Happy Birthday Doctor Who

So, it has been a long time since I blogged, but we’re back and with the first game played using the new Doctor Who models from Warlord Games.

Terry's awesome modular terain

Now, Warlord are developing a game which has all the fun of a skirmish style battle game, as well as a narrative based scenario game. This latter option I’m the most looking forward to. However, to celebrate Doctor Who’s 53^rd birthday, my friend Terry and I played a game using the Terminator rules system also from Warlord. A few tweeks here and there, such as no using Time Agents. Mainly because when you have the Doctor, who needs Captain Jack. And we rechristened the special rule ‘Asta la Vista’ to ‘Allonz Zee’ or Gerinamio. Take you pick.

I’m a big fan of the terminator rules, it’s a fun, innovative system, similar to the LOTR SBG that I love. There are a few issues such as lack of choice in forces (endo’s or resistance) and it’s very hard to kill Terminators. But Terry made some adaptations and I arrived with a Doctor (12^th Doctor armed with sonic shades and a guitar) and Clara to find out what lay before me

Scenario:

UNIT ready to burst in.

As I began the game, all I knew was that somewhere in the enemy base was Clara. She had been kidnapped, and hidden somewhere inside the early 21^st century base. The Doctor has enlisted the help of Unit and as the game begins I know not who the enemy is, or where Clara has been located.

The Game.

This is my timey-wimey detector.
It goes ding when there's stuff.

I arrived in, and kicking of the action, the Doctor ran in with the Unit troops, shouting for Clara and brandishing his shades around. Distracted by a large glowing machine, he turned away from the Unit Troops and began to investigate. Alerted by the presence of alien technology (the shades) an Alarm rang out and their an ominous rumble as somewhere deep below lifts began to arrive. More Unit troops led by Captain Benton, codename Greyhound five, ran in from all angles, ready to fight the aliens and win back Clara at any cost.

EXTERMINATE

The lift’s open and two Daleks filed out. Terry, had not told me what enemy I was going to be facing, and so it was a pleasant surprise when they rumbled out. The air was filled with the sounds of Exterminate, Exterminate. Daleks are very singular in their attitudes to others. More Unit troops poured in and started raining bullet after bullet into the Daleks, but to little luck. One dalek was quickly destroyed, obviously one unit trooper had brought some dalekanium or Teflon bullets to stop them. However, his destroyed remains was quickly shunted out of the way.

Due to a combination of my bad dice rolling and Daleks been very hard to kill, see my point about terminators, the Unit troops found themselves quickly being massacred, whilst the Dr went out on his own, shouting for Clara, and coldly ignoring the plight of the Unit Troops. Perhaps he’s not a good man after all. The highlight of the mid part of the battle was one Dalek being wounded enough for a Unit trooper to try and kill him in using the Gerinomo rule (see above). Only to find that he had brought a butter knife instead of his dalek killing knife. Silly error.

Sonic Shades

Clara, there you are

As the Doctor got to the chest that contained his lost companion, the last unit trooper died, and the Daleks turned on their ultimate foe, the oncoming storm. One dalek, tried to block the Doctor’s escape plan. One very 1960’s combat phase later the Dalek was sent rolling backwards for Clara to make her escape. Winning Iniative Terry tried to kill the Doctor, in a hail of lazer fire to miss. One quick exit left, and the Doctor and Clara were safe.

Terry and I had a lot of fun, and I really enjoyed it. Even if I couldn’t kill Daleks. I’m looking forward to Warlord releasing their plastic daleks, cybermen and Unit troops soon. Come on guys,

ACW - Day Four

Sadly, a picture less update today, as my phone and mac are not talking to each other. Or, the computer is not talking to the blog site. Who knows, I hate computers.

So, despite the lack of updates, Day two went very well. With 12 models being painted. Day three, was just as productive, with a further 8 models painted. Day Four, we scraped through with the bare minimum. 4 models being painted.

This leaves me with, after four days of painting, 28 models painted. Progress is going to be slow over the next few days. I should hit my target for tomorrow. However, with the start of a Saga campaign, where I'll be looting and pillaging with my Rohan come Saxon warband. Day six will be a right off. Hopefully, Days 7 and 8 will allow me to catch up. Three bases over two days should be doable.

I'll see you on Friday, where hopefully, there will be photos.

See you soon.

ACW - Day one

So, the challenge is now into its second day, and day one went well. Despite an impromptu pub trip, the first four models, the first base, got painted. In fact, I even got time to start the second base and got the various shades of grey done on them.

Here's a photo of the first four. Let's see what day two brings.

From this.... 

To this.

July, the month of painting

So, at the half -way mark, I'm looking good to hit the year's painting mark. I'm aiming to have 732 painted models, or two for every day, by the end of the year. Having been unemployed for two and a half months has helped this total, and I'm 4.64% ahead of where I should be and I've now painted 400 models.

Which meant, that as June came to a close, I've had to do some basing, quite a lot of basing actually, as this photo shows.

