Dougfest 2022 - General du Corp

The battle was thissssss big

After a long COVID hiatus, Doug hosted another summer game. I had missed Enfilade this year so eagerly headed over for some gaming and socialization with the regulars. General du Corp is a ruleset created by Doug and Seth (and arguably approaching it's final status) for fast play (convention slot) napoleonic large battle play (bases are brigades, and a command is a corp).

As usual, the battle that Doug set up was historically based although not a napoleonic battle it was still horse and musket (he has taken everything from 7 years war to ACW). After finishing the big battle we had time to play so we went over the backup table (set up in case people were interested in a late Friday night game....which we weren't as most of us had done a long commute that day) and played out a fun little battle. 

Taken from the ACW the forces are wildly uneven (I've forgotten the battle but I'm sure Doug will comment below to enlighten us). Peter threw the low die, so he took command of the defenders, seriously hamstrung by having a single commander so would definitely be pip starved for movement. Luckily this was a fun times game and can be gauged in terms of how the historical fight went. 

The defenders (British/Rebels) are holding a series of defensible hills vs the dug in attackers (French/union). Apparently the centre troops took local initiative to test the Rebel lines and, finding them insufficient and under fire, continued to storm forward to drive them off.

I'm unclear if  the flanks were late arrivals or part of the probe in force operation. In game terms we had 3 commands (left/right/centre) with numerical and artillery superiority. Cake walk, right?

 

 

Bump: Repair the blog social network

 Stew over at 'A Terrible Loss of Lead and Wealth' blog wrote a funny and thoughtful post on his 5 year blogger-versary. It's about the types of posts that get comments (Look it posts) vs simply lots of hits (Resource posts). 

 

Lest you think that it's about search engine optimization (*shudder*) it's actually about community. He talks about the boost one gets from comments, and indeed the bloggers that swap comments over years and become a type of friend you probably have never met.

He then encouraged readers to comment, and 'bump' another blog (like his own, but in theory this works in the generic sense). This totally resonated with me as I feel like there are a lot of 'broken links' from blogs gone dark, and people who maybe feel lonely blogging and not realizing there are still clusters of very active friendly blogs happening. I have been pretty bad about not commenting lately so I'm going to pick my heels up a bit. And I'd like to bump Stew's blog. 

It's got painted minis and projects and action reports to look at. And it's active. It just might be your jam....

May the 4th be with you... 15mm star wars characters

 Yikes! Time spins by so fast. I've been snowed under with daycare plague brought home by the children and a new (second) job. Productivity in the painting department has definitely suffered. I have been doing a paint night a month with some friends via discord so that is a positive. 

Here are some figures that have been recently completed and most fortuitously....topical to the date!

As noted in the title they are 15mm figs. Some pals from space. The maker is a bit reticent to go out and use labels so I suppose I should respect that as well. 

Bases are from proxie miniatures.

WW2 Romanians Great Escape Games (3) - Rifle Squads

The final wave of Romanians from my initial order. I still intend to add an artillery piece (printed but lacking crew) and maybe, MAYBE, some cavalry. That's really starting to stretch the project a bit far though.

Late war the Romanians coup their leadership and join the Soviets in the drive on the axis. In Bolt action they lose their free artillery piece and gain a free squad (if you have 3) of the cheapest version you have.  So I laid these guys out to have at least 4 squads. 

Standardized to 1 light machine gun, an SMG leader, a panzerfaust, (which would be lost in earlier phases of the war), and a bunch of rifles. As one would expect. The 4th squad I think lacks panzerfaust but has a big old anti tank mine being totted by the guy with bronze balls.

Turns out I can manage a 5th squad of 50% SMG. So either the project got overlarge, I've undersized my squads, or I just have some extra flexibility.  Hopefully I can find an opponent this year and get the traditional 'full painted and lose your first game' game in.

WW2 Romanians Great Escape Games (2) - Machine Gun, Flamethrower, SMG squad

I've fallen off the wagon! Too long since my last post. Here are the next wave of the Romanians. Once again they are 28mm metals from Great Escape Games. 

The SMG squad is largely equipped with Russian and German SMGs. There is a pack of figs that I ordered for more flexibility in late war Romanians (more captured gear available!), and is padded out with some of the stock infantry (stolen from full size rifle squads making an appearance soon)

 

 

 

 

 

WW2 Romanians Great Escape Games (1) - platoon assets (hq, sniper, mortar, resita atg)

Finally I'm getting around to posting up some pictures of painted stuff. I finished these right at the beginning of the year but got bogged down with pictures. My dave-cave is in a state of disarray so it's a bit of a hassle to carve out the space needed for pictures. I'm also not SUPER happy with my light box for pictures yet. It might be a backdrop issue, or it might be that it's a bit too small. 

These folks are from Great Escape Games, one of maybe 3 companies that do 28mm metal Romanians for world war 2. I found their range to be the most comprehensive so I ordered up their platoon pack and a bunch of side products so I didn't need to faff about filling in gaps. One and done is how I typically like to order up projects. Hilariously I find myself needing some more crew for guns (as I printed an artillery piece). Oh well, the nature of the game (see what I did there?). 

Please enjoy photos of: a platoon headquarters, sniper team, light mortar team, and antitank gun (a resita 75mm gun, which I think was domestically produced). 

 

Bases were finished with "Luke's ready mix" something I saw on another blog and wanted to experiment with. Fast, easy, and doesn't look shabby. 

 

The minis were protected with future floor polish applied with a brush. I figure with metal figs, and a skirmish range it will worthwhile having a hard finish. I should, and probably will eventually, hit it with some matte to get rid of the shine. 

 

 

 

 

3d printing nerd gifts (4) - finished products

Doug works fast. The package arrived 8 days ago and he's already finished his tanks. I hope that he will forgive me in 'stealing' his pictures he sent me for a post. It's nice to have some continuity and see the final product in this series. I can't do better but heavily quote from the email. 

"Before I forget again, thanks for the support removal.  I was quite prepared to do that (had picked up some others in the past so knew what to expect).  it is a pain to do.

The StuG had a barrel replacement as the ink tube was a perfect fit.  I took your advise and coated the Valentine's with runny super-glue with a few coats and it did smooth out a bit. 

 

The miscast boogie wheel on the Valetine is not an issue as you can see I covered the track area with lots (and lots!) of snow - it is a Lend-Lease arriving on the Moscow front just at the end of 1941. This ‘evens-out’ my collection which now can accommodate 3 a side.

 

The StuG is to fight my t34-85 during the summer of 1943 also in Russia for some one-on-one action.   The side armor are plastic pieces which match perfectly with your print - your scaling is perfect!"

 

 

 

I will concur with Doug, removing supports is a bit of a pain. Certainly some are worse than others. Gotta say these look great, as does pretty much everything Doug ends up producing. 

Head over and take a look at his blog Dots of Paint for more.