Toy Soldier & Model Figure

THE latest issue of Toy Soldier & Model Figure is a "special edition," and has a Wild West theme.

TS&MF...sold in larger branches of WH Smith

As usual, the best bits for me are not so much the articles themselves as the glossy pix of toy soldiers, old and new.
Having said that, I did particularly enjoy Steve Rhea's piece on Two Battles Of Adobe Wells.

Miniature Wargames - issue 413

SEPTEMBER'S issue arrived while I was in the Czech republic.

Miniature Wargames...includes "free" Colonial rules

The most interesting articles, for me, are Chris Jarvis's ideas for a grand-scale Colonial campaign, Jon Sutherland's reminiscences about an old set of Ancients rules, and the first part of Conrad Kinch's piece on the Peninsular War Battle of St Pierre - a battle I cannot remember previously reading about. 

Gentlemen, Start Your Engines

I HAVE been testing the engines that came with the Knight Playset, and I am pleased to report that I earlier significantly underestimated their range.
In my previous tests I shot them while they were positioned on my hotel bed's duvet - not a stable platform.
Today I tested them on my hotel room floor, which has a very short-pile carpet. The results were spectacular - so much so that I still do not know their maximum ranges.

Photo taken from the hotel room door, which both engines - they can just be seen in the distance - reached with ease

What I can say is that accuracy is much easier with the Grey bombard and, as is to be expected, the Black catapult could not hit targets at extreme short range. This will to a certain extent offset Black's advantage in mounted figures.
As to the scenario in which I will be using the playset, I have decided that a generic medieval skirmish battle is to be preferred over trying to refight a specific battle (the absence of longbowmen makes my first thought of a War of the Roses scenario rather foolish).

The Great Wall of Olomouc

OLOMOUC was the capital of the short-lived Greater Moravian Empire, and later withstood sieges by the Mongols and Frederick the Great.
Most of the city fortifications have long gone, but what remains is pretty impressive.

Czech Out These Knights

I WAS hopeful that a visit to Olomouc in the Czech Republic would prove fruitful from a toy-soldier viewpoint, and I was not disappointed.

Knightly array

This Knight Playset, made in China and distributed in Europe by a Dutch company, cost 119 Czech crowns - well under £5, even at today's unfavourable (from a British perspective) exchange rates.
The pack is divided into two armies - Black and Grey.
Black has 16 dismounted figures, two mounted figures, a flag depicting a lion or (gold) rampant on a field of gules (red), two mounted figures, and a large catapult.
Grey has 16 dismounted figures, a flag depicting a lion vert (green) rampant on a field of or (gold), and a bombard.
Remarkably, perhaps, both the catapult and the bombard work. That is, the catapult hurls a "stone" ball a considerable distance through the air, while the bombard has a spring-loading mechanism that allows it to fire a similar ball along the ground.
The bombard's range is shorter, but the flat trajectory of its shot could well make it deadlier.

The two armies, Black and Grey, lined up on a table in my hotel bedroom

The dismounted figures come in a pleasing variety of poses, while the asymmetry created by the different artillery, and by Black being the only side to have mounted figures, should pose interesting problems when the armies go into battle.
I am leaning towards a War of the Roses scenario, to account for the huge percentage of dismounted figures, with Little Wars-style rules, but will give it some considered thought before I return to England.

Toy Soldier Collector

I HAVE taken out a two-year subscription to Toy Soldier Collector - not least because it is next-to-impossible to find a newsagent that sells the magazine (larger branches of WH Smith, for example, stock the similar, but more American-focussed, Toy Soldier & Model Figure).

Issue 77, the first of my subscription, arrived today

Issue 77, which covers August/September 2017, is full of inspiring photos. But as usual the fact that stands out the most is how ridiculously expensive most "toy soldiers" are.
I use quotation marks because the vast majority of so-called toy soldiers are not meant to be played with as toys and are well beyond pocket-money prices.
But as the author of https://poundstoreplasticwarriors.wordpress.com/ points out, real toy soldiers at very low prices are still available, albeit mostly in pound stores and the like.

Literary Review

AUGUST'S issue of Literary Review has, as usual, many reviews of books covering historical subjects, including Martin Luther, fascist Brits in WW2, Robert Louis Stevenson in Samoa - by coincidence, I am reading a collection of his travel books - German military activity in Africa in WW1, and poor little rich terrorist Patty Hearst.

Lots of history for £3.95

OK, some of those subjects could be more accurately described as current affairs rather than history - there are people alive who lived through the years covered - but they still greatly interest me.

Slingshot Jul-Aug 2017

THE July-August issue arrived yesterday, meaning the Society Of Ancients is catching up with its publishing schedule.

A striking cover...showing a Roman sentry looking "towards the Rhine and the oncoming Vandals"

Unusually for Slingshot, there are no detailed battle reports - usually the highlight of the magazine, at least for me.
However, I did much enjoy Simon MacDowall's potted Vandal history and Nicholas Spratt's account of 17th century Tibetan invasions of Bhutan.