ECW: And Deliver Us from Re-Basing

My health appears to continue to improve, for which I am grateful, and I hope to get back to previous levels of activity on the wargaming front. However...

...my eyesight, though quite a lot better, is still not really up to figure-painting quality, so for a while my priorities should be things I can actually manage. 

First off, I shall get myself better organised - for years my wargame scenery boxes have been in a big cupboard upstairs, so carrying the box with ALL the hills and the box with MOST OF the houses downstairs (and then back up again once the game is done) has become a ritual. It feels kind of worthy, since it is hard work, and it may even be useful exercise, but it seems to me that my Preston Grannie would have identified this sort of activity as daft. For a start, and most seriously, it is a glaring example of a Lazy Man's Load, which is wasteful and sinful for all sorts of reasons. Preston Grannie came from a background where a working man might spend his days carrying bricks up a ladder, one at a time. He could also carry a large hod, bearing many such bricks, which might seem quicker, but he might hurt himself or - more seriously - he might hurt someone else; also, his boss paid him to carry bricks in an approved manner, and to exceed that - especially if the boss made money out of it - was wicked. My Grannie would have pointed out that, since I don't need anything like all my hills and houses around to construct a battlefield, it would be sensible to remove the pieces I needed for a particular project from the box, and take just those downstairs.

Even better, I could organise myself so that the big boxes were stored downstairs (which requires swapping some boxes around, which is in itself worthwhile and may even encourage me to chuck some stuff out, for goodness sake). So that is already proceeding as a background project - it will take me a while to get used to this, but I see it as a positive step. These boxes do not get lighter as the years pass.

Next thing to think about is the basing of my ECW armies - yes - I, too, shudder at the sound of these words, but I shall at least think about it. Here is a little local wargaming history.

I started work on my ECW project around 2012, and the original plan was to base the units so they would work with a number of rulesets, especially Victory without Quarter, which seemed very promising. After much thought and fiddling about, I decided to use 60mm square as my main base size (the figures are 20mm). An infantry unit would comprise 3 such bases - one had pikes and colours - 8 figures in two ranks; the other two each had muskets (including 1 officer or drummer) - 6 figures in two ranks. The cavalry units had 4 stands, each with a single rank of 3 mounted figures. Then there were all sorts of specs for generals, guns - all that. Looked pretty good, in fact, just like the drawings out of the VwQ rules. So I got cracking with building up armies using this system.

I soon decided that VwQ was not what I was looking for - in particular there was an activation system which (a) used scabby playing cards and (b) didn't work very well. So - one time among many - I started again with a home-brewed game of my own, converted from C&C. That worked much better, but it pushed me back towards using hexes - the only snag being that the hex side of my table was adorned with hexes which measured 7 inches across the flats, which is pretty close to 180mm. Which all means that you could deploy one of my infantry units in line, 3 bases of 60 x 60mm, but there was no space between them and an adjacent unit, and certainly no room for any scenery. So I stuck with my basing system, and wished that I had used 50mm squares for the next 12 years or so. My experience encouraged me to do rather better for my WSS armies, for which the standard bases have been 50mm wide from the beginning.

What I've done in the ECW, in fact, is de-emphasise formations - an infantry unit with 2 bases of musketeers in front and the pike base behind is regarded as being in whatever formation the sergeants wish, so that works nicely, until some well-intentioned soul complains that they are not properly in line. Normally, of course, the correct response is to smile pityingly, but it's true, and it does hurt a little - also, I can develop cramp in my upper lip after a few years. So - quietly, and inwardly - I have thought now and then of what I could do without breaking either the bank or my heart.

* I could live with it - I've managed thus far.

* I could rebase my ECW armies using 50mm squares. Points in favour? - well, not much really, but the bases are not flocked, and as far as I can remember just about all the soldiers are glued to their bases with white PVA. With luck, an overnight soak in warm water should loosen them pretty cleanly, then it's just a question of tidying them up and scraping off any surplus - Hmm - that's possible, I guess, but it doesn't feel good as I think about it. 

* There are compromise versions of this, too - just switching the muskets to 50 x 50 would work - a unit in battalia (or whatever it's called) would then be 160mm wide, which would be OK. Rebasing all infantry on 50 x 50 would be even better, but the pikes probably wouldn't fit the smaller bases. Cavalry usually work with 2 bases behind 2 bases - i.e. in line - so I could leave those alone. 

