Homebrew Rules

Friday, 15 August 2025

Reasons to be cheerful (Part 3)

Kudos to anyone who gets the Ian Dury reference.

The last month has seen an awful lot of heat, an awful lot of sitting in hospital waiting rooms and a virtual halt to painting and gaming. I shall definitely look back at this summer as the month of three H’s.

I actually set out a whole table full of miniatures for my next Indian Mutiny game the other day but packed them all away again before even rolling a dice. Sometimes your hearts just not in it and it’s easier to leave things be until the mojo returns.  (It’d ruddy well better - I’ve got more troops coming in the post next week). 

Anywhoo in an effort to buck myself up a bit here’s a post covering a couple of things that are a definite antidote to my predilection for doom and gloom.

Friends.

I don’t have many. I’m too worried that people might steal my dance moves. Despite this, one chap who I do count as a friend organised a cartoon of me dressed as an East India Company Officer. Here it is for your delight and delectation. The moustache came out well I thought! 

Jokes

My youngest lad, who is party to a number of personal stories I’ve deemed too wacky for the blog, has become very concerned that his dad might be “losing it”. I’m sure he’d have had me put in care by now if I didn’t live in another country. Such concern is (largely) unfounded but it didn’t stop me engaging in a fairly long wind up when a tiny tattoo shop opened (for reasons that escape me) in a nearby village. 

Step one was to mention its opening during a zoom call with the lad in June. Step 2 was to obtain a stick on temporary tattoo from the interweb. Step 3 was to claim in July that my upper arm was too sore to finish the decorating in the hall. Step 4. The big reveal. I told him in August that I’d been a bit drunk in June and had had a random tattoo done in the shop. This was why my arm had been too sore for the decorating. I claimed that upon discovering my lapse the current Mrs Broom had been furious - but now wanted one herself. My son (who remember is convinced I’m going off the rails) was duly horrified when I showed him this…


Within hours texts began arriving from concerned grand children. Was I okay? 

The following weeks conversation with my son ran along the lines of how surprised I’d been that it didn’t hurt too much and that I’d seen an eagle one that’d go nicely on my back…

Must remember at some point to tell him it’s all been a joke!

New Toys

The joy of receiving something other than a bill in the post cannot be overstated. Assuming that I get to the post box before the contents revert to a puddle of lead I hope to be fiddling around with a load of Empress and Footsore anti fascist fighters in the next week or so.

Doing skirmish stuff with small units means that a 3 x 3 board might well suffice. Oddly the reduction in gaming area is going to require a heavy investment in suitable terrain. My British Civil War project will be a lot darker than some of the jolly hockey sticks ones I’ve seen so far so I’m going to need ruined buildings, a lot of ruined buildings. Having tried, and hugely failed, at making my own with cork tiles (hat tip to Keith) I’ve settled on this sort from Sarissa Precision for the ruins…


And this sort for the undamaged bits…


Despite my advertised lack of progress the first section of BUF thugs is now complete. Here’s an LMG team.


And here’s the manoeuvre/ rifle group…


All of my BUF troops have shiny black tin helmets - so I’m going to have their opponents refer to them as blackheads I think. 

Toodleooh.


Oh by the way, if anyone finds my mojo would they please return it by email. There is a reward. 







20 comments:

  1. This is a terrific looking caricature! This rendering looks reminds me of the illustrations in Tony's rules. Done by the same hand? I hope your mojo can be found and returned to you in one, workable piece. I wonder if a game might help?

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    1. Hi Jon, I understand from Dai, (see below) that our mojos are currently getting smashed together in an undisclosed location. As to the cartoon, yeah you’ve seen this guys work before no doubt.

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  2. The cartoon you is very impressive, lovely gift to get. Your VBCW is off to a good start, the baddies look very nice, great job on them. Hope your mojo returns, it happens to us all I think, but usually comes back with a vengeance!

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    1. Hey Donnie, the trick will be allowing my mojo back without it dragging me down another rabbit hole. Lot of new VBCW stuff to come. Stay tuned.

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  3. Your mojo is currently holed up with my own drinking over-priced Macallan whiskey and pipe smoking in an undisclosed location. One day they might get bored of those gentlemanly pursuits and return to us but I'm not holding my breath.

    That caricature is pretty darn good. Is it hand-drawn or computer generated?

    Also the tattoo... I think that'd fit better on one's posterior than upper arm. More shocking that way.

    I like the idea of a darker BCW setting and look forward to seeing more on this.

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    1. Hey Dai, thanks for letting me know that my mojo is keeping good company. With or without it I really should take up pipe smoking just to piss people off in restaurants and such. Despite the health issues I’ve always liked the smell of pipe tobacco. Somebody should market it as an air freshener I reckon. The cartoon is hand drawn and coloured. Tattoo on the ass. Mmmm. There’s still time.

