My wife would eat this sushi. So would I.

This one I am waiting for. I am a considerable expert on Helmand - after watching several Ross Kemp videos.

Ten Questions with Dr Sam Mustafa It would be a fair contest to compare how many people have made money writing wargame rules for miniatures and how many have been launched  to space.  In the former category, Dr. Sam Mustafa is a bright light. wp.me/pae4WL-eyS

My review of Brougham Castle near Penrith. On the site of a Roman fort, it was built by Robert de Vieuxpont, but finished by the Clifford family. Wrecked by the Scots after Bannockburn and slighted by the Parliament forces. Still a picturesque ruin today. balkandave.blogspot.com/2026/05/brou...

Strongest Ward for Each Party #LE2026: 🌳 CON: South Marston (Swindon) | 78.8% 🌎 GRN: City (Sheffield) | 71.1% ➡️ RFM: Manor House (Hartlepool) | 66.3% 🔶 LDM: Hill End (St Albans) | 62.5% 🌹 LAB: Figge's Marsh (Merton) | 55.3% electionmaps.uk/le2026

The Lowest winning vote share in the 2026 Local Elections was Tyseley & Hay Mills (Birmingham), won by the Green Party on 20.5% electionmaps.uk/le2026

There is such a sculptural quality to this ancient Bactrian silver tetradrachm. King Eukratides I is shown in profile, wearing a Boeotian-style helmet and holding a spear, his torso twisted so that we see his powerfully muscled back and shoulders. 🏺 1/ Bactria, ca. 170-145 BCE. #MetMuseum 📸 me

The postie delivered my copy of ‘Scourge of Princes’ today, Sam Mustafa and John Holly’s new renaissance rules. I have loved this period since George Gush introduced it to the hobby. So, the midweek game is the Holy Roman Empire v Ottomans. Fighting over territory in Serbia I will visit next week.

The sun is shining.

Luftwaffe Officer Dietrich Schulz-Köhn (aka “Doktor Jazz”), Django Reinhardt, four until recently unidentified black musicians & a Jewish man outside La Cigale, a jazz club in Paris during the Nazi occupation in 1942. What a photo!

En poche en septembre

"Victory Day", by Nikolai Nikolaevich Baskakov, 1977.

Just got the art rulebook for 1943 Race to Rabaul - first-rate work from layout artist Katarzyna Jasińska - big advance toward getting the game print-ready. Below, demo this past weekend at Montreal Stack game con.

Erstes Mal Churchill aus der Great Statesman Series von @gmtgames.bsky.social gespielt! All die tollem Sachen die ich über das Spiel bisher gehört habe, haben sich bewahrheitet. Wir hatten richtig Spaß am Tisch mit jede Menge trash talk. Genau meine Art Spiel. 🤩

French Carrier Strike Group Now Operating in the Middle East — USNI News news.usni.org/2026/05/07/f...

Bank Holiday #MapMonday is a revealing one about the Battle of the Admin Box: it was just one part of the Japanese Ha-Go offensive. The entire 7 Indian Division took part, and of course the battle at the division's adminarea was the most dramatic part with the non-combatants fighting in the line ...

Third playtest: naughty Angevins inflict the Peace of Wallingford on me, led by Mark de New York - a saucy fellow i'[email protected]

I only have five troops left but Congress refused to pass the Treaty in the lame duck session of Congress, so Mexico barely outlasts the Polk Administration.

Soon after the #BerlinWall went up Erwin Schabe reported he’d been blocked from getting to school by East German Border Guards. The British then sent an escort. In his 40s he admitted he made the whole thing up to get off school!

Greater Blue-Eared Starling Bird Nature's living gem: sparkling sapphire feathers and bright eyes

Second playtest: Things  were flowing well until King Stephen was captured by Norwegian raiders in a big battle near York. The most eventful part of the war has  a lot of cards in play This means things do not happen in the historical order which injects a nice dose of (possible) alt-hist.

Anarchy: I'm oscillating between a smaller number of Regions and less activations or the reverse. It all comes down to what fits  the storyboard in terms of running hot or cold. I'll try the smaller version solitaire this weekend.

Tudor naval project: have decided that the Solent scenario is going to need some shore batteries. Not necessarily to fire, but for the French to sensibly avoid.

Viz 355

RUSI just released an excellent paper on ‘Emergent Approaches to Combined Arms Manoeuvre in Ukraine’. I wanted to test if Battlegroup Clash: Baltics could model the new approach. The answer was a conditional yes. Read about it here: www.sapperstudio.com/post/testing...

Still one of the best exchanges in any medium.

Map, Meeples, Cards, Rules we are good to go on The Anarchy. Is it a game yet? Is it even representative broad-brush history? I have no idea

Second game of this yin. Rules playing out well - still just a bit long for us while we hunt for the rules. Drone and EW both covered well, Nice one. @sapperstudio.bsky.social

Hi - announcing that I've put a new boardgame prototype, Digvijaya: Religious Rivalry in Medieval India, up on my fieldofmars.com website. It's designed for three players, but also has an AI to allow one- or two-player games. Thanks again to Tor Andersson for the use of his Rally the Troops system.

Portrait of Giovanna degli Albizzi Tornabuoni, 1489-1490 by Domenico Ghirlandaio

Legit. True. Damn right.

Marc Morris' response. If you're thinking of telling your students tomorrow about how King Harold sailed his army to Hastings, maybe make it a lesson in source criticism. www.marcmorris.org.uk/2026/03/did-...

Today’s development: update to the board for what is now likely to be called “The Emperor’s Choice”, a 2-player game about the fraught Japanese cabinet discussions on August 9 1945, leading up to surrender and then the attempted coup.

You could say that Rock n Roll was born 111 years ago today in Arkansas, but probably not where you'd think. Before there was a Chuck Berry or Little Richard, there was those who wanted to be like her. Rosetta Nubin better known as Sister Rosetta Tharpe, the godmother of Rock was born on this day

Brigadune

'The New American Gothic', Oil on Canvas by Criselda Vásquez

Fairly good win on that Cloth of Gold, doing well WITH the gold. As always there are 2 or 3 options each go, each with consequences further down the line that can help your opponent.

Hello Gaius my old friend

Playing around with some visual prompt help cards for current version of mid-Tudor Naval project.

I don’t repeat play many games in any year, so I prefer to list by playtime… here’s my 2015 - quite a high proportion of wargames!

Clever idea

The other is the Robey-Peters Gun Carrier, a World War One plane that Chris discovered. Two large recoilless guns mounted in nacelles on the top wing, a pilot who can't see, and a dangerously poor center of gravity all combine for wargaming fun. Find them here: site.wargamevault.com/browse/pub/1...

Ushibori in the Rain, 1929, by Hasui Kawase.