Eyes front!

I have tried out a couple of things and come to the following conclusions. 

1) Standard eyes - too manga-ish. 

2) Suggestion of eyebrow - this looked a bit odd to my eye as to make it visible it had to be quite far down on the face and didn't look right. I think this maybe an issue with the fact the bearskin comes down quite low over the eyes than anything else. 

3) Black dot - pictured above, this seems to work as it suggests without being too realistic. I might try it again with brown or dark blue. We shall see. 

Dapol Village Church

Time is a scarce resource at present, but I was passing our local model railway shop a few days ago and realised that my village was missing something vital, a village church. This is a plastic kit from Dapol and is I believe an ex-Airfix production.  I had one, about a million years ago, but rather foolishly left it on top of a gas heater with the result that it became rather wonky rather quickly. 

I also recall that storing it in a manner that preserved the crosses was also a problem.  

I swiped this picture from the Dapol website and it looks like a good paint scheme to me, not too dark.  I'm struggling to date this particular example. It looks early Victorian to my eye,but I know nothing of architecture.  It occurs to me that the village should probably also have a non-conformist hall. 

I'm not entirely sure when I'll get a chance to make a run at putting this little beacon of light together, but it has been run through the dishwasher and is sitting on the bedside table with some glue and a craft knife. 

I shall take a leaf out of Luke's book and in patience possess me my soul. 

Edward French

Lost Hearts by MR James

As I mentioned before reading or this year listening to the ghost stories of MR James is something of a Christmas tradition of mine, while I was doing so I came across this chap, Mr. Edward French of Boston, Massachussets.  Mr. French is a film make up artist by trade and by all accounts a very good one(1). However, he also has a liking for audiobooks and story telling and has taken it upon himself to read some stories in the public domain and record them on YouTube. 

The Time Machine by HG Wells

Mr. French tastes run to dramatic reading with some incidental music and they are, in my opinion, very good indeed.  He is a fine reader and obviously takes care in the recording and production of his work.  The quality is as good as any professional I've come across and there's a fine selection of early horror and science fiction literature to choose from. 

Herbert West Re-Animator by HP Lovecraft

Every so often, the Internet throws up these little gems. So if you've an idle hour and enjoy quality audiobooks for the princely sum of nada, free, gratis and fer nuttin' you could do a lot worse than pay Mr. French a call. 

Happy listening. 

(1) Emmy winning and Oscar nominated in fact. 

London Calling

I always enjoyed the old "Invasion" comic strip in 2000AD. It was created by Pat Mills, the man behind Charley's War and a man for all his faults, knows how to write a good yarn. The central conceit was that in the late 90s, the "Volgan Republic" was set up after a military coup in Russia. This state then invaded Britain (led by Ken Livingstone!) seeking to control North Sea oil. 

The hero was a foul mouthed, Sun reading trucker named Bill Savage, who joined the anti-Volgan resistance after his family were killed by a stray tank shell. He wrought grim vengence on the Volgs with a shotgun and whatever else came to hand. My enthusiasm for Bill has led to some interesting Elhiem figures. 

There's a large element of slapstick in "Invasion", but my thoughts have been turning to a slightly less cartoony Soviet occupation game. With that in mind, Du Gourmand, Capability Savage and I played a game of Black Ops on the 28th. 

Somewhere in the Soviet Second Commonwealth of England circa 1980

(click to embiggen)

After the brief, but bloody war of 1979, the Soviet occupation of what is now called the Commonwealth of England, Ireland, Scotland & Wales has begun. While the phony war continues between the US and the USSR in the Atlantic and the government in exile in Canada gathers itself together, resistance is growing to Soviet rule.  There were many acts of brutality, heroism and cowardice in this clandestine conflict and somewhere between London and the Liverpool Rad Zone, yet another is being played out. 

We played this as a variation of the Assassination scenario from the Black Ops rulesbook. I mustered 60 points of Soviet conscripts, while Savage and Du Gourmand raised 30 points of Militia each. This was our first time messing with the stealth rules (not solo) and on the whole I think it went rather well.  The resistance had learned that a particularly brutal and hated Soviet commander, Maximilian Foyski, was on a tour of inspection in the area and resolved to assassinate him. 

They had information that he would be in the pub for a pint after a hard days secret policing. 

After dark, a sentry walks his beat outside the Peoples Militia station 

(click to embiggen)

I set up the game and the boys started grappling with the stealth rules. One thing that I thought they handed very well was taking a good look at the ground before deploying.  I had snuck a small surprise into the game, by purposely putting two pub models on the board.  The boys quickly realised that there were two potential sites for Foy and adapted their plan according. 

The lads jump an unfortunate Russian

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Du Gourmands boys led by "The Guv'nor" sneak on to the board and run slap bang into a Russian sentry, who promptly fluffed his observation roll. He went down in a hail of rifle butts. 

