After all the frenetic activity over Christmas to get (most) of my January 2016 list of "to dos" finished, I needed a bit of a break, so off we flew to the imaginatively-named South Island for a glorious week in the sun. Below is the view from the balcony where we were staying looking over the Akaroa bay. It has to be one of the most lovely spots I've ever seen.
Any feelings of self satisfaction over the dent in the lead pile I'd managed to make over the year were swiftly dispelled on my return, however. Over the course of a few days the lead pile has increased by 4+ battalions, a battery of artillery and two cavalry regiments! My ever lasting thanks to David, Mark and Tony S for these. It looks like the Hinton Spieler will be trundling on for a while yet.
Tony S also sent me the picture below, with some further intelligence about the mysterious FN2a Hinton Hunt charging French line grenadier variant (he of the hanging musket sling). The man on the left, Tony tells me, is a David Clayton figure which he obtained from the man himself. The chap in the right, however, is rather more Hinton Huntish, being of a softer metal and the chunkier base plugs typical of Marcus Hinton originals. The other main difference, clearly visible in the picture, is their leg positions. The mystery deepens!
Rob's magnificent gun team has been staring at me resentfully for long enough now, so I guess I'd better paint it. A final review of the completed Phase One will follow, with a bit of discussion about what Phase Two ought to look like. My erstwhile opponent, JC, is already demanding a rematch with substantially augmented forces!
Yours, cracking on,
WM
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| Lovely Akaroa |
Tony S also sent me the picture below, with some further intelligence about the mysterious FN2a Hinton Hunt charging French line grenadier variant (he of the hanging musket sling). The man on the left, Tony tells me, is a David Clayton figure which he obtained from the man himself. The chap in the right, however, is rather more Hinton Huntish, being of a softer metal and the chunkier base plugs typical of Marcus Hinton originals. The other main difference, clearly visible in the picture, is their leg positions. The mystery deepens!
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| Left to Right: David Clayton FN2a and an FN2a from somewhere else! |
Yours, cracking on,
WM
Matt - that looks amazing, what was the temperature like? South Island does sound like some place that would feature in an old school campaign!
ReplyDeleteIt's been a wash-out summer in Welly, but in Akaroa it was a glorious 25+ for almost the whole week. It's normally very dry in those parts, as can be seen from the colour of the hills, which may account for the weird colour of my wargames table.
DeleteNZ has too few roads and too many mountains to make a decent campaign map!
It's a well recorded truth that holidays only increase the ambitions for the lead mountain. Great to see that somebody else has encountered what I call the voltigeur variant of FN2. It makes sense to me that he is a Clayton. But the other fellow is a new mystery to me. As to JC, it strikes me he doesn't need augmented forces so much as different dice......
ReplyDeleteThe feebleness of JC's firepower at the critical moments was a wonder to behold, Archduke. However, he also felt justly aggrieved at having no less than two battalions of c-class landwehr/reservists who broke and fled with a little too much alacrity.
DeleteAs David Clayton appears to have had few original moulds and used production figures to act as new masters, is it possible that he used as a master a figure that someone had done a bit of bending on? Or perhaps Hinton himself had to make a new mould, the FN 2s being amongst the most popular figures and altered a production figure to do this?
ReplyDeleteIt is all very mysterious, Roy!
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