The Silver Bayonet – Spain 1810
Most people when they think about the Napoleonic Wars, they think about the Battle of Austerlitz, Trafalgar or Waterloo, but quite a long period of the war was fought on the Iberian Pensinular, in Portugal and Spain, but if you want to have a quick intro, there are three YouTube videos bringing you up to speed in different levels of depth:
- History Matters - Why did Napoleon betray Spain? (3m 23s)
- Feature History - The Peninsular War (12m 14s)
- Epic History - The Peninsular War (19m 50s)
But why of all conflicts the Iberian theatre of war? This would give me the chance to re-use some of the mediterranean terrain that I have for Bolt Action and the Crusades, and I like using terrain across multiple settings, as it saves room and time.
And this project idea brewed for quite some time on the back burner. It is no secret, I am a fan of the works of Paul Hicks, and at some point I was made aware that he sculpted Napoleonics, but not just any Napoleonics, but the 95th rifles, a unit from an old tv-show with Sean Bean, where he actually sees the end of the day to film 16 episodes over 15 years - we're talking about Sharpe.
January 2025 review
Welcome to 2025 and we're doing a recap on January!
The year started directly with a gaming event, Dino and I went to ScenarioCon in Hackenheim. I managed to play quite a few games, tried out Fallout Wasteland Warfare, a home brew horror game about Jack the Ripper and All That'Z Left.
Footsore Miniatures – Mortal Gods Mythic Wild Centaurs
After we've already taken a closer look at the civilized centaurs, today we're taking a look at the wild version of the four-legged gentlemen. All models are intended for the Mortal Gods Mythic game and, like the civilized version, were modelled by Trish Carden.
SzenarioCon 2025
After a long break, I came back to the Palatinate, and as already described in the kick-off, the new wargaming year starts early, right on the second weekend, with the Szenario Con in Hackenheim, near Bad Kreuznach.
The event was fully booked, around 200 guests and 25 hosted Games / presentations along with several traders. Many thanks at this point to Jürgen and Frank for the great organisation.
The venue is a courtyard restaurant in the foothills of the Rheinhessen wine-growing region. You can go for a walk nearby or take a look upon the animals in the petting zoo nearby. And as veteran readers know, there is no event coverage without a proper parking lot picture.
Kick Off 2025
We gave you a summary of the last year already in our recap article on 2024, so it is time to look ahead on 2025.
It was surely a good year wargaming wise, lots of travelling and meeting up with people, and the plan is surely to keep on doing that for the new year.
Shows, Conventions and real-life gaming meetups
I talked with Dino and the others, to see what we can fit in our schedule for this year and try to fix as much as possible. So far these are booked or at least written down in bold letters in my calendar. And we're starting with an event in the next week already.
Happy New Year and December 2024 review
Another year is coming to an end, so enjoy 2024's New Year's Eve and have a Happy New Year!
Just like we did in the past, let me combine the review of December and looking back upon the whole year in a single article.
November 2024 review
It's December - again. That was or at least felt quite quick. Anyhow, let us sum up the last month, November of 2024.
Prior to the christmas time, other holidays were present. For example Sankt Martin, which I took as a chance to built a Space Marine latern, and just a few days earlier was Halloween. Usually something that we only participate as a grown-up party, if at all, but with the kids growing up and in coordination with other households in our little town, we went "trick or treating" with our kids and they got quite the haul.
TabletopWelt Paint Meeting 2024
For the third time, Robert aka Grinsemann of Wolpertinger Miniatures organised the TabletopWelt Maltreff (Painting Meeting), and this time - after some mild persuasion by Dino - I joined in.
The venue is a youth hostel, located within an old manor in the Eastern part of Germany, in Thuringia about half an hour north of Erfurt. But more on that later.
October 2024 review
While it is spooky season, I enjoyed my first vacation since may, when we went to Scotland. We stayed in Germany and went for a prolonged weekend towards the south western part, Trier and the surrounding Eifel.
We went for a bit of sight seeing and lots of animals close up, at our stops at the Porta Nigra and the Wildlife Park Daun.
Prelude to Crisis 2024
While I already covered the visit to the actual show of Crisis 2024 in Antwerp, I'd like to give an additional insight on a few bits around it, just like I did in the past. And pardon the delay, the trip to Berlin and preparing for the Battle for Uulda postponed the release of this article.
As usual I travel to Antwerp by car, but as I drive an EV now it requires a bit more planning. But Belgium has a proper grid of ev charger stations, so that was not an issue. Others, especially the British got there by train or plane, as you can get to Brussels quite easily and then grab a connection train from there to Antwerp (and arrive at a very impressive central station).