Celebratory Christmas Game - Bolt Action

Seeing as it's the season of goodwill (festive cheer and all that) Ash and I decided to get together for a day of Hollywood style WW2 gaming a la Bolt Action and then a cinema visit to see some little known indie pic about spaceships and laser swords!

Anyway seeing as we were playing Bolt Action I provided all the models and scenery from my collection as Ash hasn't quite built up his collection yet. We agreed on pretty equal forces and then rolled off to see which side we'd both play, I ended up with Tommies and Ash his beloved Hun (he got to use a Stug so he was happy). This game was the first outing for my Sarissa Gas Lamp Alley buildings which unfortunately I haven't managed to get any paint on yet. Anyway we used a nice narrow board so settled on a mission that involved me having to break through Ash's lines (envelopment) and laid out the terrain accordingly.

Board layout looking south - Thats my entry point at the end
 of the road

The deployment for this game involves the attacker (me) moving at least half his force on the board as the dice are drawn with the remainder as reserves. However with the size of the board I chose to have everyone match on in the first turn. Meanwhile the defender (Ash) has leave half his force off in reserve so had quite limited options for a couple of turns. So my tactic was to mob him and give him too many targets to actually do enough damage to stop me. Ash had deployed a mortar, sniper, mmg and rifle section on board against my 3 sections, para section, mmg, mortar and artillery obs so I should be able to cause some damage before his remaining section, hq and Stug arrive.

Not a bad position for a sniper!

The mortar prepares to lob shells over the church!

The mmg gets snuggled in ready to rake any infantry coming up that road.

So how did it work out I hear you all ask. Well I started out with a preliminary bombardment before the game started however I told the ever fateful 1 and they must have picked the wrong grid on the map because those dastardly Huns were decidedly unscathed as I marched down the road in the first turn.

Everyone's on the board and legging it up the road

"Jenkins, get a move on"

"Err, Sarge, ain't that Jerry up the road with a ruddy
great machine gun?"

I lobbed some smoke with my mortar whilst Ash fired at the pigeons with his sniper rather than at the troops closing in on his position.

I'd almost made it to the centre line ready to launch my assault with my eager troops when Ash managed to lob a mortar round into one of my sections. Some splendid dice rolling later and a little supporting fire from a German rifle section and I was down 2 sections.

Then the bloody Stug arrived however Ash couldn't decide what to do with it so it loitered near the warehouse with a case of the "where do I go"s

I then threw caution to the wind and went in Thompson and Lee Enfields blazing and managed to give some of those Huns a thoroughly good kicking. In the end it was a victory for me, 7 vp's to 4. However it was only because I'd managed to get into Ash's deployment zone by a couple of inches!

Another fun intro to Bolt Action for Ash, it was nice to play it again properly as it's been about 18 months since I rolled dice on anger. Ash has got himself some Yanks and Germans so we can have a few more games hopefully and maybe start a campaign of some kind.

Anyway after we'd packed everything up we traveled to a galaxy far far away and both became kids again. However that may become the subject of another post, or we might just play loads more X-wing and buy a millennium falcon!

More terrain , this time it’s Frostgrave

I've been a tad busy at home over the xmas holidays but I did find time to finish off some scenery for Frostgrave. Scrap bits of crap, that’s pretty much all these are, I found some old hardboard in the loft and have loads of packaging Polystyrene hanging about so I thought I use up some PVA and see what I could come up with.

Slap, dash and no cash, and hey presto – Snowy terrain.

So here we have some kind of statue alcove

A Rocky monolith and some rocks

Assorted trees with some snowy bushes (same techniques as the hedges from the last post but with snow scatter instead)

I can’t claim credit for the winter trees though as I was inspired by Scrivs and James WW1 game at Partizan. They’re simply twigs from the garden glued to hard board with some snow scatter. They don’t really have any effect in the game but they certainly set the scene.

Here's the whole lot together (28mm models for scale comparison):

Not bad for free eh!

FOW - Late War Yanks vs Germans

Some of Ash's very cool Yanks

I found some free time this week to return to a little Flames of War with Ashley, this time using his collection as I’ve just had a busy, messy and quite intense week at work so didn’t have the energy to think about what I’d play.

Because we’re both daft we agreed to play 4000pts with Ashley putting together both lists and randomly deciding who would play what – I got Germans which suited my mood as I got to play with Panthers!

