Big Gun, Little Gunners

Having bought a second hand artillery piece and separately based crew for use with my Hereford TA faction, I decided to look around for some other gunners to use with my other forces, with an eye, as ever on my modest budget.

Time, I decided, to take a long-planned punt on some miniatures from Reiver Castings.

Now while Reiver have a very wide range of VBCW figures, they are very small compared to other manufacturers’ wares – basically being true 25mm. The sculpting and posing can best be described as ‘old school’.

On the plus side, they are cheap as chips - £10 plus p&p for a pack of ten. So two packs – that’s four crews of five men – all for just over twenty quid, isn’t bad value at all.

Anyway, here they are, again based separately for use with my Great War Miniatures 18pdr…

BUF

Socialist

Civilian militia

Anglican League (with a sort of Boys Brigade vibe)

Again the photos aren’t brilliant as my camera, while having the sand blown out of it, still isn’t very well.

Triple Blimpage

With the weather continuing to be glorious and with work, wife and the little 'uns keeping your humble blogger gainfully occupied, little painting has been done of late.

So why not fill the void with not one, not two, but three blog pimpages!

First off is a man who is rapidly becoming the face of VBCW through his stunning artwork and his efforts in promoting the genre, illustrator extraordinaire Peter Barfield, AKA 'Panzerkaput'.

Panzerkaput's Painted Review

PanzerKaput's Painted Review highlights not only Pete's amazing illustrations, but also his figure painting. For anyone wanting a sneak preview of the latest VBCW publications, this blog is the place to go...

28mm Victorian Warfare

Next up is another cracking blog - Michael Awdrey's 28mm Victorian Warfare. It's another blog that, like Pete's, leaves me seething with jealousy at the quality of the miniature painting.

As the title suggests, there's lots of Victorian era eye candy on this blog, but lots of other genres are represented too - for example, currently the zombie apocalypse is receiving the talented Awdrey treatment.

Roundwood's World

Last, but most certainly not least, is Sidney Roundwood's World. If the other two blogs leave me a little jealous, then Mr. Roundwood's painting skills make me weep!

Here you can find lots of WWI miniature goodness to drool over, including some very useful WIP shots, plus game reports, reviews, size charts etc etc.

Please take a look at these blogs and, if you're impressed, follow them and leave lots of nice comments!

Things that make you go BOOM

After seeing my socialists get blown to pieces during the Battle of Little Hereford, I made it one of my goals this year to acquire some artillery.

Luckily I spotted this second-hand Great War Miniatures 16pdr set for sale on the Lead Adventure Forum (alongside the mortar I painted up for my BUF).

The crew are painted up as part of the Herefordshire TA, meaning I can use them for most factions (e.g. royalists, royalist support for the fascists, regulars/TA fighting for the AL or renegades gone over to the socialists etc.)

The eagle-eyed among you may have noticed that the crew are based separately – a cost-cutting measure which means (in theory) that I can now buy other crew but use the same gun. We’ll see how this works when they see action on the tabletop!

Quick – fingers in ears…

BOOM!

(Oh, and apologies for the poor camera phone photos - my camera is still bust...)

Blog Pimpage (hereafter to be known as Blimpage!)

Folks it’s high time I pimped another VBCW blog!

Today I’m highlighting Morts 1938 Scrapbook – not only because Mort has just posted his 100^th entry, but also because he is one of the originators of the Very British Civil War phenomena.

He’s also the creator of the Somerset Freedom Fighters, author of the Solway guide to the North Somerset Campaign and, judging by his regular attendance at the Herefordshire big games, will seemingly travel anywhere in the UK for a VBCW game!

Please check out his blog, and leave him lots of nice comments.