Old West Mini-Wargame: Showdown at High Noon - A Wargame in a Matchbox Epilogue

Old West Mini-Wargame: Showdown at High Noon according to my scenario and interpreted by ChatGPT

Last year I attended the 'Wargame in a Wee Matchbox Challenge' with paper miniatures from Junior General and rules made by ChatGPT; Old West Mini-Wargame: Showdown at High Noon.

The rules was really simple, fast playing and easy, and I had to keep everything small to make it fit in a matchbox (which it eventually did). -Since the Challenge I've played the game several times with my oldest son. The game feels perhaps a little too simple, as gamers usually ends up behind cover exchanging fire with the opponents until one of them runs out of health. I wanted to see if it would help to this feeling and make the game more interesting if a little more was added to it than what would fit in a matchbox. So I decided to try out the very same simple rules and scenario with larger terrain and miniatures in 3D as I wanted to use my 54mm -ish Cowboys in a game.  I'm curious to see if a more '3D-game' gives another impression or 'deluxe version' of this simple game.

I had almost everything I needed to convert my 2D-game in the matchbox into a fully 3D one, except for a female hostage to rescue. I found one 28mm scale at Thingeverse and 3D-printed her to match the size of my 54mm -ish cowboys. I guess she can double up and I can use her as a civilian or a missionary in my Congo Crisis games too. 

Scenario: It's loosely based on the scene from 'A Fistfull of Dollars' when 'Joe' frees 'Marisol'; 3 outlaws are holding a woman hostage in the house, and our 'Hero' is there to free her.

Forces: Are dictated by the rules; 3 outlaws with health of 2 and hits on 5+ Vs. 'The Man with No Name' with a health of 4 and hits on a 4+ and activates first each turn.

The Rules:

The Game

The original set up for the game (as in the 'Matchbox Challenge), and my fully 3D set up for this game (which will not fit in any matchbox):

Our 'Hero' approaches the house where the 'Bad Guys' are holding a woman captive: 

The Bad Guys spot him at a distance and it doesn't look like he's gonna take them by surprise:

As soon as a couple of the outlaws leaves the building, they get into our Hero's gun sight:

But at this distance and moving targets the Hero misses, and the Bad Guys manage to get into cover and return fire:

And very soon the firefight develops into a locked position where all combatants are in cover exchanging fire in a very dueling like battle. The Bad Guys are good shooters and our Hero takes a couple of hits. This situation does not look good for him at this stage:

I think our Hero performs best under pressure because when it start to look real bad for him, he gets a couple of critical hits on one of his gunmen:

And one of them are out of the fight:

Then the nameless Hero focus his fire on the other gunman behind cover:

And finally takes him out too:

The Villain did not like this development in the gunfight, as he now has to go out and fight him himself:

Just as the Villain leves the building he doesn't manage to even open fire before the nameless Hero opens fire... 

...and at very long range accurately hits the Villain beside the female hostage, and impacts a critical hit on him with a single shot:

After 15 minutes and 10 turns it look like the nameless Hero saved the day:

Conclusion

So was this game any different than the Matchbox-version of it? - Not really, it's still the very same simple rules that makes battle develop more into static duels where the only modifier is it the fighters are Heroes' and have cover or not. The only difference with this game was that I was able to make even nicer images for the battle report.

And with this game and battle report its perhaps time to finally conclude my entry to the "2024 Wargame in a Wee Matchbox Challenge". It's been an interesting challenge and I would like to credit Alan at The Duchy of Tradgardland for the initiative to the challenge and the entries as follow. Well done everybody!!

• Man of TIN blog
• Grid based wargaming
• Wargame Hermit: Solo Wargaming
• Deathzap
• Projects and Procrastination

I guess some of us has 'leftover matches' after emptying our boxes to join the 'Matchbox Challenge'. At the Model exhibition in Neumünster earlier this year I found this example what you can use your matches for. -At least if you have 3700 of them and 640 hours to spare...

- Perhaps an idea for a 'Challenge' in 2025??

Some new acquisitions to the collection

On my work we have a 'Secret Santa' arrangement each December, where we secretly draw a name from a box and secretly gives this person a gift for Christmas. Last Christmas one of my colleagues and 'not so Secret Santa' told me that he didn't pick my name from the box this year, but he wanted to give me something anyway. He just had to find it first. So last weekend while we were working together he handed me a reasonable full plastic bag, which contained several smaller bags:

I took a brief look at them and could tell that there were many plastic soldiers in 54mm-ish scale, mostly WW2 knock-offs from Matchbox. When I got home I finally got a chance to take a closer look at them.

In the first bag I checked there were 100 German soldiers. It was a mix of Airfix infantry, Matchbox infantry and Matchbox German Africa Corps. It was a clear majority of Matchbox soldiers. What I really like with these knock-off sets is the number of officers. Where the original set have only one, this German lot have 12 + 5 "Rommels" (Useful for any high ranking officers though):

The second bag contained 66 British 8th Army figures in a mix of Airfix and Matchbox knock-offs, and again mainly Matchbox poses. 8 officers:

It seems inevitable that all lots of plastic soldiers also contains a detachment of American WW2 Infantry or 'Army Men'. This lot contained 70 of them, and they were all Matchbox. Looks like I got some 'Snowball-fighter' replacements.

