FoG Test Game

Well I finally got round to trying out the Field of Glory rules in a solo game. I felt that I had the basic combat rules in my head but realised I would have to go stage by sage for a few turns to get all the different sections to fit together. I wanted to have a fair mix and also make it worth my while I used seven Macedonian against 11 Persian and set up with the traditional cavalry on each flank, heavy foot in the centre with skirmish troops to the front. But a couple of points, first up I have yet to paint up any Command for the Macedonian so I used a Persian Command stand and EHC stand from the Persian Cavalry not used. I also have not painted up the one camp I have so I used no camps at all.

Another good point is that the table is not a gaming table so it was rather narrow and not long enough. Good enough to move a few units, no where near what would be required if I was playing a real game.

The pike start on the long hill flanked by the Cretans and the lightspear armed LC. My plan was to move the pike each and every move to try and get into contact. I should have used the double move on these guys but never thought of it during the game! It was great to get freshly painted units on the table.

Facing these I had two units of Hoplites with two skirmish units out front, slingers and Persian bow whilst a medium lightspear unit flanked them. Nothing new for the Persians other than rebasing, the only question was would the more experienced but worn Persians beat out the shinny shinny new guys?

The first physical contact was between my venerable Persian HC and the just painted Prodromoi LC armed with Lance. First they had to pass a complex test just to charge. This they did. I was really looking forward to seeing how these guys could stand against HC. On the plus they had lance but being lights they lost one die in two in the Impact Phase. The + status for Lance was not that great of a bonus when you loose 50% of your dice, especially when they loose that bonus due to having a lower armour class. In the system you have three kinds of combat. Shooting, obviously but also Impact where just the front row gets to fight and only those in direct contact, no overlaps here. Lastly if both units remain in contact then you have melee. Though in reality shooting is normally sandwiched between the two close combat phases.

I found that whilst the rules worked well and as you use the same mechanics for all three combat mechanics were lumped together that whilst learning the rules it meant that much searching was required. The page labels letting you know what rules are covered on that page and indeed in the coming/preceding pages was useful but would be even better if the index and rules were better organised. I would prefer to have 50 more pages and some duplication to the constant dead end reading. Better yet instead of the rather annoying, 'Discussed Later' would have been a page number reference to where you would follow on the rules. After all when you look up shooting and read the section called shooting would it not be normal to expect shooting mechanic's to at least feature in that section of the rules?

In fairness once you get your head around the fact that much of the book really is padding and that the rule mechanic's for all combat is really never in the section labeled as Impact, Shooting or Melee and is in fact in 'The Combat Mechanism' and the results of this are in 'Cohesion Test' life gets a little less cumbersome. The fact they separate these two sections with another chapter speaks volumes of why it would be better to play with an experienced player.

Whilst the Prodromoi was tussling with the HC I also charged in on the opposite (Persian right) flank Eastern LC and against normal play stood the Saka LC against them. Whilst the Prodromoi managed to hold out through good dice and would eventually be defeated by the addition of another HC unit the Saka was fairly quickly put to rout. OK it took a couple of turns but each combat saw them loose a base.

The Persian Crescent Shields faced off against the Thereophoroi whist both units of bow faced off. I was happy to stand back with the bow but as the Cretans were getting the worst of the engagement I sent them into contact as well. Both melee's worked out for the Macedonian force with the quality re-rolls working for the Cretans. It's a mechanic I like.

The view from the Persian hill as the Greek Hoplites await the mass pike phalanx. The slingers were having no effect on the pike whilst the Persian bow was starting to fail.

The Macedonian view of things. No way was the Greeks going to come looking for trouble.

So as to speed up the demise of the Persian bow the phalanx moves to support the Cretans and it was all over for them from there. Both sides had beaten opposing flanks and the Persians were losing the screening forces. I had already started to move the as yet untried Companion Lance armed Cavalry to face off against the two Persian HC units which would be supported by the reduced strength lightspear armed LC. I would possibly be able to throw in the Medium Infantry but this would leave the phalanx facing the two hoplite units with little support.

End of the game. It had taken 4+ hours and to be honest I was happy to finish here. Further reading of the rules will only show up mistakes in the use of the rules and allow for a better understanding of what to do. I have previously stated that I really want to like the rules as I have invested both money (rules and 2 army lists) and time (rebasing one army and building another) but whilst a few rules are not yet sitting right I already prefer them to the Impetus light. However with Barry now owning the full rules and list III I will get a chance to play the full version. Something that I am looking forward too. My gut feeling though is that when I play Barry I will play Impetus, even looking at putting together a army for it! But when I play Lee and Matt we will swop heads and play FoG. Impetus would have to be a marked improvement to FoG to get me to re-base again and at this point it would take a lot of convincing. Still with only one game of FoG and no full Impetus I could have my mind changed fairly quickly.

Now I need to get that 2nd Phalanx finished and onto a few command stands for the new boys.

Cretan Archers and Prodromoi Are Go.

