Steve's Reinforcement Has Arrived!

Isabelle was born at 4:26 on 11/22/2011.  7 pounds 9 ounces.  Everything was textbook perfect- zero issues.  The child can count base 10 on her digits.

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One more saccharine sweet post. Back to carnage after this

Today is one more anniversary to celebrate- my dog turns one! I wouldn't have known that except that Lydia loves our dogs more than anything (including, probably, me). But this was such a good picture she took of our beagle (Recon), I had to share it.



I promise my next post will be about the men, machines, and carnage of war.

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A very good year

This weekend Lydia and I celebrated our one year anniversary- it seemed to fly by! It's been a solid year. Every day I'm glad I asked that girl to marry me. She's rational, kind hearted, and independent. And like me, she favors alone time- clinginess is something neither of us cares for. In the 4 years we've been together I don't think we've had a single argument, and laughter far outweighs seriousness. And, as readers of this blog know, she doesn't just "not mind" me playing Flames of War all the time- she encourages it! I figure I'll get as much painting and gaming in as I can until a Little MacLauchlan decides to hang out- and hopefully that won't be for a while ;)

Okay let me recount the year-
Lydia and I both graduated from school (I have a Bachelor's in Computer Science) we both got new cars (this is my first NEW new car), we bought a house (seriously, I love this house), and 2 little dogs who are pretty damn cool.

All in all, it's been the best year of my life- and I look forward to many more like it!

On the blog front- I am very excited about reaching 50 followers and averaging 50 unique visitors per day. That is up from about 10 when WWPD first started in January. I look forward to writing many new Battle Reports for Flames of War and other games that strike my fancy.

So what's good in your lives? If you're married, how long have you been? I hope everyone has a great day!

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Introducing: Iron Lydia

Lydia started her blog to document her battles with our food challenges. Check it out: Feedin' The Troops

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Easy Forest Tutorial

We were snowed in all weekend, and I was lucky enough to be able to fight off cabin fever and make some terrain. Due to crushing boredom, I was also able to get the wife to help! I made a tutorial to show just how easy this is.



Read on to see the tutorial!



SUPPLIES


First you'll need a paintbrush and some green paint. Latex house paint is preferable, but all I had available were a few large pots of acrylic.


You'll also need hairspray and flock. The large tube of Woodland Scenics green grass works well. It covers a good area as well. I bought two, but haven't even used a quarter of one tube on tons of forests.


Don't use up all the hairspray on your hair! It's for sealing the flock.


And lastly you'll need a good deal of felt and scissors. The scissors we had available sucked, get some good ones. You won't regret it.

SUPPLIES
----------------
Green paint and paintbrush
flock
felt
scissors



Step One: Cut the felt to shape.


Step Two: Apply the paint. Again, easier to do with latex house paint.


Step Three: Spread the paint. Make sure to get the edges, but it's okay if you leave a few spots.


Step Four: Shake the flock on.


Step Five: After the paint has dried, shake off the excess flock. We used an old pizza box, and wound up recovering at least half of all the flock- like I said, it goes a long way!


Step Six: Use the spraypaint to seal the flock.


Step Seven: Enjoy!

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Historicon 2009

Sadly the epic El Alamein game never happened. But now it's time to gear up for Historicon!

On Friday night I am in the 3 round late war singles tournament. I am running German Pioneers.

HQ with panzerfausts, add 2 HMGs, add 2 81mm Mortars
3 Full combat platoons with panzerfaust upgrades
3 Panzerwerfers with extra crew
4 Panzer IV H
4 Brummbars

It's a pretty solid list, although I push them hard and thus usually lose at least one platoon.

On Saturday my dad and I are in the 3 round mid war doubles tourney. We're running British Light Armour and British Motor Infantry. Tally Ho!

I'll take some pics on my phone and write up short and sweet batreps.

In other news, Lydia got a gun yesterday at the gun show. We now have a 2:1 gun:people ratio, which I believe officially makes us redneck gun nuts.



Before anyone points out "bad trigger discipline!!!!11ONE" that was on purpose- there was a very ugly white zip-tie band around the trigger that she wanted to hide. It took away from the cuteness :)

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Life, Love, Houses, and of course, War.

Been a while since I've updated. Been super busy- between work and school full time and looking for a house, I can barely take time to breathe! Consequently not a lot of painting has gone on.

My parents came up for my Birthday over the weekend and my Dad and I got in a little Flames of War. I hate to admit that it was the first game in a long time where I found playing a bit of a chore. I normally love playing my Dad and he wasn't the reason at all, but the combination of mission (Free for all vs tanks when you're infantry is never fun), a headache, and bad luck made my interest level drop. I am normally very good at keeping in good spirits even when things are going south, and I felt a little silly for losing interest, though Flames of War and the dice Gods are wont to surprise you and in one fateful turn the game totally swung my way. We didn't get to finish, and it could've still been a hard fight, and I look forward to a rematch where I can pay better attention and focus on having a good time with the old man.

Later we tried a game of Victory at Sea with a US New Mexico class Battleship escorted by a Brooklyn class cruiser against a Japanese Kongo class Battlecruiser escorted by a Myoko. The game was surprisingly VERY fun, I think we both had a blast and I look forward to playing it more. In the end the Myoko was sunk, and all 3 of the other ships limped home. Both fleet commanders had a lot of letters to write home, and some time to think about it in dry dock.

The rest of the weekend was good. I had to scramble to catch up with some homework but it's always worth spending time with the family. I miss Tito- we need to hang soon!

