2020 in Review

 1. Games Played

1. Muster Green (1642) (January)

2. Warhammer Fantasy 54mm game (April)

3. Little Wars game (April)

4. 2nd Little Wars game (April)

5. Lion Rampant 54mm game (April)

6. Men Who Would be Kings game with toy soldiers (June)

7. Siege of Novarra (1500) game - Lion Rampant + siege rules (June)

8. Aylesbury (1642) (July) Pikeman's Lament.

9. Dertosa (215 BC) Hail Caesar (August)

10. Swiepwald Woods - Men Who Would be Kings toy soldier game (September)

11. Isted - Charge! variant with toy soldiers (September)

12. Blasthof Bridge - Charge! variant with toy soldiers (October)

13. Trimsos River - Charge! variant with toy soldiers (October)

14. Quatra Bras - Big Wars (November) Big Wars

15. Dornach (1499) (November) Lion Rampant

16. Nantwich (1644) (November) Pikeman's Lament.

17. Rutupiae (368) (December) Lion Rampant

18. Fornovo (1495) (December) Lion Rampant

19. Ripple Field (1643) (December) Pikeman's Lament.

20. Rezonville - Charge! variant with toy soldiers (December)

Really not too shabby of a year in terms of games played.  Things were off to a slow start even before the quarantines kicked in. I played a few games with my son (April, mostly) and for awhile had what ended up being my "gaming pod," which was Pete coming over and we would play with masks and with the basement windows open and fans to circulate air.  This ended in October when his family had some proximity to a positive test result, at which point I (finally) tried out remote gaming using Google Meets. I had tried setting this up earlier in the year but that was before we got our internet upgraded and my old service couldn't handle the streaming video. With the new bandwidth it was a cinch! 

I really encourage any gamer with a permanent gaming room/table set up to strongly consider taking the plunge for remote gaming - not only does it allow you to play with other players who you may only see once or twice a year at regional conventions, but I could see even playing remote games post-pandemic because there is a convenience and some added flexibility to not gaming in person (two examples: playing a game over two consecutive evenings during the work week with each session starting at 9:00 p.m., which would plainly be an impossibility in person; and starting games at 9:00 a.m. on a weekend, which although certainly possible in person, can be bit easier for the guest player when all they have to do is make coffee and fire up the computer).  

My other "new thing" this year was gridded gaming.  I have read Ross' Battle Game of the Month for years and occasionally pondered gridded games but it was the desire for a satisfactory 54mm medieval game that drive me to take a sharpie to a piece of felt and give it a try.  Perhaps impressed by the added speed of play by doing away with tape measures, I went a step further and started trying out familiar rules with activation roll mechanics removed. Lion Rampant and its relations appear to work just fine without this rule (which so many players despise anyway), and I look forward to trying something similar with the Hail Caesar/Pike & Shotte rules.  With either ruleset I want to try a grid with 3" squares instead of 6" - this would mean that units would  probably occupy two squares instead of one, but at the benefit of slightly less abstracted movement and crystal clear facing/flanks.

2. Miniatures Painted

Looking back at last year's review, I was remarkably successful in checking off several painting projects.  I added to my ECW cavalry collection, and can now table 10 units of cavalry, which is only 3 more than the 7 I had before, but this makes a marked visual difference. I also added some new command stands and touched up some pikemen and shotte units.  Looking forward, I would like to rebase and touch up my mounted ECW commanders, and figure out a way to (re)base, and increase the number of units of, my dragoons.

For my Italian Wars armies, I painted the 12 Perry plastic renaissance mounted men-at-arms which have been sitting on the shelf forever. I also painted 36 Swiss pikemen (to make 3 units) using the Essex collection I got at Enfilade in 2019. These three do a lot to bump up the number pikes on the table for my 1490s-1520s games, which really enhances the period look and feel.  

For my Barbarian West armies (i.e. the late-Roman era), I finally got those 60 late-Roman-era Franks and 18 Cataphracts painted up, and had a very enjoyable game with them.  In acquired 60 Gothic infantry, 20 Gothic cavalry, and another 30 late Roman infantry, the latter of which are currently on the painting bench. It is these armies which I particularly look forward to using with Hail Caesar on a 3" grid.

Not a ton of painting involved, but there is a new collection added to the family - 54mm Britains-style shiny toy soldiers.  I have coveted a collection like this for over ten years now.  Early in the year I committed to the investment and proceeded to swoop up as many re-issue sets of factory painted britains as possible on eBay. I set some personal limits on how much I would pay for infantry and cavalry sets, and used "best offers" as much as possible.  I also targeted mixed lots with broken figures and repaired and repainted or touched up damaged figures.  In very little time I had enough figures for some simplistic games of the original Little Wars.  I was then offered, and purchased, a great number of unpainted infantry and original hollow-cast cavalry that was part of the Dirk Larsen estate, and am now able to put together quite large shiny spectacles of games using a variant of the old Charge! mixed with bits from the Men Who Would Be Kings. My only disappointment is that painting a unit of 10 toy soldiers in the toy soldier style only take a few hours as opposed to a few days like thirty 28mm figures, only because painting the toys is so much fun.

3. The Year Ahead

I made a flocked gaming mat, and now need to figure out how to add grid points to it in a visually pleasing way.  In person gaming is still out over and past the horizon, so I plan to host some more remote games in the months to come. But it is overwhelming to think about how many games I would have to run to play even once with the many players I have not seen in person in almost a year now.  I'll try to connect to as many as I can.