Greetings from Italy

Started by flyingsuppo, 05 January 2021, 07:57:03 PM

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flyingsuppo

Greetings,

I am an US Naval Commander currently stationed in Naples, Italy, and an avid gamer.  I spent that last three years working in the Pentagon, developing new concepts for Naval sustainment. During my time there, I had the luxury of working with the fine strategists at the Center for Naval Analysis (CNA), and was introduced to historical war games.  I dabbled with miniatures prior to working with CNA, such as FFG's X-wing and Imperial Assault (IA) board games.  I still enjoy those games very much, but I'm almost done painting my inventory of IA miniatures, so I want to embark on a new adventure/project.  I've decided to star my journey into historical miniature wargames by focusing on the American Civil War since I have always been enamored by political factors thats shaped both armies. 

I would appreciate your recommendations on how to get started in this new hobby.  I'm not sure how many miniatures I should get or what equipment I will need in order to host my first game.  I will need enough figures to field both sides of any engagement since there are not any miniatures clubs in my area.  I'm leaning towards purchasing Fire & Fury's Regimental or Pickett's charge rules, but am open to suggestions.    I would prefer a set of rules that would allow gameplay with minimal setup as my family and I are living in some tight quarters.  My hope is that I will purchase a large game table once my family and I return to the US, so I may be able to expand my collection/capabilities in the future.  But for now, I need to plan to play with limited space. 

All the best,

CDR D. Lovgren

fsn

Hello.

Nice to have some class in the forum. Sometimes I feel sooo alone.

I don't do rulesets - I write my own - but I'm sure you will set off a nice debate.

ACW is a great period to start with, it's my "go to".

Time to get painting! There are skilled brushmen on here who can give you lots of good advice. My advice, work out your own style. There will be those who advise priming in white, some will say black, and some will say grey.

Good luck. Please post photos of your efforts.


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Ithoriel

Welcome to the forum!

An impressive résumé in any circumstances and especially apt for a forum such as this.

I've not played an ACW game for decades but have been tempted by the "Bloody Big Battles" rules, by Chris Pringle, which aim to fight major engagements without needing a ballroom to set up in and which cover the period.

Chris is a forum member and hopefully will be along later to tell us both why we should be using them! :)
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fred.

Welcome Commander!

10mm Pendraken figures are a great choice for gaming in a smaller space. You can still get enough figures together on a base so that it looks like a unit of troops. Quite how many figures you need does depend somewhat on the rules. But it is worth noting that nearly all rulesets can easily be adapted to use smaller bases and shorter move distances and ranges.

The Pendraken army packs are a good way of starting a project, they give you a range of figures (infantry cavalry, guns and commanders) which you can easily add to in the future.

Equipment depends on the rules, but dice and tape measure are always needed, and often some markers are useful (these are very dependant on the rules). Terrain is also important to give that look to the battle. From what I have seen of ACW battles, trees, fences and hedges seem key, with not too many buildings needed. Here 10mm is a good choice because terrain is not too bulky.
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T13A

Hi

Welcome to the (sometimes) madhouse Commander!

The ACW is a great place to start with miniatures and the Fire and Fury rules is one of my favourite rule sets. That said they do take up a lot of space to lay them at their best and you need a lot of figures which may not suit your current situation. However have a look at this blog for some ideas: http://www.jemimafawr.co.uk/2020/02/01/playing-brigade-fire-fury-2nd-edition-in-10mm-i-did-it-my-way/

If you fancy having at look at computer generated rules for figures try these: http://carnageandgloryii.com/   The author is based in Connecticut.

Good luck.

Cheers Paul
T13A Out!

mmcv

Welcome! Lots of new faces this week. Good to have you on board.

ACW is definitely an interesting one. A good thing to consider is what scale of game you want to play. E.g. do you want to play out small actions between a few different regiments or huge battles between corps.