Though you may not be able to see them, there is a good mix of models in there, from the Napoleonic 79th Cameron Highlanders to Iron Man, to High Elf Archers. Having hit 400 models, it's time to turn my attention to that American War. In previous posts I've talked about playing games and the rather large amount of models I've purchased this year, roughly 100, plus the 36 I already had, well it's time to get painting.

So, with a hundred plus models, one commander and 4 cannons to go. I feel a challenge needed. For the month of July, I'm aiming to paint at least one base of models a day. A base for me means four models. So by the end of July, I could have a 100 plus models painted.

 As I'm painting Confederates, which are a mixture of Grey, brown, grey, butterscotch, and more grey, this should be  an easily achievable target. In the past, I've painted a Scottish force for the English Civil war, and so I have a lot of grey paint. 

In the photo above you can see a box with five units, undercoated, waiting to be painted. There are five units worth built, and I have parts for another three, if not four, waiting to be built. 

So stay tuned, I hope to post updates daily, but we shall see. See you tomorrow. 

That American War

So, it’s been a while, and I’m sorry for that. I’ve been busy with work, and painting, the total is increasing towards having 4000 painted models. I need to do more basing, but that will happen, at some point. 

Recently. We’ve been gaming in the American War. Jim has had a number of models for this period, and last year we had a game, that had been several years in the making, and I’ve had a box of Perry’s plastics which were brought upon their release several years ago. 

Then a month, or so, ago, Warlord released Glory Hallelujah and things changed. A few purchases of Perry Battle in a Box later, and we all had models and rules to use them. My models are still on the sprue, waiting for some space to appear on the workstation. Once it appears, the Confederate forces will be marching from my painting table to the battletop. 

We’ve had two games so far, and each was and enjoyable affair. The one thing that Glory Hallelujah does is provide a new selection of special rules, to help give the flavour of the period. So for both games John S and I were Union, while Jim and Terry were Confederate. 

Both games happened very similarly and so I won’t be producing a battle report (that and I’ve not got any notes) with both sides approaching until they were in musket range, and then opening fire, till one or the other broke. 

However, playing in this period was refreshing. One of the special rules introduced was to make it harder to charge. Apparently, and this is a period that I’ve not done a lot of research into, that American War didn’t really feature a lot of combat, the two sides would blast away at each other until one side fled. 

With this in mind, at no point did I ever feel like charging, as I was quite happy to sit back and fire away. There are other special rules, which we’ve started to use and I look forward to getting more done. 

We also had a quick game of Napoleonics, where we were joined by Lorenzo from Warlord Games. It turns out he can really roll dice, and the French nearly won. It was a good job, John S and I, allowed them to go first, so they broke first :)

In model news, I’ve just taken delivery of a bunch of German Grenadiers to get ready for the D-Day landings we’ve started talking about wargaming. A nice 20% off from warlord helped out. I’m also purchased a few beastmen. I saw on Facebook that Paul Sawyer is redoing his Tale of Four Gamer warbands, and a few eBay purchases later I have a Beast Lord, a Shaman, and Minotaur Lord. I have lots of plans, and not enough money.

I’ve also just finished painting up my Black Widow model, that I purchased from Salute, an easy model to paint, and a good job as well. I’ve also recently painted up Commander Vimes, and that model, was, even more, fun to paint. 

I've also found a new blog about skirmish games, mainly the DC and Marvel games from Knight Models, which I've put in the side bar. Go check it out. 

Right, back to the painting table (well to World of Warcraft at least)

Can't see the trees for the Germans.

So, it’s been a while. I’m sorry about that. At the beginning of April, I started a new job, which has taken up a lot of my time. Combined this with a few weeks of not playing games for various reasons, and you don’t blog. It's also up to a nearly 1000 views which I find quite exciting. 

Games were played with giant floating space triangles

However, this is now resolved. My painting has been going on, much as it always has, and I’ve now passed three hundred painted models this year. I’m currently 34 ahead of schedule which is nice. Other recent highlights of the year have been a trip to Salute and an influx of models for that American War*

The trees are alive with the sound of war.

And the reason for this next post, the second battle in Warlord Games’ Hail Caeser supplement, Germania. Escape from Aliso. The two John’s and I were the Germans, whilst Jim, Ben and Terry were the Romans.

As you can see from the photos’ we had a road running, more or less, straight through the diagonal of the board, which the Romans would advance through. Whilst the Germans waited for the opportune moment to jump out and give them a good bashing.

Turn 1

Right lad, at the double, quick march.

The Romans set off down the wooded path, careful of what the night time shadows may hold. Terry, commanding Lucius Caedicius, made a quick dash down the road, leaving his two other divisions far behind. Jim lead his men through the thick undergrowth, hoping to find the Germans and give them a good taste of Roman steel. 

Meanwhile, due to a misunderstood order, Ben's troops milled around at the back, until we remembered that the Romans were drilled and on a road, and so were able to make one move.

Meanwhile, the Germans moved forward. The scenario is all about a surprise attack of three German warbands. To do this, the scenario gives you six cards, one for each warband and three fakes. To try and give the Roman players the element of doubt.

Turn 2

Deep in the heart of the forest, Terry became a bit cagey and, jumping at shadows, ordered his men into battle lines, with the veterans, showing the less experienced troops how to do things, moved

forward.

