SAGA Dark Ages: Alliances formed and treaties broken...

On Thursday Night, we scrounged up a few locals for a 4 way game of SAGA. We decided to run the scenario from the Northern Fury book, where there is changing alliances and general mayhem! So the game starts out as 2 v 2. Then, at the end of turn one, people choose a colour of card (red or black). For the next turn, it is Red Team against Black Team, with casualties counting for the respective teams. At the end of that turn it repeats, until Turn 4, when the choices are permanent! Team with the most kills at the end of the game, wins!

So to the fight, I brought Cu Eion and his Irish lads and lasses, but we also had the Rus (Vikings), some Anglo Danish and the dreaded Jomsvikings! How these four armies got to the same battlefield, I have no idea. But since they did, it only seemed right to have a scrap!

The Irish and the Rus began allied for turn 1. This is what the game looked like at turn one....


Anglo Danish archers holding a wood


The Rus (with their pretty shields) storming out from the ruined castle


Some of Cu's warband


Cu Eion himself, directing the warriors

Turn one was markedly uneventful. We were all a long way from each other, so no shooting, no nothing really. Only thing to happen was the Jomsvikings began increasing their level of wrath.....

Turn Two.



So I chose black. What colour did everyone else choose? Red. So it is now 3 v 1 for a turn. Good....

But the only thing in my favour is that I got initiative! So, without any adieu I began to storm the castle...


Charge!


The castle is ours!

Unfortunately, revenge was swift in it's retribution, coming in the form of Varangian Guard equipped with very large axes and lots of armour. So... the opposite of my Irish! Luckily they could only kill so many warriors, and I managed to kill a couple of them too.

On the other side of the board, not much was happening. Or at least there was a hill in the way so I couldn't see anything going on. Perhaps they weren't even moving at all?


Formation dancing. That's what that is.

Turn 3 began with the royal placing of the cards. I chose black (again), and was rewarded with an ally! This time some Jomsvikings were on my side.

Which was really handy, because those Russians were not on my side, and the Jomsvikings could help with that!


Cu eyeing up some Russkis

So the plan? Simple. Take and hold the castle! Oh and clear out the Russians.

How did that go? Well, it went alright. Killed a few more with Javelins, but it was really helped by this happening on the other side of the castle...


Jomsvikings Charge!

Unfortunatly for the Joms, they bit off a bit more than they could chew! The Russian Warlord was seen to cut down the Joms' leader, as well as a score of his followers.

The other flank saw the Anglo Danish finally leave their dancing formation, and actually engage in combat! They charged the women and children, thinking that they would be easy prey. Not so for the Irish! More than a few Danish ended up on the wrong side of an mad Irishwoman's frying pan....


The Anglo Danish lads finally get involved....

Turn 4 rolled around, time for another card! What did I choose? Black. So the Anglo Danish are my allies now?

But I have a plan, after seeing the Jomsvikings get so badly decimated by the Rus, surely I could do the same thing to them, but with Javelins?


Ignore the Russians, throw spears at the Northmen!


Ok, so we killed the Northmen, but the Russians and the Danish are slaughtering us!

It was at this time that the leader of the Rus with his retainers charged Cu Eion himself. Fighting to defend his country, his fallen childhood friend, his fallen pet, his homeland, with a broken axe AND with the sun in his eyes, Cu Eion sadly fell to the Russian invader, but not before taking many of the invaders with him (two, probably two).

Turn Five. What card did I choose? Black (see a theme here?) What card did everyone else choose? Black. So the victory conditions now were having the most stuff left on the battlefield!

Turns 5 and 6 were all kinds of not good for the Irish. Cu had fallen to the Rus, my warriors on the hill had been slaughtered by probability-defying bow fire from the Anglo Danish and my left flank was being accosted by many many more Anglo Danes.


"Anglo Danes, yes, we have a reservation. Here to accost we are, thank you"

The brave levies fought on, but without being able to generate many activation dice (at this point, 3), I was very much hamstrung by not being able to roll a 6 for extra dice!


