And now for something completely different! 15mm Thirty Years' War. When I began wargaming seriously in my teens, apart from 25mm Napoleonics and Ancients, my friends and I went for 15mm 17th Century (English Civil War and Thirty Years' War). One of my friends had got hold of a copy of the WRG Renaissance Rules by George Gush and bought some 15mm figures. In the end, we had Swedes, Imperialists, and Cavaliers, and Ottoman Turks. The friends are long lost (where are you now Graham and Richard?), along with their figures, but I kept mine and added to them from secondhand sales over the years. They were based some time ago for a set of home-made rules adapted from a set found on the Internet, but are still usable for Mr. Gush's rules, with a bit of adjustment. I do not say that they are the best rules for the 15th-17th Century, but they are certainly the best written set of rules I have ever come across in more than forty years of wargaming. They should be an example for all would-be rule writers to read! Anyway, I suddenly had the idea that I would like to start 2021 with a game from the past and unearthed my 15mm Thirty Years' War. So, turning to C.S. Grant's Programmed Wargames Scenarios, I set up a game from the first scenario and enjoyed a pleasant solo action. Here are some pictures (15mm are much harder to photograph with my little digital camera, so apologies in advance for the varied quality!).

The battlefield.

Pike and musket regiment. Figures are anybody's guess, having been bought pre-painted secondhand.

Artillery battery and supporting light horse regiment.

The command base has a homemade flag, somewhat Bavarian in colour and style?

Dismounted dragoons. Most of my trees for this scale of wargaming are homemade, lichen stuck on twigs and then a plasticene base, all made decades ago, plus a few commercial pine trees found at model railway shows.

More artillery and another command base.

Light horse regiments.

Pike and musket regiments with a unit of mounted dragoons in support.

A cuirassier regiment, mainstay of the mounted element of Imperial armies

during the Thirty Years' War.

The centre piece of the battle - a card German castle for N gauge (I think) railway modelling bought many, many years ago, but still one of my favourite terrain pieces.