I have been rather fired up this past week or so with my Macedonian army. What with a possible game on the horizon and the painting competition I really wanted to get going. The rules of the contest were quite clear, to count the figures could not be painted before the 20th but could be cleaned and undercoated. Well I cleaned and sprayed 8 Prodromoi (LC with Lance) and 16 Cretans but I also cleaned up 32 Pike as well. I had already planned to paint the LC next but the ease and speed of the Cretans made me choose them as the second unit. I did feel that would be in with a good chance of leading the way with such a bunch, well dream on Ian as I was quickly enlightened by some truly good and fast painting. I think I am in 7th place and the leaders are so far ahead I don't think they need worry for a few weeks even if they stop painting!

Oh well, good job it still serves as a great vehicle to drive me on, like I really needed it.

I was expecting the Prodromoi to paint really quickly as they only have a helmet and tunics and cloaks are not the slowest items to paint. Well tunics with four colours on the chest and another colour on the sleeves are not the fastest either! I am not sure the final result was worth the effort though as it neither stands out nor really looks that great when you look for it.

What I did like though was the leopard skin on the horse, it was fun and fairly quick to do and for the most part looks effective. The pink helmets and lighter pink cloak and tunic are correct and I await Matt taking revenge on my calling his Companion Phalanx, 'Smurfs' all those years ago. Especially as they are on the painting table right now waiting for Farther Abraham to turn up.

The whole unit ready for action. The unit is a mix of two poses that are almost the same and work well together. I was intrigued by this unit as the idea of mixing LC and Lances was very interesting. It seems to only be used in one of all the Macedonian lists I have so will only get action when playing the Alexandrian Macedonian army. My daughter loves them as they are pink and keeps asking me if I like pink, oh the shame.

I struggled with what colour to paint the tunic's, white seems the new Vogue but I remember Matt's red ones with a very keen memory. I knew the red would stand out so went with the original plan. I painted them scarlet and when I added the wash this really came to light. You get 8 figures per pack and I really only needed 12 figures but painted up the whole lot as other lists may use them all and besides I needed the points.As a unit they look rather pleasing to my eye and I am 100% happy with the colour choice.

I used two different colours for the leather belts but they ended up looking fairly close to each other. If you look close you can tell but rather disappointing. More than making up for that though is the leather hats, these I mixed up the colour and they turned out exactly as I saw in my head, how often can you say that?

Now I have stated work on my second Phalanx which at 32 figures is much smaller than the 48 figure block but I already have the colours fixed in my head and I hope to get it finished in the next two weeks. Within that time frame I want to get the casualty markers I am also working on finished and based as well as the sniper markers for ASL. After that it will be more Sniper Markers, some Macedonian Command bases and more Lance armed Cavalry, this time a little heavier.

Christmas Spirit

Well I hope you all had a great Christmas Day and gave and received presents that went down well. I tend to supply a list of what I want, or as often is the case I order the stuff myself as it's so specialised and as you will know it does matter if it's not quite the right item, be it figures or other games stock.

Well this year it was all about the kids as I lost my job in July then found out two months later it had literally saved my life as I have a genetics issue that was going to kill me and work nicely masked it. The only problem with this is it meant no work for me for 6-12 months due to the advanced state of the ISSUE. This means money is on the tight side so no presents for us. As the big day got closer and we worked out the kids were sorted and we had a little left over we decided to splash each other. Well to late to get my normal candy (ASL stuff) and really not much I needed in the way of hobby stuff this became the first Christmas in years that I did not get anything remotely war related on the day. I did get some rather nice Precision dice for ASL from a good friend Olli who sent them through early in the month which was a real treat. This got me thinking just how great this hobby of ours is. At this point I am talking of the wider hobby, I think when the chips are down for one guy others pick up the slack but when you go deep, in this case Olli and the ASL community which is a sub group it goes even deeper. When I mentioned I could not get to a four day games convention next year (I have gone for the last three years) Olli quickly got enough guys together to pay for the hotel, entry and food for the full weekend and a lift to and from Blackpool (I live in the Midlands), hell he was fairly confident they could have payed for me to get to ASLOK (In the US), very heart warming, though in this case I can't accept as it is doubtful I would be fit to make much of it, but hell that was nice!

So when an old friend contacted me having heard I was ill and we got chatting I mentioned that about the only thing I can do without falling asleep or making myself very tired was painting figures he did no more than search out his old and long given up on project, that is a rather large Seleucid army and brought it over last weekend.

Given that at the rate I have been painting I should run out of figures sometime around March, this is just plain fantastic. Well the main objective is to improve me waking day (painting also makes me more alert and if I feel really busted if I can get myself to paint it brings me back into reasonable shape. My consultant (an ex-roleplayer/painter) recons it's because your brain uses various areas of the brain. If I sit and read I am asleep in 15 minutes and wake up wicked. Anyways I thought great I can paint them for him and he can have them back to sell or whatever.