Just throw more things at them! Stones, frying pans, goats!

The levies did eventually fall before the Anglo Danish, leaving even fewer alive to call the land Irish.


Dogs can't call the land anything... Run dogs run!

The rest of the battlefield saw the Jomsvikings and the Anglo Danish finally meet combat, although it was too little, too late for the Joms, the Anglo Danish were just too fresh an army to be able to fight it in two turns.

The final act was the Rus Warlord storming across the battlefield in an attempt to slay the Anglo Danish Warlord, thus claiming his right as ruler of the land. But, by the time he covered the ground, he was tired, but to his honour, he cut down two vassals to get to the enemy Warlord, only to be cut down as he swung his axe....

So ended the great 4 way game of SAGA. It was.... enlightening! I was probably too bold with my attacks, SAGA has a way of making you pay for killing enemy troops (usually at the cost of a similar number of your own), and so while the Rus and the Irish destroyed themselves and each other, the Joms took a while to arrive, but arrived piecemeal and so were slaughtered. The Anglo Danish held back, waiting for the battlefield to clear and then claimed it as their own. I could call it cowardly, but to be fair, there really isn't anyone left to make that smart remark!

There was one positive of the battle, the castle was still mine!



Look for some reports from the other protagonists, I will link them on here once I have them.

The Russian "opinion" of the battle is here

Up next? Romans. I have some to finish basing, and some on the painting table.

CP

100 Posts....

Hey look, 100 posts!



Now that is a war pooch!

It seemed an appropriate milestone to stop and have a wee muse about blogging, and what it really seems to be to me.

I started this blog almost a year ago, to document my Napoleonic British Army. Part of the idea was that I would actually write up how I did it, so I could remember the stages! But since then, the topics have been as varied as my attention span would allow, ranging in period, scale, theme, from battle reports to essays on Greek Heroes.

Honestly, I find blogging strange. It is in a way a very personal thing, through a totally impersonal medium. I share my intellectual property with the internet, sharing ideas, concepts, plans and dreams. Is it good or bad? I don't know. It has certainly made me want to paint better- challenges such as the Analogue Painting Challenge have been great for my productivity! In addition it has brought me into contact with people all over the world, some leaving comments of encouragement or perhaps even passing the information on. I do like comments, to be honest it makes me feel important! If there are things you think I should look at, historical inaccuracies, miniature companies, new paint techniques, new armies, units or anything else; feel free to pipe up and comment. I like hearing peoples thoughts and ideas!

To those who read and enjoy my posts regularly, thank you. Part of me always looks at the number of people who read what I write and thinks "its just one person, with internet issues refreshing the page lots of times to see a photo". I hope that what I write is as interesting to you as it was to me when I wrote it, and that you find something that might inspire you to want to look into something completely new, that you hadn't thought of before. I know that is how I feel after seeing things like Curt's (Analogue Hobbies) idea of making grey scale armies for WW1 gaming. So thematic, and (I think) will be so cool!

In spite of all the self serving gratification, ego boosting and general peacock-like behaviour that blogging provides for me, I hope that what I produce/write/make/spill out has something of interest, although I suppose if it didn't, you wouldn't be reading this?

Perhaps you are only in it for the pictures. If so, then google images has far less words than this, and is much easier to use to.

More Romans painted tomorrow I think. Then a game of SAGA, the Irish are back to war!

Thanks for reading,

CP

Impetvs Ancients- Romans Part One!

Well, over the weekend I managed to finish off my first few stands of my forthcoming Imperial Roman Army for Impetvs. All miniatures at this stage are from Warlord Games, from their range of plastics. I accept that I could find prettier Romans in metals no doubt, but I actually don't mind the Warlord Games ones. I have been very vocal about their WW2 Germans, but I am quite happy with their Romans! Which is good, because I have a lot of them....

For starters, here are 3 bases of Legion, all Warlord Games plastics.





