Need a scenario for TSATF by Friday evening! Please help!

I've volunteered to put on a game of The Sword and the Flame on Friday evening for people that I've never met.  Maybe no one will want to play, but I'm expecting that I'll have 2-4 takers.

Here's the resources to put on the table:
4'x6' Hotz desert terrain mat
12"x12" kishlak (Afghan walled compound, copied from Matakishi's Teahouse http://www.matakishi.com/afghancompoundbuild.htm )
Some palm trees (NB:  I never saw any palm trees when I was in Afghanistan...)
Some sheep (6-8)
Various Afghan non-combatants (a dozen or so)
68 Pathan warriors with a mix of firearms and cutlery
11 mounted Afghan warriors
Mullah on horse
20 Gurkhas
20 Guides infantry
20 Sikhs
23 British line infantry
22 Gordon Highlanders
Cannon and 4 RA gunners
53 Russian infantry
Cannon and 4 Russian gunners
3 British RE sergeants separated from their unit, accompanied by a bugle-playing bhisti
3 pack mules with full panniers
Queen Victorier (Gawd bless 'er!)
Officer of the 11th Hussars
I'm sure I could find a gentleman or two in civilian clothing

Please take a look at the ingredients above, and let me know how you think I should prepare them.

Thanks in advance!

Will

Modern Afghans and other stuff

Finally a new post!

I made an impulse purchase about a month ago - new(ish) modern Afghans from Eureka Miniatures.  I picked up the ANP (Afghan National Police) and civilians.  More on them later, but first I also managed to put some paint on other figures that had been hanging around on my table for a while.

First up are a few Russians and a Belgian from Pulp Figures.  These are figures I bought from Bob Murch's stand at Trumpeter Salute back in April.  The Russians will join my varied collection of interwar adventurers and ne'er-do-wells, as will the investigator, although he may be a bit gentile for the group he's found himself with.

Here is a Russian ammunition wagon for the army of Tsar Alexander I.  I haven't touched any Napoleonics for months, having been distracted by other projects, but I still have plenty left in the lead and plastic pile! Perry Miniatures, of course.

I managed to fit in a few more Pathans for the 2nd Anglo-Afghan War.  Mostly Old Glory, except for the bloke sitting down who is (if I recall correctly) from Chaos in Cairo, which is also OG.

Speaking of impulse purchases, I picked up a box of Wargames Factory plastic skeleton warriors.  Lots of fun bits there, but annoyingly fiddly to work with.  Mostly I plan to build them as warriors with sword or spear and shield, but thought it would be fun to start with some 'fresh' recruits.  Might be able to use these as spawning locations if I ever get around to fantasy gaming again!  There are another 28 skellies yet to build and paint.

Now here are the ANP.  There are a dozen in the pack, two each of the blokes in this photo.  Second photo shows the whole mob.  I saw more ANP than any other uniformed folks when I was in Kandahar.  These guys were ubiquitous, the ones that are stuck with little checkpoints of 2-3 guys all over town, or scooting around in their dark green Ford Ranger technicals.  They're also the ones who get to pay the butcher's bill when bad things happen (according to Wikipedia, there have been roughly 14,000 ANP killed since 2002, compared to 3,400 for coalition forces).  And since they don't wear camo, they paint up quickly!  Almost every wargaming report for modern Afghanistan that I see features soldiers from a Western country, either OEF or ISAF, battling against Taliban (with the rare Soviets vs mujihadeen engagement).  I decided that if I'm going to wade into ultramodern gaming, I'll start with the local forces.  

The civilians set includes a few women, including this charming lady.  Burqa is definitely the garment of choice for women out on the town but certainly not the only option.

Finally, this is the model that inspired me to make the Eureka purchase in the first place.  This model reminded me of a contractor I worked with at the hospital.  Engineer Ezzat was always impeccably dressed in a white salwar kameez.  He was an excellent contractor, organized and competent.  He wrote the best tenders, and got the job done to the required standard.  I ended up awarding his company three contracts in a row and was worried that I'd be accused of favouritism!  He won the jobs fairly, though, and impressed with successful completion so I wasn't too concerned.