All a bit tricky. I even thought about mad stuff like sawing the edges off the 60 x 60 bases without removing the figures, but we all know how that would work out.

So - what am I going to do?

Well, probably nothing at the moment, but at least I know what the possibilities might be, and I have a clearer idea what it is I'm not doing yet. That's OK - I am not short of quiet time, so I could work at this slowly (whatever it is), and I'm not scared - I've been miserable before. I shall see how this new clarity develops as I let it simmer. I would feel even better if I wasn't sure I've been through exactly this same process a year or so ago, and probably came up with the same answers.

A visitor to my house recently made the mistake of asking to look inside the Napoleonic Cupboard, and was obviously (though politely) shaken by the experience. "But it must have taken ages...".

I said to him what I always say: "That's what hobbies are for, I think; I'm sure I've neglected something else along the way to free up the time, but I'm not sure what it was." 

That is probably me trying to reassure myself, I think. Anyway warm water and glue, a load of bases, a can of the house pea-soup paint and sheets and sheets of self-adhesive magnetic sheet from Trevor. I could do that. The thing to do is probably try a few units, see if I survive, see how it goes. In light of that, I could abandon, or I could revise my estimates as necessary. The worst that could happen is that I end up with a few units the right size.

WSS: Action at Vannes-Koortrijk 1703

Wargaming on Wednesday morning (for me) and afternoon (for him) - James was good enough to arrive by Zoom to continue the bloody adventures of Charles Churchill and Marshal Rabachière in Wallonia in 1703. He beat me to the punch through most of the day, so it is only right and proper that he has already posted his account of the day - and very good too.

We had a lot of things going for us - the technology managed to remain rock-steady throughout the proceedings (here at Mud Farm we've been having what seems to have become our usual autumnal blight of fleeting power cuts in the early morning, but there wasn't one on Wednesday - we did get one the morning after, though, just to keep us twitchy).

James was new to my rules and I set up a fairly balanced encounter as a sampler - James chose to be the Allies. The rules are the latest edition of my CJ-Lite set, which also behaved themselves. In fact we had a nice rip-roaring battle - dignified start and then all you-know-what broke loose. I'll try to string some kind of narrative around my photos - 8 Victory Points for glory. There were two objective-related VPs - one for each half of the town of Vannes-Koortrijk. I had also considered another one for the hill with the lead mine, but decided against it.

Orders of Battle follow:



Action at Vannes-Koortrijk (1703)

French Army (Maréchal de France Clément-Alibert, Comte de Rabachière)
(8 horse; 12 foot; 3 art; 5 leaders)

Bourgeois’ Cavalry Brigade [1] (Marquis de Bourgeois)
Gendarmérie de France (6 Sqns) (elite)
Régt de Grignan (3 Sqns)
Régt de La Baume (3 Sqns)
Viriac’s Cavalry Brigade [2] (Pierre-David Viriac, Comte Pénéstin)
Régt de Lavallière (3 Sqns)
Régt du Mestre de Camp (3 Sqns)
Régt du Roi (3 Sqns)
Régt de Tarnault (3 Sqns)
Pelletier’s Infantry Brigade [3] (Comte Pelletier de Montmarie)
Régt de Béarn (2 Bns)
Régt de Champagne (2 Bns)
Régt du Dauphin (2 Bns)
2 field batteries
Bichotte’s Infantry Brigade [4] (Marquis de Bichotte)
Régt de Languedoc (1 Bn)
Régt de Nettancourt (1 Bn)
Régt de Poitou (2 Bns)
Régt de Saintonge (1 Bn)
Régt de Toulouse (1 Bn)
1 field battery

Allied Army (Lt Gen Charles Churchill)
(7 horse; 14 foot; 2 art; 5 leaders)

