Project Stew Part One

 Another post that should have been in 2024.

In July 2023 Stew of A terrible Loss of Lead and Wealth ran a competition celebrating his Six Years of Blogging which I won. Hooray for me!!

The prize was a $25 voucher to the wargame company of my choice. Being addicted to 10mm I chose Pendraken. I did not want to just add it as part of another army, I wanted it to be a discrete project that would remind me of my luck (and Stew's blog) I was struggling to work something out when Stew gave me the idea in response to one of the comments on his blog.

So with the project instruction set I just needed to work out the detail.

The Project

It is mid 1944 and the Emperor of Japan calls his generals to a meeting in the Imperial Palace where he makes the obvious point that the war is not going exactly as planned. The generals all shuffle about uncomfortably until one says that the next battle is sure to be decisive. The Emperor raises an eyebrow and states "just like the 30 battles before that. Your incompetence displeases me. Luckily I have a Sneaky Terrifying Exquisite War-Winning plan!"

The Sneaky Terrifying Exquisite War-Winning Plan (STEWW Plan)

The Navy will supply a large submarine to carry a special team consisting of the Court Necromancer and his Ninja guards. The submarine will transport the team to the entrance of James River where a small boat will take the team up the river to  Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond Virginia. The Necromancer will raise a horde of Confederate Zombies to be led by the famous Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart. Once the horde is raised they will march on Washington causing mayhem and dismay, bringing about the fall of the U.S.A. as an unstoppable Confederate Army once again marches.

Its all coming together

Luckily Pendraken produce CSA zombies infantry and Ninjas. USA cavalry will be provided by my existing US army forces and the apocalypse by WW2. Working very quickly in December I ordered Ninjas, CSA infantry, a General Stewart figure and a Necromancer which all added up to just under the voucher amount and so a perfect fit. 

So after a very slow start here are my purchases all poorly painted up.

The Imperial Necromancer and his Ninja Guards

General J.E.B. Stuart and one regiment of zombie troops

A slightly better photo

Another blurry photo

A little bit less blurry.

I have added flags to the standards so they look slightly better.

Next things to do.

Work out a 3 to 4 game campaign where the CSA zombie army fights the US cavalry (who will be riding jeeps) and ends with an assault on the White House and the Capitol Building. 

Rules: Surprisingly there don't seem to be any rules for an assault by Confederate Zombies on Washington DC anytime during the 1940's! So I am going to have to make something up. Probably based on the OHW rules with special effects for Necromancers and Zombies. Shouldn't be too difficult.

Thanks for reading and hopefully the next installment wont take too long.

Back again and 2024 Terrain

 Finally getting the enthusiasm to restart the stalled blog with some items that could/should have been posted in 2024.

Starting with some new terrain.

In previous posts you would have seen the snow white cloth used for my Fluffy games. This was "borrowed" from the table cloth cupboard. 😁  I also have a black (inky darkness of space) cloth that I used for my game "Disaster on the Zoological Explorer Ship Crikey" posted last September, although you can't really see it.

With these examples I was thinking about an alien landscape and thought that a red cloth would be suitably alien, or at least Martian. So I purchased this and then made some terrain to fit. Luckily I was looking during the lead up to Christmas otherwise I don't think there would have been any red table cloths around. 😂

All the terrain. Trees, roads and ruins, plants of various types and my mushrooms from long ago.

Close up of my pipe cleaner trees. I have since made some red bases for these.

More pipe cleaner trees in pink sponge plants. Close up of alien ruins.

A different set of alien orange trees.

Kangaroo Legionnaires move through the ruins while Platypus archers prepare to ambush them. Somewhere on the red continent. 

 While very basic I found that this worked quite well and took myself off to K-Mart for some more tablecloths.

First up my desert cloth. A proper tablecloth but only $12

The fort came from Aliexpress and is one of those foam card models. Less than $15 and about the right size.

I had to buy a fort to go on it. I already have a oasis (although it needs some camels). I also got to use the sphinxes that I purchased long ago.

Close up of the fort manned by some plucky Brits. Since this photo has been taken I have made some adjustments so that the tower in the bottom right is more useful.
A dervish desert army with lots of camels is in the painting queue.

Finally a water cloth (or plastic in this case). Nice and blue so no one will mistake it for oddly coloured grass. A bargain at $3. It comes up remarkably well with a bit of terrain on it. 

Large Octopus or Kraken about to give someone's ship a bad day.

