More Picking Away...

More stuff accomplished this weekend. First, I built a second DBA base, this one for English medievals:

I ordered a handful of Fife and Drum figures. The Spirit of '76 vignette, and five minutemen. My plan is to paint them up for a work display - the theme for the whole year (not just summer) is America's 250th. So another excuse to promote miniatures in the library. I plan to paint two of the minutemen to represent a pair of free black colonists who - completely coincidentally - shared my rare last name. So I hope to do a good job painting them.

What I got was a bunch of figures, free overstock! Thanks! About half minutemen, half Continentals in uniform. That could make up two small regiments or one large one, with mixed appearance like Jim Purky's own 2nd New Hampshire. 

I haven't built or painted metal models in ages, so some filing practice is in order. I'll also have to use a pin drill on the standard bearer. As for basing... probably singly, for skirmish games. I have lots of round Wargames Atlantic bases.

I also bought some Games Workshop 25mm and 25x50mm square bases, for the Pike and Shotte starter set. Here's the first infantry sprue mostly made up:

Needs a few more hats, and there are also a lot of scabbarded swords on the sprue I haven't figured out where they go on the figures yet. I'm glad I just made these chaps to start with, as I found out specific arms go to specific figures. Also, gluing two arms onto a figure at once is a bit messy. A little filing and paint, though, and I'm sure they'll look good enough for the tabletop.

Finally, a painted Skaven done with Speedpaint pens. Fun and not too frustrating. I find it hard to tell the colors apart when they're bunched together, so (for example) some of the leather has a gold tinge...

I'll stop here, as I have two cats on my desk trying to interfere with typing and projects.

For comparison, here's the one I have to coax into letting me touch.
On the right: still unopened boxes of Warlord samurai.

'Til next time.

Still Tired

Not much done, except reading. Read the Silmarillion and working slowly on Warlord Games' supplement Wars of the Samurai (quite good for a beginner!). Here's what little hobby I've done this week:

Two twelve-man units of crossbows for Lion Rampant,
with pavises. This may seem like they're on too-large
bases, but the plan is to play on a small scale with cm
instead of inches.

An armoured orc chieftain from 6th-7th edition Warhammer.
I picked up a command group from the FLGS.
Painted with paint markers, with the metals NMM.

I really need to get cracking on building the Pike and Shotte stuff...

Edit: I did.

Five down, seventy-seven to go!

Mincepie Pass

Two birds with one stone here - trying the Minceheim "mass battle" rules and finally getting round to the third scenario from Grant's programmed wargames. We'll be following up on my last Minceheim game, in which a dwarf mining team had a bad time with goblins. So the dwarves are going to go after the gobbos in force - which means they have to clear a pass.

Appropriately, the figures I'm using are from the old Warhammer Battle for Skull Pass box!

Three warrior units, two handgunner units, two miner units.
(one miner unit not shown)

Three goblin spear units, one archer unit, one spidercav unit.

The field of battle.

Gobbo light troops are up front, while the spearmen
won't appear until the dwarves reach the second third of the table.

Turn 1: The dwarves, limited to 2" movement due to heavy armor, shuffle forward on the center and left. (The miners on the flank are limited to 1" thru the trees.) The handgunners and archers exchange fire; the requirement for the gunners to reload a turn is balanced by +2 to wound.

Turn 2: The handgunners deliver another volley to the goblin archers - the survivor fails morale and runs.The spider-riders, however, line up for an attack on the forward miner unit, which faces left towards them.

Turn 3: The front handgunner unit turns to face the spiders, though at this point they don't really have line of sight with a melee about to start. The other forms column to get by them. The spider riders charge the miners, but in their heavy armor only kill one. However, only one goblin dies in return. Neither unit is under half strength.

Turn 4: The melee goes on, though the spiders now have dwarves approaching on both flanks. They take a casualty each. The surviving archer rallies and returns to the edge of the trees on the ridge for free sniping (the dwarves won't be able to shoot him in cover).

It occurs to me at this late stage that the dwarves shouldn't have been able to shoot the other archers either. Hm. Fortunes of war?

Turn 5: The miners eliminate the spider riders and the whole army lurches forward another two inches. Just 36" to go!

At this point we're close enough for the goblin back line to deploy - on the heights. I'm undecided whether to reinforce with another squad of archers; under the circumstances - right now the defenders are outnumbered two-to-one - it seems fair. The dwarves advance on a broad front; the goblins' programmed response is to "attempt to draw the enemy into the pass and envelop them." Well, it can do that with the warriors, but probably not the handgunners or miners.

Four turns later, the dwarven march is starting to straggle, while a clash looks ready to start on the goblin right and center. The handgunners will have to get thru the trees before they can assist, and by that time they might have to fire into melee to be of any help.

Turn 10: More maneuvering. The goblins are out of position to fight the handgunners now at the edge of the treeline, but at least they're on a lower level so can't be shot at yet. I draw the front-line dwarves up to avoid a goblin charge next turn; both sides are trying to gain positions where two units can gang up on one.

Turn 11: The first charge goes in. Let's see how this goes - the goblins get double attacks for their polearms. Two (!) of the attacks pass their armor saves, and eight of the fourteen resultant hits are kills (5+). The first dwarf unit is eliminated. Oh, and the lone surviving archer has been killed off.

Turn 12: A nice little scrum:

The dwarves are overwhelmed and broken, with three figures remaining.

I've just realized I'm not sure I'm doing melee correctly. In many games, both sides fight in a turn of melee - I've been doing it only on the side's turn, so that when a unit is broken, it loses its chance to fight. This has the effect of encouraging aggression.

Turn 13: And again:

Six more dwarf casualties.