Cadogan’s Cavalry Brigade [1] (Col the Earl Cadogan)
Cadogan’s Regt (3 Sqns)
Lumley’s (Queen’s) Regt (3 Sqns)
Schomberg’s Regt (3 Sqns)
Wood’s Regt (3 Sqns)
Wyndham’s Cavalry Brigade [2] (Col Hugh Wyndham)
Wyndham’s Regt (3 Sqns)
Leibregiment zu Pferd (Hessen-Kassel) (3 Sqns)
Spiegel Karabiniere (Hessen-Kassel) (3 Sqns)
Cirencester’s Infantry Brigade [3] (Br Gen Earl of Cirencester)
1st Foot Guards (1 Bn) (elite)
Chas Churchill’s Foot (Buffs) (1 Bn)
Ferguson’s Foot (Cameronians) (1 Bn)
Howe’s Foot (1 Bn)
Royal Regt of Ireland (1 Bn)
Duke of Marlborough’s Foot (1 Bn)
Lord North & Grey’s Foot (1 Bn)
1 field battery
Herrenhausen’s Infantry Brigade [4] (Br Gen Dietmar-Paul, Graf Herrenhausen) (Hessen-Kassel)
The Royal Regt (1 Bn)
Rowe’s Foot (Scots Fusiliers) (1 Bn)
Webb’s Foot (1 Bn)
IR Leib zu Fuss (Hessen-Kassel) (1 Bn)
IR Erbprinz (Hessen-Kassel) (1 Bn)
IR Prinz Wilhelm (Hessen-Kassel) (1 Bn)
IR Stückrad (Hessen-Kassel) (1 Bn)
1 field battery

 

 

  

Initial layout, before the ground staff removed the dining chairs. The Allies are on the left of the picture (from this end, the brigades are Cadogan's cavalry, then Cirencester's infantry, then Herrenhausen's infantry, with Wyndham's cavalry at the far end), the French on the right (again, from this end, the brigades are Viriac's cavalry, then Bichotte's infantry, then Pelletier's infantry, with Bourgeois' cavalry at the far end). The 2-hex town of Vannes-Koortrijk is in the centre, and the lead mine on the hills at the top left (after some swithering) is just a landmark, with no terrain effect and no strategic importance

 

Chairs out of the way, we're off to a brisk start - these armies know each other well, and can't wait to get to grips. Here Cirencester's infantry advance towards the town, with Cadogan's cavalry covering his flank. One feature of the recent updates to my rules is that there are no convenient "tidy" periods in a turn for photos - it is possible to wait to the end of a full game turn, but a lot can happen in a single turn, which means it is likely that significant moments are off-camera. One does one's best - the best approach is a warts-and-all set of pictures, so you will see gaming apparatus in shot; here you can see coloured cubes attached to brigadiers, to indicate who's been activated this turn. You will also see (blue) order counters (for activation) here and there as we go along

 

Some of Pelletier's boys in reserve - no problems thus far - we're all right, Jacques

 

Things are off to a more measured start on the Allies' left flank

 

Cirencester advances toward the town, with Cadogan's horse on his right. Cadogan, as always, is accompanied by his dog, Jupiter; I thought of referring to him as CaDOGan, but that would stop being funny straight away. We were using a newly-updated version of the rule for artillery firing overhead, which worked nicely and meant the guns were not quite as useless as usual

 

Viriac (complete with order counters and blue activation cube) brings forward his cavalry to get rid of Cadogan's people

 

This didn't go brilliantly. You now see a couple of Victory Points on the edge of the board. Each side has a counter for eliminating an enemy unit, and the French have a red one for marching into one end of the town. 2-1 to the French; since the Zoom cameras don't get to show it, I didn't bother with the venerable billiards scoreboard for this game, which is a shame, but I was busy, man... 

 

Now the Earl of Cirencester gets serious about the town. The white counters are hits (4 will eliminate a unit, and - to add excitement - units can also run from the field with no losses at all if they fail a Morale Check). The 1st Foot Guards are to the fore, as you would expect, bearing a red counter to indicate their elite status. [Rules note: elite units do not fight better than other units, but they are steadier, and will hang around longer under duress (usually...)]

 

Same moment - drone view from the French side

 

General view around the same time - of interest here is the top left corner: Wyndham (with red cube) brings forward the Hessian Spiegel regiment of horse, and they were magnificent - they had been sent to harrass Pelletier's advance, and duly announced their arrival with 4 sixes with 4 dice (which I don't remember witnessing before) and the opposing battalion vanished from the field. Spiegel swept on into the next French regiment of foot, and scared them too, then withdrew to threaten the French Gendarmérie on the flank. Ouch

 

Meanwhile Cadogan had lost his edge on the Allied right; VP counters show that the French are now leading 4-2 (they now hold all of the town - that's 2 red counters - and each side has eliminated 2 enemy units). Viriac sees things possibly turning in his favour here...

