Paint Table Saturday (on Thursday) 27th Feb.

Here’s my second entry into Sofie’s little event. Its been a relatively quiet week in terms of painting and hobby related stuff however this is due mainly to it being my youngest sons third birthday (you can just make out some cards in the below pic).

I did however make some progress on block colouring my Saxon Thegns - still a fair old way to go though (and a fast approaching deadline of the 16th March to complete 50+ models).

You can just make out my built up Perry Pak 36; this will be painted as a reward to myself for the next 10 completed Thegns I think. I did finish the Ceorls and therefore finished off the two Riders of Rohan as my reward last week. It seems to work giving myself these little things to look forward to.

Oh also I managed to squeeze in a little tidying as well, one of the gift wrap paper rolls had an inner roll that was the perfect size to accommodate Vallejo paint pots and it has been duly cut, glued and stuffed into the respective holes in my painting desk/bureau/thingy!

Till next week folks!

Ripper Street resurrected by Amazon deal

Text below lifted from BBC News - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-26351457

Victorian crime drama Ripper Street is to return to screens via Amazon's video on demand service.

The BBC cancelled the show in December due to poor ratings, but Amazon has now commissioned a third season for its Prime Instant Video service - formerly known as Lovefilm Instant.

The show will premiere on Amazon and screen on the BBC a few months later. Amazon has also acquired the UK subscription streaming rights of the first two series of the show.

The BBC will continue to make a contribution to production costs of the new season, while other broadcast partners - including BBC America and the Irish Film Board - will remain on board as part of the new arrangement. Filming on the new series - which will continue to be produced by Tiger Aspect and Lookout Point - will begin in May.

A date for its premiere on Amazon Prime has yet to be determined. The programme's makers said the third series would go ahead as originally planned with eight episodes, the same budget and "slightly more bells and whistles" than the previous two series.

Good news for us Victorian fans however I suspect that the campaign to bring it back was irrelevant as this was just a marketing ploy by BBC, plan I suspect was never to cancel the show but just to find alternate funding.

We’ll never know, however at least we’ll still have a decent show with the same production team!

LoTR SBG - Riders of Rohan and Gaming in General

In one of my previous posts I mentioned that I work better under pressure. Well I am currently finishing off my Saxon army for Scrivs Warhammer Ancients (WAB) Age of Arthur Day in mid March and as such am under the cosh!

However this doesn’t stop me from having a few deviations here and there, these Riders of Rohan being one of them. Over a year ago I started gathering up Lord of The Rings SBG models as part of another “On a Budget” projects that I like to do and I have to say I have amassed rather a considerable amount. Well it does seem like a good time to paint them so I picked up brushes and paints and set too - here’s the first four finished models!

They’re a little tricky to paint in that they’re plastics and are a little poorly defined (and fragile!!!) however block colours, generous use of washes and a little highlights and we’re good to go.

Now as I’ve managed to get some LoTR mini’s painted I thought it might be useful to continue to familiarise myself with the game and so fellow LoTR fan Andy and I managed to get a game in at the club. The setting for the game was a skirmish at a small farm in the outlying region of Helms Deep. We used very minimal forces as we’re both still getting the mechanics sorted in our heads. I had 5 riders and a standard, 4 warriors with throwing weapons, 4 warriors with shields and Gamling. Andy had a solid block of 14 Uruks, standard and a captain.

Now I would show pics however I didn’t take any and this isn’t really an AAR but more of a reflection on how the game plays. We’ve finally managed to get hold of the most recent edition of the rules (LoTR rules that is and not the Hobbit set!) and I have to say we had a blast. We only managed to play out 6 turns, which in LoTR SBG is not really a lot however we did focus most of our attention on playing out combats correctly. Getting a hang on the individual tactics of where to make your charges so that you shut down zones of control and how to block your opponents charges so that you fight on your own terms seems to be the “tactical” element of the game and is more akin to chess than any other wargame I’ve played.

