WELCOME IN THIS ISSUE 04 FORWARD OBSERVER With the latest news items. DOWN PAYMENT BLUES 07 SEND THREE AND W e have tried to strike an interesting balance this month, what with Jon FOURPENCE Sutherland’s Command Decision going all fantasy (which I’m sure will An interview with Mark Fastoso: one of the chaps bring some folks out in a sweat), but fear not: we have plenty to cover the historical tastes as well. A couple of months ago the front behind the YouTube channel Little Wars TV. cover featured an article on Maharatta: Wellington in India 12 GROSS BEEREN and – as promised – we have the rule writer behind that game explaining his process and making his rules (Sepoys & A big Napoleonic game in 15mm with some Soldiers) available as a download. We also have a Far East suggestions, guidance and a rule set to download. double bill with a scenario for a Seven Samurai game with an extra scratch-build to create some buildings for it, suitable 20 DEFENCE IN DEPTH for everything from the middle ages to the modern day. Plus we have Napoleonic in 15mm, another build for With the latest fi gure and rules reviews. Stargrave and lots more. Personally, I’m hoping 25 COMMAND DECISION to get to some more shows but I’ll confess that the expenses of travelling are becoming Return of the Reaper. Jon Sutherland increasingly onerous. As the late, great offers a generic fantasy conundrum! Bon Scott sang: “I got myself a Cadillac, but I can’t afford the gasoline... Ain’t it funny how the 32 SEPOYS & SOLDIERS time flies” Well it’s hardly a Caddy but the rest holds true... The process for making a short, playable set of rules for Wellington in India. With Get in touch downloadable rules and play sheet. tabletopgaming.co.uk COVER 41 DEFEND THE FEATURE VILLAGE John Treadaway MiniatureWG Whip out your katanas it’s a samurai Editor MiniatureWargames skirmish scenario for any rule set. miniature_wargames_magazine 45 THE ROAD TO MANDALAY MINIATURE WARGAMES INCORPORATING BATTLEGAMES If you need buildings for the Defend the EDITORIAL MARKETING EXECUTIVELuke Hider Village scenario, this might help you create EDITORJohn Treadaway 01778 395085 | [email protected] some: a Far Eastern dwelling scratch build. [email protected] PUBLISHED BY 50 RECCE HEAD OF DESIGN AND PRODUCTIONLynn Wright PUBLISHER Claire Ingram [email protected] DESIGNMike Carr Splendid reading material to inform and Warners Group Publications PLCThe Maltings, West Street, COVER: The Seven Samurai. By Kevin Dallimore Bourne, Lincolnshire PE10 9PH | 01778 391000 tickle the wargamer’s interest. ADVERTISINGTO ADVERTISE PLEASE CALL NEWSTRADE DISTRIBUTION 55 SCRATCH BUILD ACCOUNT MANAGERMurdo MacLeod Warners Group Publications Plc 01778 391150 01778 391129 | [email protected] Build a crashed vehicle for a Stargrave scenario or similar. ADVERTISING PRODUCTION MANAGERNicola Glossop 01778 392420 | [email protected] 59 QUARTERMASTER ADVERTISING PRODUCTION ASSISTANTCharlotte Bamford The views expressed by contributors are not necessarily those of the Modelling and scenery reviews. 01778 395081 | [email protected] publishers. Every care is taken to ensure that the content of this magazine is accurate, but we assume no responsibility for any effect from errors or omissions. While every care is taken with unsolicited material submitted for MARKETING publication, we cannot be responsible for loss or damage. While every care is 62 THE LAST WORD taken when accepting advertisements, we are not responsible for the quality MARKETING MANAGERKatherine Brown and/or the performance of goods and/or services advertised in this magazine. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) exists to regulate the content of With Simon Chandler, SELWG organiser. 01778 395092 | [email protected] advertisements. Tel: 020 7429 2222 © Warners Group Publications PLC, 2021 September 2022 Miniature Wargames 3 FORWARD OBSERVER News, previews and community submissions from the wargaming world FEMALE CANNON BOXER REBELLION FODDER the Taku Forts attack; the International Primers SF universal suffrage in plastic Relief Expedition and clashes between Caliver have produced two new books the Imperial Chinese Army and Wargames Atlantic already make in a limited run on the Boxer Rebellion. Resurgent Boxers, 1900-14. The second a pack called the Cannon Fodder: Written by Mike Blake they are copiously volume has detail on more forces with excellent, universally useful plastic SF illustrated. Each are around 200 pages The Japanese; British Indian Army; models. Now they make female version long and available for £39.95 each. The French; Italians; Austro-Hungarians; and of these. These women are the dregs of first covers The Boxers themselves; Australians. There are more operations the Death Fields sport: the washouts, The Imperial Chinese Armies and detailed including the Japanese Naval the mental cases, the warriors who just Navies; The British; Civilian Volunteers, Landings In Amoy (Xiamen); and the can’t cut it. Because they are equipped Volunteer Corps and the Church Militant. siege, relief and battle of Tientsin. with cobbled together equipment, the It also details operations on many events The