And the Winner Is...

After placing all of the entries in the hat for the New Year's Society of Ancients' membership drawing, the winning entry is...

David Morfitt!

Congratulations, David!  You win the one-year membership to the Society of Ancients!  Thanks go to everyone who entered the contest.

David, please contact me via my Blogger Profile and we will work out details.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year fellow wargamers!

While there are several 2024 battles to chronicle, newly painted units to parade, and battery of year-end wrap-ups to write, I begin the New Year with a prize drawing!

What is the reward for entering the drawing?  The winner receives a one year's complimentary membership to the Society of Ancients (SoA).  If you have an interest (whether general or specific) in Ancient & Medieval warfare and wargaming the period (3000 BCE to 1500 CE), give the SoA at the link above a browse.  The SoA publishes a (mostly) bi-monthly magazine, Slingshot, that is crammed full of interesting content.

Membership also includes expanded access to the SoA's active forum that is, likewise, packed with interesting content.  Much of the forum's content is available to members only.  Browse both the SoA website and forum to get a flavor for what is available.  If you have never given the SoA a try, now is an excellent opportunity.

If interested in a complimentary membership, reply in the comments declaring your entry into the drawing.  If more than one entry, a random drawing will follow.  Get your entry in by Sunday, 05 January.

Good luck and hope to see one of you as a new member on the forum.

Haiku Contest Results!

The Haikus have been collected, enjoyed, and archived.  Thank you to everyone that made the effort to create a Haiku for this occasion.  All were terrific; some inspiring; many funny; and all encouraging.  A few were even mulitpart!  Excellent!

By my count, there were 24 submissions.  Thank you to everyone who participated.  I enjoyed them all.  Here are the Haikus submitted.

Many armies but
No orphans or widows
Sound of laughter

I follow the blog
Paulouse Wargaming Journal
Why? I recall not ...

Wait! I remember!
The Battle of Southam played
Three different ways

All the best,
From across the foaming sea
Good wishes and cheer

Research, deploy
Play for pleasure not to win
It’s only a game

so much enjoyment
palouse wargaming journal
a prodigious blog

Backlog is too big
Real life does not provide time
To paint this Mountain

Checking updates often,
Always something interesting seen,
Prodigious output.

You are attacked
Charged by all our forces
The Shedquarters way

You are attacked
Charged by all our forces
Why is Jon surprised?

Jon writes a blog for
Playing games remotely with
People enjoying them.

I hate the haiku
Form tortures my thought and words,
Changing their meaning.

Your depth of knowledge
More painting inspiration
Hexes can be fun

Across the Palouse
Miniature armies gather
To clash remotely

dashing frequent brush
quickly, fastly painting figs:
Jon at his paint desk

days go by quickly
another army posted:
on Johnathon's blog

has been so for years
three times a week a visit
From my online friend

10 years at the screen
A decade of achievement
The glory is yours

And I congratulate
And I applaud and I cheer
For your large milestone.

Reading all the posts
Wargaming at its finest
True inspiration.

Relaxing evening
A bristle, tiny brush paints
Over the model

Palouse is his home
Blogging is in his nature
We all say, thank you!

I am still away
Deep in the heart of Texas
Back on Saturday

Posts swiftly cycle
Comments many enthralling
through hobby, Friendship

Drawing one name out of the electronic random number generator, the winner is,

Stew

from A Terrible Loss of Lead and Wealth blog.

Congratulations, Stew!  Your attempts at stuffing the ballot box paid off!

Please send me an email and we can work out details on your Gift Card.

On the gaming docket today is a F2F game.  We see action in the SYW in India using WoFun figures.  On Monday, back to Solferino in a continuation of last Monday's game.  

Ten Years Before the Screen

The Palouse Wargaming Journal (PWJ) marches across its tenth anniversary.

It is said that a habit is formed in 21 days.

Publishing a blog for ten years, with regularity, must represent a lifestyle.

With 1,458 blog posts, blogging as a lifestyle decision seems applicable.

With nearly 40,000 comments (OK, half are mine!), this has become a wargaming community and outreach program for me.