So these cloths are all cheap and cheerful. An expense that I can justify to myself for something that will be rarely used. And now every time I go to K-Mart I wander past the tablecloth section just in case there is something new. 😂

Imperial Guard vs Fluffies

 20 years ago my youngest son expressed an interest in 40k. As he was my fourth child I knew hobbies could last a lifetime or until lunch time. I did not want to spend a lot of money so bought him some WW2 Russians in winter uniform and a French Char B tank and passed them off as 40k Imperial Guard.

As expected his interest lasted until just after we completed painting them and then it was back to wrestling action figures and WWE on the Wi system.

But 20 years later his efforts come in handy and his force will brave the Fluffy xenos.

Scenario:  The Imperial Guard platoon and its supporting tank need to cross the snowy wastes of the Fluffy home world to reach the rescue shelter while being pursued by endless hordes of fluffies. Once there they need to call down a shuttle to rescue them. This will take 1-20 turns to arrive.

Rules used are the FFOL Galactic Heroes.

Fluffies move 10" per turn and can only fight in close combat and roll a D8. They have one wound each. Every turn one to four groups of three Fluffies will appear on the edges of the board. There are six entry locations on the edges of the board and each group will be randomly allocated to one of these. To wound the tank they must roll a 7 or 8 on a D8.

The Imperial Guard soldiers move 10" and don't fire, 5" and fire once, or don't move and fire twice, they roll a D8 for Firing and a D6 for Close Combat. They have one wound each and are armed with either a Laser Rifle (one shot Short Range 12" Long Range 24") or a Heavy Blaster ( three shots, -1 to hit, +1 to wound, SR 18", LR 36")

The Tank moves 5" and has six wounds. The Hull Flamer uses a template and auto hits anything under it. The Turret has a heavy blaster Heavy Blaster ( three shots, -1 to hit, +1 to wound, SR 18", LR 36") When the tank is destroyed it will explode and any Fluffies in contact with it will be destroyed.

The Rescue Shelter has doors and windows. These can be engaged in close combat by the fluffies and roll a D6. The Door has 6 wounds and the three windows have 4 wounds each. The door can be engaged by two fluffies and each window by one fluffy. When the door or window is destroyed the fluffies can enter the rescue shelter and attack any imperial guardsmen hiding within. The Imperial guards can fire out of the rescue shelter.

Start of the game. The Imperial Guard have formed a square with the tank in the lead. The rescue Shelter is on the right. Top and bottom are Fluffy hordes.

End of turn 2. The fluffies advance towards the guard as they rush towards the rescue shelter.

The Imperial guard square collapses under the fluffy attack. While some fluffies have been killed (red markers) and some incinerated (black flaming markers) the rest have contacted the guard and killed many of them. Three guardsmen are racing towards the shelter.

 

End of turn 5. The guard have reached the rescue shelter but many of their comrades have fallen to the fluffy hordes. 

End of turn 6. They have successfully requested evacuation but it will be 9 turns before the shuttle arrives. The shuttle will move along the line of clear cups one per move. Two more guardsmen are nearly at the shelter, the tank is surrounded by fluffies. Will any more guardsmen make it? 

End of turn 7. The last guardsman outside the shelter falls. Inside the shelter the guardsmen keep up a furious fire against the approaching hordes as the shuttle takes its time arriving. The tank moves and incinerates fluffies but more arrive all the time.

End of turn 8. More fluffies are killed but more arrive. So far the guard are keeping the fluffies from attacking the shelter. The tank continues its fight but will its sacrifice help.

End of turn 10. The tank explodes incinerating all fluffies next to it. Will its sacrifice save the remaining guardsmen? The fluffy horde have reached the shelter and are attacking the door and windows.

End of turn 13. The door and windows of the shelter still hold but just barely. More fluffies arrive to replace any killed and the shuttle gets every closer.

End of turn 14. The shuttle is nearly there but the door has finally been broken. Next turn the fluffies will enter the shelter. Two windows have two wounds and the third has one. If they hold another turn the guard will escape.

End of turn 15. The shuttle reaches the shelter and drops its rear door. But fluffies have broken in and killed two of the remaining guardsmen. Two of the windows are close to breaking.

Turn 16. The five remaining guard race for the shuttle door and make good their escape leaving the crew of the tank and 13 of their comrades on the field of battle. They have killed 65 of the hideous fluffy xenos but their endless hordes can't be stopped.

Wrap up.

Well that was reasonably exciting. I was not sure if the fluffies would be able to get anywhere close to the guards and then  after a few turns I thought the guard had no hope. But finally a bit of a Hollywood ending with  five guardsmen escaping by the skin of their teeth.

Having the door and windows fight the close combat worked well and is something I will use again.

I was glad to be able to get to use the figures made such a long time ago but now they are back in their box and will have to wait another 20 years. 😂

What's next? I have been painting and building some terrain.