Germans (me)

Panther CiC and 2iC, 4x Panthers, 5x PZIV J, 5x PZIV J, 3x Stug G, 3x Tiger 1E, 2x Panzergrenadiers in Half tracks, HS129 Limited Air.

Yanks (Ash)

CiC Jumbo and 2iC 76mm, 3x Sherman Platoons (jumbo, 2x 75mm, 2x 76mm), 5x M5 Stuarts, 3x Priests, 4x Self Propelled 155mm, 1x Rifle Platoon, 1x ARP, 4x M10 Tank Destroyers, Priority Air.

We took the approach for this game of “move big tanks, shoot guns, Ugghhhhhhh” as we just wanted to play with as many toys as possible. Therefore we played the Free For All mission lengthways with quite a terrain free board. Also in the interests of speed we did a simultaneous blind deployment, so basically we both just ignored each other and deployed how we wanted (which works great in friendly games). We both had two objectives in each other’s deployment zones.

Initial deployment

So on to the carnage. There was a road running diagonally through the centre of the board and a couple of buildings and wheat fields dead centre. I deployed left to right - Panthers, PZiv’s, Stug’s, PZiv’s, Tigers with the CiC & 2iC as a mobile reserve. Ash opposed me with 2 platoons of Shermans on my left supported by his artillery. His rifle platoon directly behind the buildings, then a platoon of Shermans, Stuarts and the TD security section facing off against my Tiger/PZiv tag team.

Armoured push up my right flank

Can I get my air close enough to destroy some Jumbos?

So what the heck happened? Well I started off proceedings advancing everything forward and splitting my force into two to swing round the centre of the board and threaten the objectives equally. I like to play aggressively with German armour, it just feels right. Anyway my tigers took pot-shots but didn’t hit anything, my Panthers tried the same and took out two 75mm Shermans. However it went down hill pretty quickly as I then failed to damage anything for the rest of the game whilst Ashley’s air took out 2 tigers in turn two (argh).

Yank Artillery...arghhhh

Ash pushed forward on my right flank once the Tigers were whittled down, he now felt confident that he could threaten my objective, my Panthers stuck in a long range duel on the left with the Shermans (those damn jumbo’s negating my fire quite effectively). In the centre I used my PZiv’s to threaten the right flank Shermans with side shots by rushing them through the small village. But it was not to be as I’d completely forgotten the TD’s who appeared as if by magic and pummelled the PZiv’s mercilessly from point blank range.

However he totally ignored the remaining Tiger which I pushed forward aggressively (this was now my only asset capable of pushing through to an objective). So Ash rushed his Arp towards the objective in my deployment zone and it was all down to who was faster, a Tiger 1e or an M3 halftrack……..

We called it there as it was getting late and we’d nattered a bit too long. It was fun to play with lots of toys however it was less of bloodbath than I expected with that much firepower.

We’ll have a rematch at some point!

Hedges and Trees

Like many hobbyists the world over I have a large backlog of unfinished projects sitting around gathering dust, so in the interests of clearing the decks ready for the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge I thought I’d finish a few things that have been lingering. So as a nice change from painting stuff for Africa I thought I’d finish some hedges and trees. The hedges have come out quite nicely if I do say myself and are super simple to make. Some years ago I bought a coir door matt to make wheat fields with and had a few random sized strips left. Wondering on what I could do with them I thought I’d slather a bit of PVA on a scrap and sprinkle some Woodland scenic scatter on to see whether it looked any good.

And hey presto we have a hedgerow. To make these I cut my strips to roughly 15mm wide and painted PVA liberally along the top and sides. I mixed my Scatter with some dried tea leaves from used tea bags (therefore more like dust than tea leaves) and rolled the PVA covered “hedge" in it.

Hedges are a bit of problem for vehicles etc if there are no gates so I used a little balsa to make some simple gates. I intend on using these for both 28mm and 15mm however I’ve only put together gates for 15mm at the moment.


The trees are a bit of a cheat as these are just armatures and flock that Ash gave me, they’re a pain to do as I’m using PVA to glue the foliage on and it takes ages. But I can sit watching TV doing it so I’ll keep chipping away whilst watching Rick and Co running away from Zombies again!

Saga - Vikings vs Anglo Saxons

Ash and I got together recently to carry on our Saga intro (revival) with a 6 pt game of clash of Warlords. I've decided to deny my hobby butterfly tendencies and stick with Anglo Saxons rather than flit from faction to faction and I have to say I'm quiet enjoying it.

