Tuesday, 10 April 2018

To the Strongest! at Salute


At our table GG07, circled in whtie on the plan below, Andrew Brentnall and I will be running not one but TWO games of For King and Parliament. We'll start games in the morning at 11AM and afternoon at 2:30 PM. If you'd like to play for an hour or more, email me and I'll book you in! I have invested in some big banners, to help you find us... :-)


I don't sell anything at Salute- I'm always far too busy chatting. However, Wargames Foundry at TH14 and Caliver Books at TJ12 (circled in red on the plan above) are near to the games and will each have a stock of To the Strongest! and the new TtS! For King and Parliament rules.

There won't be any coins, mats, bases or chits on sale- however, if you order from the BigRedBatShop before lunchtime on Thursday, and add a note or email me, I can refund your postage and bring the package along for collection; I might even add some samples...

I hope to meet lots of chums, new and old, on Saturday- do please come by and say hello!

Wednesday, 4 April 2018

Welcome to Soggy Bottom


The Borsetshire village of Soggy Botton will feature in our Salute game on Saturday week. All of the buildings are painted- the red-primed areas need to be textured and covered with mud or grass, and the brown strips around the edges with wattle fences. All the buildings, except for the tithe barn, are from Hovels' splendid 25/28mm range. 

If you are coming to Salute please make a beeline to us and say hello! We have spaces for up to a dozen players in the morning and afternoon. Many cards will be turned...

We are GG07, near the stage in the centre, circled white in the below diagram. As well as my 28mm game, For King and Parliament co-author Andrew Brentnall will be bringing the same battle in 10/12mm. 


Thursday, 29 March 2018

Preparations for Salute


Above are the "reinforcements" for the Salute game- eight regiments of horse and six of foot - have a click! Chum Ian has been helping me to grout the bases- just 2 regiments remain ungrouted- next week comes the dreaded flockathon that precedes any show game. 


A huge thanks to everyone who has bought the "For King and Parliament" rules so far- sales are off to a storming start! By close of play today I should have all the remaining orders despatched. At one stage, I ran out of chits but I have restocked, so if you couldn't get your dash chits they are in the shop, now.

Friday, 23 March 2018

For King and Parliament is in the shop!


TtS! “For King and Parliament” is a simple set of wargames rules for the Civil Wars in England (and Scotland and Ireland) of the mid-Seventeenth Century.


Written by myself and Andrew Brentnall, they use mechanisms that will be immediately familiar to players of the popular “To the Strongest!” ancient and medieval rules. Using For King and Parliament, a battle can be fought and won (or lost!) on a dining room table in less than two hours. The same rules, however, also support huge battles, involving thousands of miniatures and up to five players a side. The use of subtle grids dispenses with the need for measurement- and consequently play moves along at a cracking pace.


A unique activation system driven by playing cards or numbered chits introduces uncertainty; in some turns a regiment will fly across the battlefield; in others it will stubbornly remain rooted to the spot. The same deck is used to swiftly resolve shooting and melee; no dice, whatsoever, need be rolled! Special rules model the various firing systems used by the foot, and the occasionally uncontrollable nature of ECW horse.


The rules are written in plain English, and illustrated with appropriate diagrams, photographs and period images, sample army lists, examples of play and an introductory scenario.


The rules are available as a book (£19.99) and as a digital download (£9.99), or together for £24.99. Along with various accessories, they are now for sale in the BigRedBatShop. We do hope you enjoy them – and may none of your cards be Aces!

Tuesday, 6 March 2018

Saint Something-or-other


Here's a quick shot  of a WIP terrain piece for my Salute ECW game; a Hovels church and scratch-build chirchyard. David Davies painted the church but I've detailed it- it stands around 25cm tall- a fine piece. The churchyard disassembles and packs away. I was going to fill it with gravestones, but apparently these were pretty uncommon until after the ECW. I will need some yew trees, though. I am looking for a name for it- the nearby village is named Soggy Bottom, after the local marsh- all suggestions considered!

In other news, For King and Parliament is finished, and I'm waiting for the Proof copy- very exciting- and I have a flash sale of rules, chits, bases and cloths in the BigRedBatShop! 

Wednesday, 7 February 2018

More hosses


Chum Shaun McTague brought in a load more painted cavalry yesterday. These are most of the additional "Swedish" horse (gallopers if you like) for Salute; around six eighteen-man regiments worth. Dauntingly I also need to complete at least three larger regiments of Dutch; not shown... 

Monday, 5 February 2018

Still trapped in the ECW

In the lead-up to Salute, all my ancient and medieval projects are currently on hold and most of my recent posts have been on my new ECW blog. So I thought I'd pop in here and say hi, even though all I have to post is a pic of a couple of extra ECW regiments that are approaching completion.


Above are two 18-mini regiments of "Swedish" horse. Below, these minis were painted by David Davies but I painted some of the horses and added a little highlighting. 


These chaps will become "Northern Horse"; hard riding, hard fighting and turbulent Yorkshire Royalists.