Meanwhile, Savage's forces scout out "The Hare & Hounds"

(click to embiggen)

The boys had a number of close calls during the stealth portion of the game, which weren't helped by that we managed to balls up the rules at a couple of points.  I had played these before solo and had misinterpreted some key points, not realising that sentries were activated on their own cards and not by enemy action. We also forgot the cumulative effects of noise, which gave the attackers a bit more of an advantage. 

The guvnor plays it cool after being spotted by a Russian sentry

(click to embiggen)

Du Gourmand's boys surround "The Red Lion" when a Soviet sentry makes an observation check to spot the Guv'nor covering the rear exit. Fortunately for Du Gourmand, my observation check matched rather than exceeded the target number, so all the sentry could do was turn to face and then hope to spot something more damning on his next activation.  We worked this out after a hurried consultation of the rules, at which point Du Gourmand announced, "So I've been spotted, but not made? Excellent. I'll knock politely then."

The lads surround the pub

(click to embiggen)

One thing we weren't sure of was what to do with the bodies of deceased sentries. It didn't come up during our game, but I didn't see anything in the rules covering this particular situation. We decided that a common sense approach would be best and that bodies could be picked up as part of an activation. 

While the guv'nor covers the back, the boys go in the front and discover that the pub is full of locals rather than Russian troops. A jammy roll on the civilian interaction table reveals that Foyski is in the other pub. 

The balloon goes up - Savage (with shotgun) running from the scene

(click to embiggen)

Meanwhile, a recce of the Hare & Hounds led to a frustrating series of observation rolls for Savage.  There was no telling which part of the Hare & Hounds, Foyski was in. A resistance member entered the pub and tries to suss out the locals. This goes spectacularly badly with the inebriated local loudly announcing " 'ee's got a bloody gun under 'is coat!" 

This generated a noise marker (white block) and finally raised the alarm. Foyski, who was in the back lounge, immediately made a break for the police station. 

Shots ring out inside the Hare & Hounds

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But before he managed to get out of the pub, the rest of the resistance cell bailed into the lounge and riddled him with carbine fire. 

Savage had selected carbines for his troops for reasons best known to himself, I was wondering what that would be in the late 70s context.  Privately held .22 birding or small game rifles I'd imagine. 

Soviet reinforcements dashed out of the old police station and started for the two pubs. 

Soviets reinforcements brass up the rear of The Red Lion

(click to embiggen)

With Foyski dead, the resistance started to pull out, but didn't quite make it entirely unscathed. Savage's GPMG team who were covering the retreat were hit by a hail of Kalashnikov fire and went down, while Du Gourmand's boys in the Red Lion were subjected to a barrage of RPGs, grenades and bullets. Luckily for them, they managed to make their saves and fled the pub as quickly as they could. 

On the whole, we were very happy with how the game turned out. The stealth rules once we worked them out properly, there is no substitute for playing a game against an opponent, were slick and added a drama to what could have been a dull exercise for the defending player. The common sense approach employed in the rules was good and all concerned were eager to play again. 

The boys rolled for Intel and gained a point. Intel points are accumulated over a series of loose campaign games and are spent for the opportunity to trigger a final showdown scenario. We rolled for the next scenario while tidying up and got a hostage rescue scenario set in a rural farm, but with the resistance defending.  

We shall see how this plays out. 

Irish Guards

I was messing around with these over Christmas. These are classic toy soldiers from the Prince August range. I always think of the Guards as the archetypal toy soldier which is probably the legacy of Christmas biscuit tins and storybooks. They cast neatly and were under coated in red spray from army painter. Details were block painted in with Vallejo colours. I'm still in two minds about how to do the eyes as previous attempts have looked a bit odd, the sort of staring manga eyes that follow you around the room. I think some consultation may be in order. 

Uniform, as always, is that of the Irish Guards. 

Sent from my iPhone

30th Lancer

Quite an imposing sight

Over Christmas, I did some completely frivolous mucking about with some Prince August moulds. This is, of course, as opposed to the very serious business of building armies for wargaming.  I quite enjoy casting, there's something quite soothing about doing something with your hands.  This was my first time messing about with a cavalry mould in 1/32 scale, but for a first effort he hasn't come out too badly. The only flaw that I can see in this specimen is that one of the horses ears is missing, but I think a little green stuff will sort that out relatively easily.

 

I'm rather happy with how the lance turned out

One thing that I've noticed with cavalry figures is that they take a great deal of metal, but they have a pleasing solidity in the hand that is quite satisfying.

 

For the most part this cast quite cleanly, though I had to have two trys at the arms, which didn't quite cast correctly. The lance is a puzzlement as it comes in two parts, but with a little care they went together reasonably well. I'm not sure I like having the pennant as a cast on part, as I think I would have prefered to add my own. We shall try it as is for the time being. 