Wait, did you hear that!

In another part of the Forest, Jim moved his troops forward, hampered by the low hanging branches. Ben rolled well and his men moved forward, hoping to catch up with Terry before it was too late. 

Sadly, Ben had missed the opportunity and Jim had moved forward, bringing John S and my warbands into play. We held back, not ready to charge, but letting off our best blood-curdling scream and in John's case a flight of arrows, none of which did any damage. 

Turn 3

Caedicius got his men ready to charge in. He ordered his regulars to reform and charge forward. Whilst the veterans, were eager to charge forward to put the Germans to a quick end. However, a serious of bad dice rolls left Terry with only the regulars reforming to face their foes. In other parts of the forest Jim and Ben advance forward, but were delayed and so Caedicius was left to face the Germans on his own.

And on 3, charge. 1... 2... 3

However, he had a secret weapon. A battery of Scorpio's that opened fired on my skirmishers, causing two wounds. 

The Germans charged. It was a simple plan. After much discussion, John S was going to charge his cavalry was going to charge the recently reformed regulars in the flank, whilst I charged into the front. John got

his cavalry in, but I fell short, only able to shout abuse at my victims. There was some good news in that one of my units was able to support John in his combat. Probably by shouting some obscenity at the Romans.

Our shooting phase was a mixed bag. I tried to damage the artillery with my skirmishers but failed to get past the armour. Meanwhile, John was able to hit and wound Terry's veterans. Twice. Terry rolled his dice and got a double 1. Good and bad news for the Romans. Terry's role had damaged and disordered his veterans but had brought on a unit of cavalry, which appeared behind my warband. 

The combat was a quick and brutal affair with John causing four wounds on Terry's unit to his one in return. The unit broke and was destroyed. First blood to the Germans. 

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 7

Turn 4

Terry tried to charge his veterans into combat, but because of their disordered nature, they were going nowhere. His other units, including the recently arrived cavalry, were helpless to do anything. Meanwhile in the darkness of the forest, Jim's orders became confused and his division began to discuss what to do. Meanwhile, Ben, seeing the peril of his comrades, raced forward, but was still too far away to do any help.

Parley.....

With a lucky shot, taking the head of one of my skirmishers clean off, Terry added another wound and had now disordered my skirmishers.  It was now time for the German turn, and for the Romans to form ranks and wait for the inevitable onslaught.

And come it did, with John moving two of his three units into combat with the Veterans. With his cavalry charging into the side, taking my supporting unit with them.

I manoeuvred my units under initiative whilst hoping that my commander, would be able to rally the skirmishers. However, a bad d

ice roll later and they were left in their unhealthy state. John M carried on advancing under, the cover of darkness, towards Jim.

Despite being disordered, my skirmishers were able to wound and disorder Terry's Scorpio's. I feel that this is fair recompense. 

However, all eyes turned to the combat in the centre of the table. Terry's closed ranks. The Romans were pelted from all sides with attacks, with 17 hits getting through. However, Terry's dice rolling was good and he managed to save 11 of them. However, in return, he was only able to cause one wound on John's warband. The Romans were cut down to a man, and Terry's division was now broken. John's warband, buoyed by their success, moved forward, getting ready for their next encounter with an enemy.

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 21

Turn 5

Being broken, Terry's division began to retreat. The recently arrived cavalry retreated off the board edge, leaving no sign of their presence behind. With the other units heading towards the nearest board edge. 

This is my line, there are many lines like it. But, this one is mine

Hearing the screams in the wood, orders were given and Jim and Ben's division formed a line in the wood. Despite retreating, Terry tried to shoot my skirmisher again, but in the retreat the sights had taken a knock and the bolt landed harmlessly in the woods somewhere. Jim was also able to shoot at John S's cavalry which hit and disordered them.  

At this point, John M's forces appeared, and the three German players moved their forces towards the two remaining divisions. John S shot at the archers and was able to score a disordering hit on them. 

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 28

Turn 6

In an act of cowardice, Ben and Jim both fell back, increasing the gap between the two forces, and making the Roman line more compact. Meanwhile, Terry kept retreating towards the board edge. Still taking the pot shots with his Scorpios. This time, one of my warbands had strayed into his line of sight, and he was able to disorder them. 

This was it, the turn for the mass charge. The three Germans players got together and planned who was going where, and we let John S start, as he had the bigger division. One blunder later and our plan ground to a halt.  Though I was able to move my skirmishers forward for a better line of sight. 

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 28

Now, one three lads, we charge.

Turn 7

There was much discussion between the two Roman commanders about what to do and in the end, knowing that the Germans were over one move away, they held their ground, waiting for the enemy to come to them. 

Meanwhile, Terry's division was now nearing the board edge, and his civilians, worth ten victory points to us, left the table. However, his Scorpio's and Jim's archers did try to shoot at us, but the darkness was playing havoc with their shots and they fell short.  

This time, we decided to play it a little safe and moved forward only one move. Jo

hn S let rip with his archers, hitting Jim's archers again, and causing another wound on them.