 

...and sets about ganging up on Cadogan's remaining regiment - however, things have slipped over in the centre - the counters tell us that the British Foot Guards have taken half the town, and a few other reverses now make the score 5-4 to the Allies. Hmmm...

 

 

Yes - the town isn't looking very promising for the French now - Rabachière will have something to say about this, once he's thought what it is - more equipment on view - the small red arrow indicates that the Foot Guards have moved into combat. It maybe seems counterintuitive, but moving into action is a disadvantage for infantry (they lose one die in the combat) because just about all the infantry close combat consists of short range musketry, and shooting and (especially) reloading are tricky when you are moving

 

Some heavy action under way now over by the lead mine, but the French are losing momentum in their attack. The Allied troops (with their backs to the camera) are British and Hessian - they've taken losses but they are holding

 

Rabachière still fancies his chances here - he organises Bichotte's boys to die in nice straight lines, in the approved manner, and is starting to wonder what he will have for lunch. All he needs to do is take back the town, and get Viriac to mop up the remains of Cadogan's horse and then Robert, as they say, est ton oncle

 

 

Alas, the French elite cavalry are having a very bad day over on the right...

...

 

...Bichotte can't do anything to shift the Foot Guards out of Vannes-Koortrijk...

 

...in the top left here you can see Cadogan pulling back Woods' Horse onto a hill, while Viriac moves in to finish them off. Viriac lost one of his regiments, and managed to get himself killed...

 

...and somehow the mopping up collapsed. The score jumped from 6-all to an 8-6 victory for the Allies.

 

Rabachière was inconsolable. It is said that his language was so awful that he had to go to Mass immediately after the battle.

Well played, James - thank you for coming out to play - a fine effort indeed. Outstanding performances, I thought, were provided by the Hessen-Kassel cavalry kicking lumps out of everyone in sight and that remarkable last stand by Cadogan with Woods' Horse, which won the day. Rabachière's career may be on a slippery slope now - it could be fortunate that Louis XIV can't remember who is commanding his army in this area. However, I am confident that Charles Churchill's brother will ensure that this victory is overlooked by history

NOUS AVONS LE SEUM

 

Rabachière was inconsolable 

  

WSS: Getting Rid of Troublesome Spots

 I have a Zoom wargame set up for Wednesday, of which I am sure you will hear more if you visit around the end of the week. Naturally, since I always fret a bit about running out of time (or broadband), the table is set up already - just have to lose some chairs and shift the table into the centre of the room. I've sorted out the paperwork (such as it is), so I'm all set to get cracking.

Just a little tidying up; a few odds and ends, and a brief return to the niggly-but-not-serious issue of minidice, and the neat deployment thereof. I have a number of friends who consider that things like counters and minidice, not being on the official Featherstone or Peter Young merch list, are best treated by allowing the vacuum cleaner to inhale them. I'm sure they are right; anyway, even if they're not, it gives them a useful opportunity to let off steam in the padded room.

I shall explain this non-serious issue, so that you may understand - this is getting into the First World problem of Creeping Elegance in the wargaming infrastructure department. My WSS armies have minidice (that's 5mm acrylic jobs, in little frames) attached to the unit stands. In my rules, they are useful in a number of ways:

* since the armies, not to mention individual allied units, were often dressed in surprising (or the same) colours, the body colour of the minidice confirms which army (or nation, if that is not the same) this lot belongs to. It varies a bit by scenario, but the main colours in use are red (British), blue (French - slightly anachronistic, but the main significance is that it is not red), sky blue (Bavarian) and white (a general Grand Alliance colour - thus Austrian, Dutch, Hessian...).

* the number displayed on the minidice is important for army organisation and - importantly - activation, since it shows which brigade they belong to. Keeping your brigades organised is a good idea in my games, since if you get brigades intermixed then you may have plugged some gaps with reserves, but they may not be able to do anything at the same time as their friends (etc). Trust me - it is a hassle when it happens.

