The toy soldiers are almost all boxed up...

Whelp, the guys who don't have space on the shelf are all boxed up, along with all the terrain... box after box after box of stuff.

Sort of sad... I guess it hadn't really hit me that all these guys were going away:(

A Winner for the Contest, and links!

Hi all!

Well, I finally chose (using the scientifically-sound method of asking my wife to name a random number between 1 and 23 and then adding 7 to account for any tendancies she might have) a winner for my House of War/Maurice contest!

And the winner?  The beautifully-named Baconfat!

So Baconfat... if you see this (and I hope you do!) please do shoot me an email at grenadierguardscampaigns at yahoo dott com with your mailing info (Woof... maybe I should have restricted this contest to residents of North America!) and I will send you your prize... a GREAT set of rules by Sam Mustafa, "Maurice" and a set of the cards you need to play it!  Thanks again to Sam for the donation!

Now, along with a winner, I also wanted to gather ALL of the links that people posted so folks could have some fun links to look at!

I wanted to say thank you so much for everyone who has come by and read the blog over all these years... honestly, my motto was always "Make a blog that someone who is bored and online at 3 AM would be overjoyed to see" and I hope that I've done that.  Honestly, everyone's feedback is what has kept me posting over all these years.  I don't have a lot of people to talk toy soldiers with in person, so you all are those folks I can talk toy soldiers with!:D

So!  Here are all the links that people posted as their memorable links!  Let's take a stroll down memory lane...

The Links

Scenery - The 15mm ACW Terrain

10mm Napoleonics... the Battle of Edificio finished (finally!)

The Display Cabinets - Cabinet #1

I think I am done!  Flocked and Finished 15mm ACW table

More Miniature Eye Candy

My 10mm Napoleonic Game Part 2

15mm Technicals Finished

The Death of Nelson

The first real 10mm Napoleonic eye candy!

Some of my favorite war-games rooms

"Night Vision" using tricky painting and an LED...

Updates; the Wargames Room and Table

Harry Potter in 25mm... finished

A few Minecraft screenshots

Some 25mm ACW testing of "Longstreet"

The start of my blog!

10mm Forests How-To

My Middenheim army hits eBay

A game of "Longstreet!"

My latest "Longstreet" Campaign game!

Hi all!

Well, I played my latest campaign game of "Longstreet" a WHILE ago (I think back in April!) against the cavalry master himself, Barry.  However, I never posted the photos!

My force is at the top of the above photo.  I was VERY cavalry heavy, which was rough for me... I am not used to cavalry:)

Here are my boys defending the field and the crossroads.

Barry was using some loaned troops, including this skirmisher marker I made up.

Here you can see Barry stretching his line out, attempting to surround my more compact force.  I was hoping the terrain and his oncoming troops would minimize the impact of his artillery.

My reserves begin to move up.

With cavalry threatening my left flank and a ton of federal infantry on my right, I was trying desperately to keep my flanks secure.

My boys started throwing up earthworks in front of them.  I figured I wanted to stay on THIS side of the hill and field in order to protect myself from the federal guns.

I wrote this battery off, figuring I would let it fight to the death in an attempt to kill some boys in blue and to slow down the enemy so that I could get reinforcements to this flank... I simply didn't have enough infantry to cover the whole line.

The Federals hit home!

Unfortunately a bad set of rolls (I think he rolled 13 hits out of 15 rolls) and then a unit getting JUUUUSSSTT caught in the flank did in one part of my lines.

My rebs fall back, still firing...

In the end my boys simply didn't have enough troops, and thankfully I hit my breakpoint before Barry could slaughter too many more of my brave boys.

Now, thanks to the fantastic campaign system, my army isn't destroyed.  In fact, due to reinforcements it came back VERY different!

The army consists of...

31st NC, 6 stands of eager veterans with a hero
11th SC, 5 stands of seasoned veterans with a hero and sharpshooter
30th NC, 8 stands of eager Old Reliable veterans with a hero and sharpshooter

I also picked up two new units of infantry...

22nd SC, 6 stands of seasoned veterans
11th NC "Berger's Zouaves", 6 stands of seasoned recruits

4 stands of cautious veteran cavalry
7 stands of eager veteran cavalry

1 light rifle and 1 heavy rifle
1 napoleon

I also gained the Indian Wars personality trait, and a promotion to 4 eagles 1863 III.