Engineer Ezzat had a few things to teach me about the correct way of building business relations.  I was often on site, inspecting works and keeping up with progress (pretty much daily).  As I mentioned, I wanted to avoid appearances of favouring anyone, so I kept things as professional as I could.  Engineer Ezzat would have none of that!  After I evaded offers of tea and cakes, he took to carefully organizing little ambushes:  "Mr William, I need you to look at this..." as he led me into a room, where tea and cakes would be laid out for a little break.  He trained me pretty quickly, as it turned out.  I had many great chats with him (and sometimes his brother, who co-owned the construction company), over a cup of tea, a slice of melon, or a piece of cake.  He taught me the importance of stopping once in a while to appreciate the moment.  And once properly trained, I made a point of sharing tea with as many different Afghan people as I could, including labourers, the hospital admin and support staff, contractors and others.  I enjoyed it and found that my experience in Kandahar was that much more enhanced.

learning to be sinister WARNING!! Graphic content!

I think the warning is overstated, but you can never tell what will upset people.  It's my hand, and the photos don't upset me, so there!

It's been a challenging few weeks for me.  On Tuesday, 26 May, I had a bit of an accident while giving Erik his bath.  I had the water running, at a nice lukewarm temperature, when Erik decided to pull on the faucet handle to turn the water up to scorching hot.  Acting before thinking, I leaned over to turn the water off before Erik did himself any harm.  However, I ended up resting my weight on the soap dish, which collapsed under my weight.  

The soapdish turned out to be ceramic, so when it broke, it basically turned into a very sharp blade,  sliced through my fingers and only stopped when it hit bone.  It cut a tendon on my pinkie and nerves on both pinkie and ring finger.

I immediately shouted "bugger!" loud enough to get Ellis' attention (and she confirms that was the word which used and not anything stronger) then I wrapped my hand in a towel and applied pressure. There was minimal blood splatter, just a few drops, not enough to upset the boys.  I got Ellis to pull Erik from the bath and then call me a cab. I left Ellis in charge and went to Lion's Gate Emergency.

Turns out that if you show up to emergency bleeding, they send you straight in!  Either that or it was a slow evening for them.  Of course, once I got through the doors, I had to wait while the nurses got through a shift change.  The doctor on duty saw me in the hallway then I was moved to a room for treatment, which turned out to be having my hand cleaned and frozen, followed by an uncomfortable number of stitches on two fingers.

And they sent me home.  I had cut my fingers at 7:15, and was home around 10:00.  The morning after, I called the surgeon's office, and my appointment was set for the following Monday morning.

I made it through the following week glorying in my stitches and with my floppy pinkie and two numb fingers.  The first three fingers were still functional, however, so I was still able to function with my right hand, including writing and driving.  And then on Monday, the surgeon examined me and let me know about the damage:  of two tendons in the pinkie, one had been severed so that I cannot bend the lower joint of the finger, and of two nerves in each finger, one had been cut in each of the ring finger and the pinkie.  These could all be reattached with surgery, and he booked me in for surgery with Dr Saunders the next day.  I think I surprised him when I asked what would happen if I skipped the operation but he convinced me that a couple months of recovery time would be worth it in order to regain full use of my fingers.

So on Tuesday afternoon I reported to Lion's Gate Hospital for day surgery.  Ellis and the boys came to the hospital with me and saw me safely checked in.  (Arthur had a tumble out of the stroller just as we arrived at the hospital and got a nasty bump on his noggin - which made for a bit of a distraction!)  We booked our babysitter for the afternoon, but she was only available until 6:00, so had arranged with family friend Annemarie to pick me up after the operation if it went later than that.  

This was my first time under a general anaesthetic.  The operation was delayed in starting, and then took a while to complete.  I regained consciousness around 9:00 (I think).  I was pretty woozy and took a while to regain my senses.  In the end I think they just kicked me out so that they wouldn't have to transfer me to an in-patient ward!  But I was definitely happy to sleep in my own bed.

 

This is how my hand looked after the operation.

A week later, I had my first session with the physiotherapist.  For now, no movement with the hand, and that's the way it will stay until early July.  They want to give the tendon and nerves time to regenerate a bit before working them.  That means the hand is out of commission as any gripping with the index or middle fingers will affect the other two.

Here's my first view of my hand after it was unwrapped:

And here's the contraption I get to wear for the next several weeks;

Arthur is very interested in it, so I need to keep him from grabbing it.