What are ten take-aways from ten years of blogging?

• Averaging about 10 posts per month, I have yet to run out of content.  When I began, I worried that potential material would soon become exhausted.  To the contrary and to my surprise, more ideas and topics pop into my head than there is time to write up.  My list of draft topics is long.
• Blogging has enhanced my hobby enjoyment. 
• Perservance.  Keep at it and write regularly.  Regular updates are key to engagement.
• PWJ seems to attract readers and regular commenters of a similar demographic with similar interests.  How did this self-selection happen?
• The blogging community is generous and polite.
• Readers tend to follow the principle of if you cannot say anything nice, don't say anything.  My painting may not be the best nor my games the most handsome but you would never know it from commentary here.
• I gained new wargaming acquaintances and friends from all over the world.  Many with whom I have even enjoyed a game or two.  Amazing, really.
• Blogging opened up new possibilities and a venue to share thoughts on gaming, collecting, and wargaming in general with (mostly) likeminded wargamers.
• Following other bloggers’ works and reader commentary are both motivational and inspirational.
• I am grateful to anyone who happens to stop in to read my work and doubly grateful for those readers who regularly offer up a comment or two. 

Thank you for your patronage and friendship.

Now for a little contest!

As a small token of my appreciation for my valued readers, I offer up a gift voucher to one reader's favorite wargaming shop or bookseller.  The only constraints are that the vendor must allow for an electronic gift voucher purchase from the USA and the winner must supply an email address.

The Rules:

1. Create a Haiku observing the traditional three lines of text having 5, 7, and 5 syllables each. 
2. Theme: What draws you to checking in on actvities at the PWJ?
3. Enter as many times as you like by leaving your Haiku as a comment to this post.
4. One Haiku will be selected randomly from my favorite entries.
5. Gift Voucher amount will be determined by the number of responses.

Below are two examples to prime the creative pump:

Paint desk is busy

Armies march into battle

Anticipation.

Thoughts swirl and wander

Inspires; encourages

Quite habit forming.

Contest will close 30SEP2022.

Drawing Results

The results are in from the Six-Year Anniversary Drawing.  The winners and the amount of gift card won are listed below:

6 YEAR ANNIVERSARY GIFT CARD

Obs	NAME	ENTRIES	$
1	CHASSEUR	11	50
2	GONSALVO	19	25
3	PRUFROCK	6	25

Having the first name selected in the random sampling, CHASSEUR receives the top prize of a USD$50 gift card.  GONSALVO and PRUFROCK each win a USD$25 gift card. Congratulations to the winners and thanks to all who participated and commented on the anniversary milestone.  Thanks go out to everyone who pops into the Palouse Wargaming Journal whether regularly or occasionally.  Welcome to the half-dozen new Followers among the ranks.  Hope you find something of occasional interest herein.

Winners may submit their request for Gift Card vendor by submitting an email via the Contact Form request.

Now, back to our regular programming...

Six Years Past

Another year of blogging is in the books at Palouse Wargaming Journal as the ledger closes on Year 6 in the journey of chronicling my hobby activities.

While the year just passed witnessed a steady stream of units parading across the painting desk and marching off into their storage boxes, a few items stand out during the previous twelve months.  To name a few of my favorites:

French & Indian War Solo Relay Campaign - with the cooperation and dedication of Peter at Grid Based Wargaming, a SYW campaign raged over five months as I took on the operational role of administering the campaign via the boardgame, Montcalm & Wolfe while Peter resolved each action on his gaming table.  That was great fun.

Seven Years War/War of Austrian Succession Gaming - the battle of Mollwitz saw action on the gaming table twice (or was it three times?) and the battle of Zorndorf once.  More battles of Zorndorf are expected in the future.  I watched Jake's (Dartfrog's Adventures in 6mm) Russian SYW project begin and end with the result being the mustering of the Russian OOB for Zorndorf.  The guys have seemingly accepted Honours of War as a satisfactory set of SYW rules. 