We looked at a real junker of a house over the weekend. Tomorrow we're looking at another one, and I feel really good about it.

This week I have to write a paper on "Siddhartha" by Herman Hesse, study for a killer physics test, write a genetic algorithm for Artificial Intelligence, study for a Database Design Test, and try to squeeze some sleep in there somewhere :)

On top of that Jaime (my boss) is going to be out from work for a while due to new baby. Its hard to believe that A) I now consider Jaime one of my best friends. Before I knew him I thought he was a jackass. I couldn't have been more wrong (much like my initial impression of the Strokes- wrote them off as a boring one hit wonder band, but they rule!). He's one of the nicest dudes out there! Weird to think he'll have a kid in a handful of days. Growin' up man.

Anyways, I'll leave you with a handful of pictures from me and my Dad's game. I stopped taking pics about halfway through.

The Grenadier platoon in the center wood (in the last picture) all received iron Crosses. They single handedly wiped out 3 armored platoons (Carriers, Stuarts, Shermans) after weathering torrents of MG fire and artillery called in from that damned L4 Grasshopper.

As always, way more pics after the break!


Initial table setup.


The German battle lines.









Marders. The little AT guns that could.


Panzerwerfer


The Panzerwerfers open up


British M10s cautiously advance through a wood escorted by the 2iC...


and the blasted Grasshopper. (his 8 gun battery is off board :( )



British tanks on the move



"Fire for Effect!"



Overwatch



British tanks reposition



The panzerwerfers were overpriced fireworks this battle. That burning sherman is from a stug, not a rocket.



Said Stug.



This is the last picture I took. The grenadiers in the center wood charged headlong into the british lines. The Marders tried to outflank but 2 got blown up and they pulled back. The M10s retreated to the road on the right and knocked out a stug from extremely long range in concealment.

the grenadiers in the center succesfully beat back a Sherman platoon and a Stuart platoon in the same assault in one turn without losing a single stand. They never got below half despite 2 rounds of Murders, assaults, and countless MG dice slung their way.

Moral of the story- German grenadiers in woods are evil.

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Williamsburg Muster report pt 1

Had a great time running the Flames of War tournament at Williamsburg Muster over the weekend. Lydia photographed the event, but she's been super busy and hasn't had time to transfer them to her PC. Here are a handful of pictures taken by Indy Kochte. As always, there are more after the break


Lydia was the "Press"


My Dad in an intense battle with Joe Brecher's Panzer lehr Armored Panzergrenadiers.



Dad's artillery staff team


Dad's tanks advance through a wood


Dad's tanks capture an objective


Lydia Polonofsky- action photographer!


Takin' a load off


Dallas engaged in furious combat


The pub crew- Dallas, me, Lydia, Shan, Allison, Tom, Chuck, Dan. Indy is photographing

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Shooting range

On Friday me, Lydia, and Dallas went to a shooting range.

I shot a Beretta 92FS, Dallas shot a glock 19, and Lydia shot a .22. Then we rented an M1 freakin' Thompson. That was sweet.




In heels no less.

Here's a link to my photo bucket to see the rest: http://s153.photobucket.com/albums/s217/flamesofwar_sjm/Guns/

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Home from the Sicily game

Ron did an awesome job running that tournament, and I had a blast. Rangers are fun to play, and both of my opponents were awesome. Game one saw my Rangers attacking a hill and monastary (Which I mistakenly assumed was Monte Cassino- which isn't in Sicily at all- I'm an idiot) in Hold the Line vs Ken Berry's Fallschirmjaeger (german paratroopers). The combination of heavy terrain and Ranger's ability to double move through it saw me on the objective pretty quickly, and Ken just didn't have enough stuff to throw back at me.

Game two was against Gray Collins, who I plan to make an effort to play with more often, and was a brutal grind. My rangers squared off against his Italin Fucilieri across a 95% open board in Free For All. Neither of us ever really had a shot at capturing objectives, but Gray manned up and went for it anyway. By the time I repulsed his attack, I didn't have enough to go charging across the field and threaten his. I won the battle by virtue of killing more stuff (per Ron's scenario rules), but the battle was truly a draw. Gray was a pleasure to play against, and I think we had a pretty great battle.

Ken wound up winning best Axis General, and his son Joseph wound up winning Best Allied. Thanks to my tenacious Rangers I won the Infantry Assault Badge (Ron actually gave me a cool pin with a rifle on it as well as a certificate and a Pip Roberts blister- which just might motivate me to finish my British Grants) Overall the Allies won the day.

Thanks to my opponents, all the friendly faces, and especially Ron for a very enjoyable day of gaming.



And now- me and Lydia's Cylon Cake detail and comparison:

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Off to the 4th Annual FOW Day at Ft. Lee

I am about to leave for Ft. Lee where Ron "Bing" Bingam is hosting the 4th annual FOW Day at the Ft. Lee Army Women's Museum. The theme is the invasion of Sicily. For some reason I decided to run Ranger's. I think the Rangers are a cool list, but competetively their trained status and tiny platoons make them vulnerable to high casualty rates. Anyhow, it should be fun. Rangers Lead the Way!

Last night was the Season premier of BSG- I dug it.



Me and Lydia made a BSG cake. We rule.

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Mein Fiancee, Lydia. She's studying to be an interpreter for the deaf. She doesn't play wargames :(









And this is the cat, Combat:


And the snake, Kevin Snacon: (He does play wargames)

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