Thursday, June 28, 2007
Michigan Toy Soldier Company Trip
This past week, I took a trip to visit the Michigan Toy Soldier Company in Royal Oak, Michigan. You can see photos of the visit here.
It’s an amazing store, filled to the brim with a wide variety of large scale metal and plastic toy soldiers. Some of the brands they carry include Britains, Armies In Plastic, Marx, Dragon, Forces in Valor, Frontline, Andrea and the St. Petersburg Collection.
While they don’t carry historical wargaming scales, such as 6mm, 15mm and 25mm, they have everything you could possibly want in 1:72 and 1:32 scales (54mm). On a previous visit, I picked up several boxes of late 1800s British, Sikhs and Afghans from Armies in Plastic for a large scale skirmish game. They painted up very nicely and made for a good game (you can see photos here.)
I was tempted on my recent visit by large bags of very finely sculpted 54mm World War II figures, and by American Civil War figures in the same scale. One of the advantages of using such figures is that you also can get plastic buildings and terrain pieces in the same scale for a price that is much more reasonable than 25mm terrain. They are generally not as well done as the smaller scale terrain pieces, being intended originally as toys, but with a bit of customizing, they could look very nice indeed.
My six year old came away with three bags of partially painted plastic toy vikings and knights—about 40 figures for twenty dollars. He really wanted some of the die cast airplanes and tanks, but I managed to talk him out of those. The store had a large number of plastic figures loosely packed in bags, including the aforementioned Vikings, Knights, and Romans.
Michigan Toy Soldier also has a very large selection of Papo (and similar) figures that straddle the line between toys and collector figures, and of miniatures primarily designed for display (such as Pegaso figures).
Although they don’t really carry any “wargaming” figures, Michigan Toy Soldiers does cary several wargaming magazines, including the now expired Wargames Journal, Wargames Soldiers and Strategy, Vae Victus and Miniature Wargames. There’s also a good selection of paints, brushes and other general hobby supplies.
But even if you don’t have any interest in gaming with large figures, and buy your paints and magazines elsewhere, it’s worth taking a trip to the store just to see the many showcases of finely painted large scale miniatures.
Michigan Toy Soldier
1400 East 11 Mile Road
3/4 of a Mile West of I-75 (Exit 62), 2 Miles East of Woodward Ave., (Between Campbell and Main St.)
Royal Oak, MI 48067
Phone 248.586.1022
Fax 248.586.9934
Store Hours, Eastern Standard Time:
Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday:
11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Thursday and Friday:
11:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. Saturday and Sunday:
11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
A Real Hobbit Hole
If this isn’t a hobbit hole, I don’t know what is. The builder, however, calls it a low-impact home.
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Squad Leader in 3D
Some years ago, I had a conversation with John Hill, the designer of Squad Leader, about how to convert the board game rules to a miniatures game. To my surprise, Hill told me that the game had originally been designed as a miniatures game, and that he had pitched it to Avalon Hill as such. He was told that, while AH had no interest in a miniatures game, if he converted it to a board game, they would buy it. So he did, and they did, and the rest is history.
Hill’s advice was to simply use the rules as-is, converting measurements from hexes to inches. He suggested a straight one hex to one inch conversion, but I think that’s because he envisioned using micro armor. Our group decided that a two- or three- inch to one hex conversion was better for 15mm figures, and we have played it that way off and on for a couple of years.
Then recently, the owner of the WWII figures (I had painted them for him several years ago) bought a couple of Hotz Artworks hex mats. This past Saturday night was our first using hexes instead of rulers.
And what a difference it made! Squad Leader played fairly well with rulers, but is a delight with hexes. Having the hexes sped up things considerably, taking measurement out of the equation, and leaving us to concentrate on the other aspects of the game.
The scenario involved a group of Germans defending a fortified position and a collective farm, separated by eight hexes. A large force of Russians was dispatched to clear them out.
After the Germans deployed, the Russians entered on the opposite side of the board. The initial strategy was to concentrate the entire attack on the fort and ignore the collective. The Russians would mass in a wood close to the fort, shoot to attempt to disorder the Germans, and then close assault.
The plan didn’t work. As the Russians attempted to take positions in the wood, they were slaughtered by massed German firepower, both from the fort, and at long range, from the collective. An assault finally was attempted, but by then there were far too few Soviets left.
Since the game took just an hour and a half, we set up again and restarted. This time, the Russians sent a smaller contingent to keep the Collective busy. Again, the horde moved up to the woods. This time, the Germans were far less effective in their fire. Part of that was that their dice had gone cold; part was that the troops in the collective now had their own problems and could not fire with impunity.
The Russians facing the collective farm then got lucky and rolled snake eyes on a low odds shot. The German leader in the hex failed his morale check, as did the rest of the unit. The second round of morale checks eliminated a third of the German flank.
The Russians facing the fortification got a similar break and were able to force their way in for a Russian victory.
Squad Leader turns out to be a terrific system for miniatures when using printed hex mats. The basic game is elegant and relatively simple. While ASL has moved on to Multi-Man publishing, I’d really like to see basic Squad Leader re-released as a purely miniatures set.
You can see more photos here.
Friday, June 22, 2007
The Ten Weirdest People On Earth
I’m a sucker for top ten lists, and I love news of the wierd, so this was a nice conjunction of the planets: A list of the ten weirdest people on earth.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Gallery of Comic Covers
CoverBrowser has a great collection of comic book covers for you to browse online.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
The Fantastic In Art and Fiction
Cornell University has an online exhibit with some fantastic images of devils, demons, witches and the like. I really enjoyed browsing the collection and couldn’t help but think how neat it would be see a line of miniatures using these as inspiration.
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About the Miniature Wargaming Hobby
Miniature Wargaming is part of the "adventure games" hobby, which includes r ole p laying and board games. Wargamers recreate battles on the tabletop with toy soldiers, like a more complicated game of chess. Models range in height from 6mm to 28mm tall, with 15mm and 25mm being the most popular. There also is a growing interest in toy soldiers and military models, such as the 1/32 and 1/35 scale plastic soldiers from Conte, and Marx.
The most popular miniature wargames are fantasy and science fiction based, such as Warhammer, Warhammer 40K, Warmachine and The Lord of the Rings. World War II games such as Flames of War and Axis and Allies are new favorites. Other favorite historical periods include Napoleonics, the American Civil War, and ancients, such as Romans or Greeks. Other gamers enjoy miniature naval wargames, recreating battles like Trafalgar, Jutland and the Coral Sea.
Hobbyists research historical periods and paint their tiny soldiers in accurate uniforms. Others develop "historically realistic" rules sets or build scale battlefield terrain using model railroad techniques.
For pictures, visit the gallery.
Some of the bigger hobby companies are Games Workshop, which produces Warhammer, Wargames Foundry and Old Glory Miniatures. Wizards of the Coast produces several lines of pre-painted miniatures games, such as the Star Wars and Dungeons and Dragons miniatures games, and a historical game with pre-painted miniatures: The new Axis and Allies game. Wizkids produces a fantasy collectable miniatures game, such as the Mage Knight and Heroclick fantasy games, the science fiction games MechWarrior and Rocketmen, as well as the quasi-historical Pirates of the Spanish Main.
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