Tag: wargaming

Parcelforce Pulling the Rug, … well Mat

On By The OneIn Franco-Prussian War, Shows2 Comments

Max and I are heading up to Sheffield tomorrow on the train for Joy of Six on Sunday. As I packed up our stuff, I realized it would be too heavy to carry everything. So, I decided to send the mat, trees, and elevation pieces in three parcels via Parcel Force. They were picked up yesterday for delivery by 1 PM today at Peter Berry’s Baccus offices. The parcels arrived today at Baccus—well, two of them did. The mat seems to be somewhere in transit.

Talking to Parcel Force, I discovered that next-day delivery before 1 PM excludes Saturdays. So even if they find the parcel, they can’t deliver it because Saturday delivery wasn’t an option for next-day services. “Can I pay for Saturday delivery?” I asked, feeling utterly frustrated. “Yes,” came the response, “but only if we attempt to deliver it.” “You mean on Monday?” I clarified. “Yes.”

“I need the item on Sunday,” I said, exasperated. “That’s why I wanted it delivered before 1 PM on Friday.”

“Can I go to the depot in Rotherhithe if the parcel shows up?” I asked in despair. “We don’t know where the parcel is right now,” the Parcel Force guy replied empathetically, reminding me of my old German teacher when I hadn’t read that week’s text. “But if you find it and it turns up at the delivery depot, can I pick it up?” I pressed on. “Only if we attempt to deliver it first,” he said, sounding like a Kafkaesque bureaucrat from the Paranoia RPG universe.

“You mean if you fail to deliver it on Monday?” I muttered under my breath. “For heaven’s sake, Parcel Force!” I screamed internally.

So now, I need to improvise a mat, roads, rivers, and other bits and pieces. It’s possible to pull off, but I’m really angry that I can’t take the work I’ve prepared and bring to the show.

Anyway the show must and will go on,

So we will be there, father and son ruling the galaxy well at least a small part of it, miniatures, trees, dice and hopefully still have jolly good time even without the mat.

See you Sunday,

I might try to talk some sense to them tomorrow but I already living in Plan B.

Anyway this was the idea, we will see what I come up with in the interim. Sorry for anyone who had looked forward to see it as intended.

/ Keep on toysoldiering …

Playtesting the Joy of Six BBB Scenario (Gravelotte 1870)

On By The OneIn 6mm, Franco-Prussian War, Shows6 Comments

Des hosted Iain, Max, and me in the Shed of War this Sunday, and we gave the Joy of Six scenario a good run. I believe that you can read a rule set ten times, but you will always learn at least ten things when you sit down (or stand up) and play them! This held true this time as well, and I think we are in a good position to at least give the impression that we know the rules to some extent. It was a sunny and warm day, perhaps better spent on the beach, but there was a battle to be fought. Max took the role of the French, Iain the Prussians, and Des commanded the Wurttembergers and the Saxons.

Here are some updated graphics. I had made a number of errors on the previous ones and changed the colour scheme (all the information is from the excellent scenario in the Big Bloody Battles (BBB) rulebook).

Further information can be found on the BBB group pages (I linked to it in the previous post).

Anyway, it was an ebb and flow of dice rolls, but the French resisted the onslaught until turn 9 (when we wrapped up for the day). By this stage, there was hardly a line left to withstand the overall mass of the Prussians and their allies. The game works well for four players, although the Saxon/Württemberg player and the opposite part of the French section take a while to get started. This is due to the nature of the battle and the geography, not a scenario design problem—it actually created a more focused part of the battle where we all were able to start learning the minutiae of the rules.

I am not an expert on this period, just a happy tourist, so for whatever it is worth, I really enjoyed the rules, and we will most certainly play more battles with these after the Joy of Six show.

Anyway, let’s have a look at the pictures.

/ Keep on toysoldiering!

It has been a while

On By The OneIn 18th Century Rules, 6mm, Franco-Prussian War, Great Northern War, Twilight of the Sun King Rules16 Comments

Welcome (back) to your good self and to myself to the Roll a One blog. We have been inactive for some time but following some encouraging comments at the recent Salute event from people from back in the day and some people who has stumbled onto the site in the interim years and found it useful – I have decided to dust of the shelves and do a blog post every now and then.

Wargaming still plays an important role in my life, the Little One is now taller than I, I still love the 6mm scale but would not consider myself a one trick pony, but the most important thing for the hiatus is that I have been playing so much more the last few years – virtual RPG sessions and some amazing and frequent wargames and board games with the Shed of War crew – a loose collective of some great people I am proud to call my mates (check this out on Facebook if you are interested https://www.facebook.com/groups/1213707833867074 ). But more about that another time.

Have not decided yet how I want to approach this next step with the blog, but just wanted to publish something whilst I got that sorted out. In the interim I present you my two latest 6mm projects:

The Crossing of the Duna 1701 – the 2024 Project

Nick and I at Salute

I took the Crossing of the Duna to Joy of Six in 2024 and then to Salute in April this year, I am proud to say that it got the Small Scale Award at the Show and we got featured in the Wargames Illustrated (June 2025).

They also did a nice video of the game during the day (Link below).

LINK HERE https://www.facebook.com/WargamesIllustrated/videos/1405341810649268

The Battle of Gravelotte–St. Privat – the 2025 Project

The Battle of Gravelotte–St. Privat on the 18 August 1870 was the largest battle of the Franco-Prussian War. It was a tough nut for the German forces to crack, with the French taking advantage of the high ground and time to prepare some defensive position.

To give the battle justice and to be depicted at the right level on a 6 by 4 foot (1.5m X 1.2m) table using a groundscale at roughly 1:8000 (a foot representing 2.5km) and a figure scale at 1:300 we needed to make a few sacrifices to make it visually appealing without loosing flexibility to play a wargame on the board.

Anyway almost done, just a few details to complete. Next we need to finalise the Prussians, Wurttembergers, Saxons and French soldiers, detail the brown spots (some quarries) and some other details. Will take this to Joy of Six in Sheffield this year (13th July) and to Salute in London in the Spring next year.

Here a link to the Joy of Six event – https://www.joysofsix.co.uk/

More to come… that was an easier nut to crack than I thought.

/ Keep on toysoldiering!