ACW Gaming in 10mm - I tried my hand at scenario design using Norm's (Battlefields and Warriors) ACW rules, Two Flags - One Nation for the action at Fox's Gap.  Played that scenario several times; some solo and a few FtF.  Plans for getting TF-ON back out onto the gaming table before year-end is anticipated.

To The Strongest - Finally got a chance to give To the Strongest rules a try on the gaming table at Chaeronea.  Although I went down in defeat in the first playing, I am impressed by the simplicity and nuance of the game.  I look forward to many more repeats of this one. 

Napoleonics Gaming - Returned to the Peninsula to fight the action at Foz d'Arouce multiple times in 28mm.  Great to get this collection out onto the gaming table after so long in storage.

Of course, a smattering of travelogues occasionally popped up with many more in the bin to share in the future.

Besides reaching a milestone of six years blogging, The Palouse Wargaming Journal approaches 1,000 posts.  Perhaps by Christmas that milestone will be reached?  

As I mentioned in last year's anniversary commemoration,

Besides curating a large amount of information on my hobby activities, the most rewarding benefit gained is the introduction to a number of like-minded individuals. Friendships gained through these communications are important and appreciated.

this reflective summarization has not wavered.

To show my appreciation and gratitude to those who stop by for an occasional visit or regular readers who not only take the time for a visit but also to compose a reply, I offer a drawing for a gift card or three.

The Rules for Contest Entry:
There are two criteria for participating in the drawing (both must be satisfied):

• Publicly follow the blog by clicking on the "Follow" button (if you have not already done so). 
• Leave a comment to this post declaring your wish be entered into the drawing. 

Get Extra Entries:

• Top Commenter Bonus: To reward the Top Commenters and to encourage others toward more frequent contributions, the Top 10 will receive additional weightings to their entries. For the verbose Top 10, to your singular entry, you will receive additional entries equal to the inverse order of your ranking. That is, Mark Strachan gets ten more entries while Stew receives one additional entry.  Rankings will be taken at time of contest closure.
• Publicize the Contest: If a contestant is, perhaps, willing to reduce the probability of winning by prompting others to join in, publicize this Give-Away on your blog. Put a link back to your blog in the comments for verification. In exchange for possibly diluting your change of winning, you get five extra entries.
• Favorite Post in Year 6: For an extra five entries, identify one of your favorite postings in the past year and why.

The Prizes:
If your winning entry is pulled from the Random Sampling (without replacement) hat, the winner will receive an electronic gift card to the wargaming vendor of choice. It is the winner's choice but the vendor must offer the purchase and delivery of an electronic gift card.  Amazon.com is an example of a book vendor fitting this criteria as are Eureka Miniatures, Brigade Games, and Newline Designs. There are many others. If the winner can find a vendor offering this capability, gift card will be purchased and voucher sent on via email.

1 x USD $50.00 and 2 x USD $25.00 Gift Cards will be awarded.

Contest will close 22SEP2018.
Good Luck!

5-Years Before the Screen - Results!

The results from the Five Year Blog Drawing are in and the winners named.
A few statistics...
Number of Participants: 27
Ranking of Entries per Participant:

Obs	Follower	# Entries*
1	DARTFROG	16
2	GONSALVO	15
3	MARK STRACHAN	9
4	NORM SMITH	9
5	CAVEADSUM1471	8
6	PHIL	7
7	CHASSEUR	6
8	CHRISTOPHER AXEBREAKER	6
9	NATHOLEON	6
10	PETER DOUGLAS	6
11	ROY WILLIAMSON	6
12	MICHAL KUCHARSKI	5
13	ROD FOREHAND	3
14	ANDREW FRANKE	1
15	DAN FOLEY	1
16	ED M	1
17	EDWIN KING	1
18	EL GREGO	1
19	EMJENIC	1
20	JMILESR	1
21	MATT CRUMP	1
22	PETER	1
23	PRUFROCK	1
24	RAY ROUSELL	1
25	SGT STEINER	1
26	TIM GOW	1
27	WILLIE ANDERSON	1

*Recall that extra entries were allowed for publicizing the anniversary drawing and for being among the Top 10 Contributors. 

