Today's been somewhat disrupted. Wonderful yes, but disrupted.
At around midday a sudden lightning strike hit (we're talking simultaneous donner und blitzen here) and blew the village's power supply. The electricity was down only for about half a minute but the phone's been down since, and the internet (the rural, not-technically-broadband version of broadband) hs been ropey ever since.
This combined with insanely variable weather today (our 'White Christmas' was a half-inch layer of hail which lasted hours) to dissuade us from our traditional afternoon walk, and all our timings went for a Burton as a result. The long and the short of it is that I realised quite early that I'd struggle to get meaningful hobby time in today, so I made another Executive Decision:
I've bought myself a 1/100 Zvezda Matilda II.
Just one. This is the box art:
But it's not for Flames of War.
Oh no - I couldn't do much with a single tank after all (and the 8th Army are on hold until I've earned them with glacial commission work)...this is for a potential (and SMALL) Bolt Action force.
I can't help it. Ages ago, Brian over at the Inner Geek very kindly donated to me a small Early War FoW British boxed set and I've been wondering how best to use it: Bolt Action in 15mm (popular locally) is absolutely perfect!
I've been rather smitten by the BA rules, you see. I know they're flawed and a bit silly in places, but I just love the refreshing structure of it. 28mm scares me though. Not just painting the models but the scenery required too - and it's an expense I simply cannot meet. Whereas with the cheap addition of a Matilda II and Brian's infantry I've got the beginnings of a rather useful little BEF in France 1940 force.
Doomed to valiant filure just how I like it.
Plus I love the look of the Matilda II and it's so rare that I allow myself to treat me to nice things...
So there.
Hobby work done today - even if it's simply by virtue of purchasing a new toy and starting yet another frivolous new idea.
Enjoy the rest of the day,
- Drax.
My orks have a battlewagon built from a Matilda. Curiously, its not much different than it was in WWII, Well armored, lousy gun, slow moving, and the troops like to ride on top of it in lieu of walking.
ReplyDeleteI've been eyeing 15mm Bolt Action too....
ReplyDeleteHope the rest of the day went a little smoother for you my friend. :)
I didn't realise that hoping you would not be washed out to sea would result in you being struck by lightening. Here's wishing you no more weather events !
ReplyDeleteMatilda eh ? One of the things I like about FoW is the different equipments; 40K tends to be an Imperial Leman Russ vs a Renegade Leman Russ. I demand more variety !
I'm curious, do you scale down the ranges, or do you play with the 28mm ranges at 15mm?
ReplyDeleteThe latter might actually be far more to scale.
Hi, SandWyrm!
ReplyDeleteThere are two schools of thought, and I think both are played locally: you can play at scale or halve the scales. As the scales are a necessary abstraction anyway, neither is perfect but I think I'd prefer halving. This has the twin advantages of forcing units to close with each other and keeping pistol and smg ranges sensible...
SandWyrm, I ought also to point out that some folks simply convert inches to centimetres, but I'm not such a fan of this. Firstly because much as I love metric measurements it feels just plain wrong to use them for wargaming, nd secondly because the ratios are off.
ReplyDelete1inch = 25.4mm (there are roughly two and a half cm per inch) but that doesn't tally withthe diminishing ratio of 28mm going to 15mm (just under half).