Well Friday night saw the completion of Day One of the Battle of Winchester in my ACW Shennandoah Campaign. THe battle will need a second 'campaign day' to complete so I'll be looking to schedule that as soon as possible.

The game was run under my 'Across the Potomac' rules and these seemed to work well enough, although a few tweaks will be needed here and there - as I said on Friday night no wargame rules can survive what wargamers do to them! In this case a Reb brigade deployed a regiment into a firing line after having driven off opposing Yanks from their lines, only forthe reb's lines to the extend behind a Union regiment that had not been forced to retire.

Not unreasonably the Yanks turned and charged the rebs who being attacke dinthe rear were driven back, only to be charged by a second Union regiment making them the filling in a 'Blue' sandwich.

Rules for fighting on two sides for one regiment likely needed - or at least thought about!

More 28mm Plastics, this time the instigators of the whole thing - Valient Miniatures - have just released a set of WW2 American GIs. Valient are a cool company - run by Julian Blakeney-Edwards and Colin Rumford and their offerings are closely tied into the Rapid Fire rules system. This means the GIs come in a box of 64 figures with all th ekit to field a full company under the rules set - including MGs, Motars, Bazookas etc - this will all be for £8.99 plus £2.50 P&P. Value at twice the price.

They already do British and 'Classic' German WW2 Infantry so the American's will be a welcome addition to the range. I have soem of theBrits and Jerries and thefigures are actually really good, so looking forward to getting hold of the Yanks.

Well, it's been a while since I last posted and a couple of things to cover today....

Tonight we're running a Napoleonic, Penninsular Wars Game at Mike's gaff, likely to last two weeks. Loads of Brits, Spanish and French to be involved - all in glorious 15mm technicolour, so promises to be interesting.

Second, a follow on from previous postings about the new ranges of 28mm plstics. Wargames Illustrated came with a free Warlords' Roman legioanry, this painted up really easily and well and i'm more impressed than even before. Will have to get som boxes of these toys to play with.

I also took the liberty of buying 2 boxes of Perry Miniatures 28mm ACW infantry, got these off the Wargames Illustrated website - fantastic service, boxes arrived next day by post! Note I did place order fairly early in th emorning and paid with PayPal.

Anyway the first figures have painted up great - I put together a stand of 4 x Confederates in early war uniforms. the figures have hardly any flash on then amd whet there was is easily removed by running a knife over it. The poses are good, no duds! and they paint up easily.

Will post some photos as soon as i get myself organised.

30th March: Beers at the Star in Rusper.

4th April: Can't remember but at Mikes.

11th April: TBN, hopefully at Ruperts

18th April: Napoleonic - 15mm Battle of Talavera, over 2 weeks.

Well big news on the figures front is thelong overdue introduction of quality 'hard' plastic wargames figures. Like London buses we've waited for ages and now three companies come along at once.....

First the might Perry Twins are releaseing ACW Infantry, 36 figures for £12.00 a box. The figures look crisp and appealling and ripe for conversion. Due out soon are ACW cavalry, pictures of the mock-ups look like these will be excellent figures too, this time 12 figures per box, still at £12.00. Current P&P is 12%.

Next the have two companies releasing two very similar sets of figures, I hope that this doesn't cause early burn-out for one of them....

 Warlord Games are releaseing 28mm Roman Infatry, soon to be followed by 28mmCelts. THis ciompany is run by Paul Sawyer and John Stallard  from Games Workshop fame. Figures look great and can't wait to gethold of some.

Finally we have Wargames Factory, who are releasing 28mm Republican Romans and then soon Celts, this tea is tied into the new Ancient Wargames Rules being released by Osprey Publishing.

With the last to companies - good news for those wanting to raise a Celt Army, two sets of figures which will hopefully mix and match well. Hope it's not bad news for the companies themselves.

Well at last nights club meeting Alan brought along his Wings of War WW1 Dogfighting game and collection. What a great evening of fun, the mechanics of the game are so easy to pick-up and the large turnout of members were all playing in some pretty compliated dog-fights within minutes.

With 9 players all controlling planes in the sky, the action was thick and fast, best of all everyone culd play and there were no rules debates or questions.

10/10 for fun, 8/10 for realism and 9/10 for Alan's 1/144 models.