Sunday, 9 September 2018

The Portable Foreign Legion


Eevee (named after a Pokemon character) taking her ease in the office aka the isolation tank or even ‘juve cube’

It has been an interesting weekend. To begin with we have a new addition to the family in the shape of Eevee - a four year old female cat courtesy of the Cats Protection League. We made the fatal mistake of going to one of their cat homing shows and so lo and behold - the feline contingent at our house is now back up three following the recent loss of our beloved Maisy. Eevee is in isolation at present until she settles in a little more and then we will introduce her to the rest of the gang - no doubt to much hissing, spitting, tail bottling and vocal indignation!

Laurel and I had a quick run out today - not to a boot sale - and I had high hopes of getting some essential modelling bits and pieces courtesy of the Works and Hobbycraft. Sadly I was disappointed on both counts which was a tad frustrating. I wanted to get some supplies in for the great ACW ship build but came home empty handed. As these models will be larger than those I built a few years back I want to use Basswood for the hulls and superstructures as it is a more durable than Balsa. I will take a look online and am sure I can get the material I need - and knowing the prices in Hobbycraft probably for cheaper as well!

Enough of the frivolity and on with the main point of the post.

I have more or less worked out the composition of the forces I shall be raising for the Portable Foreign Legion and indeed am also pretty sure about the figures I shall be using. Initially the set up will be for Morocco so Berbers will be the opposition of choice. I want to be sure that I get these right as they will also be featuring alongside the Turks against the Italians for the war of 1911/12 as well as for the Great War and after. I reckon that after this project is complete I will have Portable Wargame sized armies for around six forces. That sounds a lot but each one will be pretty small - which is one of the great attractions of the Portable Wargame.

The Legion will have a couple of cavalry units in support - Spahis and Chasseurs D’Afrique as well as artillery and some Turcos. At the moment I am looking at either Minifigs or Irregular Miniatures but have yet to finalise this. I am waiting on a specific book to arrive before I make this decision.

I will also need to think about some terrain to go with this project as for Morocco we are not just talking about sand. At this stage I am thinking about rocky outcrops and some buildings but I will need to be sure about the table footprint of the models I use.

I am waiting on my small order from Navwar for the ships for the WW2 project and the plan is to finish those before starting anything else. 

10 comments:

  1. What is the Force composition you are looking at for your Foreign Legion/Army of Africa Force?

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  2. Hi Geordie,

    Updates will of course be appearing as and when.

    All the best,

    DC

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  3. Hi Simon,

    I have yet to nail down exactly what will appear but thus far the core will be the Legion with some artillery and Spahis/Chassuers D’Afrique. I will throw in some Turcos types for variety but mainly it will be the Legion. I need to do some more research and hope that Douglas Porch will help with his Conquest of Morocco.

    The Berbers will be far more straightforward!

    All the best,

    DC

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  4. David,

    What a very pretty-looking cat!

    All the best,

    Bob

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  5. Home the new lady settles in
    Go in a model shop come out with a model
    Go toan event with cute cats and come back with a cat ;)

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  6. Hi Brian,

    She is indeed - we just hope that she settles in with the other two OK.

    All the best,

    DC

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  7. Hi Bob,

    She represents a bit of a break with tradition in that her name does not begin with the latter M and also she is not black and white!

    All the best,

    DC

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  8. Hi Geordie,

    Ain’t that the truth!

    All the best,

    DC

    ReplyDelete