Well Martin really is not interested, just happy for me to have them and when I have painted them I could sell or keep. Well in all honesty it would allow me a massive force choice. I already have 2/3rd of the pike I needed for the current project. Well I have more than enough but I have 2/3rd's of the MAXIMUM is what I have! But other armies allow even more so now I will have enough Pike to do anything. The extra Companion Cav will bring me up to speed and this box is packed with Cataphracts, a mix of painted and unpainted. In fact most of the stuff is unpainted and some will

need to be cleaned and started again as they are part painted and it would be hard to d in my style. Others just need finishing off or re-basing.
It's a big army, the pics don't really do justice but for instance it has 6 Indian Elephants and 10 camels. I think I counted 96 pike. Looking at the FoG list which are not known for frugal figure counts I would not need to buy many figures to max out this army. I guess when Triples comes round it will be all terrain and 6mm Naps

So a big thank you to Martin and watch this space for seeing these guys started. I don't plan to touch them until I have a playable Macedonian

army done. But the other surprise was another 15mm army in the bottom of the box, this one is a Orc and Goblin army!!! well I counted about 400 15mm Ancients and the Fantasy army must ring in about 300 so that is a lot of lead and enough to keep me going to way past Derby. All in all a good catch. I also have a few other projects I have promised to do so no worries.

Crash Bang Whallop

I painted these figures over twenty years ago and I am still rather proud of them. (That is apart from the one on the right as this was painted two weeks ago). I wanted to add an extra twist to the bases so did a number of casualties. The left most is starting to fall whilst the guy next to him I simply cut the bow from his hand and bent it up to his head. The third conversion also needed a little more work. Folding the front legs back and leaning the horse forwards made the rider seem to pitch forward so I cut the axe out of his hand and again mover the arm forwards towards the reins s it looks like he is trying to grab for them whilst his axe is hanging in the air behind him in it's fall to the floor. I was very happy with that.

Close up of the action. As I was rebasing I took the opportunity to gather these figures together in two bases and used some of the tuft's again. Now these figures are veterans that have seen many a game. It's been a lot of fun pulling them out, touching them up and rebasing them. I just hope they can be as annoying under FoG as they were under 6th.

Close up final shot. I even remember painting these guys, at the time it seemed like I spent forever on them and as each figure was painted separately it took much longer than a series of the same figures. Been great to share these with you, new stuff will follow just as soon as they are based and the 24 hour delay is up. Look for sometime soon after Christmas Day.

Armies on the March

These are the last figures I painted before the Challenge began on the 20th. I just did not get the chance to set them up for Cath to do her stuff. First up are the Macedonian Companion Cavalry. I had a total of twelve of these fellows when I started painting them and now have another twelve that I will try to match up some time after painting up the figures I have lined up already. I have also started to try out the Tufts, these are The Army Painter Swamp Tuft and whist £4 a pack seems expensive you can get a lot out of a pack.

The figures are Chariot, supplied by Magister Militum in 15mm, this has always been my favorite supplier as by and large they are well detailed and fairly free from flash. Some of the more recent though have not been as fresh but still good. The problem with zooming in like this is that they look like they are holding telegraph poles.

All twelve with slimmer looking lances and with the flash the colours come out more true. These as before are based to Field of Glory so are 3 figures to a base. I have 4 bases out of a possible 6 in the standard army but the rest will come into use in the other Successor armies. I also have waiting their turn the Agema and have finished waiting final touches the Prodromoi light cavalry with lance that I really want to get on to the table top.
So what could possibly stand up against these? Well when I paint something new I have been rebasing something old, so here is the Persian HC.

These will sit along side about the same again so it's fair to say that at this point the Companions are a little outnumbered.
Anyone having read other recent posts will also be aware that I was painting up some new Saka and Skythian light cavalry. These were shown off unbased recently but have been also based up. Seems they know a good thing when they see it and have joined the Persians.

Not to bad, the twelve new Saka have been added to the previous figures and the whole lot had a bit of a spruce up. I now have more Skythian bow armed cavalry than I will be able to use in any list except the Parthian which is already taken. Maybe I will sell off the extra once I am all sorted for what I will need, especially as well errrrr, you see............ I have been given yet more of them! More on that in a later post but lets just say I have enough Pike for any Macedonian army.

The Works

Just a quick heads up for UK based (or visiting) boardgamers. The Works who are a discount bookshop have up for sale 20 or so different titles of games from Rio Grande and Queens Games all of which are £7.99 each. The games range from War of the Ring:The Dual (yes LotR's) two player to the large Euro's any one who have seen Rio Grande will recognise. Now these games are not the El Grande etc. end of their catalogue but some of them have good scores on BoardgameGeek so it's worth checking them out. They also have them on sale on their website but the range is much smaller.

I Picked up a couple, one for the kids and the other for the wife and plan to raid them again after Christmas as Cath would not buy me one.

Saka Horse Archers

I wanted to show off the 12 Saka 15mm horse archers that I finished painting last night. I could not wait till after they have been based as they are being mixed in with 22 other mixed horse archers which gives the battle groups a more irregular feel. Once based I will throw some more pics on as well as pics of the Persian HC that I have rebased and the Agema HC that I finished painting last week. No more painting for me till the 20th though, no Sir, until then it will be clean and spray, clean and spray.

