Jacklex Chinese

 Been sitting on this for a couple of days as it was embargoed until today...

'Rob,

Here is the full range of the Jacklex Chinese Army. I thought you might like to see them. I hope to have these on the site in a couple of weeks. The new Japanese and Russians will take a little longer.'

Regular infantry

Irregular infantry

Cavalry

Artillery (mine will, of course, use completely wrong Rose guns!)

Needless to say, I've got an initial order on pre order...

1 1x general

2 1x Chinese cavalry

4 20 x regular infantry advancing

7  4 x officers with sword

8  1 x drummer

9  23 x advancing militia

11 12 x peasant

12 12 x peasant

13  2 x gunners

14  2 x gunners

15  2 x gunners

16  1 x flag and pole.

Contact! Update Chinese Dragon attack post (see bottom of post)

The lead Boxers get ready to attack.

 

The cavalry face them as they send a messenger back to the fort.

Suddenly there are loud noises behind the Boxers! Columns of smoke rise into the air around the curve of the hill!

Disturbed by the passage of a noisy crowd of humans two dragons burst from their rest and engulf the column in flame!

When the smoke clears five Boxers had been fried to a crisp!

Confused, the leading Boxer unit halts in indecision.

Panic! The Boxers flee in pure horror! (To stand, officer and standard bearer needed to throw 5 or 6, other ranks a 6. All failed!!!)

The dragons follow up on the fleeing Boxers, forcing some of them to try and fight back.

Mostly they ran...

Treating all the figures as individuals, the Boxers are all down as Hordes (due to panic I've listed them as Hordes throughout, the Dragons as Dragons. +6 v +2. Using colour coded dice, in this battle 3 blue Boxers used blue dice, the red Boxers orange and the green dragon green. One Boxer did really well in this combat!

 

With many of the humans dead or running away and only a couple of them still facing them, the dragons decided they'd had enough and quietly sauntered off.

Faced with panicked Boxers heading towards them the British decided to charge!

First contact with the standard bearer who died!

Two Boxers promptly threw themselves to the ground and surrendered, a couple decided to fight and the rest scattered!

One of the resistors died, the other managed to hold off three cavalry!

 Satisfied with the outcome, the British rode off with their prisoners leaving one Boxer with a story about how he defeated and drove off a whole regiment of British cavalry! Of course, they never saw the dragons so haven't a clue what happened!

In fact, the Boxers finished up with four heroes, the other three being the ones who actually fighting the dragons - which, of course, they would later claim they killed...

 As an aside, I hate it when I read a detective novel and the detective solves it by introducing something they haven't told the audience about to solve the case. In this instance, there were enough clues and hints around that this was not a straight British/Boxer contest, though some were very obscure/hidden - I would be interested in knowing how many people spotted!

So, a few hints/clues. Nothing much, but here goes:

Firstly, right away through I have made a point of stating these are Pulp scenarios. The labels of all three of these posts include 'pulp'. The pulp side of my gaming has always been very specifically placed in the Newhaven universe (with 1897 extensions) and the single based figures  (rather than element based) especially so.

Look at recent posts - the Airfix Foreign Legion 'done as pulp rather than 'authentic'', Couple of Chinese buildings '28mm individual ones should be finished for quite a while apart from 'monsters'. 20mm for larger scale battles - got a prototype hopping vampire,', etc. Clear hints that 20/28mm single based figures are often for games with a supernatural element.

Now, the first of these three posts, 'Somewhere in China'. 'Between the Boxers and the British is my newly made village plus a temple and large protective idol.Of course, the British fort is behind the idol, which is probably why it didn't work' - so what direction IS the idol facing? Answer, towards a supposed threat. And of course magical idols are designed to ward off magical or supernatural threats. Didn't work against the British - not supernatural and came from the wrong direction. Seems to be working against the dragons - they're still outside the village!

OK, the dragons. Where did they come from? Never mentioned before. Yes, they were. Look under dragons on labels you get https://easterngarrison.blogspot.com/search/label/dragon - 

They're well hidden, but they're there! And no, I didn't expect anyone to spot that one!

Then lets look at another point. The design of the board itself.

That is a very long section of woodland. Looks like a major waste of space if that's all it's used for. Yet at the other end, where a possible siege of the fort could happen:

It was stuck at the far edge of the table... useful as a source of misdirection of course, but if I had ever intended it to be a pure Boxer/British battle the forestry section would have needed to be shorter and the fort would need to have terrain on it's far side! Otherwise - a very poorly designed board!