volumes are illustrated with set is very flexible. Each box includes (mostly) up to 1900. These include the maps, period pictures and uniform enough parts to build 24 hard plastic Boxers Attacking Foreigners and Fighting details to enable gamers to make the troops in a variety of useful poses Chinese Imperial Troops; the Boxers best use of their models for the period. (one of the six on each sprue is in a Fighting Chinese Imperial Army Troops; Go tocaliverbooks.com sort of ‘leg-out’ half crouch). They are equipped with standard rifles and plasma weapons along with grenades, shapes for you to paint backpacks, and other accessories to and build on. However, customize your force. Five different they have now come-up head types allow for very different with a new approach looks for your team. Alternatively which is to colour you can use them for planetary or print them as ponds near future militia, escaped prisoners complete with banks, edge (there’s some shaved heads), starship vegetation and water crew (there are great space helmet effects. Now they heads for the outfits), and more. You are never going can also mix and match arms with to be as spiffing other sets – especially the previous as making them Cannon Fodder Box – for even more yourself with 3D options! These are £25 a box or less banks and depth if you buy them in multiples. Go to SOMETHING TO but many gamers wargamesatlantic.com haven’t got the time or even the skill PONDER to achieve this. What’s more these will stack flat: what a great idea! There are Full-colour wetwork three different sets, each of five varying Warbases make a range of 3mm MDF shaped ponds (so all different) and irregular ‘pond’ bases. They have made are a tenner a set. A great idea so go to these for a while: irregular, wooden warbases.co.uk for more info. 4 Miniature WargamesSeptember 2022 SCUM & VILLAINY SHOW & TELL Traditional 28mm SF EVENTS BEING PLANNED! Caliver Books sent through some interesting samples of COLOURS what’s to be a new range of 28mm Space Scum SF figures. Saturday 10th September They are the sort of models that would sit well in a game like Newbury & Reading Racecourse, RG14 7PN Stargrave. They simultaneously have a feel of 1970’s SF and, nrwc.org.uk for that matter, ‘70s style figure sculpting: for those that like TABLETOP GAMING LIVE 2022 traditionally crafted figures in white metal that are heavily Saturday 17th & Sunday 18th detailed and easy to paint they certainly fulfil that brief. All September of the samples sent for review had a selection of separate Manchester’s Victoria Warehouse heads (human and alien) which would benefit from being Trafford Park, Stretford, Manchester M17 1AB drilled and pinned. Prices seem to start at £2.45 each. Go to tabletopgaming.co.uk miniaturefigurines.co.uk OTHER PARTIZAN R BUSTING BARRIERS Sunday 9th October E George Stephenson Exhibition Hall, “It was painted with a mix of airbrush Newark Showground, NG242NY N and brush. I started with a few coats of partizan.org.uk Vallejo black primer and then used the R Vallejo air brush face paint set to do the SELWG O skin. I also used the Vallejo imperial Sunday 16th October purple set for the tentacles. When doing Lee Valley Sports Centre C the skin I found a new technique, for 61 Meridian Way, Edmonton, London, N9 0AR me, by spraying Reikland Fleshshade from GW over the skin to help smooth some WARFARE Y transitions and create some shadow. Saturday 12th & Sunday 13th T It was a fun project. Vallejo paints November are a new thing to me but are quickly Farnborough International I N becoming a favourite of mine due to the Exhibition & Conference Centre, GU14 6TQ coverage and consistency of the paints. wargamesreading.co.uk U I would recommend an airbrush to THIS MONTH everyone as it’s a very fun way to paint, M In this month’s Community Corner, and very rewarding!” IN HISTORY we got the opportunity to hear from Next in line I have a collection of M Michael Smith, who got into the world busts I have picked up including things CHESAPEAKE of wargaming only around five years like dwarfs, elves, knights, Orks etc: O 5 SEPTEMBER 1781 ago, on the recommendation of friends, all very fantasy based. My upcoming who suggested he’d enjoy Warhammer. project, thoug, is to try create some very The Battle of the Chesapeake was a C “Which I do,”, he tells us, before adding strong light effects as one of the busts crucial naval battle in the American “but I prefer painting if I’m honest.” has a flaming sword so my plan is to Revolutionary War that took place With plenty of miniatures to choose have a very strong glow from the sword near the mouth of the Chesapeake from, Michael says he’s mostly painted which is above his head then a very cool Bay. British and French fleets standard 28mm Warhammer minis. “... blue light from below.” fought a strategically decisive battle however I have recently moved onto which prevented the Royal Navy painting busts and other game formats such from reinforcing or evacuating the as Marvel Crisis Protocol. At the moment besieged forces of Cornwallis at I’m really preferring busts as opposed to Yorktown. The French provided the minis just due