August 2021 - College of Kings

Historicon 2021 the final preparations.

With Historicon 2021 rapidly approaching, I am still preparing and play testing my two games.

Berestechko 1651.

My first game is the 1651 battle of Berestechko. The battle is part of the Khmelnytsky Cossack uprising against the Polish. I play tested this game at a local club games day in May this year. You can find the after action report here. The game performed reasonably well, but there are a couple of modifications that I will be making for Historicon. These modifications are designed to improve the play and lead to quicker combat. As a result of these changes, I have three units of Polish Haiduks on my paint bench that need to be finished. I also want to improve a building or two and paint some additional casualty markers.

The game will start at 9am on the Thursday morning, right at the start of the convention. There is space for eight players. The figures are 28mm. There will be about 600 figures with a large proportion of cavalry. There are also wagon tabors on both sides. I will use modified Pike and Shotte rules for easy game play.

Bicocca 1522 at Historicon 2021

My second game is the 1522 Battle of Bicocca in the Italian Wars. This game is going to be my larger game with a little over 1500 figures in 28mm. I am hoping to capture the spectacle of an Italian Wars Battle with large pike blocks and plenty of flags.

This weekend I play tested one portion of the battle, the assault on the defenses at the sunken road. I wanted to make sure that the game rules for the defenses made assault possible, but difficult. The Swiss managed to get to the defenses and engaged in fierce fighting before eventually being fought back. As a result of the play test I will be making a few minor changes to the rules.

The fight at the sunken road represents about 50 percent of the battlefield and about 50 percent of the troops that I will be using at Historicon 2021. There wasn’t enough space or players to deploy everything for the play test. Here are a few pictures of the play test.

A view of the Spanish defenses at the sunken road with Landsknechts behind.

A view from behind the Spanish line with the Ginetes out front.

Giovanni’s Black Band providing screening for the advancing Swiss pike blocks

The Rural Canton Swiss Pike block approaching the defenses.

The Swiss Pike block about to descend into the Sunken Road.

The final clash of pike between the Swiss and Landsknechts.

I still have a lot of work to do to be ready for Historicon 2021. There is the villa and grounds for the Villa Bicocca to finish. I have to make a large drainage ditch. I also have to paint a few more units. The Historicon 2021 counter at the HMGS website says I have 73 days left, so I should be ready.

I have scheduled the game for 9am on Friday morning and runs for 4 hours. There is space for at least ten players. In order to complete the game in the allotted time, I will need to keep things moving at a brisk pace. The rules will be Pike and Shotte. Some commands will be simpler to run for novice players and some will have a greater variety of units for experienced players. My aim for both games is to keep things moving fast and to focus on the enjoyment of the games. I will make sure that there are no long debates on rules.

Field Defenses for Bicocca.

This post is an update on the field defenses for Bicocca that I have built for Historicon. Even though the defenses are now finished, I still have a lot of work to be ready for the convention. The main item that I need to finish is the Villa at Bicocca and the gardens for the villa. I will be working on these items next week.

This weekend our club will be play testing the Historicon Bicocca game. The play test is to see if the rules that I have to represent the defenses work as I intend. I don’t want the defenses to be totally impregnable, but they should offer stiff resistance to a concerted attack.

Defenses length.

The field defenses are 6 feet long. The reason for the length was explained in the last blog post. The defenses have positions for three cannons and six units of Spanish arquebusiers that will be manning the defenses. There is also room for some landsknecht shot units as well as room behind the defense for the large landsknecht pike blocks to come up in support. the two Landsknecht pike blocks will be 100 figures each, so they need some room to maneuver.

Gun tower construction.

The gun positions use the log defenses from Anyscale models at the top. However, I also needed to build some extra log barricade at the bottom as retaining walls. These were constructed by cutting down balsa rods.

Finishing the terrain.

As explained last time, the base was made from foam covered by Killing Fields mats. A mixture of brown paint, model railroad ballast and PVA glue was the applied to the rest of the model. This mixture provided a base covering. The wooden defenses were then added using caulk to fix them and fill gaps.

