A Very Scary Solstice

Long time friends and acquaintances know that I take Christmas very seriously. On the other hand, I always appreciate a good humorous lampoon, and I'm also a fan of H.P. Lovecraft's fiction.

The H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society has put out two "Solstice" (read: Christmas) albums. The first was A Very Scary Solstice, the new one is An Even Scarier Solstice. Both of these are available online.

A good example of the fun songs is It's beginning to look a lot like Fish-Men (go there now and play the song) to the tune of "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas".

Great fun for your holiday gaming session.

Thanksgiving Vacation - a book fest (but sadly no miniature painting)

I just posted about a used book store find that I got from McKay's books in Winston Salem - Red Cavalry. Other books that I read (or purchased) over the Holiday weekend include:

A War Like No Other - Victor Davis Hanson analyzes the Peloponnesian War with (in my opinion) good historical perspective. He then appplies the lessons of that conflict to modern day (and other) examples of "just war". You may find it interesting.

The Russian Revolution: A Very Short Introduction - S.A. Smith. Just what it says - a short introduction. Good overview of the 1905-1917 era, with the rise and release of Lenin, and the rise of the Bolsheviks over the Mensheviks. Not bad, but (as it says) short.

Greek War of Independence - David Brewer. Good book on the events of the 1820s and 30s. Not a lot of detail for the wargamer, but a very good general history. A lot of detail on individual personalities, which makes the whole thing very accessible.

The Russian Civil War - Evan Mawdsley. A very nice counter to Red Victor by Lincoln (my favorite single volume on the RCW). Shows in great detail how the Whites really had a lot of advantages, and how the Red chances of victory were slimmer than previously supposed. I don't know if I'm convinced (I haven't read the whole book, admittedly) but it does make for good reading.

1066: The Year of the Conquest - David Howarth. One of my favorite history authors - this is (as usual) a very readable and enjoyable book. Worth looking for, and should be easy to find.

So there you have it - the books I dragged along with me on my week long trip, and some I picked up on the way. My time would have been better spent painting miniatures, however. Harrumph.

Red Cavalry - a recent used book store find

Red Cavalry is a collection of short stories and reports written by Babel during the Russo-Polish war. I have, admittedly, not read the entire work, but the excerpts I have read made it clear to me why it (in the 1920s) got broad international acclaim for two reasons - (1) It is engrossing and well written, and (2) it is incredibly brutal.

The scenes of Bolshevik, White, Green, Anarchist and Polish troops engaged in all sorts of operations are meticulously detailed, and the feel for someone doing RCW (or related) is fantastic. If you can manage to keep your lunch down between the descriptions of mercy killings, slogging through your own mate's intestines, and gang rape victims being taunted.

Not for the young.


Tags: Russo-Polish War

19th Century Imaginations - Sausage Wars (new entry from Chuckipedia)

Sausage Wars - (see also Brazilnutti Uprising) - a minor conflict, now often relegated to the underside of the dustbin of history, that involved the minor states of Balkania. The main cause of the disagreement seems to be whether or not to include Sausage in the canonical listing of Balkanian cuisine. The XIVth peace talks, held in Gaspacia (Kingdom of the Three Sicilies), famously broke down when visiting dignitaries from Vulgaria began a chorus of "Wassamatta wi' me?" to be answered by their Hostian rivals with "Wassamatta for you!" across the room. This led quickly to a tossed sausage, and finally to musketry volleys.


Tags: Sausage Wars, Balkania, Brazilnutti, Gaspacia, Kingdom of Three Sicilies, Furstenberg, Vulgaria,

Russian Civil War Equipment Series (2) - 1902 Putilov 76.2mm gun

While not as famous of a piece during WWI as the French 75, this field gun is quite a successful model, and in addition to being used in the Imperial Army during the RJW and also in WWI, it was used by both sides during the Civil War.

The gun proved so successful, that it was used by the Polish and Romanians, and continued in use by the Russians up through the Great Patriotic War. Of note, the Romanians retooled the gun to take the French 75mm round, and the resulting field piece was named the Schneider-Putilov 1902 75mm.


A modernized version of the gun (shortened from L26 to L24 in 1930 by the Finns to use as a gun in some tank models. Notably, it was found in the Finn versions of the BT-8 and the T28-B.

Polish Armored Train number 54, the Grozny, had a couple of Putilov's as main armament. It was used in the Russo-Polish War.

It is a good workhorse field gun, and received several upgrades and mods. The basic form has a range of about 6000 meters, and a ROF of 10 rounds per minute. Not bad as an infantry support gun. It was finally replaced, in service, by the ZIS 1941 gun.


Tags: Russian Civil War, miniatures, wargames

Clubmen for the ECW

Wargames Factory just announced the Liberty and Union League - basically something sort of like the 100 club of Eureka Miniatures.

Someone submits a Sprue idea, for figures to be produced in hard plastic. Gamers then sign on to order figures, by committing (with no money down) for a number of sprues. Once the orders reach 500 sprues, photos of the in-progress sculpts are made available. Once 1000 orders are made, each pre-order person then kicks in $1 per sprue, to pay the cost of tooling up. Once finished, they sprues are shipped and the remainder of the cost per sprue (about $4-6 per sprue?) is charged.

Great idea! It works for Columbia Games, GMT Games, Eureka Miniatures and a bunch of other companies.

I put in a sprue description for something that I've wanted for some time (and in a decent quantity), and I can only assume that other ECW gamers would want too. That is a nice, affordable, 17th century armed civilian that would be suitable for peasant mob or armed Clubmen. These would fit into a number of wargaming army lists for ECW, as they fought on their own vs. a number of armies (see Dorset and Wiltshire). Similar armed figures fought for Fairfax against the Royalist army in Yorkshire in 1643.

This figure could also serve very nice as armed mob in the Monmouth Rebellion, or as armed peasants for a Thirty Years War game.

This is not even addressing the usefulness such figures would fill for civilians in a typical Musketeers or Pirates or ECW skirmish game.

So, support the cause! Defend ye homesteads, ye Godly men! Take up the Cudgel and Bible and say Nay! to tyrants and blasphemers! Go to Wargames Factory and put in your order, with the Liberty and Union Leage for Renaissance 17th Century Armed Civilians!

Tags:

Russo Japanese War at Fall In a success

The running of a Russo-Japanese War game at Fall In was a great success. It was sponsored by ODMS and will be repeated at the Williamsburg Muster.

The game had six players (three per side), and was a test of my mods to the great set of rules for Russian Civil War by the Jackson Gamers, Forward Comrades. The mods are becoming more and more extensive, and the rules (nicknamed "Forward for the Tsar") will be published here in the near future.

At the convention, the scenario was a contested river crossing. We played it two times, once with just ODMS lads (with the Russians attempting to force the crossing) and once as the convention event (with the Japanese attempting to force the crossing). The Russians won (but not neatly) both games.

The only differences between the armies was a slight difference in command, a slight initiative benefit to the Japanese army, and a difference in the organization of the artillery batteries. The Russian army was slightly bigger (10 battalions to 8 battalions of infantry), but the Japanese had a few Elite units to balance it out. The artillery difference was three batteries of two guns for the Japanese, and two batteries of three guns for the Russians - this gave the Russians more dice per battery, but one fewer battery (the number of dice is per gun, so the total for each side was balanced.

I have to say that I am looking forward to more RJW, but also the slightly connected RCW.

Tags: Russo Japanese War, miniatures, wargames