I really like the pose and I think these are Museum Miniatures but in honesty I am not sure as I picked them up off e-bay a couple of weeks ago as I was short by two figures for the maximum. A few casting issues between them though. About half of them are missing the end of their feet (one and sometimes both) whilst two figures have a gap in the bow, a real shame when the figures overall are really good, maybe this was the reason for selling them.

Each figure is painted different which added a little to the time but not as much as expected. One thing I missed until half way through painting is the lack of reins which was a surprise. Still it was one less bit to paint right at the end. I blue tack my figures to bottle tops to aid painting, some 6mm go on lolly sticks. The kids step up to the challenge when ever I need either.

Another close shot and to be honest they do look better a little further away, but not to shoddy. These are now glued to their bases and awaiting the first stage of flocking.

Last close up, this time the other side of the figure, no side arm on these guys and the main difference between them and the others is the rug rather than cloth to sit on. These really add to the mix I have and are in the top three of 6 or more poses I have within the group. Looking forward to finishing them and getting them all snapped. I still plan to continue rebasing the Persians each time I come to base up a Macedonian unit as I have loads yet to do but already I have way more than the basic army done. Over the next week I hope to get a practice game in, my game with Barry has been postponed and Christmas will get in the way of some opportunities but at some point I will get these and others on a table. I have a game with Matt over the holiday period booked, just need a day but not what we will play as yet. Watch out for the next lot of pics!

Of Mice and men

OK OK I stole the title, but it does seem kind of right. Blog hopping as I do I found on one of my favorite blogs details of a painting competition I could enter and not only that but possibly hold my head high. No not a contest you have to be blind to join but one that is not based on quality of painting but amount you paint! Whilst I am not too shabby with my painting I am not in the league of some of the guys who run blogs so this contest was of interest. With a little digging I son wound that a friendly rivalry was going between not just this great blog I follow but another I really like as well. Great, I can have some of that! So over I go to the blog Analogue-Hobbies to check it out only to find it in the process of accepting the last entry. A quick sign up attempt and e-mail to confirm interest and lucky me I got in (20th entry). Well one more guy from Spain got in behind me so now we have 21 and that will be it.

The idea is that we have to paint as many figures as possible between 20th December and 20th March with points assigned based on size and a little fudging by the Judge for any reason he feels apply, which is reasonable enough given the shenanigans we wargamers are known for. Also we have to paint one of his figures for him, in this case a viking which I will look forward to doing for sure. The rules are fairly straight forward, figures can be cleaned and primed but no painting should have been started and have to be finished, that is based to count. We just send in a pic or three as we complete our figures and basically rib each other silly (well that's my plan). So since the joining I have been painting myself silly, after all I was about half way into 12 Saka horse archers and have 34 to base as well as a few Persian HC, well these are now all painted and the start of basing has been done. This time tomorrow they will be done and dusted.

Good Luck to my opponents and I am sure when the paint settles we will have all had the most fun and nearly as important a few more figures painted than otherwise.

Field of Glory go Napoleonic

Osprey/Slitherine will be releasing a set of Napoleonic rules to compliment their Ancients and Renaissance sets. These will be released in March of next year (in time for me Birthday). I could not get much from the website but it will use Battle Groups and mentions correct formations so I assume it will really be more directed at 15mm and larger, possibly 10mm but not block based 6mm. It will be interesting to see what comes from these rules and how they differ from The Ancients, but then again I have yet to get the Renaissance rules for my ECW army and don't feel any rush, first I need to get the Ancients down.

The rules are listed at £25 and can be pre-ordered via the Osprey Website.

The Battle of Foz d'Arouce, Preview.

Newstead Abby May 2011

The French under Ney, are being forced out of Portugal by Wellington's combined Anglo-Portuguese army. Late in the afternoon Wellington caught up with Ney as he was trying to get his army over the Rio Ceira at a small town of Foz d'Arouce. Normally this could be done via the bridge and the ford but due to the heavy rain the use of the ford is only possible by the Cavalry.

The French are drawn up ready to fight it out but are outnumbered and several regiments are already disorganised and have taken a pounding in the retreat so their combat effectiveness has been reduced. I as Nay will have to try and balance force preservation with the ability to hold the west bank of the river. Night is not far off but I am not sure this will be much help once battle is joined. Wellington (Barry) will try and drive my troops into the river smashing my force as I try to have one foot on either side of the river. Already outnumbered this really does no seem the smart thing to do but I am told this was not Nay's brightest day.

Rather than the normal fight till you destroy your opponents army, this battle can be won by the side taking the hardest pounding if they play it right and go after Victory Points.

These are:-

Each side gets

2 VP's for an enemy unit routed off board

2VP for control of the farm of Poisao,

2VP for control of the town of Foz d'Arouce

2VP for controlling the ford

2VP for controlling the bridge

The French

1VP for each unit on the at start side of the river.