I am very much looking forward to the TtS! Worlds at Chalgrove in 3 weeks time. We have all the army lists in and I was very surprised to see that there are more medieval armies, than ancient ones! In fact, there are several surprising trends, of which more anon....

Monday, 29 January 2018

Last call for the To the Strongest! Worlds


On Saturday 24th February 2018, the fourth "To the Strongest!" World Championships will take place in the village of Chalgrove in Oxfordshire- and there is still time and space for a few late entries!

We believe that "Worlds" is the largest 28mm big-battle ancient/medieval tournament in, well, the world. This year we expect to have up to 40 players from at least four countries who will each fight four battles using 28mm armies, to establish who is the World’s Strongest! 

The atmosphere is more good-natured than competitive; that said, the competition for the wooden spoon can be fierce. ;-) If you'd like to throw your hat in the ring, you can pick an ancient or medieval army from any of the 181 official "To the Strongest!" ancient and medieval lists, up to 130 points. If the list for your favourite 28mm historical army isn't already written, let me know and I will write the list for you. If you don't have a suitable 28mm army, I may be able to lend you one.

Wargames Foundry have very generously provided prizes for the winner, runners up and the best-painted army. There are also prizes for sportsmanship, amongst others- and, of course, the wooden spoon. The cost of entry is £9 (includes tea/coffee and biscuits). 


To register, please email steve.dover (at) 3dsystems (dot) com. Steve will send you out a template to enter your army. We will need to hear from you in the next few days….

PS- I will be bringing the Spartans above and hope to get four games in, myself!

Monday, 27 November 2017

All basing and no posting...

...makes Simon a dull lad.


I am very much up against it, as I need to finish basing seven foot regiments, four regiments of horse and five command stands by 13th December. Some terrain would be nice, too...

Sunday, 12 November 2017

Meeples Podcast

I recently had a fine chat with the guys at Meeples about forthcoming To the Strongest! developments and the forthcoming TtS! "For King and Parliament" English Civil War rules, which they have kindly made into a Podcast which you can download from here:-

https://meeples.wordpress.com/2017/11/12/meeples-miniatures-episode-234-for-king-and-parliament/

It is always a great pleasure to chat with Neil, Mike and Mike!

Wednesday, 25 October 2017

St Crispin's Day


"We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day."


(Minis painted by David Imrie and based by me for a projected To the Strongest! army).

Monday, 23 October 2017

Ruspina 46 BCE

"Caesar once again returned to the town of Ruspina, drew up his camp there, and then set out himself with thirty cohorts in light order to forage."

Yesterday I ran an extended version of the Ruspina 46 BCE battle that is one of my favourite ancient engagements. NB all photos are clickable! 

Below are the massed Numidian cavalry, thaaaasands of them (well, 120).



The miniatures are almost all Foundry Numidians or Caesarians, with a degree of admixture of Crusader and conversions from other ranges. 


Above, lines of grim-faced legionaries. Below Caesar surveys the situation. In To the Strongest! terms he is a brilliant general, and very handy, too!
  


More Numidians, above and below.



Above, I based some palms with the minis, just for fun. Below, you can see how well the BatBases blend in with the Sagebrush Steppe design mat. Look- no straight lines!


We played the first part of the battle, twice, with novice players; everyone seemed to have fun, especially the kids, one of whom played for the third year in a row. SELWG is always a fun show! Huge thanks to chum Ian for the beautiful photography and to Mike Brian and his son Alex, and Robert, for helping with setup, and to the SELWGers. Thanks also to Foundry for the nellie and hippo and 1st Corps for all the sheep!  :-)

PS We have one place left on Saturday for a rerun of the battle at the Wargames Holiday Centre, near Basingstoke,; I'm also running the battle of Gaza with Demetrius Poliocretes, elephants and a forest of pikes.  If you are free drop me a line, i believe the day's gaming costs £75.

Friday, 20 October 2017

Out of Africa(ns)


With the above Numidians based, I have finally have as many as I anticipate needing for the foreseeable futire.... These minis, mostly lovely Wargames Foundry from the Caesarians range, bring me to a total of 120 light horse which should be enough for most battles, even those battles where both sides had Numidian cavalry, such as Zama.The minis were painted by Shaun McTague and finished by me; the bases are my famous Batbases.

I'll be running the big Ruspina game at SELWG on Sunday  and we'll see how they do! If you are coming and want to play, please drop me a line. I won't be selling anything at SELWG, but if anyone wants to order things from the BigRedbatShop by, say, 6PM on Saturday, I can bring them along for collection and refund your postage.

Wednesday, 18 October 2017

Announcing the 2018 To the Strongest Worlds!

The fourth "To the Strongest!" World Championships will take place in the village of Chalgrove in Oxfordshire on Saturday 24th February 2018. We believe that "Worlds" is the largest big-battle ancient/medieval tournament in, well, the world. This year we hope to have 50 players from at least four countries who will each fight four battles using 28mm figures, to establish who is the World’s Strongest! 


The atmosphere is more good-natured than competitive; that said, the competition for the wooden spoon can be fierce. ;-) If you'd like to throw your hat in the ring, you can pick an ancient or medieval army from any of the 178 official "To the Strongest!" ancient and medieval lists, up to 130 points. If the list for your favourite 28mm historical army isn't already written, let me know and I will write the list for you. If you don't have a suitable 28mm army, I may be able to lend you one.


