Demo wargaming and history for school

We received a request if it was possible to present a wargame demo to the senior class of the elementary school where Hermien, the wife of Peter, is a teacher.
The class had closed a project about famous persons in history so our wargames demo should have a connection to that. 

After some looking at the list of our available demos we decided to present two demos; the first one about the Eighty Years War in connection to William of Orange and the second one about the French Revolution in connection to Napoleon Bonaparte (although our demo would be situated in the Low Countries 1793 while Napoleon would be fighting in soutern France at that time!).

 So, last Wednesday in Peters livingroom, we set up two tables (each 6*4 feet) with terrain and figures (we already had prepared beforehand some simple to understand rules for both periods), picked up 19 children at their school, split them in two groups, one for each table, and introduced them shortly to the two periods, the figures, the rules and the game.
And we have a go with it. After some time, we switched the groups of course.

We hope that the children had a good morning with us, seeing their reactions we did succeed with our goals but of course some liked it more then others. Some loved the game (esp throwing the dice and moving figures around), grasped the simple rules very quickly and even understood some of the formations used.
So as introduction I think we were succesfull.

Some pictures of the visit underneath.

Crisis 2024. A short report.

Thanks to the cooperation of the HQ and TSoA Clubs, Crisis was resurrected; not in Antwerp but now in a new venue at Sint Niklaas and it must be said, a great day it was. 

It was nice to see again all those faces of well known wargamers but also new faces and as far as we know all had a great time. Of course it is a pity that due to British politics, British traders were missing but a lot of traders from mainland Europe were present.

There was of course one trader (although without its wel known trade) Barry Hilton who presented two 17th century games in one and received a well deserved a Best of Show trophy (left picture underneath ). Petra and Peter from Murphys Heroes got the prize for most innovative game (right picture).

We presented for the first time a game situated in the beginnings of the 80Years War with Pikemans Lament rules and 28mm miniatures (mostly by Tag). Some pictures underneath but it must be said that sometimes the sun peeking through orange painted windows gives a strange effect. 

Of course we quickly took pictures of some other games at Crisis (sorry, didn't get the names of the clubs). As we didn't have time to takes pictures of all other games, please go to Chaosbunker.de for more pictures.

:It was a great show, so thanks for the organizing clubs HQ and TSoA and hopefully see you next year!

80 Years War miniatures

 

Before The Assault Group (or for short TAG) started sculpting their beautiful Long War range for the early 80 Years War period some years ago, I had started already many years before to collect suitable figures from other branches.

When painted, many of them fit well, although TAG will stay my favourite figures.

I keep buying TAGs' latest issues and will show them on this blog when painted.

Here already several pictures of cavalry from various branches for the first decades of the 80 Years War and one picture of artillery.

Old glory Huguenot Artillery

Old Glory generic gendarmes painted as Spanish

TAG German black reiters

TAG Spanish mounted arquebusiers

                                                                           TAG Spanish mounted arquebusiers in line

And the same in column

Wargames Foundry/Casting Room German Reiter

Wargames foundry/Casting Room Spanish generals

Warlord generic demi-lancers painted as Spanish

Warlord generic mounted arquebusiers painted as Dutch

The 80 Year War; the first figures are ready

These are the first pictures of Peters' foot units set during the early decades of the 80 Years War in the Low Countries (Netherlands).

All the figures are from the Assault Group’s Long War range and is the first range that made me finally start my 80 Years War Project.

They are all wonderful sculpts and also typical for the early period (1560’s and 1570’s), of which besides the invaluable Hoogenberg drawings not so much temporary picture evidence has survived.

All figures are based to suit the Pikeman’s Lament ruleset. And viewing the pictures it seems they still need a layer of matt varnish.

The first 3 pictures underneath show a group of (irregular) Sea Beggars with various arms and a unit of the first regular Orangist militia.

The next 2 pictures show German mercenary troops in typical Pluderhosen or very baggy trousers.

They fought on both sides during the war. Especially the command figures are great.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               Next is a picture of a part of the first English unit officially sent by the government under Sir Humphry Gilbert.
They are from TAG’s Tudor range and are well suited for the first decade of the 80 Years War.

Then of course the adversaries to the Dutch units: Spanish troops.

Again beautiful sculpts and once more splendid command figures.

Artillery was in its early stages of becoming a bit more standardized.

The crew are again from TAG’s Tudor range and the horse team and driver are good old Dixon’s.

We are anxiously waiting for the cavalry and Artillery from TAG to come.

Next time we’ll post some pics of cavalry from other ranges that Peter has painted up to now for this period.

TAG 80 Years War figures

As You maybe know, Peter (half of the Alde Garde) is fascinated by the 80 Years War and is very anxious by the announcement of The Assault Group (TAG in short) that they will bring out figures for this period. Good figures for this period, especially the 1568-1600 period, are almost not available (Old Glory is an exception) so this announcement is great!

Pictures of the new range, sculpted by Nick Collier for TAG, underneath. TAG starts with "late"  Landsknechts (already on their site) with Dutch/Spanish on their hiels (just greens yet).
First there are packs of pikeman:

and arquebusiers

and of course comand

Of course, go to the Assault Group site ( http://theassaultgroup.co.uk/ ) and buy them 

Dollies for Spanish/ Dutch