Anyway on to the action, I took 4 units of warriors, hearthguard and levies with Ash opting for 2 nasty hearthguard units, a unit if warriors, berserkers and the Sons of Death (I can't spell the Gaelic name for these nasty mercenaries!)

I was hosting tonight so I decided to use my recently finished hills and river, luckily I remembered to put a ford in the river and also lay a rickety bridge across the gorge made by the two hills.

My tactics for this game were simple, try and draw Ash to me and wear him down with my greater numbers. The river was my friend here as I had no intention of crossing it into the wrath of Ash's marauding Vikings. So it was simply march up and wait

I think I'll let the pics do most of the talking however suffice it to say that my dice were good and Ash's were bad.

The opening shot, thats me on the left with the tons of
warriors.

Sneaking over the crest of the hill are the Sons of Death
(you can just see them peeking over the the top).
Can my only hearthguard unit and some warriors hold them off?

Capture the ford! I send my Warlord and his pet levies to
challenge Ashley's crossing

Another one of Ash's dastardly Hearthguard units sneaking
up my left flank

The Baddie, a Viking warlord in all his glory

Thats me at the bottom, as you can see I'm going for the classic
Saxon shieldwall approach.

Nice saxon shield wall!
"Defend the farm"

Its the Sons of Death sneaking over the hill. Hang on a
minute where's the rest of them. Oh yeah Ash is using there
multiple activations skill to redeploy them. Now my
Hearthguard are stuck on the hill with no-one to play with

But my Hearthguard guard the bridge anyway!

Damn Sons of Death facing off against my Warriors. Many
insults are slung across the river

Meanwhile Ash pushes his berserkers through the ford, 16 attacks
from 4  models. Thats right 16!

Time to feed them my levies, "Get em boys!"

The Sons get ready to go playing in the river

And the action begins o the left flank. Its almost like Ash
has a plan!

"Oi Brian, whats going on down there do you think"
"Nowt Fred, now then what do ya think of this bridge. It's a
right good bit o'woodwork don't ya think?"

2 levies left, but whats this, no berserkers. Ha!
I'd been saving a Saga ability that turns my levies into warriors,
then I loaded them up on extra attacks and butchered the naked
crazy loons!

The Son attacked but failed to destroy my warriors (and I have
loads of them!)

Mano E Mano. Warlord vs Warlord time and I have warriors to
back me up. At this point Ash had lost a couple of units and
therefore had less Saga dice than me.

Damn Viking Warlords are hard to kill, it was a damn
close thing but I hard some lackeys...err I mean brave
comrades who would die for the cause but unfortunately
Ash had none nearby.

And that was that. I held my nerve whereas Ash took the risks that almost paid off. Its hard playing Anglo Saxons as they have a lack of really offensive abilities but they certainly can wear your opponent down. I guarantee it won't go my way next time though.

We'll see.

The challenge returns

Yup, that's right I've signed up to take part in the annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. This will be the sixth time that Curt has graciously run said event, with this being my second outing. Last year I aimed to hit my own very modest personal target of 750 pts however this year my goal is a more manly 1000 pts.

I haven't as yet accepted or issued any side challenges however there's still time as the mayhem doesn't kick off until the 20th of December.

If you'd like to learn more about this very unique and quirky little hobby event then head on over to www.thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.ca to find out more and follow the action.

African Militia

As I mentioned in my last post I’ve been slowly pulling together figures for a foray into a new genre of gaming – moderns, and here is the fruits of my kitbashing labours. These guys represent armed militia to be used in a Mogadishu setting, the figures are a mixture of three plastic kits – Perry Mahdist Ansar, Warlord Games Celts with Bolt Action weapons.

I’m not sure about the eyes on them, I’ve done the flesh really dark and the eyes look a little weird, I may have to tweak them to get the right. I’ll probably have to order some of the Wargames Factory Survivors as they come with oodles of modern weapons that would be perfect for arming a civilian militia in any area of civil unrest.

All of these are left overs from previous uncompleted projects and my rather extensive bits box. Some of them are a little generic and possibly not quite “modern” however they’ll do in a pinch whilst I slowly save up some pennies (or cents!) to order some nice Eureka or Spectre minis’.

Next up - a Delta Force team