Some rocks were then cast in dental stone using woodland scenics rock molds. These rocks were then painted and stuck to the model using the paint/ballast/PVA mixture. Once the rocks were fixed and dry, various shades of flock were added. I then fixed grass tufts and bushes to finish the model off. I also dry brushed some of the dirt areas to give a little more depth to the model.

The defenses took a little longer to make than I had hoped. However, they do blend very well with the Killing Fields terrain mats that they will stand on. I will add a road on the terrain mats to represent the sunken road. This road will run in front of the defenses. On the other side of the road I will put foam under the terrain mats to provide the opposite slope.

Although the field defenses for Bicocca are not model railroad quality, they turned out well for portable wargaming terrain. I am hoping that all the terrain items for this game at Historicon will work well together. The game will be reasonably large with 1500 figures and space for ten players.

Defenses for the Battle of Bicocca

As I have mentioned in previous blog posts, I am planning on running the Battle of Bicocca at Historicon. One of the most important terrain features will be the defenses for the Battle of Bicocca.

Historical description of the defenses

From the book “History of the Art of War in the Sixteenth Century” by Sir Charles Oman: On page 179 the defense width is listed at no more than 600 yards. On page 178 the defenses are described as: “On the North front, where a sunken road leading to the manor-house ran along the front of the park enclosure, he had deepened the hollow, and made a rampart along it, with the cast-up earth, piled above the existing bank. In several places he had constructed high platforms in this rampart, and placed guns upon them, which would sweep not only the fields in front, but laterally the ditch immediately below.

On page 181 he discusses the earthworks height. “the obstruction was so deep and the rampart behind it so high, that the head of a pole could hardly be stretched from the bottom of the ditch to the top of the earthwork.

Design of the defenses

From the description, there are some important factors to consider when designing this terrain feature for the game. The first is the overall length, the defenses are not a small item. The second feature is the height and the third feature are the gun platforms.

Length

On the length of 600 yards, this is 21,600 inches. If we take a 28mm at 1:56, scaled down this would be 385 inches. However, we need to remember our figure scale. I am running the game at 1 figure is about 25 men. For the pike blocks one figure would be about 5 men deep by 5 men wide. Using this frontage, I calculate that the required defense length would be 385 / 5 or about 77 inches. For table appearance, I actually made the defenses a little short of 6 feet long (72 inches). This size looks and feels about right. The defenses for the Battle of Bicocca are a dominant feature on the battlefield terrain.

Height

On the height, a pike is up to 18′ long. Using our 1:56 scale this would have meant that the defenses would need to be about 3.8″ tall. The height of the defenses is where I decided to make an artistic compromise. I used some inch thickness foam and then mounted some log barricades from AnyScale models on top. The barricades cost 2 UK Pounds a piece, which seemed reasonable. These barricades are around 0.75 inches high so the overall height of the defenses is just less than 2″. These are a little low, but still look imposing on the table top. I could still add another layer or two of foam board under these defenses to increase the height.

Close up of the gun platform which is still under construction.

Gun platforms

The next job was the gun platforms. It is important that they stick out so that the artillery can fire along the length of the sunken road. The image above shows the early stage of construction of these emplacements. I am going to add logs at the front and sides of the platforms to retain the earth. Also along the entire defenses I will add terrain and rock outcrops to give a better finished appearance.

Construction of the defenses

I used a hot wire cutting tool to cut the earthworks from a 1″ foam board. I then cut and laid some terrain mats from Killing fields terrain to give the bulk of the ground cover. This ground cover will allow the earthworks to blend with the rest of the terrain. I then shaved paths to the gun emplacements with hair trimmers. After I painted a mixture of paint, Elmers glue and rail road ballast over the paths and uncovered foam board. Finally I painted, weathered and glued down the log barricades.

I still have work to do to finish the defenses, but I feel that basic design and structure is complete. I hope to finish them in the next few weeks.

The defenses for the Battle of Bicocca will allow me to deploy 6 units of arquebusier and 3 artillery pieces. The Landsknechts can be easily moved up to the barricades due to the gentle slope at the back. Combined, there should be enough firepower to cause the advancing Swiss Pike some problems.