Bloody Big Battles is a good one for 19th century warfare and has many free scenarios for ACW. I've played the Gettysburg one and found it very enjoyable. It gives you a very much grand scale of the whole battle on a 6ft by 4ft table (though could be trimmed down a bit if needed).

Black Powder is another popular ruleset for gunpowder eras and has a "Glory Hallelujah" supplement aimed at ACW battles. It can be quite flexible for different table sizes as can easily reduce the movement distance and unit size to fit a smaller space.

I've not played any of the ACW specific rulesets myself so will leave that to others to recommend.

As far as starting your first game, I'd suggest starting small. It's all too easy to plan a massive project and take forever to get anywhere with it. Might be sensible planning a small action with maybe 6-12 units per side (depending on the rules) and put that together first then expand from there. That way you have enough to put on some small games and then decide from there where you want to go with it.

The army packs can be a good place to start giving you a mix of units to experiment with without having to plan out exactly what you need up front. That way you can experiment with how best to base the units to get the look and size you want without ending up with a huge mountain of lead to work through!

Leon

Welcome to the Forum Commander!

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Chris Pringle

Welcome aboard, sir!

Since my "Bloody Big BATTLES!" ruleset (BBB) has been mentioned, I feel obliged to say a bit about it. It's been used in classes at the US Naval War College - maybe that's a recommendation?
http://bloodybigbattles.blogspot.com/2017/01/wargaming-at-us-naval-war-college.html

You say you want minimal setup because of tight quarters. That could be a reason NOT to get BBB, or at least, not to use it for the big battles with richly detailed terrain (Gettysburg, the Wilderness, etc). These all fit on a 6'x4' table but demand a respectable-sized collection of hills, woods, roads, buildings etc. An alternative is to draw or print a battlemat which is then easy to roll out and pack away, but that also takes some time and effort to create.

However, there are quite a few small scenarios freely available from the BBB group on groups.io. Shiloh is surprisingly small - about 3'x2' - and wouldn't be too hard to do a custom battlemat for. Then there are smaller actions like First Bull Run, Champion Hill, Cedar Creek ... feel free to join the BBB group and check out the scenarios.
https://groups.io/g/bloodybigbattles
They'll also tell you how many troops you'd need for a game. (Unit strengths are given in 'bases'; a 1" base would probably hold 4 to 6 10mm figures, depending on the figures and your aesthetic preference.)

Lots of reviews quoted on the BBBBlog:
http://bloodybigbattles.blogspot.com/search/label/Review%20of%20BBB

Plenty of good rulesets out there. Good luck finding one that suits your taste and your situation.

Chris


jimduncanuk

Hello Commander

If space is a premium for you there are a set of rules entitled 'Portable xyz' for a number of periods by a chap called Bob Cordery.

Typically they use a small number of small sized castings, 10mm or 15mm and a small gridded (like a chessboard) with simple rules.

An example is here.

http://wargamingmiscellany.blogspot.com/2020/11/waiting.html

Bob has a number of books covering his varied periods which are available on Amazon and such.

Worth a look.

Jim
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FierceKitty

Welcome aboard, and please call in at the Capodimonte on my behalf!
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Jonny

Hello!

Can't really offer any advice myself, but I look forward to seeing how your projects go.

Jonny

Techno II

Welcome Commander.

Cheers - Phil. :)

Lord Kermit of Birkenhead

Welcome sir, Rule 1 - ignore FSN - Nobby
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Leman

Welcome to the forum. I too would highly recommend both Bloody Big Battles and also Altar of Freedom (available from Little Wars TV - also do a variety of wargame related videos on You Tube) for rules which allow the largest battles of the war to be recreated in a relatively small area. Peter Pig produce a good set of rules for the river and sea actions called Hammerin' Iron, using 1:600 models, land unit blocks, terrain and other accessories. Incidentally a number of us use 6mm buildings with 10mm figures and here I would recommend Total Battle Miniatures and Leven Miniatures.

Andy
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