The Joms-Viking SAGA

This week's gaming has been all SAGA. Last Sunday I got in a couple of games vs Andy's newly painted Anglo-Danes. Since that is my usual board, I tried something new: Joms-Vikings! No levies allowed in that lot so two points worth of JomsVikings (Hearthguard) and then four points of Warriors. To make it up to six points, Andy took Cnut the Great, the Anglo-Dane legendary hero, who uses both the Viking and Anglo-Dane boards. Round one went very well - once they get going, the Joms-Vikings get going! To the right you see them swarming all around the person of the soon to be late King Cnut. 

Tempest 2012

Tempest 2012 was early this year. I think the reasoning (don't quote me, I am sorta on the committee but have been a bit of a club absentee recently) was that Tempest is a charity thing and had become one day.... so there should be a new 'Tempest' called CAVCON to actually be two day and raise club funds and Tempest could be rushed through at a point that seemed opportune. That personally suits me fine. Overall, the event was exceedingly low-key but not FOW! We had a great field of players: 16 involved all up. And, better yet, it was four games of 1100 pt MW with players encouraged by the TO to take true 'Ironman' forces. Not naming any names but SOME people instead took infantry!

Flames of War: New trees for the Brave new TLOS World

Obviously, there has been a bit of a blogging hiatus. I'm still here, just working at a workplace with tightly controlled internet so no blogging before/after shifts or on breaks... until my new tablet PC arrives anyway!

Anyway, my initial read through of the V3 rules for Flames of War turned up one immediate and serious issue - I was going to have to sort out my trees. For better or worse, Phil Yates et al have caught the 'True Line of Sight' bug. Now, we still (thankfully) have area terrain for woods and forests but aircraft can be hidden from AA by intervening trees! Now, my previous trees were over 4" tall and easily hid any and all aircraft,so something had to be done.

SAGA Iliad: The Lykians

I had a request to do a Lykian (Lycian, Lukka) board for our Iliad project. However, it has been a week coming - since I've started a new job. However, the wait was worth it (I hope) and I have drawn up a board that is pretty close to the Achaean one, with the addition of the 'Apollo' ability - one of Apollo's epithets was Lycian Apollo - and the 'Chiron' ability, like all the other factions get in Saga Iliad. 

SAGA: Propainter's Viking Archers

The 'pro-painter' has been busy and has completed the last of my Viking Archers, originally bought for Ragnar Hairy Pants' warband.

I haven't based these properly, since I have decided to go get some more GF9 magnetic round bases to put them and any future single-based troops on. It does add to the cost of the army but is very useful.

Flames of War: Thoughts on V3 roads

Flames of War V3 has made some big changes to the mobility of transports and other light vehicles, like recon. The aim of this (well this and their new magical abilities like the shield spell on recon and the summon at will power on transports) is to give them more of a role in the game.

Flames of War: Rota Surround Hungarians on the Southern Front

More Flames of War! When I proposed the Ironman challenge, I was keen to get going with my Armoured Panzergrenadiers. However, two games in, I have had to be the allied player both times. On Thursday, I was up against John's (Than's) Hungarian Motorised infantry. Way back early on in V2 he drew a line in the sand and said goodbye to all LW gaming and got rid of his (more effective) Germans and Soviets. What he tends to run now is Hungarian mechanised and armour. That's right, he set the 'Ironman Challenge' years before I wised up to the stodgy mess that V2 had become around here (should have been apparent to me by Tempest '08). In true V3 fashion, the mission was randomly determined - Surrounded. He rolled to be defender. The Hungarians had: HQ and 2plts Vet Motorised infantry, Nimrods (the point of the exercise), Pz 38ts, and Pz IV F2s. He also allegedly had Sporadic air. I had the Soviet Rota: HQ, truck mounted AA and 2plts, with mortars, of fearless trained Razvedki. Then the support was Conscript T-34s and SU-122s. So how did the Soviet tip of the spear fear in Southern Ukraine?