The winners of the three USD$25 Gift vouchers in the order of their selection are:

Obs	Follower	# Entries	Entry  Selected
1	CAVEADSUM1471	8	1
2	ED M	1	1
3	NORM SMITH	9	9

Congratulations to the winners and thank you to all who either participated in the drawing, follow the PWJ, or stop by for an occasional visit.

If you are a lucky winner (and Ed with only one entry in the drawing, you are lucky!), please send your email details and electronic gift voucher choice via the Contact Form.  Once received, your electronic voucher will be purchased and delivered lickety-split.

Note: 27SEP2017 - All gift cards have been awarded.

Thanks again,
Jon 

Five Years Before the Screen

Five years have passed before the screen (my thanks to R.H. Dana Jr. for the catchy title which I paraphrase) since the Palouse Wargaming Journal set sail into the blogosphere.  Prodded by only slight nudging from a few friends to "get with the times," I fired up PWJ in September 2012.  My, how time flies and postings accrue.  To date, post count exceeds 800.  Never did I envision having that much material to share.  Many of the posts offer up details on recent painting output but posting units as they depart the painting desk is a good method for chronicling my collections.

Maintaining a blog I discovered to be quite rewarding.  Reporting hobby activities including both painting and playing has provided much enjoyment.  Blogging also provided an incentive and motivation to push on with "just one more unit" in a project I thought finished.  Are projects really ever truly complete?  After more than forty years in the hobby, I still have no answer although some projects remain dormant.  Maintaining the Journal through regular contributions allows me to focus catalog my efforts and track where I have tread and where the next path may lead.  I can look over my shoulder and see what went before even when memory of those activities fades.

Besides curating a large amount of information on my hobby activities, the most rewarding benefit gained is the introduction to a number of like-minded individuals.  Friendships gained through these communications are important and appreciated.

To show my appreciation and gratitude to those who stop by for an occasional visit or regular readers who not only take the time for a visit but also to compose a reply, I offer a drawing for a gift card or three.

The Rules for Contest Entry:
There are two criteria for participating in the drawing (both must be satisfied):

1. Publicly follow the blog by clicking on the "Follow" button (if you have not already done so). 
2. Leave a comment to this post declaring your wish be entered into the drawing. 

Get Extra Entries:

• Top Commenter Bonus: To reward the Top Commenters and to encourage others toward more frequent contributions, the Top 10 will receive additional weightings to their entries. For the verbose Top 10, to your singular entry, you will receive additional entries equal to the inverse order of your ranking.  That is, Dartfrog gets ten more entries while Cyrus would receive one additional entry.
• Publicize the Contest: If a contestant is, perhaps, willing to reduce the probability of winning by prompting others to join in, publicize this Give-Away on your blog.  Put a link back to your blog in the comments for verification.  In exchange for possibly diluting your change of winning, you get five extra entries.

The Prizes:

If your winning entry is pulled from the Random Sampling (without replacement) Hat, the winner will receive an electronic gift card to the wargaming vendor of your choice.  It is the winner's choice but the vendor must offer the purchase and delivery of an electronic gift card.  Amazon.com is an example of a book vendor fitting this criteria as are Eureka Miniatures, Brigade Games, and Newline Designs. There are many others.  If the winner can find a vendor offering this capability, gift card will be purchased and voucher sent on via email. 

3 x USD $25.00 Gift Cards will be awarded

Contest will close 22SEP2017.

Good Luck!

Top Commenters Gift Card Drawing

I enjoy receiving feedback from readers.  One feature of maintaining a wargaming blog is that a blog entry may have many views but most readers lurk rather than leave a comment.  That is fine.  Those that leave comments are greatly appreciated.  Those visitors who routinely post comments are honored.  The purpose of the Top 10 Commenters widget allows identifying the most prolific followers. To show my appreciation and gratitude to the cadre who not only take the time for a visit but also to compose a reply, I offer a drawing of one USD$25 Gift Card to one reader on the Top 10 List.  The Gift Card can be chosen by the recipient and valid towards any vendor allowing purchase of an electronic gift card.  Amazon.com is an example of a book vendor fitting this criteria as are Eureka Miniatures, Brigade Games, and Newline Designs.  There are many others.  If the winner can find a vendor offering this capability, I will purchase the gift card and send the voucher on via email.       Entries are weighted by rank.  That is, Gonsalvo at the top of the rankings receives 10 entries.  Dartfrog in Slot #2 receives 9 entries down to Scott MacPhee in 10th place with 1 entry.  Drawing will be by Simple Random Sampling with weighting by rank.  That is it.  On to the drawing... And the winner of the USD$25 Gift Card is:

