"Indian Mutiny Game in 54mm" Topic

I recently ran an Indian Mutiny game using 54mm miniatures at my local club. I began collecting Indian Mutiny miniatures five years ago with a view to playing small skirmish games. Now I have over 100 figures per side, representing (I believe) almost all of the makers of Indian Mutiny figures, past and present. They are almost all metals. I used The Men Who Would Be Kings rules from Osprey which are my current favorite colonial rules. I tasked the British players with taking the Mutineer side of the town or breaking half the Mutineer units by the end of twelve turns. Otherwise, it's too easy for the British to stand back and blast away at the Mutineers with their superior, longer range weapons. It was a very close game, with the British routing seven out of thirteen Mutineer units on turn twelve. They only lost two of their ten units, but they were down to one or two men in three of their units.

Looks like a cool game, Nick!

The RHA in the third photo down are wearing your Havelock heads. Thanks!

Nick, that's a great looking game! The figures are beautiful and I love the buildings.

Thanks, Ragbones! A friend at my club scratch built them for me when I complained that I couldn't find any suitable buildings in 54mm.

Nice looking game Nick. I am guessing most of the figures are metal. I'm not aware of any Indian Mutiny figures in plastic.

Nick, I wish there were any plastic figures! I am using some Deetail Arab cavalry types, but that's about it. I have seen some clever conversions of Airfix Napoleonic British infantry but have yet to try it. Also, Expeditionary Force ACW Militia with the Havelock kepi have possibilities with the right paint job.

Very nice. I think I recognize a handful of the great Armies in Plastic Afghans as well. Love the layout.
CB

Great to see some 54mm action – to my eye there really is nothing like it. Lovely figures and table! Thank you for sharing!

Looks like a fun game !

Nick, splendid job! It does look like a fun game indeed. Awesome collection.
Cheers,
JB

Now that's old school

Looks fantastic!
Another good advert for gaming colonials in 54mm.

What size table did you have?

Comicbook Hero, due to an error in scheduling, our club meeting took place in a smaller location than usual. So we were forced to play on a 6X5 foot table. Usually we play on an 8X5 foot or 7.5X6 foot table.

Hi Nick, look like a splendid game. Would have loved to be there. Great publicity for 54mm gaming.

Nick,

6x5 is close to what I have in my games room. I have a 6x4 (I can stretch it to 8x4 but it is a real pain, and can't be left up) and It comfortably takes my 54mm WW2 games and terrain for some great games.

I'm toying with colonials in 54mm so I can dust down my old TSATF rules, but wasn't sure 6x4 would be big enough. Happily you have proved me wrong.

Thanks again.

CBH

Comicbook Hero, if you can play WW2 on your table, you can certainly play colonials. It doesn't leave much room for maneuver, but on the other hand, you get down to fighting right away. Cutting to the chase, as it were ;)

Curious, what rules do you use for WW2?

Nick,

I have had many enjoyable games using Bolt Action (the original ones.)

The only rule changes I use are to allocate the dice per Officer and NCO with maybe an additional dice allocated to a side if they are elite and reducing one dice to simulate a sides disorganisation or low morale.

I keep ranges as per the rules and just explain it away as limited visibility due to a smoke filled battlefield. They work really well.

Here are some pics of my first Bolt Action game. https://imgur.com/a/AQ3if
I have fond memories of it, not only because it was my first game in 54mm with my Conte playsets but it finally convinced my wife that I needed a games room rather than taking over the dinning room table!

I have also experimented with Airfix Battles. The game uses squares for area movement and firing and comes with cards for activation and movement. It's a really subtle system and gives an enjoyable game.

I just changed the squares for a measurement of 9 inches and rather than the 10 figure squads it uses as units, just reduced the men to 5 or 6. Worked fine.

Here are some pics of the Airfix Battle game. https://imgur.com/a/y29fe

CBH

CBH, Wow! Just wow! I thought I was looking at still frames from Saving Private Ryan. Great miniatures, great buildings! I own both Bolt Action and Airfix Battles. I was planning to use Airfix Battles with my HO collection, for nostalgic reasons, but your photos have me thinking otherwise. I see I can buy some pro painted British Paras and SS camo Germans on eBay for a reasonable price. I've always fancied doing Arnhem. Oh well, here we go again!

Nick,

Thanks for that. That's the type of thing I was going for.

I'm lucky enough to have a large collection of the plastic Conte British Para's. in fact it was seeing pictures of them on the Conte sight that convinced me I needed to game in 54mm. They are just incredible.

When I could find no more I supplemented them with some of the Pre painted metal versions. I did touch the metals up with a bit of shading and painted their berets maroon. It was more to make them fit in with the plastic ones. https://imgur.com/a/LuU4p

CBH

GREAT looking game and table.
It sounds like it was a clear victory for the Colonials, but a 'very' costly one. (2 of 10 units lost, 3 units down to now more than 2 men that's some serious fighting).

Well done!