 

The minidice system - here you see some of the 4th Brigade of the French army - battalions, attached artillery and the brigade commander, all numbered up

That's all fine then. Army commanders are important chaps, of course. A few of them gallop around accompanied by their national flag, which is certainly a clue, but it makes sense (to me, anyway) to have them fitted with a colour-coded minidice too - if the CinC has a brigade all his own (guard, whatever) then that brigade will have a number all to itself, and the CinC will have a minidice with his army colour, bearing the number of his brigade. More usually in my games the Commander does not have such an attachment, but it is still potentially useful to have him colour-coded (these Marshals are very casual about what uniform they turn out in). As a sort of default, I have used 6 as a conventional non-number to indicate that this chap is of this army, but doesn't have a brigade alignment. It isn't right, though, is it? It isn't elegant, for one thing. Apart from the potential inconvenience of one side having 6 actual brigades, anything which requires some explanation isn't right by definition.

Righto. The problem is defined - my early plan was to get a few 5mm acrylic cubes which looked like dice, but didn't have dice spots. What could be simpler? Well, in fact it isn't simple at all. You can buy 5mm dice in many, many colours, you can even buy them with a hole bored through the No.1, to make bracelets and necklaces (I don't mean "you can buy them" of course, I mean "one could buy them"). You can even buy excellent blank dice in all sorts of colours, but nothing smaller than 10mm - in fact hardly anything at all smaller than the ubiquitous 16mm. So you can buy 5mm beads (not cubes) by the truckload, or 5mm dice with holes in, but you can't get unmarked 5mm cubes. I can only assume that this is all based on the assumption that they are a choking hazard for small children, and it is well known that children would never try to ingest a bead or an actual minidice.

Hmmm. I spent longer than you might think trawling the Internet looking for them - eventually I was going to just give up.   

At this point I must thank anyone whom I dragged into consideration of this little problem. I got some thoughtful advice, some very decent suggestions, and I'm grateful - you know who you are.

What I did was take some of the minidice, in appropriate colours and in quantities of one of each, and soaked them in Clean Spirit for about 3 days. Scrub them with the old toothbrush (no, not that one) and wash them and we're ready to go. 

 

New tweak - the French army commander has his new spot-free minidice. If you look very carefully you will see that the ghost of the "1" is still just visible, but if you notice it then you are being awkward - it's streets better than a very obvious "6" staring up at you, anyway!

Hooptedoodle #503 - Not a Sausage

I was up before 04:00 this morning. I must say I like this quiet time of the day, though I don't see it very often. Today's special occasion was a lunar eclipse, so I got myself wrapped up in sweater, dressing gown, warm socks and baseball cap, put on my fancy LED head-lamp and ventured out into the garden and the lane outside.

It was, and still is, as dark as - well, as night. It is raining fairly heavily, must be overcast (as evidenced by lack of stars) and is (I can confirm) foggy. Not even a glimpse of street lights from Dunbar, 7 miles away by seagull.

It's OK; I am not disappointed. This is another in a long line of events which I never saw - snapshots from a personal history which is notable mostly for its length. I did see the spectacular eclipse of the moon on 9th January 2001, and very fine it was. I had only recently moved out here from the city to the Front of Beyond, and the concept of zero light pollution was still new to me - I've never forgotten that occasion. Apart from that I have recent experience of invisible meteor swarms, and any number of failures to see the Aurora, though we have a north-facing beach within 300 yards of the house which is famous for sightings. 

I once waited up for most of a night, on a clifftop near that same beach, to see the new British (Anglo-French?) aircraft carrier sail past, and I think I saw something large and dark passing in front of the lights of Pittenweem, so I have that down as a possible. Otherwise many years of no-shows. I walked across several farms to see the Red Arrows flying overhead on their way from Norfolk to Edinburgh, and they were cancelled. A long list of expected events - some of them very prestigious and historic - which ultimately served only as an excuse for a cup of coffee in the middle of the night. Like the inauguration of Pope Hilarius I, these things all passed me by.

I don't take it personally, I sort of expect it now - it has become almost reassuring, something I can rely upon, so that's all fine. When I think about it, I went out tonight to see the natural wonder which is non-appearance of the moon, and that is what I got. To celebrate, I was going to include a music video of Dominic Miller's Eclipse, of which I am very fond. However, I decided on this one, the title being probably a more accurate statement of what I actually saw tonight; this is Julie London singing No Moon at All, in 1955, accompanied by Barney Kessel, with Ray Leatherwood on bass and that's it. The song was composed by David Mann, with lyrics by Redd Evans, though the chord progression may well have been influenced by Chopin:

I've had my coffee - may as well get dressed now. I have things to do. Can't hang around here, blethering.