Epic EA Atreides: Report and progress

Jason and I got our game in on Tuesday. Sadly, I think I need *more* terrain but do have a 'theory' or two, and the sheet draped over some hills and weighted down (that's the lines of stones) into some gullies, worked pretty well. For those of you that like that kind of thing, Jason had 3000pts of Speed freaks with all manner of things, including a huge GW war machine that looks like it was designed by a schoolboy as a laugh... (seriously, nipple and crotch guns?) My list was: Four Devastator detachments, two with Hunter AA and one with Landraider, Two lots of Fedaykin (Terminators) in a Thunderhawk, with Chaplain (Korba!), two lots of Ornithopters (Landspeeder Tornados) and one lot of Predator tanks. We played the proper tournament mission, with all its multiple objectives. The objectives are circled in red. Neither of us could properly remember the rules.... so who emerged victorious from that chaos?

SAGA Iliad: Odysseus fights Hector near the Scamader

Jason managed to make it round after work, on Thursday. Fresh from doing VERY well vs Achilles and his Myrmidons, he was sure that Odysseus and the men of Ithaca would prove to be little trouble. The two forces met near two fords over a tributary to the mighty river Scamander.We were fighting here because this is the only 28mm terrain I have that is passingly suitable for SAGA Iliad - the general lack of snow is an issue. Something must be done methinks. Anyway. 5pts, no great heroes: Jason had Hector, Hearthguard (1pt), Warriors with bows (1pt) Two units of 12 Warriors (3pts). I had Odysseus (not feeling as heroic after his drubbing at the hands of Achilles), Eight Companions (2pts) and three units of eight warriors (3pts). So who won eternal fame this day? 

Epic EA Atreides: Terrain

One more week until I start the new job and must use my time productively. Our lawns are only so big but fortunately Jason texted midday to suggest we play Epic Armageddon.
This was the perfect opportunity to do something with my stalled terrain project from last year. Basically, if I am not playing, I do not progress the terrain. Epic's scale is 1/300 or 6mm so no point making things hyper-detailed as none of us have the eyes to see the details, outside of photos. The game didn't pan out, hopefully tomorrow. The deadline was useful though. Here is what I got done.

Flames of War: My first V3 game

Chris has already done a 'serious report' so I am going to run this in my usual style. 

The Mission.... Was the crazy new two ambush 'Hold the Line'. The Soviets defended in this one, a probing action somewhere in the Ukraine - forced to halt a German counterattack. A four platoon force (as I thought when building it, but it was actually five?) defends with all of its forces in ambush. both of had air and both of us had AA and there are no trees because all of mine (in honour of the massive trees outside a former flat) are much too large for this absurd new world where terrain can block the LOS of AA to enemy planes. Numerous new trees are on order!

Impetus: Basing for our 8cm frontages.

I've fielded a few questions from people interested in Impetus about how our basing system works. Jason and I initially started out with the 'proper' 12cm frontages for 28mm but found that the battlefield was too cluttered and it got in the way of our fun. So we followed Craig's lead and went for 8cm frontages instead.

Here is a quick rundown for how I've done it and some comments on how to make the basing a bit more flexible.

More SAGA!: Halfdan's tale.

More SAGA! Adam has got his Varangians all assembled and blacked to we had a clash, last Sunday.  The idea behind his army was to basically field these cool Varangian figs he found (and he is a big Eastern Europe nut) along with some Gripping Beast Slavs. That works well in this game as Harald Hadrada can have up to twelve Varangian guard and there is no reason why the supporting troops can't be Slavs, instead of Vikings. For this game, he had: Hardrada 1pt, 2pts of Varangians (one unit), 2pts of Warriors (two units), and one point of Levies (one unit). Halfdan was defending England with 2pts of Huscarls with Dane-Axes (one unit), three units of warriors (3pts) and a unit of Levy Bowmen (1pt). The goal, kill the enemy Warlord! Was Hadrada to meet another untimely end on English soil? 

SAGA Iliad: Progress

We finally got to give my SAGA Iliad mod a run at the Cavs last night. Poochie ran Achilles (using Ivo the Norman from the Official lists) and I ran Odysseus (using an even more unpronounceable Welsh Hero). The outcome of that little clash can be seen here. See, it was all a ruse to get the wayward kid Achilles to do the work of posting up the batrep!

