S ones).

Chrysler's Farm in 54mm c2002-ish

 54mm Zulu War

Refurbished Britains' figures against (largely) A Call to Arms Zulus. A game every couple of years. These don't take up much room and the Brits do double duty. Rules: The Square Brigadier. or The Portable Wargame. 

Last game of 2020

Last Played: 31 Dec 20

and last, but not least:

ATLANTICA: The 2nd Oerberg War.   Small Colonial games set in the early 20thC using 40mm glossy toy soldiers and some early armoured vehicles and modern artillery and machine guns. Last Game played 13 Oct 2023, figures passed on to a friend.  

Game played 13 Oct 2023

A game from June 2021

 The 1950's.  Fictional mid 20thC Wargames including some toys that I've played with for 60 years!!

June 2021

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Battle for New France and Acadia. 30mm 18thC miniatures battling for control of Acadia and Quebec.  The basis of this was a collection of 30mm figures, my first metal wargame figures, that I bought in 1973. The figures were originally commissioned for a diorama of the 1759 battle on the Plains of Abrahams for a museum in Quebec which I once had the opportunity to view. Mine were part of the surplus which a dealer was selling off and have probably fought less than a dozen battles in 35 years despite being near and dear to my heart. I finally found just what they have been needing, a new home  where there are some of their kin and where they will see the light of day and get to fight again. 

15mm French Revloution. Figures from 7 or more manufacturers for 1st Coalition, French Republic, The Vendee, Anglo Holland in 1799, West Indies, and various over campaigns in the works. All gone now.

18thC Turks. 

A nascent 25mm Portable Wargame army using original homecast figures as well as various conversions. Not likely to happen now but still in the cupboard. Their only opponent would be a friend's 25mm SYW Austrians, unless I cast up or bought some old school 25mm opponents.  Don't hold your breath!

  

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