WSS: Foy Accidentally Meets the Modern Age, and Compromises his Prejudice

I've been working on my wargames rules, and had a useful exchange with Count Stryker, who has also been working on his. He provided some useful width to my views, and we worked up to the "I'll show you mine if you show me yours" stage which, again, proved to be valuable.

Ian has been looking at AI as a development tool for his published rules, and our discussion got into that area. Interesting. I, of course, have been thinking vaguely about AI but have done nothing about it. I have always preferred to have my friends walk through the minefield before I have a go myself. Whatever, our discussion was interesting and potentially useful, and Ian kindly sent me an example of the sort of thing he has been doing with illustrations. This is one of my own photographs, of one of my own wargame units, uploaded to ChatGPT by Ian and rendered as a line drawing.

 

Bavarian Cuirassier Regt "Costa", circa 1703, from my own collection - if you are keen enough, you may be able to spot vintage castings by Les Higgins, Irregular and SHQ - if you do manage this, my compliments, and it probably isn't anything to worry about

I realise this is kindergarten stuff as AI goes, but I am thunderstruck. I absolutely love this - it is a formal drawing of some of my little friends, produced apparently by magic, and I find it surprisingly touching - no idea why - I just love it. My sincere thanks to Stryker for sharing this with me - I shall take this whole topic more seriously in future.

If you're out there, Neil, please cross AI off my list - there's a good chap.

 

***** Late Edit *****

I decided to have a go myself, to see what I can manage with no experience at all. I uploaded a photo of my French Army Command Group to ChatGPT, and asked for it to be rendered as a traditional watercolour - this is the result, with no further editing... 

I am very pleased. Nice little 20mm men.

Righto - this is now getting silly, but I thought I'd try one more before bedtime - here's the same photo, rendered in Baroque style (or what AI thinks is Baroque style). This is all Stryker's fault. 

I'll think about Blenheim Palace Tapestry style tomorrow...

********************* 

WSS: Time for a Rules Update - Cutting the Umbilical Cord

This weekend I have a note in my diary to get busy, consolidating a sheaf of odd notes and scribblings into the next coherent release of my CJ-Lite rules. Coherence is in the eye of the beholder, maybe a hopeful direction rather than a recognisable state.

It's maybe worth setting out a summary history of where CJ-Lite came from, and where it has been since. Such a summary would be useful to me, if no-one else, so please bear with me for a paragraph or two, and then I'll say some things about recent changes, and evolution of the presentation and style. 

Very quickly, then. I bought an existing collection of 20mm WSS soldiers in 2019, and set about organising, repainting and augmenting what I now had. I had a look at the commercial rules which were available, and fairly quickly decided to go my own way. The Covid period found me working away in self-imposed exile, painting and grinding away at a new rule set. Lockdown allowed very little in the way of playtesting, and by the time things got back to normal I found I had produced the most awful set of wargame rules I had ever played; just dreadful. Tedious.

Disappointing.

Because I was now heavily committed to this new period, the search for Plan B was pretty frantic. I fell back on a familiar strategy - bought in a game which already existed, which ticked as many boxes as possible. I bought Richard Borg's Tricorne, which was the AWI cousin of his Commands & Colors series. The game obviously needed a little customising to fit the European theatre  of 70 years earlier, but I got busy and was much happier with the way this developed. This was the beginning of Corporal John. I was very pleased with the new game, it actually worked - it was even fun to play.

Since then I have produced a development which worked for multi-player games and even remote games by Zoom. This was (jokingly) branded as CJ-Lite, the most crass name I could come up with. [The spirit of The Emperor's Toenails is alive and well]. 

The new release is Version 1.03. Over the last few years, CJ-Lite has dropped the Command and Combat cards of the parent game, ditched the fancy (and unobtainable) custom dice, acquired a new activation system. In addition to various improvements in function, I have now made a conscious decision that the game has less and less to do with Tricorne or C&C - it uses tweaked versions of the movement and combat systems, but much of it is new.