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 38

Turn 8

I say, Sir, there are quite a lot of them.

On one part of the table, the Romans were unmoving, playing a game of who will break first and charge, with the Germans. In other parts, they were high-tailing it off the board as quickly as humanly possible, when stopping to take pot shots. 

However, this waiting game carried on. Each side, waiting for someone to blink. However, my skirmishers were now close enough to lob some javelins at one of Ben's unit's which caused a wound. Whilst on the other side, John M did the same trick, but went one better, and caused a disordering wound onto one of Jim's units.

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 38

Turn 9

Sensing someone was going to break, and charge forward, Jim pulled his lightly armoured archers to the back ranks and moved forward a unit of Legionaries. Whilst Terry moved further and further towards the board edge. 

This can't go wrong, can it?

And in a blink of an eye, the Germans charge forward, John S and I were able to make contact with the enemy units led by Ben, but John M fell a little short. This allowed his units to throw a variety of missiles at Jim' causing four hits, two of which got through the tough Roman armour, and disordered

the unit, twice.

John S also allowed his commander to join the cavalry and was able to rally them. But with that, it was time for combat. Ben ordered his men to form ranks, but against John it was not good enough and he lost 4-3 and retreated disordered with John following up. However, against me, Ben had better dice rolling, and my units were beaten off and I retreated disordered with Ben hot on my heels.

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 38

Turn 10

Thier was precious little movement from the Romans, with the enemy close at hand, but Terry carried on towards the board edge and with his last shot, finally got the final wound on my skirmishers, breaking them. 

Ben's troops slammed into my disordered warbands, and when the dust had settled down, had destroyed two of them and the third was hurrying away as quickly as possible. Remember that they had left the gas on. The centurion was heard muttering, "tu tantum vivere bis" 

It's getting tense down there.

Jim, also shouting out this new latin motto had charged into John s's forces and was able to hack their way to a victory, but the combat carried on. 

With a broken division in my hands, all I could do was fall back. Things had, in the last turn, gone from looking good to looking decidedly iffy. However, fearing no interloper, the two John's charged forward into combat. 

In this whirling mass of combat, John M took on Jim and won, with Jim holding his ground and muttering something about "this is my line. there are many lines like it, but this line is mine". Jim fought John S. This time, Jim comes out on top and wins the combat, shaking John S's unit and causing them to retreat. 

Finally, Ben fought John S and lost, retreating in good order. The Romans were starting to fight back but were not moving towards the exit point and the victory points that it brings. 

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 38

Turn 11

An important turn for the German Tribesmen as Terry finally retreated off the board edge, giving us another 22 points. Meanwhile, having taken some damage, both Ben and Jim decide to use their commander to rally some of their men. Ben was able to make this role, but Jim was unable to. 

The ongoing combat between Jim and John S carried on, with Jim gaining the upper hand, but John as going nowhere.

As I continued to head home, my job done for the day. John M charged into Jim and was also able to get a flank charge in the ongoing combat between Jim and John S. Meanwhile, John S, seeing the vacant hole, from where I had been, charged into Ben's forces, which his commander was hiding in,  with his commander led cavalry. 

In the three-way combat, Jim closed ranks, and by doing so, was able to win the combat, however, the Germans were going nowhere. 

Jim then lost horribly against John M, taking many hits that left both of his units shaken. With the benefit of charging in John S, was able to hurt Ben's unit with Ben unable to do much in return. Both players were unable to kill each other's commanders. However, both sides then retreated in good order.

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 60

Turn 12

The final turn was here, the Romans were hanging on, but it was getting to the wire. Both Jim and Ben were able to rally their units, with Jim taking  a wound of a unit that was now no longer shaken. 

There was only one combat to be decided, and that was the swirling mass between the two Johns and Jim. The dice rolled poorly for Jim and his unit broke, only to find the Germans were faster and they were massacred to the last man. 

As we began our last turn, my men retreated again, but stayed on the table, which in the case of the skirmishers, was only just. John S charged his men forward, taking a unit of skirmishers and archers as support into Jim. And on the other flank, he charges Ben again with commander led cavalry. 

However, this was a wise choice, as the combat was a draw, four wounds apiece, but to John's Commander's horror, one of the Romans blows crashed into him, shattering the skull, killing him instantly. Which loses the combat to the Germans. 

In the other combat, the Romans get the upper hand, but the unit become shaken, and with that every Roman unit was now shaken. The game was over. The Germans had won.

Victory Points

Romans: 0 Germans: 67

It was a fun game, and could have gone very differently. Roman legionaries are very hard to damage in face to face combat. To do maximum damage, you really need to charge them in their flanks.

I also think that, by charging ahead, Terry let himself get separated and he should have waited for the others to catch him up. 

So, that's it for now. I hope you enjoyed the game. It was a lot of fun to play.

David.

* That American War: An alternative name for a war that took place between 1860 and 1865 and by planning to play it has seen the demise of two gaming venues. Its true name must now case of breaking the world. 

not be spoken in

The Italian Job

Pint's of coke with a pink straw give you a +1 to all dice rolls

So, after a brief foray into the Age of Sigmar, this week was back to normal and a game of Bolt Action vs Terry. For many years, I've not enjoyed this game. It's something to do with the pulling of tokens to determine who moves next. However, in the last year, breaking out my 101st Screaming Eagles has given me a new appreciation for the game.

