Doug's Workbench

Doug and I have been meeting at his house for some dedicated painting and project time.  If you have never been to Doug’s basement you could be amazed.  It is like a hobby shop with Wargame stuff in every scale, every time period (including Sci Fi), finished or in-process projects, board games in every nook and cranny.  His library of Military books is the largest private collection I have ever seen.  Pretty cool. 

Broken fence and corn stalks, how cool is that?

Anyway, we try and meet once a week to chat, listen to music and work on whatever projects we have in-process.  I have already learned a bunch of tips and tricks on making terrain, painting figures, etc.  It is always an enjoyable evening. 

Beautifully done!

I joked with Doug because he had some Artillery to paint up and he called it a “low hanging fruit” project.  I laughed because so far in my career at work or wargaming I found in my book there is no such thing.  There is always more to the project or the project changes that makes it a little longer to complete or a little more complex.  Well, I have to hand it to Doug, he finished this Artillery Batteries fairly quickly and I wanted to share a couple of pictures of what he completed and how cool they look.  They really look like diorama pieces.  Well done Doug!  I wished I had your attention to detail and patience.

Dan

More Gun Stands Doug painted and mounted

Regimental Fire and Fury - Battle of Stones River

The 35th holding the line, at least for a while...

December 31, 1862

Battle of Stones River (Scenario taken from RF&F)

Today we played the Battle of Stones River in 15mm at Matt’s house.  What a battle!  On the Union side we have Dan and Andrew going up against Bob, Matt and Doug.  

Andrew, Matt, Doug and Bob

For the Rebs, Doug (Manigault) commanded the Reb right flank, Bob (Loomis and Maney ) had the entire Reb center and Matt (Vaughn) took the Texan and Tennessee Regiments on the Reb left. 

On the Yank side Andrew (Roberts and Schaefer) took command of the Union left and the reserves with me (Woodruff/Poor and Sill) in the center and right. 

Here come the Rebs through the Corn Field

On the Union Left there were hilly woods and that is where Doug started his attack.  Andrew on the Yank left facing this flank attack fought Doug keeping him in check and protecting our flank.  Doug was able to enfilade the Unio Fence line with a battery.  Andrew had some long range fire that starting sniping at them and eventually wrecked those batteries by the end of the battle.  At the same time Andrew sent in Schaefer to the Union right in anticipation of the Rebel’s inevitable punch through our right Flank.  

Rebs on the move, view from Yank Right

In the center with Doug and Bob finally getting his center into contact the Union were finally taking a licking.  On the Yank left center Rebel right center they finally punched through with my regiments starting to fail in hand to hand and with the Rebs on the Flanks started failing their maneuver checks.  It wasn’t looking good.  If it wasn’t for Andrew sending a regiment to block the Rebel spearhead and some great rolls stopping the broken regiments we finally plugged the gap.  

Doug's Forces enfilading the Yank center (top left)

On the Yank center Bob pushed out my poor General Woodruff off the fence line with sheer weight of numbers.  We couldn’t hold and my regiments started to panic.   On my far right I was luckier.  The 35^th Illinois were pretty tough on the right repelling numerous attacks.  Then I thought it was over when Matt threw in his 9th Texas.  The 35^th again held their own and pushed them back.  Schaefer's forces started to arrive on hill to assist the 35th.  Note, a few attacks in the center were repelled by fire alone. This is part of the fire combat charts that determines if a charge can resume or is checked.  That only held them until the rest of the Reb force got into the fight. 

Rebs punching through the fence line

As you can see in the pictures the Rebs punched two deep holes through the fence line.  That was a key objective so the next maneuver phase for the Yanks would all suffer a negative modifier.  Also when you have enemy threatening your flanks you suffer a huge -2 modifier for your maneuver roll.  That hurts and it happened when the Rebs broke into the yank center. 

Union plugging the gap in left center

So that was another Regimental Fire and Fury Battle under our belts.  It was a first time for Bob and Andrew and they caught on right away.  The Rebs did take the Key objective and we got to a point where we called the battle.  I would give it a slight Rebel Victory because if you looked and saw what the Union had left, the battle could have easily been extended.  Thanks Matt for laying out another beautiful table!  And thanks to Doug, Andrew and Bob for joining the game.  I think we all enjoyed our Saturday morning battle.  Can’t wait for the next one.

Here a few more pictures of the battle...

Andrew sent Schaefer to reinforce Woodruff on the right

Woodruff trying to stop the Panic on the right

The 35th Illinois holding the right flank with Schaefer forming behind