Allied

5VP no French on the at start side of the river

5VP for each Allied unit on the opposite back of the river.

A nice set of conflicting VP's that rather force the French players hand and make him at least stand and fight for part of the battle. The scenario idea is lifted from the board game Fuentes De Onoro 1811 and is the first scenario from the game. It comes with 3 battles (about 6-7 scenarios) over three maps. I choose this one as it's the smallest and seems easy to port across. The boardgame is produced by the French Company VaeVictis in both English and French and the company have a solid reputation. The game is next week so you won't have to wait too long for the result. Polemos rules will be used for the game itself so these get another airing.

French Dragoons Enter The Battle

I like many have a tendency not to like painting horses and 6mm horses are no better, well were no better. Seems the time since I last painted horses and now I have grown to not really worry about it. Better still when it came to painting these guys I actually enjoyed it, possibly the time pressure being much reduced and the expectation of using them in a coming game have all added to the fun, whatever I have to say I enjoyed painting these and have 2 regiments of Hussars on the table waiting their turn. Above is the 19th Dragoons all ready for action

The figures are 4 Regiments of Baccus and 2 of Irregular Miniatures I had left over. I will compare them towards the end of the post.

All six regiments lined up on a hill awaiting orders to fight their first battle. Until now all I had finished was the five Hussars and six Lancer units, still got to paint up the Cuirassiers and for these I have 4 each of Baccus and Irregular so they are some way back on the list as in a pinch I can use some of the Prussians if really forced.

Two of the Baccus Regiments, the 19th and the 28th Dragons. I have painted the collars, turnbacks and rolls (over the ammunition boxes to the rear of the saddle) to fit specific Regiments. France had rather a lot of these Regiments so I have plenty to go at when I expand further.

The 23rd managed to get in the frame twice, this time sharing with the 13th. The 23rd is one of the two Irregular units.

Now the 23rd share the stage with the 30th, both Irregular which means the only time the 7th gets in on the photo shoot is the compare pics below, oh well at least they will get Battle shots.

Compare the Dragoon.Com. On the left we have the Irregular and the right Baccus. The Baccus are to start off slightly larger and more filled out figure which helps to give more detail to the figure. Also what needs mentioning the Irregular are somewhat old castings I have had for 15+ years whilst the Baccus were probably cast in the last few months. This in fact favours the Irregular because their molds unless replaced in the last few years were showing their age and I know at least one guy who has taken figures back to them after buying them at a con due to the heavy flash and poor detail. Still £ for £ they are really a great price but even looking at the price of Baccus since the price rise they are a fair price for what you get.

The Irregular being on a base of 4 figures facing forwards means both the sculpting and painting options are reduced. The feet of Irregular horses are all joined together whilst the Baccus are 4 legged creatures and what's more they stand on their own 4 feet! This also means that when basing they are nice and regimental, lovely straight lines and all. Great if that's what you want, not so good if you like a more realistic wave line. Talking of Regimental, the lack of any pose other than musket raised leaves me a little cold. No Trumpeter, no Officer, no character and that's where they really start to lag behind for me. Then add the extra detail of Baccus (some of the detail on the Irregular is painted on where it is obvious on the Baccus figure forcing you to include it. It was a joy to paint them, glad I don't have 20+ regiments to paint at a time as they really do demand the attention and pay you back in spades for the effort.

So is it worth the extra money for Baccus? Yes on almost every level is my answer. Sure if you are starting out and you get the better cast Irregular it's a start and can help decide if 6mm Naps is for you. Painted weel like my Prussians then really they are as good as you will ever need, but not as good as you may ever want. Of course if you can start with a small force and work your way up I would say skip Irregular as you may well find yourself replacing what you have spent the time and money painting, whats more don't expect a good return on selling them as most are on the Baccus wagon and those that are not are as much Adler as any other.

More from Mr Postman and other stuff.

I bid and won a couple more E-Bay lots. These are a pair of Heroics and Ross wagons in 6mm for my Naps which are under the rules I am using at the moment are no more than battlefield furniture but were such a bargain I just had to go for it. These are already undercoated and if I had not already painted a bunch of horses would have been done straight away, but they remain on the painting table so may jump the cue yet.

The other item I bid and won was 12 Saka 15mm Horse Archers that I got for a little over the price of one pack. These are great looking miniatures. I needed just two more figures to complete my Persian LC allowance and as I have just de-based the rest of them ready for conversion to FoG I will paint all 12 up and mix in these figures with the rest giving me a yet more varied group. This is great as I already have about 6 different figures and with a few conversions already in place I will have 10 different poses over 24 figures. This will leave me with 5 bases more than I need which I will hold onto for now but possibly sell on or trade them off for other unpainted led.

E-Bay. Well the slingers were watched by 6 guys but none of them bid on them so they go to the back of the cupboard until the next convention and may well try to get rid on the bring and buy, shame as at £7 starting bid I had hopes to off load, anyone want them for that, just get in touch.