to the size and how much Franco-American army with siege more you can do.” artillery and French reinforcements And indeed there were plenty of which proved decisive in the Siege examples of fine work from Michael. Not of Yorktown. The battle itself was only was there a Geralt bust from The evenly matched, although the Witcher game series, but also a tentacle British suffered more casualties attacked face. “I chose [that] because I am and ship damage, and it broke off enjoying painting skin and I thought when the sun set. The resultant If you’d like to submit something for Community the it was an amazing looking piece effective Siege at Yorktown secured Corner, contact with lots of detail. And I sort of enjoy independence for the Thirteen MiniatureWargames@ painting gruesome things.” Colonies. warnersgroup.co.uk September 2022 Miniature Wargames 5 S E N D T H R E E A N D F O U R P E N C E MOSEYING ON INTO TOWN With Mark Fastoso Words and pictures by Conrad Kinch L iving in the “COVID Times” (or, Campaigns series of scenario books, checking out Mark’s own website as the as the Kinchlets call it, “The Big most notably his book on Ethiopian free download there also includes a few Sick”) has found me watching campaigns of the 1890s. Mark has had a pages on generating your own cowboys even moreYouTube than I do varied wargaming career, writing a set and writing your own scenarios. The normally, and this led to me discovering of Company Level Second World War Little Wars TV site (littlewarstv.com/ some excellent wargaming channels, rules called Fireball Forward; scenario tombstone-support.html) also has two most notably Little Wars TV. It was books for the classic colonial era ruleset free scenarios and a free mini campaign on Little Wars TV that I came across The Sword and the Flame and aerial based on the events leading up to the American wargamer Mark Fastoso combat game Check Your Six! and – gunfight at the OK Corral. while they were reviewing his free set of most recently – the Cowboy skirmish I’ve played around with Ruthless a little Western gunfight rules, Ruthless. I was rules Ruthless. bit and can confirm that the rules are slick, impressed with these, but I knew the Ruthless is an interesting case in point fast playing and well suited to the chaotic name rang a bell. because they are incredibly short (being western gunfight genre. Unfortunately just two sides of a sheet of A4) but are they are not solitaire friendly at all, but RULES MEISTER also available absolutely free, both from the ingenious card based mechanic makes It was weeks later when I realised that the Little Wars TV site (littlewarstv. them ideally suited to fast paced multi- this must be the same Mark Fastoso com) and from Mark’s own website player games. Perfectly suited for a club who was associated with the Colonial (fireballforward.com). I would recommend night or an evening with friends. 6 Miniature Wargames September 2022 riding a muscular horse while leading shelf called, ‘Afrika Korps.’ My mind a great cavalry charge at Waterloo! was immediately blown. I thought, I want my games to help you access ‘What could this be? How do you make a your imagination and bring history to game about World War Two in Africa?’ My life. I model my games on compelling Mom got it for me as a birthday present memoirs and hope they have that feel. and eventually I found a group at the If a game is fast-paced, exciting, local college that knew how to play gives the players plenty of decisions Afrika Korps. I still know a few of the to make and they leave with a gaming guys from that first gaming group. ‘buzz,’ I have done my job. I have found that an exciting game also can inspire When – and how – did you make the jump gamers to explore history a little deeper. from playing wargames to writing and Many people do historical research publishing your own material? and produce thick books, I express my I started writing and publishing my own research and love of history through stuff when I moved to the Washington wargames. DC area and began gaming with the SkirmishCampaigns guys. They had Could you tell us a bit about yourself? been producing scenario books and it When I was about eight years old, I inspired me to create my own and that befriended a World War Two veteran is how Colonial Campaigns was born. who worked for my Dad. This would If I did not have a group of supportive be around 1975. He used my little hobbyists around me, I might not have ‘plastic green army men’ to demonstrate made the jump. how the US Marines tried to cross the Matanikau River on Guadalcanal. His stories about Guadalcanal brought my army men to life in a way uncommon to most young boys. This started me on a road to find interesting ways to A Vietnam scenario using an adaption of Mark’s Second understand and tell stories World War ruleset Fireball Forward. about history. When I watched the Civil War documentary This motivated me to get in touch by Ken Burns on PBS (Public with the man himself, who is not only a Broadcasting Service) I found wargamer, but proved to be a gentleman a career path. Eventually and a TV producer whose work includes I ended up as