In addition knowing when to use might points to change that all important die roll or call heroic actions (move, shooting or combat) seems to be key to achieving your objectives. We have played a straight forward “pitched battle” before and didn’t really feel connected to the game however as soon as we put our film/book heads on and pictured the action it became a more immersive and enjoyable experience.

I’ve now come to the realisation that LoTR SBG is in reality two wargames; traditional manoeuvre/out-manoeuvre that I’m used to and then micro-managed combats where you start thinking three or four moves ahead as you really focus in a small playing area. Heck the majority of our game was confined in an area roughly 10” x 10” in the centre of the board.

So I’m looking forward to getting some more models finished and on to the table and thrashing out some scenarios!

LoTR Battle Companies

Well my exploration of LoTR SBG continues apace with the acquisition of the Battle Companies rules which GW published on their website some time ago. Whilst no longer available from GW you can access them from the below websites:

The first link is the original document as published however the second is an updated version (unofficial) that incorporates the Hobbit line as well.

Hopefully this will be my intro set to the rest of the guys at the club, skirmish gaming seems to be having an upsurge in popularity at the moment and with the advent of “buy millions of models before you get to play” version of WFB I think this may be the way to go.

http://www.lordsofmiddleearth.com/Battle%20Companies/Battle%20Companies.pdf

http://battlecompanies.wordpress.com/

PS: Incidentally I finished up the first 4 Riders of Rohan so will pop some pics up shortly.

PPS: I also based up a couple of my Hobbit bargains as scenery for some dwarven scenario’s (Moria etc). They look pretty good and will provide a little character to our club scenery. Now I just need to get some rock faces etc completed (I have a master plan for the floor which hopefully should follow soon!).

IHMN - Dino Wrangling (Final Draft)

simplebooklet.com

Well after play-testing my little Dino Wrangling rules for In Her Majesty’s Name I thought I’d finally publish them so here they are. They’re in the format of the Casebook of Inspector Johnson and hosted on simplebooklet.com. If anyone wants to try it out themselves an account is free and relatively easy to administer.

Click this link if you can't see it below

Any comments or queries are more than welcome.

Oh and if you want a copy then just drop me an email and I'll send one over

Thanks

Ste

Paint Table Saturday (on Thursday!)

Sofie over on http://sofies-paint-blog.blogspot.co.uk/ is running a friendly and inclusive little submission thingy whereby you submit a photo of your paint table each Saturday to:

a)     Share how messy (or not) your painting zone is

b)     Help you keep a track of your own progress

I guess in a way she’s the project manager of all our own little projects, in a non scary cheerful kind of way.

Anyway here’s my first submission which as you can tell is not on a Saturday however I’m a rebel (and also kind of disorganised) and therefore my submissions shall feature every Thursday.

On the table today are a bunch of Ceorls for my Age of Arthur Saxons, they’re being rebased on to pennies as I’ve taken to storing my minis in magnetised box files. Along side them are some of the very nice Gripping Beast Saxon Thegns, I know they’re not strictly the right period for age of Arthur but I don’t care. They’re nice!

Also in shot are two LoTR SBG Riders of Rohan. They’re more of a fun painting diversion when the production line gets a bit too much.

Fingers crossed this little lot will have moved along considerably by next Thursday (Saturday!). 

Midnight at the Oasis - Bolt Action AAR

Well it wasn’t midnight but there was an oasis! As agreed Phil turned up at the club with his 8th Army to pit against my Motorised Afrika Korps, the board being very sparse in terms of terrain (apart from my nice retasked toy palm trees!).

We decided on the envelopment scenario to represent a DAK raiding force trying to return to there own lines through the British defence. Primarily to test out how effective troops mounted in soft skins can be, the scenario plays to the strengths of mounted troops with the attacker (me) winning 1 VP for each enemy unit destroyed, 2 VP for each of my units in the defenders deployment zone at the end of the game, and finally 3 VP for every unit I get off the board. The defender however gains 2 VP fro every unit destroyed.

