Who do you think you are kidding Mr Mosley…

Very short post this week just to catalogue some VBCW painting progress. Needless to say there’s still tons more to do.

Given the poor weather and the absence of both gardening or visitors I finished off the last few figures for the Brompton TA section, produced a WW1 era lorry, 5 members of the Brompton Carpet Factory Defence Force and a couple of bits of scatter terrain. Here in no particular order are the results.

First of the carpet factory lads. This is Bill *Butcher* Haskins with a lethal looking hedging implement. Comes in handy for all your fascist pruning needs. 

Michael *Pedro* O’Rorke. Anarchist volunteer recently returned from Spain. (Hat tip to Chris for the inspiration). Along with the pistol he’s carrying either a sticky bomb or an over large marital aid. Either way…if he uses it on you you’re buggered. lol. 

Charlie Booth, local Green grocer and former TA chap. Might put a scope on that bondook and make him a sniper.

Another TA bod. Len Tyler. Demon bowler for the Brompton 1st Eleven.

Alfred Bingham, last of the TA chaps - chief clerk at Lloyd’s Bank on the Brompton High Road. 

Frank Upton. Works at the carpet factory - but used to be a pilot in the last lot…so he says.  

Norman *Trotsky* Tomkinson - factory shop steward and inventor of the one shot Tomkinator - hand pumped flamethrower. 

Essential scatter terrain or vital comms equipment depending on your viewpoint.

Most of the initial VBCW stuff will be set in and around an industrial area, and, as anyone who plays skirmish games will tell you - you can never have too much scatter terrain.

The jury’s out on this one. A Sarissa Precision WW1 Lorry which I’m reliably informed would still just about be in use by the mid 1930´s. A bit crude? WS Atkins is my brother in laws garage in Coventry by the way. Thought I’d sneak in a bit of cheeky advertising on his behalf. lol. 

None of this lot are of Aly Morrison standard, but they’ve been really fun to paint and there’s a few more characters yet to come (along with a bunch of buildings).

Toodleooh for now mateys.

The adequate six

Yeah, the adequate six.  Doesn’t have the same je ne sais quoi as the magnificent seven does it? These lads are the first of the anti fascist resistance fighters defending the fictitious midlands town of Brompton. 

Not sure what the back story of the guy with the gas mask and the petrol can with a grenade strapped to it is, but it’ll be fun (for me) to create one. The guy on the right is from North Star and though billed as 28mm is a bit chunkier than the others from Irregular. Given that he’s a staff officer I’m going to assume that he’s been enjoying more than his fair share of brandy and cigars. 

I’ve broken my anti fascists into three groups this lot are from the local TA battalion, disbanded by Mosley, hence the battle bowlers and webbing. The second bunch (with a lovely Maxim 08 LMG) are from the towns concerned business community and the third are workers from Brompton’s carpet factory. 

The results so far don’t really support it but they are a delight to paint and I’m looking forward to getting to grips with the rest. 

Finally here’s the Lanchester (especially for Keith who’s partial to the odd interwar armoured car) which is still to have its name (Rosie) and registration plates applied. The eagle eyed and the picky will note that it doesn’t have standard British Army markings, this is because it’s operated by Mosley’s 1st (Hounslow) Assault Column whose tactical symbol is a white square (and anyone who claims I just didn’t have any proper decals to hand is a ruddy liar…so there).

“Rosie” with BUF flash applied to turret.

T’other side. Markings show Rosie is the third vehicle from the second troop. 

Right I’d better sling my hook, the suns on the wane and Elsie (the chicken) still hasn’t learned it’s time to head for the coop. 

A bientôt mes amis.

A nut to crack a hammer

With the last of the house guests dropped off at the airport I’ve been able to get back on with some hobby related stuff at last.

I particularly wanted to test out the Never Mind The Billhooks rules now that I’d produced two starter forces. Given that I’m using Billhooks for the Hundred Years’ War the preeminent question to my mind was how strong English archery would turn out to be. With that in mind I set up a very straight forward encounter in the manner of Crecy etc to see what would happen.

One part of the NMTB rule set that I especially like is the ability to manoeuvre your units one at a time until someone shoots or engages in melee at which point the game and the random turn draw actually starts.

On the French side the Comte De Bourganeuf was in overall command, ably assisted by the Duke D’Aubusson. For the English the Earl of Runcorn and Sir Edward Grey headed up the rearguard - attempting to stop the French from reaching the retreating baggage train. 

During the manoeuvre phase I positioned my three French groups of cavalry directly opposite what I considered to be the weakest spot in the English line, a company of English spearmen unprotected by stakes. Knowing the English archers only had six shots each en masse I pushed two groups of skirmishing crossbowmen forward in order to inflict some casualties and hopefully soak up some of those English arrows. The plan was simple, draw fire with the crossbows and smash through the English line with my massed cavalry.

Initial French set up as described above. I did not like the range bands in the rules and changed them such that short range became twelve inches and long range was boosted out to twenty four. 

The French hammer prepares to crack the English nut.

Kiki the wonder cat inspects the troops prior to kick off. 

All was going okay until the French crossbows got a little too close and the English gave them a volley to end the manoeuvring phase and start the game off proper. 

The archers behind the stakes let loose and rolled well. The crossbowmen correspondingly rolled abysmally and the result was the entire unit was wiped out in a shower of arrows. Fortunately the loss of a skirmishing unit had little effect on the rest of the French army’s morale. Didn’t do much for mine mind you.

A bit shaken by the outcome I decided there was no percentage in trying to draw fire and so decided to get stuck in with my cavalry as soon as possible, fortunately the random card draw for the turn allowed them to activate next anyway. When activated via an order a unit can perform two actions. I chose to advance and then charge.

Sorry I had to sneak in a comment bubble.

And that was meant to be that. The might of the French cavalry should have just swept away the English infantry, armed as they were with a right old mish mash of hand weapons, but they didn’t. Both sides inflicted the same amount of limited losses and the melee became a stale mate. 

The second round of melee was another grinding match. The cavalry having lost all of their charge bonuses and re rolls were now at a distinct disadvantage. Again it was a draw so while both units became disordered neither side broke. I consoled myself that the archers could not fire into a melee and I bought up the second company of knights from behind to finish the job. 

Only 50% of the French first wave still survive as fresh reinforcements thunder up behind.

Thunder up they might’ve done but unfortunately the turn gods gave the next move to the Earl of Runcorn and his archers fired en masse into the approaching group of French nobility.

With their two actions the archers fired twice, at close range. Do not try this at home kids. The advancing French nobility went from eight horse to two in the blink of an eye. Ouch. In fairness the English rolled well and the French attempts at saving rolls were appalling. 

Sir Edward Grey was forced to ride over and steady the wavering English spears but the last two knights from the first wave broke and ran from the final third round of melee. Seeing the appalling losses I decided to call the game quits at this point even though I could have pushed on from a morale and fresh forces point of view. 

Other units were of course moving around on the field but in this brief “histoire” I chose to concentrate on the more cinematic aspects of the action.

And as it turned out, this time, the nut actually cracked the hammer! 

I’ve been working to a 1:10 troop ratio so the losses accrued in this battle were:

English. 60 spearmen and 30 archers (hit by crossbow fire).

French. 60 crossbowmen and 120 knights. 

Were the English archers effective? Yup very! I have to say that despite the outcome though they didn’t feel overpowered. The English rolls were good and the French were bad. Another wave of horse with the leader attached might have punched through. I’ll have to give it another go and see. 

Right I’m going to sling my hook and get on with painting that Lanchester.

Toodleooh for now mes amis.