a television a forthcoming documentary on the producer for PBS… even famous “Lost Battalion”, whose fight working on a couple of Ken in the Argonne during the Great War Burns’ films. You can watch was so memorably reported by Damon one of my PBS documentaries, Runyon. titled Jeremiah, about Vietnam prisoner of war Jeremiah Denton A CHAT WITH MARK on Vimeo. Currently I am living I know you mainly through your work outside of Washington DC with my on the Colonial Campaigns Series – but wife and son. looking at your back catalogue – there’s a wide variety of stuff there: air combat, How did you get started in the naval wargames, cowboy skirmish, second hobby? world war. How would you describe your One day in the late wargaming work? 1970s (when I was I create wargames and scenarios that try about 12 years to tell compelling stories about historical old) I walked subjects. One reason so many people into a hobby are attracted to historical gaming is store and that history is inherently dramatic. Let’s saw a game Mark Fastoso - Wargamer, TV producer and History Buff. face it, we all want to imagine we are on the › September 2022 Miniature Wargames 7 large 28mm figures in squad size units. want the narrative to go. Having said it into a full set of rules. This gave me Since that war was mainly an artillery that, fostering a healthy imagination is the opportunity to put my own spin on battle, using squads as the manoeuvre not what initially drew me into fantasy World War Two naval gaming. I became units seems odd to me. Napoleonics. interested in how you account for what I was reading the Sharpe novels and is happening with the crew during a What are you working on at the moment? watching Sean Bean portray him on battle. Currently I am working on Fire in the TV when Alternative Armies released Most games that I have played treat Sky: this is a Second World War air their miniatures line. The Sharpe figure, ships as robots that fight to the death. combat game that is a companion game a.k.a. ‘Sharke’ was a dead ringer for an I wanted to add simple rules which to my naval game Fire at Sea. It is a elf version of Sean Bean. There weren’t reflect the human drama playing out fun and fast paced game which allows any historical Sharpe minis at the time, on the ships. Currently I am working players to game large air battles. You so I bought the fantasy version and fell on a Pacific version of the game. take the role of an air commander as in love with the miniatures. They are full Check Your 6! was written by the opposed to a fighter pilot. There are of character and fun to paint. The broad SkirmishCampaigns guys although I games where you can dogfight your areas and exaggerated proportions are had input and playtesting. They started opponents but not many that allow for like colouring books for miniatures playing air games, but they couldn’t find bigger actions. painters. anything that satisfied them, so they We have been having a lot of fun wrote their own game. I had a ton of fun using this new game to refight the You’ve written for Check Your 6! (aerial writing scenarios books for them. Kanalkampf which was the prelude to wargaming) and Fire at Sea (naval the Battle of Britain. Eventually it will be wargaming). What prompted you to do that With the advent of computer games available – along with my other games work? Aerial and naval wargaming are both like World of Warships and the literal and scenarios books – through my niche areas in an already niche hobby. hundreds of excellent flight simulator website (fireballforward.com) I jumped into writing Fire at Sea wargames, what can tabletop wargame offer because naval miniatures are perfect for that computer games cannot? Who do you think is doing the most exciting someone who wants to start historical Tabletop wargames offer a wide variety work in the wargaming field at the moment? miniatures but doesn’t want to spend a of experiences that you can’t get out of I think that Daniel Mersey is doing some lot of time or money to get going. A blue computer games. This hobby is actually exciting work in the wargaming field. cloth, 4 or 5 ships models and you are a collection of different hobbies that His rules like Lion Rampant, The Men ready to go! There was also a need for a combine to make something unique. You Who Would be Kings, etc. are fairly fun entry-level set of rules. explore terrain modelling, miniature tight while not being overly burdened Originally, I wrote a very simple set painting, historical research, game with detail. This allows a gamer to add of rules that just covered the Battle of design, scenario design… on top of their own twist on his rules without the Denmark Straight which we played actually playing the games. I enjoy all compromising the game. We have via web cams during the beginning of aspects of the hobby but some people had hours and hours of fun using his the COVID lockdown. Everyone had that I game with only participate in one Dragon Rampant rules to play fantasy so much fun that I decided to expand or two. Napoleonics. I have tons of Alternative Armies’ Flintloque/Slaughterloo figures but never had a set of rules that