I am now learning to do almost everything with my left hand.  This has slowed my productivity down considerably.  I can type, slowly and with more than the usual number of errors.  Handwriting is atrocious but unavoidable in some cases (like signing medical consent forms!).  Doc says I can drive but Ellis and mum are vetoing that for the present, so I'm rediscovering public transit.  This means more time for reading, and I'm almost finished 'And Quiet Flows the Don'!  Recommendations for my reading list accepted in the comments below.

All for now, best wishes for all.

Will

Trees! (or now for something a bit different)

I took a break from painting miniatures this past week to make some terrain - not for wargaming, but for my sons' wooden railway.  We recently picked up two sets of the wooden railway from IKEA, and it's been a great hit with both kids.  I like particularly most wooden railways are mutually compatible, including IKEA, Thomas the Tank Engine, BRIO and Melissa and Doug.  This means that I can load up on track from IKEA or M&D, and save up for specialized items like bridges or buildings from BRIO or Thomas.  

However, it is very difficult to find terrain other than buildings for any wooden railway.  I searched through many different catalogues, and could only find a handful of trees available, and only as part of a much larger set (I think one set was over $100, and included two trees along with a full set of tracks, trains, bridges and whatnot).  So I eventually figured out that if I wanted trees, I'd have to build them myself.

So I stopped by Michaels and picked up some cones (wooden doll bodies) and balls (dolls heads) plus a length of dowel and some wooden wheels.

I then got to work cutting the dowel to the necessary length, and glued it in place.  The dowel I selected was a perfect fit for the cones and balls, but the holes in the wheels were just a little too big, so I needed to pack them with a bit of modelling putty to get a good fit.

Once the glue dried and the putty set, I slapped on some paint (gloss green for the upper part and a flat brown for the trunk and base).

And here are the trees along with the IKEA train and tracks.  

Nice and quick little terrain project.  Parts cost me around $25, and I still have lots of paint left over (and I could probably find a cheaper source for parts than Michaels, to boot).

Gunga Din and the Sergeants Three

Carrying on with my Pulp Figures booty from Trumpeter Salute, here are Gunga Din and the Sergeants Three.  I choose this set (rather than the 1930s one) as I can drop the three sergeants into my British army for the Second Anglo-Afghan War.  The Bob Murch figures are joined by a British Officer of the Great War era from Copplestone Castings.

Photos aren't great, and the painting is mediocre.  I guess they look ok at arm's length!  

Mad guru and friends

Continuing with the latest batch of Pulp Figures I mentioned in my last post, here is the Mad Guru plus some of his nearest and dearest friends.  They've been joined by an Old Glory Pathan Warrior, one of 30-odd that have been sitting in the lead pile for the past several years.

The Scarlet Patrol

The move is done, and we are, for the most part, settled into our new home in North Vancouver.  I can now find a moment here and there to swing a paintbrush again!  Whoo-hoo!

Last week, I even managed a brief visit to Trumpeter Salute in Burnaby.  Erik and I were there for about an hour - no gaming, but I saw a couple of familiar faces from Victoria (hi, Brian and Bruce!), and got to meet the famous Bob Murch.

I also, of course, bought new toys.

First up is a settler's cabin from 4Ground.  This is my first piece of laser cut MDF terrain, but it won't be my last.  The kit went together like a charm, no painting needed, just a bit of white glue and the building is table ready!

Amongst the several packs of Murchly Pulp goodness I picked up 'The Scarlet Patrol'.  I'd only intended to get 4 packs, then Bob mentioned the 6 for 5 deal, and then there was the breadfruit goddess, and then, well, you know...

Anyway, back to the Scarlet Riders.  I decided that I didn't want to have bolt-action rifles in my Wild West games, so I only painted the chap with the revolver and the one with the Winchester as mounties.  The others, for fun, I've done as Canadian cavalry, representing Strathcona's Horse in South Africa, the 19th Alberta Dragoons ca. 1912 and Canadian cavalry in the CEF prior to heading to the trenches in 1915.  For this period, the main distinguishing feature of the Canadian cavalry was the Stetson hat that we now associate with the RCMP.  These guys aren't quite right for the role I've assigned - none of them have bandoliers, for example - but are close enough for my purposes.

Hopefully I'll be able to update this blog on a slightly more frequent basis now, but you can never tell when you've got two toddlers as a permanent distraction!

Cheers

Will