Painting Zulus and a remote Air Wargame

Painting-wise, it has been all about painting the Zulus. Last week I was able to complete 60 figures, and I currently have another 60 sitting halfway done on my painting desk. All the Zulus are plastic HaT 20mm miniatures. I am hoping to keep the momentum going for as long as possible by painting steadily until I hit that inevitable point of not wanting to paint another Zulu. When that happens, as it inevitably will, I will switch to something different for a change, then hopefully return to painting the Zulus refreshed.

In terms of basing, I have settled on 4 x 3 inch bases and have 12 figures per base. This gives a nice dense look to the unit, while still leaving enough space around the figures so I can apply glue and flocking without too much difficulty.

The first batch of Zulus completed.

The Zulus are mounted on 4x3 inch bases. 12 figures per base.

On the gaming front, I have returned to air wargaming using the Blood Red Skies rules by Warlord Games. This was a project I started earlier this year with Airfix’s Battle of Britain set which came with the basic Blood Red Skies rules. The boxed set came with 2 Messerschmitts and Spitfires in 1:72 scale and I have added some additional models to add variety, Hurricanes and German Bombers (see here). They are all mounted on telescopic rods so I can vary heights to show when aircraft are Advantaged, Neutral, or Disadvantaged as per the rules.

Yesterday I played a remote game with Jon from Palouse Wargaming Journal. To make remote play easier I have adapted the rules to use a hex grid, as free movement and the associated measuring and shooting angles can be problematic when gaming remotely.

The setup for remote gaming.

My remote gaming setup is fairly simple, a mobile phone mounted on a tripod using Google Meet. For this game I added a backdrop sheet to prevent the models from getting visually lost against my wall of shelves with their clutter of boxes and containers.

As Jon was new to the rules, and it had only been a few weeks since my last game, we started with a small action with one aircraft each. Jon opted for the Messerschmitt and I had a Spitfire. There is no action report this time, partly due to me not taking nearly enough photos during the game, but also because an air combat game is really difficult to describe. Unlike land battles, where you can write about and take photos of flanking manoeuvres and centres holding firm, it is difficult to describe dogfights that have the aircraft zooming around the tabletop shooting at any enemy targets that end up in your aircraft sights. I will have to think more about how best to describe the games as I am planning a small air campaign.

A dogfight in progress as viewed from the mounted mobile phone.

Early on in the game Jon managed to get his Messerschmitt into more advantageous positions to line up more shots overall, but luck was not on his side with his dice rolls letting him down. On those occasions when he did roll well and landed a possible hit, my pilot proved elusive and successfully dodged incoming fire. With both our aircraft struggling to land any decisive hits, we introduced additional aircraft to escalate the engagement. Jon had a second Messerschmitt, while I added a Boulton Paul Defiant (a recent purchase I that I could not resist getting on to the tabletop) with its distinctive turret guns.

The extra aircraft came with veteran pilots and soon increased the intensity of the game, creating more firing opportunities. It was not long before Jon managed to get on the tail of my Spitfire, and this time, his shooting found its mark and I was unable to dodge. My Spitfire went down in flames and that was the game.

A Spitfire getting shot down.

Thank you to Jon for a most enjoyable game. By the end of the game we had both got to grips with the rules and many of its nuances and our aircraft rule traits. Hopefully I will be able to remember the game's nuances the next time I play! 

Currently reading.

I am planning to setup a short air campaign over the next couple of weeks, and I hope to post the campaign rules in my next blog post. With any luck, my current reading "The Most Dangerous Enemy" by Stephen Bungay will provide plenty of inspiration and ideas.