So, we played a quick 1000 point game. Terry is busy painting a force of Italians for a forthcoming tournament. First time I've played against the Italians and they brought with them a few surprises including a plane, more of which will come later.

We rolled to see what scenario we would be playing, and the dice gave us scenario six, Demolition. We each had an objective and we had to try and destroy the opposition's objective. Terry used a vehicle and I chose my Anti-Tank gun.

We deployed half of our forces on the table and began turn one. It was a slightly uneventful turn as we moved forward and took up positions, ready for the scramble forward. The only thing of note happening was my sniper shooting the LMG from one of Terry's squad.

Turn Two arrived and so did Terry's plane. Having no flack to deal with this, it came in on my left flank and proceded to decimate an eight man squad. I opted to go down with this squad, but I still lost four men. The turn began properly and saw Terry land a mortar shell on the second of my squads. Again, I went down and Terry was able to do some damage to the squad.

In the rest of the turn, we began to bring on all of our reinforcements, and we were both able to bring on the rest of our forces. We moved up and I pushed a ten man squad as far forward as I can.

Hang on a minute lad, I've got a great idea

Turn three was the pivotal turn. Terry has moved his command squad out into the open and my ten man squad charged forward, and despite taking a casualty as they charged forward were able to engage them in combat, and wipe out Terry's commander. My men advance forward, and I could see his objective. One more turn, and I might be able to win.

However, Terry's veteran squad charged forward, from the nearby building where they had been hiding out and wiped out my men. I had seen victory and then watched it slip away. Worse was to go for me in this turn. Terry had pushed forward an armoured car down my left flank, threatening my troops. I tried to blow it up using a Bazooka and failed. I then tried to land a shell from a light Howitzer on it. I need a six, it was a long shot. I rolled to hit. It hit. I rolled to see if I penetrated. I rolled a one. It was a frustrating end to the turn.

Turn four arrived with the reappearance of the plane. It aimed at my fourth squad and did some damage to them. Again, I went down, and was able to reduce the damage caused, but it still did some serious damage to me. Having the next dice, I was able to fire my howitzer at the armoured car again. Having hit previously, I needed a 2+ to hit. I hit, with a dice roll of 2. This was it. I was going to blow it up.

Only to roll a 1 again. Two turns and two failed attempts to wipe out the tank. This was the main highlight of the turn. Terry approached one of his squads forward and wiped out the last few men from one of my squads and took cover in a building.

Turn five arrived, and I was able to wipe out Terry's squad in the building but the game ended with little fanfare. Due to the scenario objectives, neither of us had achieved our objective and so the game was a draw. Though, having done the most damage I feel that Terry takes a deserved moral victory.

To go left, when you should go right

So, what went wrong. Two things. Firstly, the airplane did a lot of damage. It did have a ridiculous amount of dice for its machine guns and quickly did a lot of damage to my men, who had little to do but die. It's an interesting unit, and one I'm going to be thinking about adding to my collections.

The other thing was my suicidal charge. I went against Terry's command unit, but on hindsight, I would have done this separately. There were three units behind the wall. The command unit, the tankette, and a medium machine gun team. I chose the command as it had the lesser amount of shots to fire. However, I think I should have charged the machine gun. I think, I would have been a bit further over and hopefully away from the veterans charge range. Then, I would have been able to make my way forward and get the objective.

Having said this, it has rekindled my interest in World War Two gaming and I'm thinking about starting a Desert Rat army. As I say a lot, to many ideas, not enough time.

Age of Sigmar - game one

So, I finally played my first game of Age of Sigmar and before I go into a short battle report. I have to say, despite playing against Liam, which meant an automatic loss, I really enjoyed the game. The rules are very different to Warhammer and come with the adage easy to learn, difficult to master. I like them. It's a game that is designed to a narrative theme. So the point of the game might be to capture a building and hold it for the rest of the game, or kill the enemy leader, instead of the traditional lineup and wipe up each other out.

There is nothing wrong with the latter game, and I often enjoy this. But the little something extra that makes me think a little different about how I play is a nice extra. So what forces played. Well, I took my High Elves and brought a Lord on a Dragon, which you can see on to the left. A unit each of archers and spearmen, staples of my High Elf forces for years. A unit of Dragon princes, a skycutter, and a repeater bolt thrower rounded up my army.

Liam took a Beastmen force and had two units of Minotaurs. A Shaman, a warlord, and some bestigors and a few razorgors. Liam won the roll to see who sets up first and then elected for me to go forward. I moved forward and tried to get my Dragon Lord into a place where he could charge. However, I was out and so the only damage that I did was a hit from the Bolt thrower, causing a wound on the minotaurs.

Dragon meat anyone?

In Liam's turn, he moved forward and my Prince and Dragon suddenly found themselves being brutally ripped apart by their giant axes. Minotaurs axes, as we both discovered, do three points of damage for each wound caused. My Dragon disappeared under a hail of axes. Liam was very apologetic about this, but things didn't look good for me.

