Return of the Blog! Club Roundup 2025

Our club website has been transferred from Wix to Surfup. In my opinion the format looks better, with more incisive typeface. With no blogs over the past two months, I’ve had a break, but I thought I’d feature some games from the first half of the year that may have flown under the radar.

1. Sci-Fi: Car Wars (Friday 3 January) – Kamall 

Mal has hosted a number of Car Wars games since January at the community centre. These have been old school in feel, using cardboard tracks and cars, and great fun depending on which opponents have been crashing and burning. I unwisely began the first game with a 100mph entrance, ending up rolling for semi-eternity (2 hours of the game) after a crash, and fired on by Alex. Thanks mate. Richard, with real-life car-handling nous, assisted with the rules, the first one of which seems to be don’t speed… will we obey?

2. 28mm Second Boer War (Friday 7 February) – Rob

This was Rob’s first trial of the Battles for Empire Rules, using his very good 28mm Boer and British figures. My hazy recollection is that while the British advance was slow across the rest of the table, it wasn’t on my Boer right flank, where I was mullered with only a small force holding a hill against the main attack by Mark. Rob is sticking with these rules, which he thinks could be the integrated solution to his entire Colonial collection. Rebasing of which, beckons.

3. Napoleonic: 6mm Battle of Maloyaroslavets (Friday 14 March) – Piotr

In preparation for my mega War Room Austerlitz game (see separate blog), we played this scenario from the retreat from Moscow (1812), using 6mm figures and my Coup de Grace rules. Mal and Rob’s Russians attacked the Italians at Maloyaroslavets (commanded by Doug, Philip and Alex) – southwest of Moscow – but took heavy casualties. This wasn’t umpiring bias, it was history! (Actually it wasn’t, because the real Russians pushed the Italians back onto the initial road of retreat from Moscow, sealing the Grande Armee’s fate.)

4. Modern: 6mm Arab-Israeli (Friday 11 April) – Doug

The Israelis have been losing most of these games over recent years, because attacking in Spearhead (a set of rules I’ve still never read) is just very difficult. Jonathan and I were the Israelis attacking Mal and Patrick’s Egyptian position. I attacked the small hill while Jonathan masked the long hill. We were massacred. Four of our aircraft were driven off without firing their weapons. My Israeli paras landed on the hill, but two other copters were driven off, and the supporting troops were decimated. Israelis inflicted one base lost on the Egyptians all game. Broken rules or just me? Well, the game was set in the 1970s, when the Egyptians had loads of AA guns, said Doug – umpiring…

5. Napoleonic: 2mm Battle of Waterloo (Friday 2 May) – Piotr

Could we replay Waterloo in a couple of hours in an infinitesimal scale? That was my plan, and Rob and I (British & Allies), and Doug and Mal (French) gave it a go. It was a decent night using some ad hoc rules I had assembled, with one or two holes. While overall indecisive, Mal’s French, ignoring Hougoumont chateau, did storm the British ridge. While this iteration of the rules may need to vanish, the figures won’t: being suitable for a small box and a fast game, as well as generic enough to be useful across various periods.

6. Back of Beyond: 1st Battle of Mary (Weekend 3-4 May) – Rob hosting at War Room

I won the Back of Beyond campaign some months back, having fulfilled all my objectives (though the rules have changed – as they do in life – and I now have to hang on until the bitter end to claim my prize. A budenovka hat?). Great battles continue across benighted Central Asia however. A two-day mega game at the War Room saw the Bukharans (Trevor, Brian) fighting the Chinese Warlord army (Doug), the British (Pat) and the Czech Legion (Alex). Despite being ‘pummelled something rotten’ Brian had a ‘tremendous weekend of gaming… played in the best spirit’ (to quote your Whatsapps). Alex and Patrick also thought it was a fun weekend, despite general mayhem and heavy losses on both sides…

7. Skulduggery and Santa Anna (6mm Intervention in Mexico) (Sunday 25 May) – Trevor

Trevor assembled a cast of several with this surreal and frenetic fictional campaign and battle held at the War Room. The Spanish (Rob) held the Golden Idol of the Aztecs – a flawless 18” diamond with alleged powers of immortality, at the town of Santa Anna in Mexico. The French, British, Russians, Austrians, Prussians, Portuguese had all arrived and had to negotiate alliances and seize the town, idol, and Rob (‘General Bastardos’). So we negotiated in multiple locations, with spies penetrating – each faction being reduced to delusional paranoia, some of which was justified.

The long and the short of the tabletop battle is, I was double-crossed by Neil’s Prussians early on, and largely destroyed. I spent the rest of the game attacking my French ‘allies’ while being rearwardly rewarded by the Prussians and British. And the French, too. Rob won the game, and evacuated the town. An original, ambitious (and for Austrians, mortifying) game that might have been played over two days… But guess who got the last laugh? I can now reveal that I had planned the Prussian operation against myself. All for gold, right Trevor? 😉

8. World War II: 20mm Saint Mere Eglise (Friday 6 June) – Philip

On Philip’s birthday, a cake and large turnout accompanied this O-Group game at the community centre, depicting the US paratroopers trapped in St. Mere Eglise after falling out of the sky at the time of D-Day. While Philip umpired masterfully, and Alex and Simon in particular enjoyed the game, according to Whatsapp intel, there were so many of us playing on the large table that not much happened in the short time available for the game (particularly owing to unfamiliarity with the rules). However, an American armoured column showed up to relieve the paratroopers being attacked by the Germans. Nice figures and great terrain!

9. World War II: Coastal (Friday 13 June) – Richard

Richard, using Action Stations rules (what had happened to Cruel Seas?), umpired a game in which the Germans (me, Philip, Paul) had to lay 10 mines near the Channel Islands, while the Royal Navy (Rob, Doug, Patrick) intercepted. While Paul and I, each with three boats, held off the British, Philip set about minelaying. All at sea with nautical ennui, I decided to ram one of Doug’s boats, which I badly damaged, but both of mine were sunk in the process. Paul followed up with a torpedo. General chaos ensued, and I can’t even remember who won, but probably the British, as the Germans didn’t lay all the mines. Nice models.

10. Colonial: Zulu War (Friday 11 July) – Rob

‘Yes, that’s a flank’ – Rob

Me losing. Have you noticed the pattern here? So we continued with Battles for Empire rules, and had an enjoyable Zulu game. Richard, Mark and I were British with a small force officially tasked with raiding a Zulu village. But it was practically impossible to reach on the long table. Paul, Patrick and Doug were the Zulus, and advanced along two hills towards us. My mounted rifles scouted ahead, and I tried to split the Zulu ‘horns’ and dash for the village, but ended up in a sticky situation and was meleed out of this life. At least I had delayed the main Zulu assault. Not that it mattered. Richard and Mark’s infantry held firm, but ultimately were outflanked and would have been destroyed by Patrick’s Zulus. Colonial wargaming at Heston & Ealing (as in life): never be an imperialist.

11. Wildwest (Friday 18 July) – Philip

I couldn’t make this game, but it was going to be 3:10 to Yuma in 54mm with stagecoaches and cowboys. Philip has put on a number of Wildwest games in this scale, to great effect. The idea of using a film for the scenario is great. See above for a picture of Philip’s 54mm Wildwest figures…

Prehistoric action at the community centre, which I missed unfortunately. Phil always surprises us with his creativity and modelling skills. See above for a picture of his 28mm Cavemen. But are the uniforms accurate, Phil?

– Ed.