A Gap Year?

It's been nine years since I started playing Art de la Guerre (ADLG) and I have decided to take a break for the next year or so. I believe this is known as "stepping back" in current newspeak.

The Other Partizan (Newark, 12 Oct 2025)

This is new: a show report! The last time I went to a "major" show was in 2008 when I helped Mirliton run their trade stand at Salute. So the offer of a lift to this show was more than welcome; as was the £2.00 entry fee for wrinklies (pensioners) like me.

In the end I saw very little of the games on display. If you want lots of pictures of the wonderful games on offer then Google is your friend. I spent most of my time shopping, and bumping into old friends. I also met a celebrity and spotted an influencer.

A Blogger's Challenge

Jonathan Freitag runs a long standing blog, the Palouse Wargaming Journal, which has just celebrated its 13th anniversary¹. In his latest post² he mused on the effect blogging has on battle reports building on a post from 2019³ which looked at how visitors read battle reports.

I know Jonathan as we are both active on the Society of Ancients forum and from Jonathan's statistical work on the Great Wargaming Survey.

After I'd commented on his anniversary post⁴, Jonathan replied that he would enjoy seeing my views on the topic of battle reports. A challenge I couldn't resist; even if it does lead to a blogger writing about blogging!

On Brushes

Introduction

When I lived on the Wirral in the 1980s, I was lucky enough to live close to an art shop called Tapley's run by the very knowledgeable Irene Brown. One day I was chatting to her and mentioned that, no matter how careful I was, my brushes didn't last very long; be they sable or synthetic. She reached under the counter and produced a small box of "special" brushes from Isabey of France. This was my introduction to the wonders of Kolinsky sable brushes: I've never looked back.

Current situation

Decades later I've still using Isabey brushes, but my main source of Kolinsky sable brushes has shifted to Rosemary's Brushes.

Basing Recipes

Preparation

Base edges: I always paint the edges of my bases before applying any groundwork as it gives a far neater finish. I usually use the first colour given in the recipe, although for my North American, temperate scheme I quite like black edges.

Groundwork:This comprises two layers of sand and PVA (white or wood glue). The first layer is fine sand; mainly to texture around and across the figure bases. The second is a layer of coarse sand to hide the figure bases. This basic groundwork doesn't need to be painted, just highlighted (see Temperate #2).

Improving A Warbases Paint Rack

In October last year I cleaned my painting desk and re-organised my paints. When I'd finished I realised it was time to invest in a vertical paint rack as I was running out of space on my desk no matter how I arranged things.

I looked around online and ordered this from Warbases for £12.00 plus £2.60 postage:

Sunlight

Forged in Battle: A Cautionary Tale

This weekend I prepared a pack of 15 mm Illyrian cavalry and much to my dismay I found:

Painter's Miscellany #5

It's been a while since I posted anything in this occasional series.  This is more a "thought piece" delving a bit deeper into my approach to painting ancient and medieval toy soldiers.

A Painting Injury?

No. Not cutting your fingers with a scalpel or stabbing yourself on a pike. This is a bit more serious and a cautionary tale for all avid modellers and painters. Please bear with me as the background is important.

Background

For some time I've been suffering with a problem with my left shoulder and the left side of my upper back. In 2019 it got a lot worse and I thought I'd injured myself in the gym. I had tingling fingers and pains in my left arm. My GP thought I might have something more serious so I had an MRI scan and was tested to see if I had Multiple Sclerosis.

Thankfully all the test were negative and I was referred for physiotherapy. A set of simple exercises eased, and then eliminated, most of the trouble with my back and tingling fingers. My shoulder still had the odd twinge but nothing too serious.

Lockdown came and went. I painted a lot; almost every day. The twinges persisted. I tried all sorts of stretches many of which helped but nothing really eliminated the problem.

Hobby Haul

I don't normally do this but what follows is that staple of wargaming blogs: the "what I bought at the last show" post but with a twist or two.

Ten days ago I spent the day at the Phalanx show (St Helens, UK) helping Dave Lanchester run his bookstall.  I didn't get a lot of time for shopping but I went prepared with a list to focus my efforts.  The purchase of the day was a rather special dice tray:

Everything Must Change

After more than 25 years in our current home it's time to move on.  It's the usual set of motivations for people in retirement: fewer stairs, closer to family, move while we're fit & healthy, etc.