On my left, his bestigors had charged into combat with my Dragon Princes, and had quickly killed three of them. I was able to kill a couple back, but the unit then disappeared due to battle shock. On the other flank, the Razorgors had charged the skycutter, and my spearmen were able to join in the combat.  I was able to get the upper hand in this combat and caused more wounds than Liam.

Surprise

Turn two was pretty much the same as before. Liam went first and behind my rear, some giant monstrosity appeared and charged into my Repeater bolt thrower crew. Surprisingly, he managed to leave it with one wound, and despite my best effort, the crew was not able to harm it.

The Spearmen and the Skycutter and the Razorgors carried on the battle and it went mainly in Liam's favour. Both of my units were not looking healthy but were still in the fight. Meanwhile, the minotaurs charged into the archers and decimated them. Though, this time, I was able to get some attacks in but caused little damage

In our third turn, the writing was on the wall and Liam finally killed off the rest of my forces and we called it a game.

So, despite carrying on my tradition of losing to Liam, I had a lot of fun. Age of Sigmar seems to be an enjoyable game and I look forward to playing more in the future.

Now, all I need to decide is if I want to buy more. I'm very tempted to get the starter set and go from there. I'm not a big fan of either the Sigmar force or the Chaos, but the new Dwarfs look good. So many ideas, not enough time or money.

March update

Hello all,

  It's been a bit quiet recently due to ongoing busyness. Good news is that I've now found a new job, which allows me to invest in new models :) I've also gone past the owning 6000 models, which is exciting, but I'm itching to get a stock count to find out what I've got.

To get to this point, I paid a trip to the annual wargaming show in Sheffield, Triples. I was disappointed by the show, barely any traders and punters. I don't see the show lasting much longer if the organisers are not careful. However, despite this, I was able to pick up a few new units to add to my Napoleonics. I got another Hanoverian unit, which will be acting as the Hildesheim regiment and a unit of Dragoons which will be the 1st Royal Dragoons. It's another step forward to getting towards gaming Waterloo.

Painting has been going well, and I've now gone past painting 200 models this year. Recent highlights on my painting table have been a unit of archers and a mixed unit of archers and billsmen which will be seen in my Bosworth force. I've also been able to get some further progress on my Seige of Gondor project.

See you soon.

If you go down the woods today, you'll surely be in for a surprise

With plenty of test games under our belt, we gathered last Saturday to play out the first scenario in the Hail Ceaser, Germania. This is the battle for the Teutoburg Forest, where Varius led his legions to disaster.


As you can see from the photo to the left, the legions are deployed randomly along the road, with the Germanic tribesmen rushing in from the side.

Sides were drawn, Terry, John M, and Ben were to commanding the Romans, whilst John S, Jim and myself were the Germans who were to do their best to introduce them to a world of pain.

The objectives for the Romans was to get off the board in reasonable shape. For the Germans, it was to kill and loot as much as possible.

Turn One.

With the men deployed, the first turn fell to the Germans and we did our best to charge forward. However, a flurry of bad dice rolls saw only a couple of units getting into combat. John S saw his cavalry charge in and break one of the Roman Legions at the front. Whilst, at the rear, Jim did something similar with one of Terry's unit.

To represent the desperate last stand of this fight, there was an unusual special rule which saw the Romans reduce in size, when they break from combat, instead of being removed from the table.

In response, the Romans did their best to reorganize their lines, but a flurry of bad command rolls and units stuck in combat, saw little movement. Ben was able to charge his auxiliary cavalry into the flank of one of my warbands, and after causing many casualties, I retreated. Worse lay ahead for Ben as John S wiped out the lead unit in combat.

Turn Two.

With a lucky flank appearing before me, I charged a small unit of skirmishers, as seen in the photo to the left, into Ben's cavalry. The combat ensued, and I managed to cause a mighty six wounds to Ben's one in return. The cavalry disintegrated and the skirmishers swarmed forward, taking the Roman baggage train. They would do very little for the rest of the game, so I imagine them drinking their way through the wine. 

Elsewhere, John S was able to get two units into combat but saw his archers blunder and retreat in panic, gaining a wound as well. This combat was a success for John and saw Ben's forces retreat under the Germanic pressure. At the rear of the table, Jim was about to make his move to charge Terry but was left standing out on his own, after failing a command test. 

The Romans reply saw Terry charge Jim. The combat was quick and furious and saw the drilled might of Rome teaching the locals a lesson as Jim gave ground disordered. In other parts of the table the battle between Ben and John S carried on, but this time, it ended in a stalemate. John M tried to charge my skirmishers, but I successfully evaded them. The wine was mine, and I was not going to be giving it back. 

Turn Three.

Turn 3, was going to be an important turn, the Germans had been able to get the upper hand from their surprise charge. Jim was able to carry this on and was able to get a nice flank charge on Terry's forces. The combat was quick with Jim coming out on top. Terry's units, breaking, were once again reduced in size as they desperately fought on.

