The McPherson's Ridge Project (part 2: The Cutting)

(Part 1 of the project can be seen HERE)

Oh... the ACW,

is the best CW,

so no old terrain will do.

For the ACW

the best CW,

we'll make hills perfect and new.

McPherson's Ridge Part 2

Or kinda perfect.  Mostly perfect.  Because having some imperfections is a form of enhanced perfection, or so I tell my wife about my personality.  

I've had a good chunk of hobby time of late; so am plowing along with the McPherson's ridge.

The 2 hills from part 1 are covered in ground cover and then painted brown.
The ground cover is a mix of fine ballast and coffee grounds.
The coffee grounds make the hills smell tempting.

Since I'm planning to cover these entirely with flock and grass, I'm not sure the texturing with ballast and coffee grounds is necessary.  I figure it couldn't hurt, and maybe provide some extra durability though this stuff is already pretty durable.  My original idea was to do the first two hills to completion as a proof of concept, so the next step would be to give a dry brush to the top and to flock them.  However it suddenly struck me that I was family free for two nights and therefore had the WHOLE house to myself.  Big open spaces that I could work in and walk around in my underwear.  So while the hills were drying I cut out the rest of the elevations.  Because what else was a I gonna do? paint miniatures?  Blech! Sounds awful.  

The pieces were sketched out on the foam and cut out following "the plan." 

"the plan"

When all was done, I laid them out on the playroom floor,
amazingly clean with the children not being home.

Put down some buildings where the ought to go (McPherson farm, Thompson house, and Lutheran Seminary), and stood back to take a looksee of how it was coming together.  Not too shabby.  

kinda looks like a cactus.
Or someone giving the bird.

It occurs to me that if I did a better job of rounding the top of the slopes then you probably wouldn't have that definition line that can bee seen on the painted hills, where the slope clearly hits the top.  I 'll need to work on that.  

Now hobby time is spent making a big mess
by cutting out the slopes with sharp things.
I can see why people who do this a lot invest in hot knife or wire cutter.
it gets tiring.

I still haven't cut myself though.

Got a few more slops to carve out, and then it will be sanding all the pieces, applying the ground texture and flocking.   So far, the whole project is bigger than I first expected but also going by much faster than I thought.  Kinda like being a parent.

Maybe in a month or so these might be ready for some FUN ACW gaming.

Speaking of Fun ACW Gaming

I had my first ever remote game with the unconquerable Jonathon Freitag, on the unmatched Palouse Wargaming Journal blog.  He's been doing a lot of remote gaming of late, and it always looks like fun, so selfishly I wanted IN on the action.  Especially when he started to set up an ACW (the best CW)  game.  I practically invited myself.  

Being a complete rookie to remote gaming,
I didn't take any pictures.  Not sure I even know how.
JF sent me some he took just so I'd have something
pretty to post.

I wouldn't say that I was skeptical about remote gaming, but I'll admit that I secretly thought that it wouldn't be as fun as in-person gaming.  That remote gaming was something you did when you couldn't get in real gaming.  That remote gaming is to real gaming as pornography is to sex.

And I was wrong, because it was DAMN fun.  It was so much fun that when the game was supposed to end at 9PM, I subtly suggested that we keep playing for awhile longer "because I wasn't going anywhere or had anything needing to do.....maaaaybe do another turn?"  

I played the Union.  Here we are pressing the attack.

There are several things that worked really well; Using hexes / grid makes it easy to move troops and probably cuts down on measuring and sentences like "move that unit to the left, little more.. maybe a little more... To far!  back to the right..."   I even got used to units facing the hex point versus the hex side.... like driving on the wrong side of the road.  The rules were simple and effective and I was able to pick them up pretty well.  But of course Jonathan did all the work and just told me what to roll.  I didn't even print out the QRS he sent me, what a rookie!

The biggest attraction to remote gaming is being able to have a game with other bloggers.  Many of us have been following and commenting on each others blogs for YEARS now, and I've often suspected that many of you would be fun to play games with.  I'm sure you've felt the same way about me.  I definitely am.  But it was very nice to put a face and a tone of voice to the name on the screen.  

The only thing that gnawed at me which I didn't become conscious of until about 3 quarters of the way through; was that Jonathon couldn't see my dice rolls.  I would just tell him how many successes I had.  I couldn't see his dice either (he would roll them on the table on camera but I couldn't read them).   I said something like "I feel weird that you can't see my die rolls."  He said "Why, are you tempted to fudge the numbers?"  "No," I said, "because I am a grown up and that would be stupid and what's the point?" 

We laughed.  But it's the only thing that I can think of now, that was in anyway, substantially different than playing games face to face.  I really don't think that dishonesty runs high in miniature wargamers, but there are horror stories.  It's not that I wanted to verify what Jonathan was rolling, but more like I missed the ability for him to verify what I was rolling. Especially when I was rolling HOT.   And I roll Hot a LOT.  

And in any game there are those moments when both players are paying close attention to the dice, and that aspect was kinda missing.  (Like your leader dies on a 4+, and we both watch the roll).  

Though I'm probably over thinking it; I'm making it sound like a bigger issue than it actually is.  Through work I spend a lot of time with lairs and manipulators, rapists and murders, so I think my mind has gone slightly twisted.  

I mean; cheat in games with your children so that they win once in awhile?  Sure.

cheat on your diet? once in  awhile.

cheat on taxes?  all the time.

cheat on your spouse? depends.

cheat in a miniature wargame?  NEVER.

I enjoyed my first remote game ever and that's largely thanks to Jonathan.  Game was fun and the company good.  Makes me want to play with more bloggers.  

Thanks for reading.

Double thanks for writing a comment.

Till Next Time.

(EDIT: Part 3 can be seen HERE