I have decided that it is no longer necessary to hang on to terminology which is identifiably part of the Borg games. Very early, I reasoned that, since effective musket range in 1700 was about 80 paces and my hexes are 200 paces across, musketry just becomes one of the unpleasant things you can do to an enemy who is next to you, and thus musket fire and melee were jointly subsumed into a generic Close Combat activity, most of which, for infantry, would in fact be short range musketry. 

Next up was the resounding Retire & Reform option for cavalry under attack - this was so obviously straight from C&C Napoleonics that I have changed it to the simpler Evade - most people can imagine what that means, and it is generally less flatulent. A new change in Ver 1.03 is that the Tricorne-specific Rally Check is now just called a Morale Check in my game. Thunderous in its unpretentiousness. I thank you.

This may seem a bit over-thorough, but I hope and expect that it will help avoid confusion. Anyone who plays CJ-Lite who is aware that it has blood lines from C&C may find it easier to remember which rule set they are playing if it doesn't look or sound like its ancestor to any unnecessary extent.

Ver 1.03 also makes some small changes to terrain effects, amends the rules for artillery firing over friendly troops, corrects some ambiguities and grammatical irritants.

I still have to hand-polish the QRS sheet to remove a few bugs and incorporate new changes - I'll work on that today. I have to update a draft leaflet which explains how to use CJ-Lite in ECW games [I'll keep the title the same - it has been suggested that CJ could be an abbreviation for Cromwell's Jockstrap, but I shall ignore this].

I also want to edit the Corporal John appendices that cover the solo campaign system, and the little siege game which features in that system, to make them fit with CJ-Lite, and I need to have a look at another leaflet which explains how to use CJ-Lite to handle the tactical bits of my Leaguer siege game (not much to change there - some simplifications, some smaller unit sizes, some changes to the Morale and Retreat rules - how do you run away when you are the garrison...?).

That's all OK, I think. The trick will be to get it done before I forget what it all meant. 

 

Guest Contributor Issue - More Fortresses from Jean-Marc

 I posted some photos taken by Jean-Marc back in April, which prompted some enthusiastic responses.

At that time he suggested sending some more photos, this time of a Helm's Deep terrain in 10mm. I'm pleased to say that he is once more as good as his word, so I set out what he has sent me.

Firstly, here are some pictures of 6mm Romans - I understand the camp is Irregular, the figures by Heroics & Ros:

 

Next we have the promised 10mm Helm's Deep model - first of all, J-M's explanation:

I have sent some pics of the Helm's Deep 10mm model (pics with the model in its many parts, and others where it's ready for battle). 

(1) This 10mm model was made by Ken D in California around 2005 - at the time we discussed how to use Warmaster rules in LOTR world. The model was made  in styrofoam with machines used for aircraft repairs. The styrofoam is the blue one rather thick, but not too thick. Ken has done fabulous work here. My kids, enthusiastically, painted the Keep later.

AFAIK only 3 models were made (IIRC there was a prototype made before these 3).  So it is a rare one, don't you think? It's  great work.

(2) The board: you'll notice that Helm fortress is on the small side of the tabletop. This is not a very good choice, and I'll have to fix this later , when I'll go back to 10mm LOTR Warmaster games.

I choose this option for the following reasons : 

(a) I did not see how I could model the mountains behind the Keep on a table 2.40 meters long...

and

(b) Tolkien wrote in the first versions that the battle was fought on the ridge where the 3 roads arrive, so .. I supposed the small side could be a reasonable answer for (1) making the terrain, (2) giving the Rohan player the choice to fight there with a small chance against overwhelming forces (In LOTR, if you read carefully, the ridge is used to slow down Saruman's army advance).

(3) Figures. I could not resist, sorry :-)  I like 10mm scale figs.  Copplestone figures are very nice, I have also converted some figures from other ranges (you would like to see the troops for the Pelennor too). The best detailed flags, Rohan flags on dark green fields, are also Ken D's great work. 

Hope you'll like to see the model and  figures. 

And before you ask, no I did not make a model of a part of Minas Tirith for the battle of the Pelennor (making the whole  town, would be, well, something special and probably not a good idea for a battle), but my plans are ready!

Amicalement, 

Jean-Marc

The Model out of the box:

The Terrain:

The Fortress:

Figures:

 

I hope you will join me in complimenting J-M on his work and thanking him for sending the photos. This is an unfamilar world for me, but impressive