All pretty stock standard paintjobs, these are more or less my benchmark now for how my Romans will look. I decided that I wanted to have a different colour of grass for a change, the last few armies have all been green! So, out came the basing I used for my Flames of War Germans, with some Army Painter grassy tufts. The shields are the decals from the Warlord Games pack and are... fiddly. They have a nasty wee habit of curling away from the shield, which means much to my suprise some of them had lifted half off! But, after some decal softener, a matt varnish, brown ink and another matt varnish, they are there to stay, and I am happy with the effect.

Next up, 8 Warlord Games Western Archers, split into bases for Impetvs.





Nice, simple paint jobs, nothing too extraordinary there.

Last up, a Scorpion artillery piece.



And that is all I have painted as yet for my Roman Army.

Number of Figures: 34 Infantry, 1 Artillery
Points Total: 141 Points
Maximus Level: 0 Maximus

Like I seem to usually do, I have bought lots and lots of stuff, which really means I need to get myself into gear with my painting. So, my plan then is to BUY NO MORE MINIATURES UNTIL I PAINT OTHER ONES! So, that means that I have to finish an army, before I can start something else. Which I hope will make me actually finish some projects which I am half way through working on. And I expect this plan to fall apart shortly when I see something bright and shiny. Shiiiiney......

Back to painting, these Romans don't paint themselves (sadly)

CP

SAGA Dark Ages: Cu Eion defending the Shores of Eire

So, I managed to get in a couple of games of SAGA last night, where the mighty Irish were defending the shores of Eire against the rampaging Anglo-Danish!

In true style, the Irish turned up late, so missed the chance to attack the enemy at their beach head, so instead had to make do with a pitched battle further inland.

The Irish formed up in their battlelines, wary of the opposing forces. Hearthguard took the flanks, warriors in the centre with Cu Eion himself, with a protective screen of women and children (that sounds a bit bad actually...)



But the cunning Anglo-Danish were lurking in the trees...



Darn cunning!

But, both armies surged forward, eventually meeting at the crest of a hill...



And, in true SAGA style, proceeded to beat the snot out of each other. SAGA has had an incredible body count in my games so far, and this was no exception. But, the Irish were able to hold their own, the game being decided in single combat between each of the Warlords with their retainers...



Where ultimatly Cu Eion was victorious! Well, more that his 4 Hearthguard with Dane Axes and a whole combo of extra dice were victorious!

So, with the lead army crushed and leaderless, Cu Eion set about catching up with the remainder of the invading force....

This game did not go as much according to plan! The Anglo-Danish were able to roll very, very useful dice, gaining the right abilities at the right time. To be on the recieving end of at least +3 fatigue for each of my units was a real, real pain!

So, at one stage my army looked like this...



Why yes, that is the entire army fatigued to the point of exhaustion! Which is a real problem in SAGA, and something I was very, very lucky to counteract!

But, the Irish did as Irishmen do, and they killed everyone. In spite of being fatigued, they managed to do the business!


"I thought I had friends... like a unit or something? Guys? Hello...?"


"There they are, get them!"

So, in spite of my massive fatigue, I was able to scrounge another win. So the Irish go 3-0! Must be some luck there. Still liking SAGA, nice and simple, easy and enjoyable to play.

Must get back to painting, plus some more gaming I hope!

Next up? 28mm historicals I hope!

CP

6mm Modern British in Iraq!

edited for historical accuracy...

Well, in keeping with my tradition of random side projects, here are some (relativly) Modern British!

This combined arms force would be right at home in Operation Desert Storm (part 1) from the early 90s, which for me growing up was very much in the news! I am sure my teacher at my first year of school really enjoyed my commentary on the Coalition Air War, focusing on the aircraft themselves! I have vivid memories of an image in the paper of a downed aircraft, with an Iraqi dancing on the wreckage of the wing. I brought that to show and tell!

So in a way, I have always been a fan of the machines of warfare.....

But, on with the force.



The miniatures come from GHQ, and are really nice. The force contains...