Selection Method	Simple Random Sampling

Input Data Set	PWJ2017
Random Number Seed	195687001
Sample Size	1
Selection Probability	0.018182
Sampling Weight	55
Output Data Set	SAMPLESRS

Obs	USER	COMMENT	J
1	DARTFROG	9	5

DARTFROG!  

Congratulations, Jake.  A good way to begin 2017 with an unsolicited gift.  Please send me your email details along with your vendor of choice.  If for some reason you wish not to receive the voucher, I will draw again.

N.B. 18JAN2017 - Dartfrog requested a Warlord Gift Card as his award.  It has been sent.

500/5,000 Drawing RESULTS!

The results are in!

First, I want to thank everyone who participated in the contest and for those taking the time to visit.  Not everyone can win but many did and those winners ended with one of their top picks too.  An armload of books will be hitting the post office shortly.

Second, as the random sampling results show, making it into the Top 10 Commenters paid dividends.  Frequent commenting was rewarded in the manner in which the ballot system was constructed.  Also good to see a few infrequent commenters make it into the prize list.  Notice rather than the eight books offered up as prizes originally, I pulled ten names from the sampling bin.  Two of the more requested titles got tapped twice.

Anyway, on to the prize distribution.

Winner: El Grego 

Winner: Michael Peterson

Winners: AHunt &
Christopher (aka Axebreaker) 

Winner: Bluebear Jeff

Winner: Gonsalvo

Winners: Samuli S &
Phil (aka Ms. DBA) 

Winner: Phil (Associaton les Riflemen)

Winner: Black Powder 

Congratulations to the 10 winners.  To collect, simply send an email via the Contact Form (shown below) containing your preferred mailing address:

Several books were in many contestants' Top 3 list.  Hyde's Wargaming Compendium was one of the most requested.  With such demand, I will consider offering up another copy in a future Give-away.

What?  Ray did not have his name drawn?  How could that be?  Well, Ray, to maintain your unbroken string of uncanny prize wins, send me your mailing address details.  I have a Consolation Prize for you.

For the winners, enjoy the books and please let me know when they arrive.  

Book Drawing Ends Friday

As a reminder, the last day to enter into the prize drawing Give-Away is Friday, July 10.

If interested and having not yet entered, please visit 500/5,000 Drawing and leave a comment.

To have a valid entry into the contest, you must be a public follower of the Palouse Wargaming Journal and leave a comment on the blog entry linked to above.

Time is running out.

500/5,000 Drawing

When I struck out on this blogging endeavor I call the Palouse Wargaming Journal approaching three years ago, I really knew not what to expect.  My initial objective was to create a place to which I could log and archive my hobby activities.

Would anyone else find my work interesting or mildly entertaining?  I knew not.

Could I make a small contribution to the body of wargaming?  Again, I knew not.

Would the novelty of blogging wear off as a passing fad?  I knew not.

Would the effort required to maintain a blog quickly dampen my enthusiasm? I knew not.

500+ postings and 5,000+ comments later (of course, about half of the comments are my own!), what do I know now?

I know now that blogging has been a useful way to plan and archive my wargaming activities.  For planning, commitment to "as it is written so shall it be done" is a great motivator to remain focused and tackle goals set out.  Blogging has become an integral part of my hobby enjoyment.

I know now that feedback received from readers is a most rewarding source of encouragement.  I count many of the frequent contributors as friends.  If the opportunity arose, there would be no hesitation in facing any of these fine fellows across the gaming table in battle or discourse.

