May: Dave's Parade....Part 1

Not quite what I meant but this post was born in May and will feature a parade - well sort of, in due course that is....

The month of May was a very good one for me from a work perspective. As you may (or may not) know I am currently working within financial services recruitment and was delighted to have placed two and a quarter people (the quarter was my share from helping someone else with a particularly tricky role) in new positions - by that I mean jobs. The end result of all this was that my sales billing target for the month was smashed by a record-breaking margin. Anybody that works in a sales environment will be aware of the use of incentive schemes whereby when certain thresholds above your target are reached prizes are given out to a stipulated value. By virtue of my successful month I qualified for the top prize; specifically the cash equivalent.

I mention all this because it does have a direct bearing on this post as we (SWMBO and I) decided that whilst the main bulk of the prize monies (and this is separate and in addition to the commission earned) would be used for our forthcoming holiday a portion could be used by me for whatever I wanted in reconition of the amount of hard work I have put in. Naturally gaming bits and pieces figured prominently but I was also toying with the notion of acquiring a tablet to support my mobile computer needs. Then it happened - an 'Oooh shiny' moment of such earth-shattering, buying the winning lottery ticket, 'watcher-in-the-skies-when-a-new-planet-appears' proportions that everything in my gaming universe was been turned on its head. As an aside this will also the reason I will be missing Broadside.

So what exactly has caused this great conundrum? 

A taster of what is to come - and boy oh boy I am delighted with this little lot!

Essentially I have acquired a previously owned 3/4 professionally painted metal 20mm WW1 Middle Eastern collection consisting of horse, camels, foot, guns, machine guns, limbers, wagons, command, armoured cars and pack mules. There is nigh on 700 models in this collection - Tumbling Dice for the most part, with some Dixon draft horses used with the wagons - and are mostly (the 3/4 mentioned above) professionally painted in a early Dallimore style (black lining and bold shading) complete with textured bases. The figures are based for storage in six box files, all lined with magnetic paper so the entire collection stays in place when on the move. The figures are primarily based individually with machine guns and artillery on larger bases. Some of the earlier units are on multiple bases whilst the camelry are on massive bases which will certainly need changing. 

The forces represented are the Turks, Germans, Imperial, Indian and Australian with some camel and horse mounted Arabs. I will be holding a photo shoot of each force in due course. The significance of this collection for me is that in one fell swoop I shall be able to tackle all those games that had only existed in my imagination or had been fought using the blocks. If I am completely honest the likelihood of me ever acquiring a such collection using conventional methods - that is buying the bare metal and painting the same - is extremely unlikely and probably impossible. Having said that, there are a couple of units that will be repainted by yours truly - the Arabs and Indians to begin with.

To say that I am delighted with this collection would be putting it mildly. I now have the wargaming wherewithal to undertake not only one off battles in a period I am passionately interested in but also to realise, at long last, all those ideas kicking around for campaign ideas.

The models in the collection are probably around 30 years old and as a result there is a degree of routine maintenance required. the biggest issue is around the basing as some of the models are not based as per the bulk of the collection so some degree of rationalisation will be required. Some of the models will need to be rebased completely which will have the knock on effect of meaning that everything will need to be painted in a uniform fashion. I am not fussed by this, in fact it will help to tie in those models that are not painted in the main style. I often find that a uniform basing style can help units to blend in - even when they are painted using different techniques.

In the meantime though....

The current frenzy of warship painting will continue unabated with the only change being to the long term plan in respect of ship acquisitions. For reasons that will become obvious I will need to add some of the older kit to the two fleets - protected and armoured cruisers and pre-dreadnought battleships mainly - as the theatre the Middle Eastern collection will be used in will feature much in the way naval activity.

It may have been Confucius that said something about 'May you live in interesting times' - mine have certainly gotten a whole lot more so!