Our house is the one with the car parked on the drive.  From a hobby perspective I've had a great painting desk on the middle floor with lots of natural light.  The room also doubled as a home office.

Moving House

My wife and I have been trying to move house for almost all of this year, but the whole process in England is a nightmare.  As I write, we're still not certain our purchase will ever happen.

One of the by-products is that we have spent, and continue to spend, considerable amounts of time looking at our possessions and thinking “do we need this?” and “how are we going to move that?”.

Now add in the factor that this is a very troubling set of questions for a wargamer, and you should be able to imagine how stressful the entire process is.

Wargaming is ...

A recent question on the Society of Ancients forum set me thinking.  The question was: "How do you define wargaming?".  Most of the replies were quite long, and a bit serious, but it seemed to me that a few pithy replies might define my hobby better.  So here are my slightly tongue-in-cheek thoughts.

Wargaming is ...

• Something people do with toys.
• Niche and tribal.
• A way to pass lots of time.
• Something you talk about more than you do.
• Always good for an argument.
• A relatively cheap hobby that wargamers think is expensive.
• Something people like to spend their money on.
• Having a lot of unpainted & unused toys.
• Of inordinate monetary value (especially when selling off old toys on eBay).
• Something your partner approves of as it's "harmless".

Care to add your thoughts?  Comment away.

New Storage

Ever since I returned to wargaming in the 1990s I've used metal toolboxes to store and transport my finished armies.

I Used To Be A Wargamer!

There's been something nagging me for quite some time. It's about my hobby. It's so troubling that I've written this post at least three times.

I enjoy painting toy soldiers. To be specific I like painting 15 mm figures for the ancient & medieval periods. It relaxes me and I like to think that, after years of practise and hundreds of figures, I've become proficient.

So what's the problem? It's this: all this painting has to have a purpose. I don't want to be a collector. I'd like to think that the units I've painted will see service on a table (one day). But as this year has gone on, I've become less and less certain this will happen.

Rebasing Thoughts

One of my mini-projects for 2021 is to refresh, and re-flag, the command bases for my War of the Roses retinue & levy bowmen. This involves a total of six bases and lots of the "new" livery flags I produced back in 2018 like this one:

The plan was to remove the figures from the old bases, replace the standard bearers, add a few new command figures, add new flags and do as little re-painting as I can get away with.

Surprisingly, this plan is still on track but the amount of work involved has been more than I'd bargained for.

Hobby Overkill

This morning I was perusing the list of new posts on the Lead Adventure Forum when a post piqued my interest; not because of the specific content but because of the behaviour it exemplified.

It started with a simple plea for help and advice.  These often start with "how do you ..."  or "have you had a problem with ..." or some such.  The classic subjects are glue, primer, varnish, and ground work.  We've all seen them and been amazed by the sheer breadth of options (opinions?) that resulted.

True to form what followed this particular request was a series of posts, including one from me, which each provided a sure fire recipe to address the problem.  All of them different; many of them overly convoluted and complex.  It was the latter recipes that set me thinking.

Anatomy of a Painting Desk

Photos of hobby desks are quite common. Some hobby forums run "show your desk" threads and I enjoy them immensely. I'm always curious to see what people's desks look like be they tidy or chaotic, dirty or clean.

The above is a slight twist on this recurrent theme. I've numbered the various items so I can add extra detail below and illustrate how I work.

I didn't want to add a written key to the image: you'll see why when you read the rest of this post. To identify things you'll need to switch back and forth between the larger linked image and the key.

Painting Time

As my retail business winds down I have started painting a few display samples for Ian Marsh at Fighting15. I'm now on my fourth batch. Here's a sample from the first batch:

As these are commissions pieces I decided to fill in a time sheet every time I worked on them. I was really curious to see exactly how long it took me to paint a batch.

New Toy Time

Regular readers will know that I hate photographing my toy soldiers. So after seeing this on a hobby forum somewhere I bought myself a new toy. It only cost a fiver from eBay and arrived within a week or so.

The box has LED lights in a strip across the top which takes power from the PC via a standard USB cable. The sides have magnets in them so it is easy to assemble and disassemble. It folds flat when not in use. Plus it comes with two backgrounds (white & black) and a nice bag for ease of storage.

My previous photography set up was dependent on lots of natural light and a lot of digital processing to get a half decent image. So when my new toy arrived I was keen to see if it would really make things easier.

Thankfully it did so I thought I'd document & illustrate the process.