There will be prizes for the winner, the best army, the best camp and for sportsmanship, amongst others- and, of course, the wooden spoon. The cost of entry is £9 (includes tea/coffee and biscuits). 


To register, please email steve.dover (at) 3dsystems (dot) com. Steve will send you out a template to enter your army. Please don't wait too long, as there are fewer than twenty places remaining.


I hope to see you in Chalgrove in February!

Tuesday, 10 October 2017

With Ruspina to SELWG!

The annual SELWG show (Crystal Palace on Sunday week) is now just ten days away and I'll be putting on a rather grand game of To the Strongest!

Ruspina is one of Caesar's less well known battles, but one of my favourites because the great man came within a whisker of defeat. It is also an asymmetrical battle, with legionaries matched against masses of light troops. Here are some shots of the game as run earlier this year at the Wargames Holiday Centre; I hope to have a couple more units finished by Sunday week. All photos are clickable!


There will be Romans, Caesar and baggage...


...there will be elephants... savage Germans and proud Pompeians....


...and probably more Numidians than you will ever have seen on a gaming table!


If you are coming and want to play or help or both, please mail me or post in comments!

Saturday, 7 October 2017

Mea culpa...

...mea maxima culpa- it has been six weeks since my last blog post in the BigRedBatCave! 

I have been posting on my new ECW blog, For King nd Parliament, but writing and modelling time has temporarily cut across my ancients posting. I shall see if I can remedy that.... in the meanwhile, here are some lovely Caesarian Romans that Andrés Amián Fernández very generously gifted to me earlier this year. There are some fine painters out there but none who are better at hand-painted shields. The minis are Warlord Caesarian plastics and metals- the photo is clickable. They make my other Romans look shabby!


In other news... in the BigRedBatShop  have some gaming cloths on sale this week- mostly gridded, some ungridded. If you need a cheap cloth, you can find them here!

Friday, 25 August 2017

Leuctra at Partizan

Hi all, I'm still playing catch up after Partizan but here are a couple of photos of the game, taken by chum Ian Notter.


Above is the Spartan deployment- that's Cleombrotos I at the start of the battle. 

Below is the Theban extra-deep phalanx. The speed of the Theban advance in the first game was astonishing (hilariously the new pack of cards they were using for activations wasn't completely shuffled and they played the 6, 7 and the 8 of Hearts in a row, advancing straight into melee and clobbering the Spartans).


In both games Epaminondas' phalanx got off to a cracking start, but narrowly failed to break the opposing Spartans and was pushed back, disordered. In the second game it was routed. Despite this, both games eventually ended in extremely narrow Theban victories due to their superior cavalry (and in particular a large unit of very scruffy raw light cavalry) getting behind the Spartans and causing mayhem. Next week, when I have the time, I'll post the scenario in the BigRedBatShop for downloading; it's a cracker!

A huge thank you to Ian, Andrew Brentnall, Simon Williams, Phil Hamer and all those who helped, played or dropped by for a chat! It was a very enjoyable day at a terrific show. We were surrounded by lovely games with astonishing modelling- but I don't think any games were played by more people or with more good-natured enthusiasm than was ours.

Friday, 18 August 2017

Mega phalanx 4

Here are a couple of WIP shots of the Theban phalanx for Sunday. This will represent the very deep Theban phalanx used at Leuctra. 


The bases are only part painted and also need to be flocked, but should be finished today/tomorrow in time for the show on Sunday. I'm very much looking forward to Partizan, especially as I want to see the stunning Crecy game that David Imrie and Simon Chick have been working on.


In other news, for "To the Strongest!" fans... I've just released a revised version of Even Stronger- this free supplement  includes additional rules that can be used with the To the Strongest! rules. This latest version includes changes to combined light troops, who may now charge formed troops regardless of how they are armed. I have re-written the light lance rule. There are extra sections on ammunition (including a very important change regarding lances and shock and lance chits) and extra weapons. Supported cavalry have become deep units. Artillery have had a boost with a new type – Artillery (field gun), and these and bombards are now very effective against dense targets.

The free supplement can be downloaded from:-

https://bigredbatshop.co.uk/products/to-the-strongest-even-stronger-updated-24-3-2017

Tuesday, 15 August 2017

Mega Phalanx 3


A quick WIP shot of the forming phalanx; all minis finished and varnished. Ranking up is always a challenge with animated minis like the ones I'm using here. 

Happily I am currently ahead of target for Partizan! :-)

Friday, 11 August 2017

Mega-phalanx 2


A hastily snatched shot of Thebans forming up for Sunday-week's mega phalanx. Here are the 70-odd hoplites (Lucid Eye, Foundry and Victrix) that will constitute the 6-deep formation. They are all in active poses - I want the finished unit to have a send of mass and momentum. The minis were all painted by Shaun McTague but I'm in the process of adding some detailing, ink and varnish. I'm getting back on schedule by dint of some rare, daytime painting.