At the top of the table, more jockeying for position happened, whilst John S carried on his fight against Ben. It was another draw, but Ben had reached his limit and was forced to roll on the break table. Breaths were held to see what would happen, and the Romans sighed with relief as the unit was forced to give ground. 

In response, the Romans turn was somewhat poor. Trying a cunning plan to get them out of the road, and into a fighting position. However, several poor rolls for command checks left them strung out across the road.

Turn Four.

Again for the Germans, there was further moving into position at the top of the table. Many units passed their command tests, however, were left frustratingly short of getting into combat. However, the excitement was still happening at the rear of the table. Carrying on the combat Jim rolled well, causing hits left, right and center on Terry's unit.

Failing five saves, the unit crumbled and disappeared.

At the top of the table, the Romans were able to get into the action. Despite Ben failing his test, a regular occurrence during this game, John M was able to get a charge in against John S. The combat was short and fast, with John M coming out on top and John S forced to give ground.

At this point, we stopped for lunch and discussed the game so far. The Romans were still holding out, but their numbers were dwindling. The chances of getting a second game in that day looked less and less likely, however, we would be home in time to see England smash Wales. 

Turn Five.

In this turn, I was hoping that I would be able to get two of my units into combat but failed to roll well enough to get into combat with John M. 

John S and Jim did something similar to each other. Moving forward, whilst trying their best to remove wounds where they could. 

The John's carried on their combat, causing four wounds apiece. The result of this combat was that each unit became shattered and they were required to take a break test. John M became a smaller unit whilst John S gave ground. 

In response, the Romans threw caution to the wind and John M was able to cause some wounds with a  good round of shooting. 

Turn Six.

John and I charged into the Roman lines, getting several different charges off. With a good round of combat, we could finish the Romans off. John was more successful in beating Ben's forces, as you can see from the photo above. I, on the other hand, bounced John M's Romans. However, to help round up the turn, John S's cavalry made short work of a unit of Romans. Jim, having wiped our Terry's division was making his way as fast as he could to the top of the table.

In the Roman turn, things went more their way. John M was able to cause wounds left, right and centre, but in a moment of foolishness, he added Varius to one of his units, which was beaten in combat, allowing John S to kill Varius. Another point to the Germans.

Turn Seven. 

The final turn. Both Jim and I saw all of our movement stalled as we failed to roll well enough. John S was better, getting into combat with Ben's unit. The combat was quick and fierce with John S coming out the victor, breaking Ben's division at the same time.

In the final Roman turn, John M went all out for it and charged as much as he could. He won several combats which saw my division finally break. However, it was too little too late, the damage had been done and the game was over.

So, a quick top up of the scores saw the Germans win by 94 points to the Romans 65. Points were awarded for capturing baggage, destroying units and so on. The final score really shows how close a game it was. John M's last minute fight back helped them get some last minute points, but the German surprise attack had won them the game.

Now, to the next scenario. 

Wargaming needs

In an issue of White Dwarf, many moons ago, I remember one of the better freelance contributors, Mike Walker, once described new models like this.

"There are two types of new models. Those that you have to rush out immediately to buy, and those that you will buy shortly"

I'm paraphrasing there as I can't find the issue with the original quote, but for me, it's very true. I want lots and lots of models, and if I had the money, I would be living with a lot more models, than I currently own.

Why am I talking about this, well it's been a reasonably busy week on the painting front. On Saturday, we were due to play the first scenario in the Hail Ceaser supplement, Germania. This was the battle of Tuteburg and a write-up of this scenario will follow shortly. As in all of our big battles, we all bring enough units to play the games and have some fun. At short notice, one of our players dropped out and we were suddenly a few Roman units short. Out came the brushes and I set about painting up a unit of Roman Veterans.

Despite being struck with nurgle's rot I managed to get a unit of 16 painted up. I tried something that I had never done before, painted up without having undercoated the models. I remember the great painter Gareth Hamilton's Skaven army from many years ago, which led me to buy a Skaven army, painted without a base coat. It had a few challenges such as having to make sure that all areas were covered so that none of the plastic grey would show through.

I'm sorry for the lack of pictures in this post, but why am I rabbiting on about needs. Well during that week, between painting and applying for jobs, I picked up two warhammer supplements. Nagash, from the End of times series and Age of Sigmar book one, Age of Sigmar.

I'd deal with the Age of Sigmar first, I've been reading an awesome blog about playing through Age of Sigmar, and this rekindelled my love affiar with Warhammer.

Lot's has been said and done on Age of Sigmar, even a man burning his army. I'm going to say this the Age of Sigmar is an intresting rule set and allows me to play more narrative scenarios instead of just a line up and fight, however I do miss the background of Warhammer. Unlike an intresting series of comments on Gav's Thorpes blog after talking about his recent Age of Sigmar book, where people call the Age of Sigmar background as devised by the Games Workshop marketing team. I like the Age of Sigmar background and models, but it does need some more back ground, which is coming.

Now, at the same time I won Nagash off eBay for a decent price for the hardback version of the book. I have to say that this set is amazing. I've only dipped into the fluff book, and I have to say that after reading the Age of Sigmar which had lots of fluff but it was slightly on the lighter side, this book was packed.