worked with them. We adapted Dragon Rampant and never looked back. Most of my gaming companions are hardcore historical gamers but Dragon Rampant is so much fun that they have been converted. Why fantasy Napoleonics? What itch did they scratch that historical Napoleonics weren’t doing for you? The short answer is that fantasy Napoleonics allows me to give free reign to my imagination. You are always in a box when you create historical scenarios because you are limited by Playing a multiplayer Fantasy Napoleonics game using the Dragon (or should that be Dragoon?) Rampant rules by Dan the historical record. I find it healthy Mersey and Flintloque figures from Alternative Armies. to create games that can go wherever I › September 2022 Miniature Wargames 9 SEND THREE AND FOURPENCE imagination: they should feel like you are reading a memoir. Most games that I played in the 1970s-80s felt like I was reading an engineering manual. Wargaming has had some limited exposure on UK television – I’m thinking of Battleground, Game of War and Time Commanders – but I don’t think that there’s ever been a US version. Do you think there’s a good reason for that? Or could a programme based on wargaming work? I don’t know for sure why there are no wargaming programs in the US. My conjecture would be that the audience is much too small to support a national broadcast audience. The Little Wars TV crew do a good job of reaching the US audience and their average video has about 35 thousand views. Those numbers won’t gather enough advertising dollars to support a broadcast program. Until there is a demonstrably larger wargamer That tumult in the clouds: air fleets clash in Mark audience a wargame program won’t be Fastoso’s new game Fire in the Sky. It’s a mass air combat game rather than a dog fighting simulator. viable in the US. The other major difference from to convert my older (TSATF) scenarios What do you think is the greatest computer games is the face-to-face to (TMWWBK) because of the uncertain “Wargamer” film? experience that tabletop gaming offers. movement in the latter. When I release Great question! To me the greatest Standing around a game table with your my new colonial book, I will provide “Wargamer” films are the films that neighbours and friends connects you to guidelines on converting my older are quotable around the gaming table. your local community. books to The Men who would be Kings. There are two films which are essentially I think that you can adapt either set of just quotes strung together to form a What’s next for Colonial Campaigns? rules to larger engagements because script: Gettysburg and Waterloo. I can’t I am planning on starting a new Colonial they are fairly broad in terms of scale. tell you how many times I have heard Campaigns project in 2023 and featuring gamers say, “We should have gone around it on the Mark’s Game Room YouTube Your day job is as a TV producer. Is there to the right!”; or: “I’ve made one mistake in channel. The topic will be either French- ever any cross over into your historical/ my life; I should have burnt Berlin.” To me Indo China, 1880 or The Sudan Campaign, wargaming interests? it’s a toss-up between those two films. 1898. The former is a less-known period There is a lot of crossover between my which peaks my interest in much the career as a TV producer and my wargame This is actually the only question that you same way as the Italians in Ethiopia, but career and it goes both ways. One direct got wrong during this interview. The perfect the Sudan is classic colonial wargaming. crossover was in my Vietnam War film wargamer film is clearly Zulu: “Thousands I might ask my YouTube audience what Jeremiah when I needed to film scenes in of ‘em!” “Because we’re ‘ere lad.” and the they would like to see and let them decide. the infamous Hao Lo prison, also known always popular “You be quiet there’s a good as the ‘Hanoi Hilton.’ We did not have the gentleman, you’re frightening my lads.” The Colonial Campaigns were – up until budget to film in Hanoi, so I decided to However, thank you very much for taking relatively recently – exclusively for an recreate part of the prison in miniature. the time. adaption of the popular The Sword and the The miniature was so convincing that Thank you. It’s been a pleasure. Flames rules. Will you be expanding them a former veteran inmate thought that I CONCLUSION to take in The Men who would be Kings? had been filming in the actual location. TMWWBK has rekindled my interest That is a unique example as most of the If you’re looking for more of Mark’s in colonial wargaming. I think of it crossover has to do with storytelling. As a gaming work you can find it at the as an updated version of TSATF. My producer I tell stories… I want my games previously mentioned fireballforward. new Colonial Campaigns project will to do the same thing. I try to have my com, while his film work can be found at be based on TMWWBK but it will be games/scenarios be a series of cinematic echofilmsproductions.com. He is @mfastoso easily converted to TSATF. It is trickier moments that capture the player’s on Twitter. ■ 10 Miniature Wargames September 2022