I always use the Summer to take some reflective thoughts on what to do next and as discussed in the last post I did have a fair go at some GNW (Great Northern War) miniatures for yet another legendary battle – although it seems more like a prologue to that devastating battle in Ukraine a year later. So far I, Nick Dorrell and his chums from the Wyre Forest Wargames club, have put on the following Great Northern War Battles at the Joy of Six (from 2012 to 2015):
- Fraustadt 1706 (2012)
- Klissow 1702 (2013)
- Kalisz 1706 (2014)
- Gadebusch 1712 (2015)
Following this years sabbatical I have decided on doing the “Towards Moscow Trilogy” and do the three key battles for future Joy of Six shows, namely:
- Lesnaya 1708 (2017)
- Holowczyn 1708 (2018)
- Poltava 1709 (2019)
Perfectly doable projects and some reusability of miniatures from battle to battle with a natural build-up (..to disaster, at least if you are Swedish). Apart from the finale it should be possible to fit these on 4 by 8 tables. They are all very different types of battles so this offers some variety. Now I just have to convince Nick Dorrell et al that this is a jolly good idea. If I still have the will to live after this I think Narva 1700 and the two key battles of the Finnish Campaign 1713-14 would be fun to do too. But that is rushing ahead a little bit too much.
Overall I am working on a few different strands at the moment:
- Towards Moscow Trilogy (TMT) (as discussed above) with the next target being Lesnaya 1708 for the Joy of Six (2017)
- Halo Ground Battles – I and the little one are waiting for the box to arrive. We pre-ordered at Salute in April earlier this year and the little one took part of the first demo game of the day. He really enjoyed it. This is my dad and lad project. We are painting some Halo fleet battles in the interim.
- French Indian War Skirmish in 6mm – I have some fond memories from this period and my dad read me the Last of the Mohicans about 3 times when I was little and when I was older we watched the movie with Daniel Day-Lewis together on more than one occasion. Dad left us far too early – this project is for him. I have ordered a fair few SYW/AWI from Baccus, including the new Compagnies France de la Marine and Canadian Militia. I also ordered highlanders, Indians, jaegers, continental light infantry, queens ranges and british line. This should be plenty to build a decent French and British force. I intend to use these with the Musket and Tomahawk, Sharp Practice and Songs of Drums and Tomahawk rules sets.
- Finnish Winter, Continuation and Lapland Wars 1939 to 1945 – I have started a project doing the Winter War in 15mm using the Chain of Command rules. I am using miniatures from Battlefront, Resistant Rooster and Peter Pig with the idea of being able to field, for both sides, a platoon for the Winter War (1939-40) as well as the later stage of the continuation war (1941-44) that allows (with limitation) an interesting range of supports to the finns including the Landsverk L-62, F-42, Vickers 6 tonne, SU-152, T-26, T-28, BT-5 & 7, KV-1, Panzer IV Ausf J and Stug III. Some more likely than others to appear on the Battlefield. Later in the war they also get Panzerfaust and Panzerschrecks too. This again is a historical period that is personal to myself as my mother was born in Finland. Finland basically fought for its existence during the those cold Winter months of the Winter War against the Russians and the sacrifices on both sides deserves our respect and remembrance.
- Other Stuff – I will do some more Saga factions as some point and also do something with the 1/3600 galleys I bought for Poseidon’s Warriors (however it currently feels like they will take a back-seat for a while). I also have 1940s Germans, French and British Chain of Command Forces I am slowly working on. I also have some kickstarters that are screaming for some paint including Zombiecide:Black Plauge, Bloodrage and soon, I hope, the stuff from the Conan Boardgame. There are probably more things on the (slow) go.
I will try to provide some variety in updates based on these projects but as they move in very different speeds it would be pointless to do have a rolling schedule. Things will be updated as and when they are done.
Nevermind, some further Lesnaya progress. Three dragoon regiments. / Take care.
Roll a One - Wargaming Blog 
We will certainly up for TMT and also probably some of your other projects.
As you say Lesnaja will be relatively easy to do, says the person whose only contribution is to turn up and enjoy the game :), except perhaps the woods. Holowczyn also but here you could make a change, especially if you are planning to do all of Poltava and not just the main action.
At Holowczyn there was a chance of a full battle between the full armies of both sides. So you could expand the battle to include all the Russian positions and similarly field all the Swedish army. This would give a chance to see the biggest Swedish army of the war but it would need a big table and a lot of troops. As an alternative you could do the ‘what if’ battle of Horki/Gorki. You would still need loads of figures but the armies are more concentrated and so the table will be a lot smaller.
Doing one of the larger/extended battles would give extra usage for the large number of Russians you will need for Poltava.
In any case I can’t wait 🙂
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