What I've spent most of my time reading is the rules supplement. It's jam packed with new monsters such as Nagash and his Mortrearchs. Scenarios to represent the battles mentioned in the fluff. It's this last segment that's made me want to get back into WFB and get my Undead, Bretonnians, Skaven, High Elves, Dwarfs, Empire and Chaos out and get painting new units and repainting old models.

Which brings me back to my original point. I'm very much of a hobby butterfly and I want everything. So watch the blog as I get the Undead out of retirment.

Romanic civil war

So it's been a while since I posted. This is due to a bout of Nurgle's rot which saw me miss a Wednesday, which was a shame. However, I was back there this week and I clashed with Jim on a Roman vs Roman battle.

Romans lining up

It was a straight line up with a division a piece. I had a mixture of Legionnaires, with one unit upgraded to be veterans, with a few auxiliaries in the form of a unit of archers, which you can see to the right, and a unit of cavalry. 

Jim's force was similar in nature to mine, but instead of cavalry, he took some artillery. The opening phases saw us both moving forward. Our archers and artillery taking some early pot shots, but not doing anything of note.

Time to have em.

 As you can see from the photo above I was able to get the charge on Jim and combat ensued. I'm sorry to say that the dice  were not favourable to me, and Jim won the combat. I managed to hold my ground, but my forces were starting to wobble.

Cavalry to the rescue.

However, in my fourth turn, I made my game-winning charge. Charging my cavalry into the flank of Jim's supporting units. This is where our practice games came into use. Mistakenly, I had nominated the cavalry to charge and fight the unit, not supporting the combat to the right. A mistake on my part. However, the dice, fickle as they are, smiled upon me and I managed to wipe out Jim's unit.

This allowed me to take a sweeping advance into the other unit. Feeling confident I rolled, the dice and it looked good. However, Jim's dice rolls were better than mine, and my cavalry unit retreated allowing Jim to support the sprawling messy combat to the right. My plan had been good and had succeeded in part. However, by not tieing up the unit in combat, left it free to support a combat. With that, we rolled the dice and my units disappeared, give Jim the game.

It was an enjoyable game and though I tried my best, the dice were not in my favour. They were just not able to get the rolls I needed. Having the practice game's has been a good thing and left me ready for our upcoming Saturday gaming day, where if you go down to the Teuteberg Forest you'll surely be in for a surprise.

Now, I'm off to watch the Rugby. Come on Scotland, let's beat the French.

Germanic Invasion

In a few weeks time, my wargaming friends and I will be playing the first few scenarios in the Hail Ceaser supplement, Germania. As you'll know from previous weeks battle reports, we've been playing Hail Ceaser to get ready.

This week, we put aside the Saxons and the Vikings and brought out the Celts and the Germanic Tribesmen. Instead of just a straight forwards line up and fight, we decided to have an objective. The Germanic tribesmen had to get through the Celt forces and off the board edge.

How the battlefield look for turn 1 and 2.

So we broke out the troops and lined up the forces. Both sides contained a good mix of troops. The Celts, or as they should be called Brits, had a few chariots. Whilst the marauding Germans had some cavalry.

The Brits were commanded by Terry and Jim, and they won the right to go first. The only positive move forward was when Terry blundered and his division drifted to the right. On our turn, we moved forward slowly, getting ready to charge forward in the following turn.

That was if we had a turn two. In this game, as you might be able to make out from the photos, we had six division, three apiece. All six divisions failed their command checks. Worse for Terry, the division that blundered previously blundered again and remember that they had left the gas on, and left the board, taking a wound per unit. At this point, Terry was the only player to have caused any damage and that was on his own turn.

It's not fun getting up close and personal with fanatics

The third turn was a bit better and I believed that Jim was able to charge forward and take on John's forces on our right flank. Combat raged but neither side were able to find the upper hand. In our turn three, seeing a big hole in the middle of the battle line, I charged two of my units forward, hoping to break through a unit of fanatics and off to the green countryside of Britain.

We rolled the dice, and my men came off the better. Causing five wounds, to Terry's two. It was this point that we've realised that we had rolled the wrong amount of dice on both accounts. As gentlemen, we agreed to refight the combat, and this time, Terry came off the better. Causing many wounds to my units.

Just before my clever move to kill the skirmishers

Turn four was a brutal round of combat, and my memory is a bit fuzzy on this. Hopefully Jim, on his wonderful blog Wednesday Night Warlords, will be able to inform you more about this turn. But at the end of this turn, we saw my division taking enough wounds to be broken. Whilst on the right flank Jim suffered the same fate.

As it was getting late, we called it there as a draw. I enjoyed this game, and it was a good game, played with lots of laughs. I'm looking forward to getting a rematch next week. Hopefully, it will come off better for me.

On the painting front, the weather has been better this week and so I've been able to get outside and do some undercoating. This allowed me to get the remaining seven Warg Riders undercoated and as I write this I'm in the processing of painting two of them up. This leaves me with some Mordo Uruks to paint up and a basing session and I've finished all of the models I need for scenario 1 of Siege of Gondor. I hope to do a photo session of them soon.