MIDWAY ENCOUNTER

Today the Mini Monster and I gave the aircraft a little run out on the living room coffee table, (Its far too cold in the shed to keep a 5 year old ammused for long!).

So todays scenario would be a quick Battle of Midway encounter, seeing Nat in command of 2 Buffalo's

Who wouold be up against me controlling a flight of Val dive bombers and a second flight consisting of a pair of Zero's as the escort, how hard could it be!!

The more observant will notice that I have decided to attach labels to the bases, these are purely reminders of the basic in game stats, such as:

1.  A/C type
2. Speed (Inches) Movement phase 1 + 2
3. Minimum forward speed (Prior to perfprming a maneouvre)
4. Hit points
5. Saving throw

The day started well for the IJN, Nat as opted to fly straight at the enemy whom in turn broke Left and Right with the Vals making for the table edge whilst the Zero's doubled back onto the Buffalo's sucessfully scoring hits with both MG & Cannon fire. Luckily the Buffalos are quite resilient and saved all hits bar 1, leaving a Buffalo trailing smoke.  

At this poin Nat decided to split the Buffalo's into two individual A/C. So with the damaged plane completing a slow arc to the rear of the action it was down to the un undamaged A/C to get stuck in. And get stuck in it did, scoring 4 hits in the middle of the Val flight, even after saving 2 of these hits the middle A/C was done for and dove straight into the sea (no parachutes observed). The Zero's enraged by this act of defiance homed in for the kill.

 But in their haste both pilots completely forgot about the damaged Buffalo that was slowly arcing back onto their flight line. Bam all MGs managed to obtain the score to hit and it was at this point I realised one fatal design in the Zero, its really vunerable with a saving throw of 6+ what are the chances? let me tell you, none what so ever! and another Jap A/C plummeted seaward.

The Vals were making good speed towards the table edge and the undamaged Buffalo raced to catch them but ended all movement just out of MG range, however as the last Zero gave chase it only managed an ineffective burst without scoring a single hit. Once more the Buffalo trailing smoke and loosing Glycol managed to sneak up and hammered it with MG fire the same miserable attempt to save all three hits resulted in another A/C downed.

The US admiral was overjoyed at the brave efforts of the trusty Buffalo's, hopelessly outnumbered and outclassed they managed three enemy A/C destroyed to one of their own damaged. Sore looser? Not me!!

Nat has come on really well, progressing from Wings of War card laying to miniature gaming including multiple dice throwing and measuring. I am making some measuring sticks and turn templates to make game play a little easier for her, but there is nothing like a home grown opponent, even if she does keep winning!

Cheers

Al



New Years resolution Pt1

Well its been some time but progress has resumed at last! Like almost everyone else in the hobby a firm promise to oneself was made to finally tackle the unfinished and in some cases the unstarted projects!

First on the agenda was a pile of 1:285th scale aircraft from Raiden Miniatures:  http://www.raidenminiatures.co.uk/index.html I purchased these as the Midway Battle Set about 2 years ago and subsequebtly stowed them away in a little plastic container with all the other unpainted lead and plastic.

The sculpts are great all beautifully proportioned with hardly any flashing and the set comes with flight stands, rule set, dice and scenario sheet.

First up are the Val dive bombers

Followed by a dodgy photo of the Kate Torpedo Bombers

Zero,s painted as three flights of two

A thoroughly ficticious colour scheme I am afraid to say although it does give each seperate flight some individuality, and i like them. All the meatballs were hand painted, and below is a shot for scale. Not entirelly a tiny model however still enough for my shakey hands to find difficult!

Now for the USN contingent, these AC are still awaiting the arrival of the decals that are in the post, so i will follow up with completed shots later.

A Squadron of 6 x Dauntless dive bombers

Hellcats in two flights of two

And finally a pair of lumbering Buffalo

Below is the entire Battle set arrayed. In total it took around 3 days on and off to paint the 24 AC. All were painted in their respective vallejo base colour with either a Bronze Green/Klear or Black/Klear 50/50 wash and as mentioned I will be posting once more once the decals arrive for the USN

The rule set provided in the Battle Sets are "Thunderbolt & Lightning"and are also free to download from the Raiden site. They are very basic yet functional rule set, and I have played a couple of quick (less than 20 min) games from the basic scenario sheet utilising a half dozen AC with my 5 year old and enjoyed them. I am currently looking at purchasing the Battle of Britain set:

 Set 1 - Battle of Britain (Version 2)
Contains 6 x Ju-88A1, 4 x Bf109E, 4 x Bf-110C, 3 Spitfire I, 3 Hurricane I, 20 Bases, 2 Dice, Our Fast Play Rules & Scenario Sheet.

With the possibly of investing into Check Your 6 rules to add more complexity to the games.

Next job will be to progress/restart work on my Funny Little Wars Army Red Highland Inf Btn that was a project from almost three years ago that stalled like all the rest, along with 6mm Ancient Greeks, 6mm WW2 German & Russians for BKC, finishing the extra 10mm Russian & Germans that I bought at Harrogate last year (Still packaged) various terrain works, various 15mm FOW stuff to paint & sell on Evil Bay and some 28mm figs half completed! Not to mention the Ships that I am also thinking in purchasing where will I fit it all in?