From Empire to Revolution Update

Rich just sent me the latest proofs of my Mud and Blood supplement. It is looking fantastic. I am so excited to see this starting to really come together. It is getting closer and closer to being published.

So far it has detailed information for the Austro-Hungarian and Russian empires. Including Stormtrooper and JadgKommando information. I have details on cavalry formations and the changes to the standard infantry formations throughout the war.

I am anticipating updates on the scenarios over the next couple of weeks. I am hoping that this may launch as early as my birthday (October 7th for those who were wondering and wanting to send presents).

A Task Completed

Well I finally finished with my East Front supplement for the TooFatLardies Mud & Blood. I sent it on to Rich this afternoon. The supplement has 15 scenarios. It also has information for both the Russian and Austro-Hungarian infantry and cavalry. There is also a small bit in there on German cavalry for the Great War. I managed to check on when I started this project. Turns out I had been working on this since 2008. Wow! Did not realize that this one had been cooking for close to 4 years.

Now on to the next project. I have two that are over half way done. The first is a IABSM supplement for the Italians on the East Front. The second is another Bag the Hun/Check Your Six supplement that covers the Western Desert for the first few months of the war. I am not sure which I will work on first. I can probably finish the Western Desert one quickly. The IABSM project is more interesting to me though. Decisions, decisions. Any opinions?

The Impending Weekend

Well once again Friday is here upon us. I sit and examine the pile of work that needs to be done and just sigh. The painting table has my 80% finished groups of Romano-British Levy from Khurasan. There is something that is blocking me from just knocking these out. I did get in another two packs of Russian WWI figures from Peter Pig that are tempting me to go off track and do those instead. But I am trying to stay on target and not succumb to my "Oh Shiny" impulses. In terms of writing, I made some headway on the WWI East Front material. I found the autobiography of the founder of the Women's Battalion of Death. Very interesting story. Maria Bochkareva who was known to her fellow troops as Yashka, had appealed to no one less than the Tzar himself for permission to serve in combat. She fought against the Germans as early as 1915 and her stories generated two scenarios so far. The first is a rather brutal encounter where the Russians were ordered to charge across open ground against entrenched Germans that had not been properly softened up by artillery. They had to run over a half a mile from their trenches to reach the German wire that was left undamaged by the artillery barrage. She was awarded a medal for bravery as she rescued some 50 men who were wounded in the engagement. Of the 240 men and woman that formed her company prior to the attack 83 were killed in the charge and only 48 were combat effective once they made it back to friendly lines. The second scenario is based on her description of Russian and German scouting parties in 1915. She mentions conducting such missions on a regular basis and that in the void of no-mans land, occasionally scouting parties from either side would have their own small battles at night. Should prove interesting. I have much more to read and hope that I have the material to have at least one good scenario involving the Women's Battalion of Death. If for no other reason than the name of the unit. For some reason my writing inspiration has left me the past week. I find myself playing FreeCol in my free time rather than something useful. Hopefully I will snap out of it soon. Also, the Blog has now exceeded 15500 page views and 48 followers. I am amazed. Thank you for reading. I think I will post a scenario that I write from Maria's story here because of that.