The scenario required Phil to deploy half his force with the remainder in reserve. I then nominate at least half my force as the first wave (advance on in turn 1). Being the non-tricky devil I am I chose to bring my entire force on in the first wave (I could have placed some of it in reserve and tried to outflank!).

Phil - 8th Army

2nd Lieutenant and Adjutant

Forward Artillery spotter

Medic

4 x Rifle Sections

MMG

Light Mortar

AT rifle

6 Pounder

Bren Carrier with AT rifle

Matilda 2

Me - Motorised DAK

Leutnant with Unteroffizer - (Kubelwagen with MMG)

Air Observer and Radio Op  - (Kubelwagen with MMG)

2 x 9 man Rifle sections (Trucked)

1 x 10 man Veteran Rifle section (Trucked)

AT rifle

Light Mortar

Pak 36 AT gun

SdKfz 222

With Phil deploying a squad on my far right, 6 pounder a little further in, MMG team in the oasis in the centre of his deployment, AT rifle to their left, 2” mortar to their left and finally a squad on my left flank he had most of the board covered. However he still had two squads, bren carrier, HQ and a Matilda 2 in reserve so he would be able to respond quite well to any focussed attacks.

I picked the left flank as it had a few more areas of broken line of sight to give me a chance to break through, with less opportunity for Phil to maximise his rather considerable firepower.

Preparatory bombardment. As attacker I got to roll on the table and cause pins on nearly everything, also managing to kill the AT rifle loader (it was now at -1 to shoot).

Ok so Turn 1 I advanced pretty much everything towards my left flank, my AT gun in the center with lines of fire to both the right and left flank depending on where Phil brought his tank and Bren Carrier on. My SdKfz 222 I placed on my far right, reasoning that with its Recce ability it could play cat and mouse with Phils AT gun and hide behind the only hill on that side of the board (and tie up the rifle section over there!)

My shooting was pretty good whittling down a rifle section on the left flank however Phil destroyed one of my advancing trucks, pinning the passengers in the process. Phil also redeployed his MMG through the swamp…..err I mean lovely oasis to next turn get line of sight on my other trucks. I chucked some smoke to try and screen my advancing troops which hopefully wouldn’t drift in subsequent turns!

Turn 2 saw me assaulting and destroying the rifle section on the left flank, the AT guns exchanging fire with each other, Phil brought on his Matilda and Bren Carrier which decided to make my life miserable by  destroying my Veterans truck pinning the passengers (including my AT rifle). Oh and then Phil brought on his last rifle section in front of my pinned Veterans.

Turn 3 was not pretty. My Veterans assaulted the AT rifle, destroyed it and were promptly destroyed in turn, My HQ was assaulted and destroyed by another rifle section and then Phils tank assaulted my last rifle section. Luckily they withstood the armoured behemoth and survived the assault. We had agreed to call the game at three turns and therefore I rushed my SdKfz 222 up the right flank past the AT gun and section that was opposing it. Phil made the mistake of assaulting it, I chose to recce and as it was so close to the board edge we agreed that it departed (3 VP to me!!!).

However it was a clear win to Phil as he had destroyed 3 trucks, 1 Kubelwagen and both my HQ and Veterans.

So what would I have done differently? Probably taken the risk and rushed all my transports 24” in the first turn and chanced the damage. I didn’t make use of my units movement nor did I mass my assault very well. Soft skins in Bolt Action are really vulnerable as they are damaged by small arms fire on a 6 and if damaged they’re automatically destroyed. This coupled with their large size (allowing pretty good line of sight and very little cover) and the amount of small arms means that they die quite quickly.

I still maintain that my force works within the confines of the rules and will persevere to adapt my play style to suit the force. I’ll only change rule system if to make it work I have to play counter to the history books!

Happy Valentines!

This is a hobby blog and as such is focussed on hobby activities and outputs. However I am not necessarily limiting it to just my own! My wife also has a hobby, one which I enjoy the fruits of!. So without further ado I give you………………… PARENTAL ADVISORY NOTICE - MILDLY RUDE IMAGE BELOW………..

