"God is not on the side of the big battalions,"

", but of the best shots."

It turned out that I needed a British Army Sniper for the Top Malo House scenario in the Force on Forcerulebook. Not having one to hand - I cast about for a suitable replacement. As it happened the British Army were still using a variant Lee-Enfield in the early eighties, so with the addition of a bit of greenstuff, aCeasar Second World War British Commando sniper became a Falklands/Cold War era sniper.

I generally shy away from this sort of thing, but it would have taken so long to order an additional figure, it seemed ludicrous to wait. Unlike Ross, I can't simply make off with the lead from the Church roof and ramble home to cast up some extra hussars.

Outfitting him in a ghillie suit seemed a bit silly, so I added a non-regulation camouflage cape and scrim on the rifle.

Snipers are a law unto themselves at the best of times and while the cape has a rather Soviet look about it, it will do for the time being. I regret now that I didn't score the scrim on the rifle a bit more or take a picture of the back of the hood, which I was quite happy with.

Loot from Hay on Wye

A collection of loot from Hay on Wye*

The Falklands collection picked up for a song in Hay on Wye. I've always had something of a shine for the Falklands as it is the first contemporary conflict that I actually remember being aware of, admittedly some years after it occurred. My mother bought me a book about it when I was small, Raymond Briggs polemic "The Tin Pot Foreign General and the Old Iron Woman." My view of the conflict has become somewhat more nuanced since then.

I took part in a Falklands war campaign, which was something of a curates egg, the results of which were described in an issue of the Classic Wargamers Journal. I also ran an abortive matrix game version which I got from a magazine, but that didn't progress as I radically underestimated the difficulty of umpiring the game.

I have a yen to do something in that line again, hence the haul of books. I have the Two Fat Lardies "We'll have to bloody walk" expansion for I ain't been shot Mum, but I think most likely I'll use an adapted version of the tried and trusted Memoir '44 rules, probably leaning rather heavily on the rules presented in the new Winter Wars supplement.

*The Ospreys were bought from an elderly chap whose observations amused me greatly.

"Lovely people the Argentinians. Great at football and shite at war."

This is no where near as funny when divorced from the euphonious Welsh accent in which it was delivered.