Here is a shot of the 30th North Carolina... brave lads, these guys are!

And here is the 11th South Carolina... also SO beat up.  Uniforms in disarray, dead everywhere... I love my boys, and can't let them die!  Compare them now to the start of this terrible conflict!

They were a pretty sight when they first marched out of Charleston!

So!  That's where we left off!  I know that the campaign has slowed a bit, but I am sure I'll get at least one 1864 game in there somewhere!:)

A celebration contest, with a great prize!

Hi all!

Well, as anyone who reads this blog knows, The House of War is being converted into The Kid's Bedroom of Peace and Happiness.

So a sort of sad time, toy-soldier-wise, for the blog, as I won't be able to post as many photos and eye candy of the troops and terrain and all that fun stuff that I hope has made this blog worth checking out over the years.

So!  I thought a little contest with the idea of highlighting some of the fun blog posts from the past would be fun way to wrap it up!

First...

The Rules:

In the comments section of this blog entry, just post a link to a blog entry from The House of War that you've enjoyed from over the last six years, with a brief description and link.

One catch... you can't post that has already been posted by someone else.

From all of the posts I'll pick a single random one as the winner.

That's it!  Simple, right?

What Does The Winner Get?:

Thanks to rules author Sam Mustafa, we have a prize!  Sam offered up a copy of his rule set "Maurice" and a set of the game cards as the prize to the winner.  It is a GREAT set of rules, able to simulate any number of conflicts from the age of linear warfare.  And it doesn't just work for the tabletop... it even has a whole campaign system and ImagiNation creation system built in!

So... whether it is a rule set for a period you already game, or if this is a perfect chance for you to get a set of rules for a period you might not have ordinarily tried out... well, I think it is a great opportunity for any miniatures lover!

So!  Please take a few minutes and look back over any of the old blog posts you may have enjoyed at the House of War... maybe you'll find one you didn't remember, or never saw, and will enjoy it!

Latest game of X-Wing

Hi all!

Well, here are just a few photos from my latest game of X-Wing!

To add some spice, my buddy and I tackled this one a bit different... we bought each other our squads!  I gave him two Scimitar bombers with proton bombs, Darth Vader, and Vader's two wingmen, Mithel Mauler and Backstabber.

He gave me Jan Ors with an Ion Turret and Squad Leader, and then three Rookie X-Wings, all with astromechs... an R2, R2-D2, and the new guy who repairs shields (whose name I cannot recall... damn numbers and letters!)

So he came at my forces in the Mighty Ducks flying V, and I responded by going head to head with him, both of us blasting away.

As expected we jousted a bit, and when I turned to come back at him he dropped both his bombs.  Dumb me, when I looked at the range of the bombs I was, for some reason, thinking of 1 MOVEMENT, not 1 RANGE, and figured I was fine... but then when I realized what an idiot I was, ALL FOUR of my ships took hits!  Yikes!  It was crazy... by the end of the game I had two X-Wings down to one hull each, even though they hadn't lost any shields yet!

I did manage to get an awful lot of guns on target, though, and the two X-Wings really beat the crap out of the TIE Bombers... and then Jan Ors finished it off with the Ion Turret!

There was quite a mess in the center of the table, as the two sides beat on each other, stripping shields and blasting apart solar panels.

Finally I turned one of the Rookies into range one of one of the TIE Fighters, and with Jan Ors extra die... well, that TIE Fighter didn't last long.

And Jan, with the Ion Turret, actually finished off the last TIE Bomber, stripping its last damage off... two dead TIE Bombers killed by an Ion Turret!  What are the chances?

So overall a good game!

Two more zombie survivor ladies done

Hi all!

Well, two more survivors done!  On the left an older Latina woman, blasting away at something.  On the right, an black woman with sunglasses, a gold choker, and an AK.

Here they are from the back, with the usual selection of packs and canteens and the like.

I am up to five female survivors now... here they are all together!

Next up?  Two male survivors.

The miniatures find a new home...

Well, at least SOME of them do!

So, I finally finished building and putting on the new shelf fronts, and overall I think it turned our really nice.  The War Den is coming together!:)

Unfortunately, a lot of figures didn't make it to the display... no 15mm ACW, no 10mm Napoleonics, no 25mm Russian artillery... but I don't have a lot of space, so choices must be made!  A mistake?  Should the 15mm WWII Germans go, in favor of something else?  They DO take up a LOT of space... thoughts?