Impetus Batrep: Shamlessly borrowed my battle-plan from 'Gladiator'

Impetvs! Still no WOTR for me but I really like this game and Jason suggested 400pts. Awesome, a full multi-command game. Jason had the German list from Extra Impetvs 2 and I had, in true Gladiator fashion, Marcus Aurelius' forces (Middle Imperial Romans) led by a general that has Maximus' looks and dog, but none of his smarts. Exhibit one was giving an independent command to that Muppet Quintus. I don't have the German list but it was essentially plenty of their cool cav with integral skirmishers (allowing them to shoot on the charge) and then another command that had about five large units of German light-foot warband, the tough long-spear kind that my Sarmatians have an intense dislike of.

SAGA: Thracian Battleboard for the Iliad

Andy is getting into SAGA using some assorted Numidians and Near-Eastern figs that he has. He is going to run them, as Thracians so I've done up a battle-board.

Flames of War Ironman Progress

Despite missing out on 'Day of Days 2012' and generally not actually playing Flames of War at all last year, I've been plugging away at a new army. My contribution to the Christchurch Ironman challenge is coming along. I've got my copy of V3 now and some AA half-tracks (because Air seems nasty) and a new plan for the army. I've decided to do the Ironman thing properly and chuck out my usual practice of taking two mobile AT platforms. This army is for Midwar and for that period, my only tank will be a Tiger I - though I might get a second StuG to field a pair of those or better yet get some plastic PzIIIs.

February 22, 12:51pm

I've been looking at my post-count. My last post right before the Earthquake was 'The Ill-Omened 100th post' and I am almost at 200 but have been holding off.

I'll be at my son's school at 12.51. A school where the pool had been saved from closure due to budget constraints by over a year of hard PTA work and community fundraising and then... Maybe it will be back in a year or two if a grant can be found somewhere and like everything else in Shakey Chch it is another case of everything 'sorta working' - another is me going to a job interview with a large organistion that is temporarily working out of student accommodation.Or the roads. Or take your pick.

I've never been much of one for counting the quakes but I will say that the last aftershocks I really noticed were those around Christmas - though there was one recently, at night, that actually made me pause in case it was going to actually be something and wake the kids up to remind them of where we are. Just last weekend my son brightened up to know we were doing some shopping out at Hornby - for so many weeks it was the stable and functional place we could go every Saturday and he still feels like it is 'getting out of Christchurch'. So it's a kind of very mixed progress here.

So today is a sad reminder of the deaths and the many cases of people still existing in poor conditions, with a lot of work still to be done. I know many feel that, as so many things improve for others in Chch or so many people have already relocated when things were terrible, that their situation has been 'written out' and people do not understand. I can't claim to understand but I haven't forgotten what is going on for a lot of people.

Impetus Batrep: Ersatz Byzantines vs Khan Aspurahk

With the army finally complete, Adam was keen for another game of Impetus so we had another 250pt clash at the Cavs. Our armies were similar to last time: The Bulgars with Khan Aspurahk leading a block of three shock CM Cavalry, two wings of CL Horse archers, and some skirmishers on light horses. My Ersatz Byzantines were forced to take the same core of four Legionaries but swapped out the light Cavalry and some skirmishers from last time to add a balista and some of the fearsome Sarmatian Cataphracts. My Lanciarii Skirmishers were gone from the list but I now had two units of the supporting bow for the Legionaries. Most importantly, Constantine IV was long gone up the road to Byzantium and had taken his idiot cousin with him. Who then emerged as King of the Hill?

Dystopian Wars: Ragnorak (P)

Since the furious battle between the Empire of the Blazing Sun, The Kingdom of Britannia, The Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Federated States of America had led to considerable losses on all sides but the Americans in charge of the base, all the rest had been content to leave well enough alone.  Today however, John's Austro-Hungarians made a daring assault where none else had dared so far to tread: The research station at the 'Eyrie'. There he made a surprising discovery, a new FSA prototype....