Boobie cake!

Please note I did not consume this cake as it was made for a friend of my wife’s, and it would have raised a few questions from my 3 and 4.5 year old!

Terrain for North Africa

Here’s a little something that I knocked together whilst waiting for the PVA/sand basing and undercoat to dry on my Fellowship mini’s. I have a young family and as such a house filled with toys (not all of them are mine!). Periodically my wife and I have a clear out of those items that are no longer used or beyond their effective use, and a bunch of palm trees from some kind of zoo animal set was bound for the bin. So rather than call the A-team I opted to rescue them myself and filed them away as “potential scenery” for use at a later date.

Well as I have a game planned against Phil’s 8th Army at the club I thought it was time that my motorised DAK column had something to hide behind so I bashed these together using some left over thick card, sand and liberal use of spray paints.

They also feature the new tufts I purchased from Tajima1 on eBay. Very nice products and great value (£5 ish for 100 tufts or so).

I’ll get some pics and do an AAR of our game and post up later. Phil does have some lovely models (although I hate his Matilda 2 as it guns down everything!).

The Hobbit - A Crazy Little Bargain

And while we're on the subject of LoTR. In my eternal hunt for cheapo wargaming toys I came across this little fella in my local bargain store (home Bargains for all you UK readers).

For a measly £0.29p I got Bofur from the recent Hobbit films. He’s in soft plastic, measures 54mm foot to eye and is painted up to look all “Pewtery”. The only bad thing is they’re “blind bagged” and as such you don’t know what you’re getting however with a bit of a feel you can identify whether you’ve already purchased the contents or not.

I splashed out on a couple more however haven’t taken any photos yet. They will be based up on plinths and used for Dwarven scenery in my LoTR SBG games.

LoTR - Ferry Across the Brandywine AAR (No pics, Sorry!)

Sorry chaps, no pics as we spent most of the time reminding ourselves of the rules (and my Hobbits were wearing their very best metal suits!).

So we’ve finally returned to LoTR SBG after a bit of a hiatus. Its been quite nice to dig out all the models and get a feel for it again, it helps that when drafting documents at work I listen to the LoTR Trilogy Soundtracks on repeat.

Well how did it go - hilarious and quite brutal really. The three Hobbits are in sight of the ferry across the Brandywine with only a single Ringwraith barring their way. But no whats this, two more wraiths advancing up the road behind them, what do they do. And herein lies the problem, I’m using the Return of the King rulebook, Chris (my cheerful Victorian throwback opponent) the Hobbit rules and we’re playing a scenario from the Fellowship Journeybook that was published for the “One” rulebook. So the first problem was the “Sentries” rule which doesn’t appear in either rulebook. Hmmm how to get round this, ignore it and just start rolling dice.

So that’s what we did. I deployed the hobbits in a line 12” onto the board. Roughly 8” away was a line of woodland 3” thick and a slight hill. Beyond that was a bit of open ground and then the river and ferry where the Ringwraith lurked.

Obviously I got priority in the first turn because Hobbits are good (aren’t they?). So with all the aplomb of a day at the fair Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin advanced straight forward towards the treeline. Then Chris moved his two other Ringwraiths up behind them from my board edge and the game was afoot.

Turn two saw me winning priority again and now the Hobbits realising their peril, angled towards the west a little and into the woods where Sam badgered “Mr Frodo” whilst taking the opportunity to cook up some nice juicy sausages!.

The wraith near the river shimmied across to face them on the other side of the wood, ignoring Merry and Pippin who were making straight toward the ferry, it would appear that they’d seen the two menacing shadows coming up behind.

Turn three saw more stumbling through the treeline (with those feet you’d think they’d be good at getting through undergrowth!), Merry and Pippin moving to menace the lone wraith on the far side of the woods (as much as two capering fools can menace the undead shade of a great king of men!).