 

The figure was trimmed and glued with epoxy as standard superglue wouldn't be quite up to the job. If the epoxy does not do the job, we might have to consider pinning.

 

The uniform is that of the 30th (Royal) Lancers, though there may be possibilities for paint conversions for other regiments.

Sitting a little far back for my taste

 

Prince August describes the 30th as follows;

 

 

"This unit was raised in Hyderabad, India, in 1862, by Captain John Gordon of the Coldstream Guards, by a treaty with the independent Nizam of Hyderabad; who was forced to give up large tracts of his land to pay for its upkeep and maintenance. According the the treaty the regiment was to provide security for the Nizam, but for the British authorities it served the added purpose of keeping his own power in check. Thus, when the Nizam's younger brother rebelled in 1929, the regiment moved into Hyderabad City and restored order. Later in 1854, the units name was changed to the 4th Cavalry and it became part of the Hyderabad contingent. During the Indian mutiny (1857-1858) Gordons Horses served as part of the Central Indian Field Force and took part in the defeat of a large rebel army near Mehidpus. It took part also in the relief of Neemuch and the capture of Jhansi. The regiment later saw action in the opening phases of the second Afgan War (1879), in several action o the North-west frontier. It served in Burma from 1887, undertaking police and anti-guerrilla activities. In 1890 it was renamed the 4th lancers, and again in 1903 it was renamed the 30th Lancers."

I shall have to correct that lean

On the whole, I'm relatively happy with this first effort, though there was a lingering uneasiness that I couldn't quite put my finger on until I looked at the photographs a second time.  I can't ever recall having seen a clean shaven Indian lancer. While I could add a painted on beard, I don't think that mere paint could possibly do justice to the magnificent facial hair sported by our brothers on the sub-continent.

I don't think paint could do justice to this.

(Image property of Amit & Naroop from their Singh Project)

Hark the Herald

The Cathedral filling up

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This year my rest days fell across the holiday and we were able to spend Christmas together which was brilliant.  There was a lot of tooing and froing in the run up, but all that nonsense faded away when we went to the Saint Patrick Nine Carols and Lessons. The service is very well attended, so we had to turn up an hour early to get seats. This might seem irksome, but it was actually really pleasant, because it meant that we got to sit together for an hour with no phones, nothing else to do, but talk and enjoy each others company.

The service itself was magical, with reading from the choir and the school.  The carols were a mix of old and new, ending as always with a resounding "Hark the Herald Angels sing" with half a dozen trumpets.  We don't get to go most years because of work, but when we do it's a memory we cherish the rest of the year. 

After service was spent catching up with family and friends, before bolting out of the Cathedral and seeing the senior Kinchs.

We also ran into Dom, who was certainly festive. 

(click to embiggen - but exercise caution, excessive exposure may cause blindness)

Ghost stories at Christmas are something of a Kinch 

tradition and there are few better than these. 

We spent Christmas Day with Mrs. Kinch's family which was a wonderfully relaxed day filled with good food and good company.  Rare roast beef and yorkshire pudding and my father in law's vintage port meant that my waist band will be a little tighter come New Year. A new dressing gown and smokeables kept me entertained while I painted a few Prince August Guardsmen and listened to some MR James Ghost Stories. The above recording is a good one and I recommend it unreservedly. 

And lest there be any scruple about listening to audiobooks on YouTube, the recording is in the public domain was made to be distributed as widely and as freely as possible. 

One of my mother in laws cribs

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So we spent Christmas day with the inlaws, during which time I had a look at some of my mother in laws cribs.  My mother in law really likes cribs. These figures are about 1/32 in scale. 

How much does she like them, I hear you ask? 

She has thirty of them. 

And another

The figures were picked up on a family holiday to Italy in the 1960s, the backdrops were both made by Mrs. Kinch's great uncle.  These slightly smaller than the previous lot, around 1/48, I'd hazard. 

A table of Christmas decorations

My mother in law was going to decorate another family members home and had put a little collection of things on a table in the living room.  A number of things caught my eye. 

Including this little chap

This crib, with a frame made by Mrs. Kinch's great uncle, is really surprisingly small. About 1/300 scale I think and made with German flats I picked up in Hanover.

My keys for scale - It really is teeny. 

(click to embiggen)

But lastly, this stuck out amongst the Christmas decorations. If I had any doubts as to the essential soundness of Mrs. Kinchs parents, they were put to rest.  What home would be complete without a Christmas Bismarck? 

Nothing says the anniversary of the birth of Our Lord and Saviour quite like Eisen und Blut!

But seriously, we had a wonderful, peaceful day and I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas, however belatedly, and share this video with you. It is a very simple idea, but beautifully executed by some very clever people in a German supermarket.

Rarely does Wordsworth's phrase "surprised by joy" seem so apt.

See you all in 2016.