Met a couple of friends yesterday in London, one on his way back home to Australia, he very nicely gave me a Napoleonic board game that he picked up in Paris. Not only does it look a good game that I will try out in the coming weeks but I have to come up with a scenario for my Naps game with Barry and this game may well supply some inspiration for the game. Double value that one.

BatRep of Roman V Dacian Basic Impetus

Keen to play with these rules for a second time, we stayed with period for out next game. That's three games played two weeks between each, HOORAY.

Well that's something to cheer about, what is not is the epic fail of downloading the photo's from my camera, managed to delete them so no pics so you will just have to take my word for it.

Again we went with the Impetuous Light Rules but this time instead of the Gauls we played the Dacian force against the Romans. These are the free to download rules and armies from the Internet and are designed to act as an hook for the full rules. Well it looks like it is working as Barry is hoping Santa or the Birthday Fairy brings them for him. Well we certainly got a good game out of them. I had failed to get round to re-reading the rules but they are so basic it's not difficult to pick them up after just two weeks. We set up the terrain then diced for table sides and then diced for forces. I was keen to get the Romans again and was lucky enough to get them. Once we were set up and I looked opposite at the massed forces I was not so sure. A quick count of units and it was confirmed, Barry had 3 more units than me and as one of my units was ART B I felt he had 4 more! But three of mine are rather tough Legion guys and regards Cav mine again was of better quality. I set up with a double Legion (large unit - two made into one) centre right with the Art B and Archers centre left with the other Legion and my unit of Cav on my far left. My right itself was the two Axillia one behind the other. Three hills dominated my side of the field, two out front (one each flank) whilst the main one was angled through the middle with the crest forward of my start position. I planned to hold the left hill with my Cav and send my double Legion beyond the crest of the main hill. To make sure this happened I needed the Initiative in the first turn. I did not get it but Barry just sent skirmish units forward and so I was able to get the ground I wanted.

Both of us stood off each other with his skirmish line happy to send arrows at my unit whilst my archers and Art B fired on targets, neither really doing much. Barry wanted to get his Javalin armed skirmish unit into range and temped me to charge in with my Auxilia which rolled very well routing the skirmishers and clearing the way to push on the right. The stand off on my left continued for a while but with it becoming obvious I was not going to come off the hill Barry sent in some of his best troops, with support from behind. Now Barry was rolling something like 13 dice to my 7 so it did not look like I would hold for long but again I rolled well whilst Barry just got the one result so I knocked him back off the hill with loss. This was the story of the fight for these units all day until near the end after losing no casualties my Medium Cav destroyed the front unit of heavy infantry. Meanwhile in the centre I charged the bow armed skirmishers with the second auxillia but these evaded leaving me close to the Dacian main line. The medium unit facing me charged in with support but again the dice were kind and I survived the initial charge just disordered. My double Legion was making steady progress to support him whilst the Art B continued to keep the unit on my Auxillia's flank disordered and started to reduce it's strength. A archer unit had positioned itself so as to temp (I think force) me to charge it with the other auillia which again went well for me as I drove it over the right flank hill in some disorder. But in doing so it allowed a medium unit to get behind him. Fast forward two turns and he was the meat in a Dacian sandwich!

Over on the left the Med Cav was keeping the Heavy foot entertained so I moved the spare Legion forward to clear the medium foot and light horse away from my Cav. The medium foot was punished but in shear desperation to buy time to reorganise the foot Barry charged the lights into my Legion and the unthinkable happened. Yes I dropped it two levels with the Pilum but still they charged in and disordered me! From this point onwards the combination of medium foot crashing into my Legion only to be thrown back followed by his Light Cav rescuing the situation for yet another turn. It should not have happened once but it happened time and again. Sure I was wearing them down and it was really just a repeating freak of the dice but still it was interesting to watch it play out.

In the centre no such suttle action was in play. My Auxillia after standing against a supported attack was now driving the Dacians back mainly due to their reduced support as my Legions smashed into the best supporting unit and was to keep on driving until the unit was destroyed. The whole centre started to melt away and whilst my unfortunate Auxillia was being whittled down it was not being destroyed fast enough. This allowed the victorious Legions to turn about and join the rear of the melee and smash the medium unit. Meanwhile the Axillia in the centre turned to menace the Light Cav/Medium Infantry Combo. Quickly from here I managed to get the required points to break Barry's Army. I had suffered less than I deserved and in fairness Barry was diced rotten and not once did he moan. Though I think one die of his will be held in high esteem being about the only thing that kept him in the game, this being the roll a 1 die that was the start of the save roll.

It was great to get a game played to a conclusion and it's a real shame I have no pics as Barry had in the last two weeks flocked his bases and this really finished off the units.

Having played further into a game and being more astute to what was going on we started to pick holes in the rules. These holes will of course be filled by the full rule set but for the most part we were able to work out something reasonable and now plan to work a few of these observations into the rules we are using at the moment. Obviously a lot depends on when we get the full rules and if we like what it brings. For me when you play with so few units I don't want to get too bogged down and think we could make the basic version work well for us. Next up for me will be some sample playing of the Field Of Glory rules. First on my own to get a feel for them and reduce the page turning in a face to face game and then probably with Lee over the Festive Period. Matt also wants to try them so again plenty of opportunity to test drive them.