It was now that Chris decided to use the Ringwraiths magic, chucking nasty rubber darts, err I mean mystical balls of energy at Frodo. Wow that was rubbish, no damage whatsoever, it would seem that Frodo isn’t a wuss after all.

Turn four and I didn’t get priority. Argh, that means the lone wraith can attack Frodo - HEROIC MOVE. As the other Hobbits were within 6” I legged them as fast as their short legs could carry them out of the woods and towards the ferry while Sam made a brave dash into combat with the lone Ringwraith (I needed to tie him up to allow Frodo to get away). Luckily in this scenario the Ringwraiths start off with no Might, 8 Will and no Fate so they are actually quite fragile and can’t call their own heroic actions. Also they lose Will for every mystical power or combat they fight so I was trying to keep track of what each wraith was doing.

Ok time for fisticuffs, Sam tried to dodge the blows of the cloaked figure but to no avail, luckily Fate intervened and the sword passed through his cloak, missing him entirely (at the cost of a Fate point).

Turn 5 and I gain initiative moving Frodo onto the Ferry, and moving Sam, Pippin and Merry to block the advance of the wraiths. However this was a rookie move as Chris moved a wraith into combat with Sam and Merry, thus removing their control zones, allowing the last one to move between them and menace Frodo and Pippin. If I didn’t get initiative next turn there would be a scary fight on the Ferry.

The combats began with Sam getting clobbered and falling to the evil servant of Sauron. Cries of “SAM” from Frodo and Pippin could not avert the catastrophe, if they survived this encounter the journey to Mordor would now be without the stalwart gardener.

However Merry, exhibiting the courage that would later result in him being made an “Esquire of Rohan”, dodged his assailant and landed a blow on the fell creature, unfortunately causing only a tear in the fabric of its robes.

Turn 6 and I lost intiative, disaster strikes, my opponent Chris grins wickedly, rubbing his hands with glee. Until of course I use up another Might point and call a Heroic Move. Hah! take that servants of Sauron as Pippin leaps aboard the Ferry and Frodo launches the rickety thing into the current. Pippin turns with a cry of “Merry” to see him beset by three Ringwraiths as they are pulled further from shore.

So, surely this is the end for the poor Brandybuck! But no, all three wraiths beat the stalwart Hobbit pushing him back against the banks of the Brandywine however when it comes to the all important hit they fluff it, rolling three 1’s.

Turn 7 and I win the initiative, Merry dives into the rushing water and swims for his life, the wraiths hurl mystical darts but can’t seem to beat Frodo’s indomitable will and we call the game there.

So possibly the most vital member of the Fellowship has fallen before the quest has even begun, is this the beginning of the end for Frodo and co?

Nahhh, as we had so much fun we’re going to go back and play out as much of the Journeybook as we can, I’m painting up my Hobbits this weekend so in a couple of weeks we can have a game that warrants photo’s.

I have to say thanks to Robert at http://slumminingoblintown.blogspot.com/ and Scott at http://scottswargaming.blogspot.co.uk/ for inspiring and reviving my interest. Now I just have to get the figs through my painting queue. I’ve to sort out my Saxons for Scrivs WAB Age of Arthur day in March so no pressure really!!!

North Africa Campaign Day - Arghhhhhhhhh

Here's the promised write up!

The basic rules were - two lists chosen from the relevant North Africa theatre lists from the army books, a single platoon at 1000 pts and 600 pts respectively. No flame throwers or other really nasty bits however you could write a third list (armoured platoon) and choose to use that in the relevant games. Oh and we weren't using the controversial dice cap (good job as my 1000 pts was 13 dice).

Game 1 (Doubles, 2000pts)

DAK Motorised Platoon (Me), DAK Armoured Platoon (Chris)

Vs

LRDG/SAS Patrol (I forgot your name dude, sorry!), US Armoured Rifles (Geraint)

Ok the mission was Point Defence with Axis as the defender. Really big board with three objectives spaced out. We got suckered by the Allies with the US advancing through the village in the centre, soaking up fire whilst the SAS and LRDG outflanked in turn 4 to capture one objective. Then in turn 5 the US advanced onto the second objective in a half track and the game ended.

