Impetus

First impression is two thumbs up! However I'll start with a small critique.
I received the main Impetus rulebook 2 weeks ago and imho I think it needs an aesthetic update to come on line with the current rule book's hitting the market. It needs to be hardback and the photo's updated. Some of armies/units looked quite good, but too many didn't show the great basing potential Impetus offers in diorama type basing which anaesthetically is such a strong point of the system . However, I'm happy that I bought the rules.:-)
Some of the translation was a little dodgy, but since I'm dyslexic resulting in my writing also being dodgy even in my own language and the book originally in Italian I'll give that an understanding wink and a pass.
That said the rules are easy to understand and are not overly complex. The structure of armies and organization seems very good and flexible with an emphasis on results over process which is nice for game flow.
It offers an Impetus Bonus rule which is another nice factor of the game where you receive this on charges when Fresh(no wounds suffered) and not disordered which will make players think about when committing their best troops. To early and they will wear out too soon or too late and your army will already have suffered too much damage to come back.
Today at our club we played Impetus for the first time using the Basic Impetus version to just get a feel for the game before moving on to full Impetus later on. This leads to the other nice point about Impetus is they offer both a free scaled down version with the option of buying the full version.
Any ways, I had a great time and really enjoyed the pace of the game and unpredictability built into it. Results were fast and furious and packed a lot of drama.This was a very welcome change from FOG with it's grinding approach that I quite frankly find boring. I also believe it to be superior in play over DBA/DBMM  because in view DBA/DBMM are to slow to react to changing situations and single dice rolls deciding everything.  Of course that's just IMHO, but it is how I feel.
We played Normans(my friend) vs Saxons(me) which at first I thought might not have that many tactical decisions as the Saxon player will generally start in shieldwall. However, during the course of the game situations came up where the Saxon player had to decide if he wanted to take advantage of situations by moving. So, what I thought might be a static game, actually turned into manoeuvre. In the end the Saxons prevailed, but I think the Normans could equally have won on another occasion had the dice been a bit nicer to the Normans.
I'm looking forward to more games and hopefully my friends at the club will play some more games. They want to try FOG which I will accommodate, but hopefully like me they will end up preferring Impetus.
There is no doubt Impetus will become my 15mm game of choice and will also join the ranks of top 28mm games I play for sure for Ancient and Medieval gaming . Really enjoyed this game folks!
Sorry, no pics, but I'll try to remember next time.
I also just received Hail Caesar in the mail! :-) However I'll leave that review for another time.

104th New York "Wadsworth Guards" Infantry Regiment

This is the second half of the Perry plastic ACW box set with 2 Foundry miniatures added and two  wonderful GMB flags that I praised about earlier. It's been a bit since my last miniature post, but I admit I struggled to finish this regiment. The poses of these miniatures are just a bit too static and it doesn't help that I don't like the weight and feel of plastic miniatures either. They turned out decent enough, but I need more then that to keep me coming back to the painting table to finish. I won't be buying any more of these infantry box sets. I've also looked at the cavalry box and feel little enthusiasm and likely won't bother, but the horses do look good. However, that said the Zouave box does look quite good and I'll give that a go later even though it is still plastic.....

I might be turning my attention back to my El Cid project as the September dead line is drawing near and that needs to be completed. Any ways, back to the unit.

This regiment is the 104th New York "Wadsworth Guards" Infantry Regiment from the Army of the Potomac,I Corps,2nd Division of the I Brigade during the Gettysburg Campaign. The regiment was organized in Albany New York and was mustered in the service between the years September, 1861, and March, 1862 under Colonels John Rorbach,and Col. John J. Viele.

The regiment saw action at Cedar mountain, Rappahannock Station, Thoroughfare gap, Bull Run, and Little River turnpike,South mountain, Antietam,Fredericksburg,heavily engaged at Gettysburg, reserve at Chancellorsville,Mine Run campaign, Wilderness,Spottsylvania and Appomattox Court House.It was mustered of service on July 17, 1865, having lost during its term of service 5 officers and 85 enlisted men killed and mortally wounded; 2 officers and 145 enlisted men by disease and other causes, a total of 237.

You can read more on the regiment here http://dmna.state.ny.us/historic/reghist/civil/infantry/104thInf/104thInfMain.htm and see a monument at Gettysburg here http://www.gettysburg.stonesentinels.com/NY/104NY.php

Thank you for viewing.:-)

Miniature Company- Perry Miniatures

Leipzig 1813 Museum

Hello everyone I just got back from a couple days at a family swim park with my family at a place called Tropical Island which is located in a huge dome structure that is in-closed and therefore can be used year round. It contains two very large pools, sauna's, restaurant, children's park plus much more. Here is more about it.

http://www.tropical-islands.de/en/visitors.html

On our way back we stopped by Leipzig so I could see some of the old 1813 battlefield

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Leipzig

and visit the Monument to the Battle of the Nations which is a memorial monument to the battle of Leipzig in 1813. The monument is huge and stands at 91meters and is made of concrete with a granite facing. It's the tallest monument in Europe and includes 500 steps to the top! Fortunately it now has a small elevator/lift that will take you up 75% of the way leaving you roughly only 25% of the way by stair which is still a work out.;-)

As to be expected the sculptures are impressive although outside in bad need of a good cleaning which is currently under way.  Restoration began in 2000 as massive clean up and repairs needed to take place and is expected to be finished in 2013 the 200th anniversary of the battle. Already the inside looks pretty darn good and the outside hopefully will look the same for the anniversary. More info here and better pics then mine turned out:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_to_the_Battle_of_the_Nations

The part I enjoyed the most was the 1813 museum with all the authentic Napoleonic apparel, weapons manuscripts and a very large diorama of the battle in 1/72mm. A panoramic view can be seen here of the diorama and some of the museum:

 http://www.stadtgeschichtliches-museum-leipzig.de/site_deutsch/forum1813/panoramaansicht.php 

Here are a few pics I took inside the Museum. Really fantastic genuine articles on display to see here and a must see for all you Nap buffs! I really wish I knew more about the age of Napoleon as I'm primarily into the ACW, but even I appreciated what I saw and was very fascinated. I plan on doing some Naps in the future and found this quite inspirational.