As a token of my appreciation and gratitude to those who stop by for a visit and especially for those making the extra effort to leave a comment, I offer up a few items from the store house.

I submit the following items to a random drawing.  There are two criteria for participating in the drawing (both must be satisfied):

• Publicly follow the blog by clicking on the "Join this site" (if you have not already done so) as shown below:

 

• Leave a comment to this post declaring your wish be entered into the drawing.  If you have a preference, please rank 'em.

To reward the Top Commenters and to encourage others toward frequent contributions, the Top 10 will receive additional weightings to their entries.  For the verbose Top 10, to your singular entry, each will receive an additional 5 + (11 - Top 10 Rank) entries.  For examples, Gonsalvo would get 15 entries into the drawing (1 + 5 + (10-1)) and Ray would receive 7 entries (1 + 5 +(10-9)).  Clear as mud?

On to the prizes!  Of course, if I pull your winning entry from the Random Sampling (without replacement) Hat, the winner could also opt to take a dive into The Lead Pile for a handful of goodies.  A majority of the books are wargaming related but Austerlitz and Maida are cracking good historical accounts.  All are either in new or like new condition. 

Classic Neil Thomas

Reviewed earlier on this blog

Soon to be classic.
Now in paperback.

A Classic ECW booklet

My Favorite series along with 1859 and 1866.
Even if you don't play the rules, 
as a reference it is First Rate

Even if you don't play the rules,
as a reference it is First Rate

Best Austerlitz account

Clear account of the battle.
My Go-To battle for testing
 a set of Napoleonic rules.

Deadline for entries is 10JUL2015. 

Any questions?

And the Winner is...

After receiving many excellent entries, selecting a winner was very difficult.  In fact, many of the haikus really hit the nail on the head delivering a solid punch.  Some contestants focused on the wargaming philosophy theme while others focused on the Compendium theme.  Some participated in both!  I thank everyone who submitted an entry.  All were enjoyable and many prompted thought and reflection.

Did I mention selecting a winning entry was difficult?  Really too many excellent choices from which to choose.  Selecting one haiku was very challenging!
After considerable cogitating, I select the following haiku by Gonsalvo as the winning entry:

Dice roll, tin men fight
Spanning the sweep of all Time.
Superb Obsession!

Wargaming is, indeed, a "Superb Obsession" as Peter points out and I am guilty as charged.

Peter, for having the winning haiku, you will receive one hardcopy edition of Henry Hyde's Wargaming Compendium.  Of course, if you prefer, the Kindle version could be yours instead.

Congratulations!

Now, for a few runners-up prizes.

My pick for the "Why I want the Compendium" theme, goes to Johnny Rosbif with his elegantly concise,

A compendium

Is all I need to master

An elusive art.

If the only thing needed to master the art of wargaming is the Wargaming Compendium then your request is answered. A Kindle version of the Wargaming Compendium is yours.

For being the most persistent entrant with four haikus, Bluebear Jeff wins his choice of either,

Wargaming Compendium Kindle Edition 

or

The Campaign of Naseby 1645

And finally, the first reader to leave a comment requesting a Kindle Edition of Wargaming Compendium will receive one!

Thanks to all for participating in the contest and especially for reading and contributing to my chronicle.

Blog Contest - Fast Draw

"I hope this handgun is a nine-shooter!"

Still one week remaining in the Haiku contest.  With no activity in a few days, time to mix it up a bit.

What does that mean?  Well, how about a "Fast Draw" for a Kindle version of Hyde's Wargaming Compendium?  I have the Kindle version in addition to the hard copy and it is quite handy having it available on the iPad.

Anyone who has submitted at least one Haiku gets one entry in this random drawing.  Bluebear Jeff with four Haiku receives four entries out of the 12 received thus far.

Sometimes the odds are not favorable but you succeed despite the odds.

And the winner is:   Michael Peterson!

Congratulations, Michael!  If you can send me your email address, I'll send details on how to collect.  If you do not want the Kindle version, let me know and I will draw again.

Thanks for playing!