Next up for Barry and me will be a small 6mm Naps Battle with his newly painted Brits that look just right for the scale. When he told me he painted them all in just 4 mornings my jaw dropped. No way could I have painted so much in so little time and made them look half as good. My only conciliation is that today I finished six French Dragoon Regiments, the subject of the next post.

Down On The Farm

Had these sheep, goat and dogs for a very long time (as well as the cows and pigs still waiting) and after painting shall we say more challenging projects I decided to take it easy with these guys. Finished them about a week or so ago. They are for my ECW project, I thought at the time it would be funny to have them dotted around in the background, way back before it was the norm to have diorama style battlefields. The pic is not a great one (yes I have done the last lot can you tell?) but the sheep have more than a hint of yellow to their wool whilst the lamb's are a nice white.

Whilst on the subject of ECW, I am hopeful of getting a game using Forlorn Hope 2 in the coming month or two. Hope these are the answer to the rules search. I have a New Model Army fully done (though old and really needs fresh blood) and a Royalist Army still mustering. Matt has Parliament which I used to battle under Tercio Rules (5th edition?). I recently painted up a Regiment of Dragoons (see early post) and have one regiment of foot waiting painting, maybe get that on the table soon.

Talking of painting table. For a bit of a mix I have 12 Companions about a third of the way through being painted in 15mm and to keep with the cavalry theme have 8 regiments of 6mm French Napoleon's on the go. Six are Baccus and the other two are left over Irregular. Two of the Baccus are Hussar's whilst the rest are Dragoons. I still have four Irregular regiments of Cuirassiers waiting to paint with about the same of Baccus. No question that the Baccus have the better detail and look forward to posting pictures of the final comparison but at this point only the horses are painted so you will have to wait.

Waiting, that's a good one. Bought something else off e-bay the other day, but in this case it was for me. Two Heroic's and Ross wagons that I thought would add a little colour to the battlefield. Arrived two days ago and are sitting on the side of the painting table, these will fit into the que somewhere. As will the Reading haul. Lee is planning on dropping them off mid-next week so will wait happily for the chance to paw at this lot. Triples seems so far away.

Also waiting for Tuesday to turn up, I have a game planned with Barry, this time it's Romans V Dacian but we will be starting nice and early so will get the full game in. Well I say that but Monday I have my first Vivisection, supposed to be rather unpleasant which I do not understand as it's just Blood Donating without the biscuit.

But what I'm really waiting for (and very impatiently) is a trip to London on Saturday to meet up with a couple of ASL buddies, one I have met many many times but it's always a pleasure as he just radiates good will and fun, yep that's Dave. The other guy just happens to be an Australian not even visiting the UK, rather he is at a conference in Paris and is stopping buy for a chat!!! Never met the guy before but we have crossed swords on the battlefield so many times. Rob is an incredible bloke who I have EVER yet to hear moan about his dice, yep unbelievable!

And to think this post started with sheep.

Sassanid Persian Slingers 25mm

Picked up these figures on e-bay two weeks ago. The idea is to paint them and sell them on via e-bay and hope to make some on the deal to spend on figures I want. Since first losing my job and then finding out I have a long term illness I decided I did not want to spend money on the hobby unless I have generated it through painting or selling gear. I have a couple of guys who want me to paint for them but neither is quite ready (one will supply ASL kit and the other will supply extra figures of my choice, no money changes hands and all will be happy) so whilst waiting for other commissions to come through and these two I have decided to invest a little and try and get ahead, not that I am short of things to paint but I don't want to run low.

So I bought these guys but to be honest the castings are not the best in the world so I settled for a quick paint job, and hope to make a little on the original cost to buy more paint and brushes, at this point my wargames neutral is in the red.


They are based to Field of Glory, 14 figures over 7 bases. One slinger has a missing sling but can be made good. Vallego paint used for the most part and mat varnished (again Vallego). I offer it here first, £20 plus cost of postage, if no takers then it's off to E-Bay.

I also bought some 25mm Nap's which after doing some of my own figures I will make a start on them. On the painting table at the moment is 6mm Baccus and Irregular Cav (mostly Baccus) and the first of my Companions.

Hypaspists ready to go.

Originally I bought enough Hypaspists for a different set of rules but under FoG I am at least one base short (well technically I am 2 figures short). Fortunately Reading is this weekend and I have the figures ordered through a mate who will be there. Other than the shield I have used base colours so it will not be difficult to get the same results on the rest of the unit. I had enough figures for 5 bases of 3, this will go up to 12 bases of 3 figures. I had the choice of Heavy or Medium (3 or 4 figures a base) I went with three as I have plenty of Heavy options and felt the extra movement gained by being Medium was well worth the trade off. If I am wrong I will convert to Heavy.