Basically we had too few infantry to contest objectives or slow down the SAS.

Game 2 (1000pts)

DAK Motorised Platoon (Me) vs LRDG Patrol (Dave)

Argh, I hated and loved this. Dave’s entire force (apart from 2 trucks carrying 2 squads of 6) was Recce. This meant that I was facing 9 Chevy truck with MMG/HMG combo’s that kept dancing out of range. The mission was maximum attrition (kill everything) however my force came on to the board piecemeal (you deploy half and the rest are in reserve) with very little weapons that could harm a vehicle. So statistically I was bound to lose. Dave was great though and it looked awesome, the board had 1 road and a small building and that was it. An education in gaming on an open board.

However it’s the first time since staring Bolt Action that I actually thought a rule was broken. I guess that’s the problem with playing any force that has a significant bias to a specific rule. Dave referred to it as a Glass Hammer. Well in this case I was the glass that got hammered.

Game 3 (600pts)

DAK Motorised Platoon (me) vs Brit Gurkhas (Mario)

In quite a few wargames systems out there it’s quite possible to win the game in the first turn, mainly through understanding the rule system well and manipulating your force choices to maximise a certain strength along with getting the first turn (FoW and WFB spring to mind). With a random activation sequence rather than IGOUGO this is minimised.

Well not today it aint!

I’m actually being unfair. This mission was demolition - each force got an objective to place in their deployment which was the target of their opponent. Then we placed half our force with the rest in reserve so down went an infantry squad and truck and my HQ and Kubelwagen. First dice out of the bag was mine so I placed the infantry squad next to my objective in Ambush. Second dice was his and he called in a heavy mortar strike on them - Blam no more unit!

This was pretty much the sequence of play with his M3 Grant taking out my truck and then radio op leaving my Leutnant hiding behind a bush….and that was it.

Turn two and I tried bringing out my second Kubelwagen with anti-tank rifle only to have them vapourised by the Grant. Then next up was my second platoon who was gunned down by a combination of the Grant and an MMG.

Game over man, game over!

I did however win “Axis Player exhibiting extraordinary bravery - or more properly titled ”Rubber Spoon” 

I'm the idiot on the left!

No pictures of the event yet although I believe Gazerb will have some up soon so I’ll post a link. Also Scrivs will probably have a review over on his blog shortly.

In review, I’m glad I attended the event, I was very pleased with how my force looked and will be playing out some more games at the club with them. Playing without terrain is a very liberating and scary experience. The big learning factor for me was that my force was small and very expensive without being that elite (i.e special rules) and therefore with uninterrupted lines of sight it goes down just as easily as inexperienced troops. So I need to downgrade them from veteran, get some fire support and possibly more cannon fodder….errrr I mean troops!

28mm Deutsch Afrika Korp - I work best to deadlines!

Let me elaborate. Some months ago I agreed to take part in a North Africa themed Bolt Action campaign dayorganised by Gary and Tim (Gazerb and General Timmy of the Warlord Games Bolt ActionForum) to be held at the East Manchester Historical Gaming Centre on Sunday 2nd February.

I agreed purely because my buddy Geraint suggested it would be a laugh and also Phil from our club was also attending so I signed up, without an actual army to play with. This was back in Nov last year and then I promptly forgot about it until about 3 weeks ago when I realised I absolutely had to paint something.

So putting my money where my mouth is got cracking, throwing the plastic Perry DAK together, buying some trucks and kubels from Westwind and just generally staying up much too late painting frantically.

Well the day arrived and low and behold I actually finished my force off (1000 pts of Veteran Afrika Korps mounted in trucks!)

And so without further ado here’s the completed version of my toys (although I may do some more work on them depending on if I can get any of the club to sign up to a mini North Africa campaign).

I’ve done a write up of the day however I forgot to take photos therefore so my next post will just give a quick summary of my games!