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  4. Sorry to read about your summer of discontent - hopefully the cause of all the hanging around in hospital waiting rooms is resolved with happy ending....
    I too have had a slight drop off in motivation, I made no effort to attend two recent FtF games and I think I only posted twice in the first two weeks of August - on average I do 10-12 posts per month. I think its the aforementioned cork tile building projects - I tend to get carried away and keep thinking of more and more enhancements I can add, and nothing ever gets finished - and then my motivation drops off too!
    I understand what you mean about VBCW settings - a lot of the games (the names of the various leftist militia etc) seem almost Dads Army like rather than the horrors of the SCW or the RCW transferred to England's green and (un)pleasant land. It's interesting no one ever seems to think Mosley and the BUF are the goodies - they had several million supporters at the time, and I am sure there must be some wargamers who would be more sympathetic to a conservative, pro-monarchy and anti-socialist view of the world?!
    I like your heading about fascism too - very apposite in the current times...oh, and yes, I got the Ian Dury reference!

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    1. Hi Keith, I think I used the wrong type of cork tiles - mine were a bit bendy. Poor results and hot weather are not conducive to perseverance. I’ve done a fair amount of 1930’s politics research and the general consensus (revisionist or not) is that the left were more often the instigators of street violence. Before British fascism morphed into poundshop national socialism (with the Jew hating and racial superiority thing) it did indeed have a fairly strong following amongst all classes of society. I won’t allow my own political bias to bleed through into any games, after all neither side saw themselves as the bad guys at the time. Kudos for remembering Ian Dury by the way. Were obviously “of an age”.

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  5. I hope all is well now JBM.
    A great cartoon and definitely will look great on the wall.
    If you tease your children enough when you do go off the rails they will not suspect it and leave you alone😂
    Good luck with the VBCW project, off to a great start.

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    1. Hey Ben. Yeah the cartoon was a really nice gesture wasn’t it. I still wonder why the guy wanted me to pose nude for it though? lol.

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  6. What rules will you use for a VBCW?
    Alan Tradgardland

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    1. Hi Alan, I’m going to be using 5 men at Kursk, which is aimed at small unit skirmish and has some nice mechanisms that allow for firing automatic weapons in a suppression rather than kill mode. Oddly enough it’s got nothing to do with Kursk or 5 men. Go figure!?

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  7. "Blackheads".. chortle... very good, and quite apposite..

    Chin up matey, the mojo buggers off and then returns... usually for no reason you can think of, and then you realise it was a book/film/picture/programme that just triggered the synapse that makes the mojo go into overdrive... so read, watch TV, and it'll be back before you know it..

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    1. Hey Steve, yeah it’ll come back when I’m least expecting it, and probably with an all new project in tow. I think it was a surfeit of knights that finally broke me. I hate painting ruddy cavalry and I’ve dozens of 100yrs War ones to do. Aaaaargh.

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  8. Yep, keep the kids guessing, works for me :-)

    I do have real empathy for everyone suffering from the heat at the moment. I am really no good in the heat and I moan about here, but it is nothing compared to what some of our friends around the globe are putting up with. I have had those moments of setting up and then putting away, there is something a bit scary about them, as though they are a marker to something being really wrong (hobby wise), but I think its just a normal thing that happens for us wargaming weirdos! :-)
    As for hospital visits, to help pass the time, I can highly recommend Warning Order, which is a down-loadable e-zine, here is a link to them;

    https://www.wfhgs.com/wrngorder.html

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    1. Cheers Norm, it was really depressing to realise I couldn’t be arsed playing the ruddy game after setting it up - obviously it happens to others too… I’ll have a butchers at that zine later. Could be just the thing to pass a bit of time!

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  9. Apart from the underlying darkness, your post cheered up my morning - thank you for this. I think the tattoo hoax is inspired - congratulations. It occurred to me that the end game might involve a Twilight Zone phase in which the tattoo changes very slightly, or appears on the wrong arm. [Years of subjection to sadistic party games at family parties when I was a kid, Your Honour.]

    I too am having a mojo-free summer; it's ok - I'm managing to find lots of other stuff to do. In fact I'm getting a bit depressed by the amount of stuff which needs doing.

    I didn't get the Ian Dury bit, because he was after my time.

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    1. Hi matey, shame you missed out on Ian Dury, the whole new wave thing was pretty rad (as the kids no longer say). The thing about the tattoo is knowing how far I can push things. Taking after his mother, my youngest son is as sharp as a tack and he’d quickly see through the ruse if I take it too far too quickly. Like you I seem to be engaged in half a dozen other things at the moment so lack of gaming mojo hasn’t been much of an issue.

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  10. Because Google hates me, I had problems signing-in above - I'll try again now - if this is Anonymous too I shall try again later.

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    1. Google hates us all, but loves our data. Knew the post above was from you but I thought you were doing it on the down low (as the kids no longer say)by choice.

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