A cannon:

 Napoleons Death mask.

Some Pistols, Swords, Sabres and Muskets

Some great Helmets and Hats

Very nice Cuirassier armor:

uniforms:

saddle:

Napoleons statue where he stood during the heaviest of the fighting:

A big gun salute

I just hit a milestone of 200 followers today and I would sincerely like to express my gratitude in following my blog. I read every post and really appreciate the time you the reader take from your lives to support my fascination in painting and wargaming miniature soldiers. I'll be off the net for a couple days so please don't think I'm ignoring any comments or other folks blog entries as I'll answer as soon as I can which will be shortly.
Until then happy wargaming, painting and of course blogging.:-))

All the best
Christopher

GMB Designs

Well I just got my first 20 or so packs of GMB designs flags for my ACW project and let me say they are stunningly beautiful flags and well worth the 3.75€ I paid for each pack. Yes, they are expensive, but for their quality I really don't mind paying the price as they are easily worth that in my opinion. No question they live up to and exceed the hype. They will be my go to flags of the future for sure. Here's the link:

http://www.salespartners.co.uk/

Also on the hobby front I just placed an order from a company I stopped buying from directly years ago, that being........Wargames Foundry. Up until just this order I've been buying my Foundry stuff from other retailers, Forums or e-bay.
Many may ask why did you break your wallet this time? They answer is they finally pitched a deal I could accept in which I got 30% off a discontinued series with a further 20% off of figures online rebate giving a total of 50% off! I bought the "Dashing Confederate cavalry regiment" that I've had my eye on for awhile as I really like the figures. I also really like Foundry's detail brushes, but never wanted to pay their ridiculous P&P charges for items under 70pounds! Since buying the regiment at such a reduced cost still put my order at free shipping I treated myself to the brushes and some paint pots too.
This time I feel I got my moneys worth as the figures under the deal are more in line with other companies current figure prices and their brushes and paints are IMHO excellent and worth what they charge without a mark down and so don't mind paying full price on these. :-)

94th New York "Bells Rifles" Infantry Regiment

As I posted previously one of my friends is playing the Union while the other the Confederates and so I therefore opted for doing both sides . I was going to any ways as I like both sides. I thought I would start with a union regiment first to get the ball rolling.

Since I don't want to just call my regiment entries " Union Regiment Generic" or "Confederate Regiment Generic" I've decided to name each regiment and post a matching historical flag set if possible and give a bit of history if their is some which most do as the ACW period is remarkably well documented.

I haven't received my GMB flags yet and so with the 94th I'll use what came in the plastic box. I couldn't find their exact state flag and so thought no harm done using the box example.

This regiment is the 94th "Bells rifles" Infantry Regiment from the Army of the Potomac,I Corps,2nd Division of the I Brigade during the Gettysburg Campaign.
The 94th or "Bells Rifles" was recruited in Jefferson County and was mustered into service at Sacket's Harbor March 10th 1862 under the command of Henry K. Viele as Colonel.

It saw service in Gen. Pope's Virginia campaign and later rejoined the army of the Potomac and saw service at South Mountain, Antietam,Fredericksburg, Gettysburg where it suffered it's highest casualties from combat, Mine Run Fiasco,Wilderness campaign, Cold Harbor, Totopotomy, White Oak swamp, Weldon Railroad, Petersburg Siege, Five Forks and finally Appomattox Court House. It was mustered out of service in Washington on July 18, 1865. The regiment lost 116 KIA and 138 from other causes. In addition 37 died in imprisonment.

The regiment has a monument located at Gettysburg and for those seeking further information on the 94th I recommend this lovely site http://dmna.state.ny.us/historic/reghist/civil/infantry/94thInf/94thInfMain.htm .

On to the miniatures. These of course are the Perry plastic American Civil War box sets figures with the addition of a couple Foundry figures. My overall opinion is they are not bad if a bit too fine for my tastes, but are a nice way to cheaply bulk out your armies. Personally, I'll probably paint up the 2 boxes I already own and then move on to metal figures as I really do prefer that. I like dynamic figures and the Perry plastics are just a bit too stiff if you get my drift.

Some of you may have noticed that one stand has only 3 men and not 4. This is on purpose as it allows for the building of off number regiments for Guns at Gettysburg. Most units in the lists are divisible by four 12,16, 20,24 etc., but some do not and are 14,18 etc. and this allows to build for that. But, of course I can still and in most cases will still play it as a full 4 man base. Also, I went with 40x40mm bases which leaves perhaps a bit too much room for these slighter and less dynamic Perry miniatures, but when I mount my more animated and larger Redoubt I think I'll be happy with the extra room.

Right now I'm doing white backgrounds until I build up some ACW terrain and then I'll do a mix of white backgrounds and scenic shots together.

On to the second half of the box which will be a firing line.

As always, thank you for viewing.:-)

Miniature Company- Perry Miniatures

American Civil War picking up steam

Just to give an update. The American Civil War is picking up steam at our club with two club members joining me in gaming the period. Since it's my favourite period I'm very happy! One will be collecting Confederates and the other will be collecting Union. I prefer rebels, but also like the Union so I'll be collecting for both sides. I'm almost finished with my first regiment and will post when finished. More coming soon!