There were also some 31 Japanese soldiers in one bag. Some few of them are Airfix copies, but the rest of them I'm really not sure. Perhaps Atlantic??

All of them togheter:

Being knock-offs they're usually not 'true 54mm scale', as they are often smaller. These are some 50mm+ and lines up pretty well to those Army Men I've already painted and used for wargaming.

All the different plastic soldiers in this collection are made to the same size:

They have some flash and mold lines, but that can easily be trimmed away. Those of them who have small wobbly bases I plan to equip with larger 3D-printed bases.

Adding these soldiers to the collection of the cheap plastic soldiers I've acquired earlier I now have a big stockpile of figures for future figure and painting conversions and wargames.

Mark Man of Tin Blog recently published a couple of very interesting postes regarding using pound store plastic soldiers to make wargaming inexpensive and achievable. There are some really interesting point of views in the comment section of those blogger posts as well. Please pay them a visit.

I belong to those who like to wargame on a budget using whatever available. I don't care if my miniatures are not made to a specific brand or rules, as I'm happy converting them to those wargames and scenarios I want to play (usually free rules found online. Check my rules menu in the menu to the right). So these new acquisitions makes it possible for further conversions and new scenarios.

Norway 1940 is mentioned....
- I don't want to rule it out.

In these bags there were also some accessories for my Army Men. They can get useful:

There were also some few other figures in the lot. Airfix Cowboy and Indians knock-offs, and an Airfix British paratrooper which is copied to the unrecognisable:

And some few 1:76 Airfix originals; RAF Ground personell, Washingtons army, German Gebirgsjägers, 8th Army and some very few French Napoleonic artillery crew. There were also some 1:72 scale American WW2 infantry which were knock-offs of the Airfix 1:32 scale originals:

And there were even 3 small (smaller than 28mm) metal miniatures. Looks like they are from 'The  Lord of the rings':

So thank you so very much for the gift not-so-secret-Santa Jørgen. These will provides hours of fun, converting them, painting them and deploy them in future wargames.

Please follow my blog for future updates.

DAS Pronto soldiers - A DIY soldiers moulding from air-drying clay

When John Yorio at 54mm or Fight was sculpting his own miniatures by using air-drying clay, it made me start thinking if air-drying clay also would be suitable for small plastic figure conversions?
When searching the internet for tips or tricks for using air-drying clay for plastic miniatures conversions, I didn't actually find much, so perhaps that's not a proven method??

- What I did find however was the product name of such air-drying clay I remembered using as a kid; DAS Pronto. It's an Italian product from 1963. This made me remember a birthday gift I got from my beloved sister when I was a kid; It was a DAS Pronto moulding kit for moulding your own Cowboy & Indians with the air-drying clay. Perhaps not a coincidence that such a set came from Italy at the time several 'Spaghetti Westerns' were made there? I remember DAS had other similar sets with football players, animals, custom cars and buildings too. 

You added clay to the pres fit mould, and after releasing it from the mould again, the miniature could be posed as desired and you could push-fit different weapons, hats, and different equipment in them while the clay was still soft. After the clay had hardened it could be painted and varnished. The only limitation to how many you could make was the available accessories. I'm not sure where I have my moulds anymore, but I've borrowed some images from different forums and adds at ebay to give you an idea. These are similar to the Cowboys & Indians I had:

What I've discovered recently, and didn't know at the time, was that there were similar sets from DAS to mould soldiers from the American Civil War as well. One mould for soldiers with kepis and one mould for soldiers or officers with hats, and you could off-course combine them and using them for making a blue and a grey army:

There was even a 'maxi' combination-set of the 2 sets above, with cardboard fortress and a 'battle mat' to be colored:

Another interesting thing I've recently discovered with these DIY 'DAS soldiers', is that they even made 'modern' Army Men. I can't remember seeing any of those in Norway:

While working on this blogger post I've also found out that the made Sci-fi Space warriors:

And D&D 'miniatures':

Here are some of the other DIY figure sets from Das Pronto with skiiers, American football players, soccer players and ice hockey players:

Of all these different sets, I've only seen the Cowboy & Indian set in Norway.

This is not a sudden change of focus for me in the wargaming hobby, as I have no plans for start making DAS figures again. I just thought I would share the information if someone finds it interesting. It would be interesting though if anyone has pictures to share of the 'finished product' of soldiers from DAS. -And especially if anyone used them for wargaming.

On the other hand, if DAS can be used for moulding figures, would the same air-drying clay be suitable for making smaller conversions on plastic figures? Anyone having experience with this??

It seems like DAS also was marketing and aiming towards the military modelling market too:

Thank you for the gift Sonja❤️