Anyway, as said there were plenty of clues and hints... but no-one was expected to find them, any more than someone reading a detective novel should be able to work out whodunit before the detective explains everything at the end. The idea is that tthe clues are there but you aren't supposed to notice them!

Jiangshi

Simple conversion of the Rose standing ACW artillery figure. Arms bent forward, sword carved away and given a big silly hat. The Jiangshi are reanimated corpses. In theory, they are killed by sticking a religious text on the forehead, or possibly a spot of blood. On the other hand, they don't exist in real life so they can be killed in any way the rules allow. For wargames purposes, a shot through the forehead or heart would seem reasonable - this lot aren't high class undead.

I started off trying to build up the bottom of the tunic with greestuff then found that a pure paint job worked as well/better. The pistol holster on the right of the belt substitutes for the knot tying the belt. Hands and face painted white to represent the fact it's an undead vampire. The figure also has possibilities for use as civilians. I'm having quite a think about converting ACW to Chinese.

Don't usually buy many books these days but thought (bit late!) I'd get a couple of Osprey uniform books. 'The Boxer Rebellion' has arrived, 'Armies of The First Sino-Japanese War 1894-' is on pre-order with Amazon.

Getting closer.

As the Boxers approach from one side of the board...

The cavalry cross the bridge on their patrol.

Meanwhile one company of the Highlanders leave the fort, their tour of duty over. A replacement company should have arrived to replace them but it's overdue. No matter - it's a quiet sector, one infantry company plus a cavalry squadron should be more than enough!

Not quite in sight of each other yet - still part of a hill in the way.

 

The cavalry haven't seen the Boxers so the squadron splits as it carries out it's job of checking the village is quiet. Not sure if the Boxers have seen the cavalry yet!

And the 2nd infantry company get further away from the fort.

Somewhere in China

 Setting up for action...

Cleared an 8' section of my table and set everything up. It should be useful for more than one type of scenario, even 20mm though the fences will look a bit big. Must put some of the trees on bigger bases - they keep falling over!

 

My 28mm Boxers are down to see their first action. They've heard about a fort set up by the White Devils and felt they had to pay them a visit.

Between the Boxers and the British is my newly made village plus a temple and large protective idol.Of course, the British fort is behind the idol, which is probably why it didn't work. I really must source some decent Chinese civilians. I'm assuming not all of China consists of paddy fields. This is part of China that looks a lot like the terrain I've actually got.

Meanwhile a British cavalry patrol approaches the bridge, on it's way to check on the locals. Bridge was made for a completly different scenario!

The fort is held by 2 companies of Highlanders, one guarding the walls, the other on parade.

A view from the British side of the river. The trees in the orchard seem to have been replanted. Quite mysterious really. I read on the internet that, in China, houses should ideally face South. These houses all face South, but I really should turn the temple before I do anything else - at the moment it faces West.

Couple of Chinese buildings.

 

OK, One building, one statue. With all the Chinese figures I'm making I needed a bit of architecture!

The building was off ebay - nice size and scaled OK for 20 to 28mm! Should be a very useful piece of terrain.

This rather imposing structure came from our local aquarist store. Again, should be useful for a number of scenarios.

In terms of figures, 28mm individual ones should be finished for quite a while apart from 'monsters'. 20mm for larger scale battles - got a prototype hopping vampire, actual army...  Jaclex are supposed to be bringing out a range of Colonial era Chnese this month, so that should provide a good basis.

Boxer Army Review

One of my smaller Reviews, but the Boxer Pulp army is 'officially' finished for now so it seems the appropriate time for one!

As an 'army', 42 figures and 2 cannon seems little to me, so I wouldn't be surprised if I did bump the numbers up later!

So next job is to get on with that Boer War army.

 

Actually, technically I do have a bit more to do with this army - I've cast 3 Sung carts that can be used as supply wagons for these and (which I suspect is now on my to do list!) any future Sung army.

Yet more Boxers

Another unit of mixed pole arms and firearms. I seem to paint most of my Chinese units red.

It gives me two Boxer units on individual bases - should be enough for Pulp games.

A few Boxers.

There are a lot of small ranges in the Garrison stable. One is a set of 5 Boxers. Not brilliant figures, very similar in size and style to the Kmer range. In the Garrison casting book they are listed as Vietnamese!

I think the standard is actually from the Sung range.

Simple paint scheme, mainly to see how they look painted up before I wasted any more time on them. Sprayed blue clothing.

 

These were the two best figures in the range. They should be useful Pulp figures, later I may see how they fit size-wise with the Sung.

Overall, very basic figures, potentially very useful. I could build an army based on them.

Meanwhile, actually started casting. Should be pretty much up to date by the weekend!