4 Challenger 1 Main Battle Tanks. Before being superseded by the Challenger II, these were the big boys of the British Armoured Forces. Armed with a rifled 120mm gun, and still with the British Armies refusal to use auto-loaders (manual loading with highly drilled troops instead- continues on the Challenger II), these tanks are certainly formidable.



8 Warrior Armoured Personnel Carriers. These battle buses transport the modern British soldiers, armed with a 30mm cannon and a co ax MG. Tragically 2 Warriors were lost in the Gulf War through a friendly fire incident with an A-10 Warthog.



4 Scorpion Light Recon Tanks. Armed with a 76mm cannon, but really designed to go fast and scout, these form the recon elements of my force.



6 FV432 including variants. This includes two FV432 Armoured Personnel Carriers, two FV432 mortar weapons and two with Swingfire Anti-Tank Missiles. Although being phased out in favour of the Warrior and other systems, the FV432 is still in operation now; although with a much improved armour and defense systems.



9 bases of British Infantry. These are the dismounts from the Warriors and the FV432s, mounted on 21mm washers. Pretty simple paint jobs, pretty small miniatures! But they look the part in my opinion!




This is everyones favourite VTOL aircraft, the Harrier! To those who think their favourite is the F-35, you know it isn't......
Anyway, one single Harrier Aircraft, to act as Close Air Support. This particular Harrier, a GR-5 was the top of the line in Desert Storm. Equipped with two Sidewinder Anti-Aircraft missiles, four bombs and two rocket pods, it is certainly equipped to unleash on some unsuspecting locals!




Last up, two of my absolute favorite aircraft, the Westland Lynx. Now, not to gush too much about this helo but... It is the fastest, can perform loops, equipped with TOW Anti-Armour missiles and is just generally cool! I have been a big, big fan of this helo for some time!

In Desert Storm, they did unfortunately suffer many weapon malfunctions from their missiles, after all, the TOW warheads had been sitting in storage since the 1970's....

These were a treat to assemble and make- the details are provided by cut brass, details like the rotors and skids. Wargamers are a funny lot, we get really angry when rivets are wrong, but really excited when you give us something new. I can only imagine how much we frustrate companies!

At any rate, there is all of my 6mm stuff painted! It feels pretty good to get a whole project done and dusted, but it is usually in that euphoric feeling that I order more (to perpetuate the cycle), I haven't yet, but am seriously looking! What game system will I use these with? No idea. At all. Haha!

And so the painting war continues....

CP

Tempest 2012- The 82nd Airborne on the Attack!

This weekend was a one day, 4 game competition here; called Tempest. It was expertly run (as ever), and with some great terrain on tables, smaller armies it made for 4 games in one day!

I was running the US Paratroopers from the North Africa book.



Company HQ- 2 Bazookas
2 Full Strength Paratrooper Platoons
A Parchute Mortar Platoon
Two M10 Tank Destroyers
Limited Kittyhawk Air Support

And how did it go?

Well, the Kittyhawks were really... useless. When they decided to turn up (game 1 it took 15 dice before even ONE plane turned up...), the enemy was near the woods, making me have to roll to spot, which just didn't work. As a contrast, the Stukas I faced in my last game were far, far more deadly! Poor little paratroopers in the open...

The M10s were a wonderful deterrent, not really killing anything, but making people avoid, and be a bit more careful with how they played.

As for the Paratroopers, they did everything that it said on the box. They killed tanks, killed infantry, took a very long time to die, and then even when there were 2 stands, they still kept on killing things!

A particular favorite was the 3rd game, where my opponent and I had a total of 11 elements left between us, but I had 6, where he had 5, so I won!

All up, won 3 of the 4 games, ran out of time to win the first game! But, such is life, and is my own fault really. So, a respectable 3rd, the top 3 placings were all on 3 wins, it was just a point or two that separated it!

Anyway, lots of photos...

















So, lots of fun was had, another well run comp! Had to do a little painting to get my Paratroopers ready, was quite fun. Perhaps it is time to finish off the rest?

But that would be distracting me from my other 5 or so projects...

CP