Turn 14: The dwarves hold their own, as the forward dwarf regiment marches stolidly towards the goblin back line. Goblins assault, their spears proving key with all the extra attacks. One regiment of handgunners breaks, a warrior regiment holds its ground with but two dwarves remaining.

Turn 15-16: The handgunners are run down, but the second line fires a volley into the goblins and breaks them. Two survivors flee. One of the spear-gobbo regiments on the far side of the valley sees off its opponents, but the survivor meets up with the dwarf rear guard.

From victorious to sitting ducks.

Back-and-forth fighting but the dwarf reserves are hastening to the rescue.

"Where are we going, chief?"
"Away, young dwarf. Away."

Turn 17-20: More internecine warfare. I did not determine an army breakpoint for the game, but there are now three decimated dwarf units remaining, and one goblin one (in a position to be shot at in another turn). The dwarves have carried the pass, but at grievous cost.

End game.

The rules are very simple, more so than the skirmish game - though I may have missed some subtleties. I did give handguns a bonus to wound, for example, but didn't do so for the dwarf axes. The table size and fighting down the length made it seem longer than it really was. Perhaps the army break point can be the same as for individual units - at half strength, roll a 5+ or retreat.

I also played turns "turn and turn about," rather than with an initiative roll. The fewer steps to recall, the better, and it would have made for a swingier, messier game anyway. I didn't play either side very well; one thing I've noticed with the Grant Programmed Rules is that the AI instructions must of necessity be vague. I ended up being more aggressive with the goblins than their instructions called for - though with their spears this actually didn't go too badly!

The "campaign," such as it is, is in stalemate, and I'd either have to have a truly massive battle (maybe not a good idea with this little experience at the rules) or start a skirmish campaign as the sides try to find a lateral path to victory. I look forward to trying it. "Please let's not go through Mincepie Pass again, milord."

A good game, but definitely something smaller next time. I did enjoy the speed with which it could be played, even if I overlooked a few steps. Til next time.

Battle at the North Pole

Today about eight members of the South Florida Miniatures Gamers played in another game DMed by "Oriskany Jim" Johnson of Sitrep Podcast. I'd gotten up early for a Sunday, was browsing Youtube, and spotted this "prep" video for the game:

("Whoops, forgot about this one...")

I hastily decamped to Das Krieg Haus and made it in time for deployment.

As usual, Jim provided a fantastic table of scratchbuilt terrain to play on:

    

If it's not obvious yet, this is Santa's workshop. Among the defenders:

I got the Toys For Tots squad led by a USMC bear, and Santa himself - the only flying model on the board. Other units included reindeer, elves, snowmen, polar bears, and a displaced yeti named Colonel Bumble.

Our opponents?

I've never played HALO, but that's a lotta guys.

Gun emplacements ...

... and Warthog vehicles were particularly intimidating.

Some of the good guys' deployment:

And those on the side of the Grinch:

Eep!

Justin the Mammoth leads (nonflying) reindeer.

Most important, AI holographic objectives. Take these out
and the defenders get bonuses to their rolls.

Table as a whole. HALO's objective is the lit-up Christmas tree.
If they have anyone touching it for an entire turn, they win.

The rules are very basic, and would work well for a snowball fight (that's presumably what the otherwise unarmed defenders were throwing anyway). I need to try this before I leave my branch (moving to a different one after Christmas); one of my coworkers has plenty of Christmas critters and decorations.

Left out is cover - +1 to the roll - and open and difficult terrain
movements are reversed. There are no morale rules.

HALO won initiative, and dropped a hurricane of fire on us. The reindeer mostly became venison, but the polar bears won so many of the rolloffs that we started calling them the Iron Bear Brigade. Justin the Wooly Mammoth, one of our commanders, was gone too. I was nervous about losing Santa, our fastest and most powerful piece, and kept him out of view.

"How do deer throw snowballs?"
"Chernobyl."

In Turn Two, we managed to knock out one of the powerful Warthogs, and I took the risk of flying high, where Santa could see everyone, but everyone could see Santa. Luckily, he took out one of the holograms, while a sweeping movement by the elves got the other. Next turn, Santa took a wound and hastily dropped back down.

Snowmen and bears hold the line.

The Yeti fearlessly leads on the right.

I selected thematic ice-blue dice for my units.

Brisk firefight ice fight on the right.

High move distance relative to the table meant double envelopment could be a thing. Unfortunately, ours left the primary objective unguarded, and ten HALO troopers descended upon it in triumph.

A bitter fight in bitter cold.

Santa's boys raced back and knocked out all the blue HALO unit, narrowly avoiding a knockout loss of the game. But a sniper took out Santa.

He's a magical elf. He'll recover
in time for next year, right?

At this point, the tree was defended; HALO's center thrust was gone, but they had defeated everything on our left; and HALO's right was going down to defeat under the overall leadership of the Yeti. My Marine bear picked off the sniper ("Zero Dark Thirty," was my inappropriate quip) and the game ended with an unbroken, if decimated, line of snowmen and bears between what remained of HALO green team and the tree.

If HALO meant High Altitude Low Opening, these guys
have just reenacted Arnhem.

A missile launcher team hides out of view...

... as very cute bears look on from a lovely scratchbuilt bridge.

So the North Pole is safe in the end, but HALO has a moral victory having taken out Santa. Who will deliver the toys now?

It belatedly occurs to me that there should have been severe range penalties on all sides for fighting in the dark. Since it's December above the Arctic Circle.

A fun and diverting game, in which I actually managed to learn the rules! Though, true to form, I kept asking the GM questions anyway. "Can we go faster sliding on the ice?" "Can we cause a snow avalanche?"

Next week, the annual Regatta!