Figures are Magister Militum (ALM7) 15mm and are the first figures I have had from these guys that I am not 100% happy with. A fairly heavy mold line runs down the face, from a distance this is OK but a lot of Macro shots could not be used as the faces of all the figures are disfigured. Worse though is the shields they have what can only be called a rough patch that makes painting an emblem on them a little tricky and whilst I hope it was just this batch I expect to find the next lot looking the same. Other than that they are very nice figures and once I have full battle groups I think they will be a presence on the battlefield.

A little thin on the table right now but it's another unit off the list. Till next week I now just have 12 Companion Cav and 24 Thracian Peltasts to paint. Still I need to get some kind of command figures for my Macedonian army, any suggestions?

Egyptian Hoplites Rebased.

One of three command bases of this group of warbands.

Continuing with the project of changing over from WRG 6th to Field of Glory I de-based not only my Egyptian Hoplites but also the rest of my Persian Heavy Cav as well as the Saka Horse Archers. However running out of heavy duty glue as I finished off the Hops meant that further rebasing will have to wait till after getting more glue tomorrow. However I of course could finish off the basing of the Hops as the flock and basing compound use watered down PVA. As per other re-basing efforts it was linked with having other figures to base but more on them in the next post. FoG allow me just 6 bases of these guys so once I am set for rules I can see the rest being up for sale. I remember them being a joy to paint but then again it was not that long after I had painted up plenty of Greek Hops so maybe that was an influence.



Two more stands had been re-based to stand in for Greek Hop's under this list. I will need about double the number I own of Greeks to make max out on FoG. Under 6th these would either fight as two or three units, of course I could use them as a base for yet another army but I think not.

Same unit but from behind, I really like the skin tone and will look out for the paint colour at Tripples next year as it was one of the paints that did not survive the hiatus. I am fairly sure these figures are Chariot Miniatures, long time has passed so not 100% sure. Colour Party was the paints of choice for me way back then and I still have a few left in good enough order to still use.

AAR Battle of Annes Table

OK so this was not based on any real action as sooooooo many games are not, but it was on Anne's table so thanks MUM. 44 years old and still nips over to Mum's to game, bless. Well given Barry lives across the road and we were using his figures it seemed the easiest option. Not sure the manufactures but these are all 1/72 (20mm) plastics (though the cart mounted Art was metal and for a guess Irregular Miniature). We diced for sides and I got the Romans which was interesting as I have never ever ever played with Romans before. The game just like the one two weeks before was just to try out the rules. This being Basic Impetus which Barry is keen on given that they suit small numbers of units and given the scale we will only use small numbers on such a table, though we could nip to the local games store and play on a huge table if wished as we will possibly do with the 15mm.

I personally had grave doubts about the rules though they read fairly well I know chunks of the good stuff were missing. Just like the game before we set at the same time paying no attention to the other players positions etc. Under the assumption that we would be over in a couple of hours we started later than normal but with about 3 hours play time, plenty.

Barry set up his Gallic force up on the left my Romans on the right. More or less a straight up set up, Barry had Cav on both flanks whilst I only had the one Cav unit but I set up archers in front of a legion and ART on the hill. The warbands kept behind the crest fearing my mighty ART. As we were both more interested in trying the rules than winning the game we both were keen to come to grips in ways that under other circumstances we would not even think of. That said Barry managed to tempt my Cav out wide on my flank by offering a target that I had every right to expect a quick conclusion. This move indeed worked and sprung his three chariots to drive towards the infantry flank. I sent one of the two Auxilia to face these, OK they won't stand for ever but they should cause some damage, meanwhile I sent a Legion to play with a unit of skirmishers not even bothering to use the Pilum in first contact. The only other action at this stage was the other wing of Cav charging my other unit of Auxilia on my extreme left flank.

The only action that was conclusive first off was my Legion against the skirmish troops. I rolled oh so high and killed them all giving me first blood. This just exposed a war band with support which I received a charge from but this time I did use the Pilum and to some effect. This was an interesting combat as it swung back and forwards till...........

Not the way you want to roll, especially when they were rolling five dice to your seven! I passed the Cohesion test and as such managed to soldier on. At that point I had still to loose any loss whilst both warbands were down two levels. This scrap went on to the end with first one winning then the other, dice were fairly even once the disorders started to kick in but Barry struggled to do much in the way of casualties to me and they have lots of levels to resist damage.

This was the story through out the game, one side then the other seemed to get the upper hand. On my left the Auxilia had been disordered by the Cav but thanks in part to being uphill I continued to stave off being beaten and slowly the casualties rose. Barry decided after being pushed back twice for one last charge and the rolls went all my way and another unit routed from the field. This would allow this unit that was still in good condition to remove it's disorder then attack the flank of the double warband approaching my two Legion units still unblooded in the centre. The bow troops really to this point had done little as they could not fire into melee and I was not about to charge into a fight. The last skirmish unit approached them and I let them have a fairly unimpressive volley of arrows before they crashed into me guys. Well I won and caused a casualty forcing them to break off. Now I had a double warband to face. OK stand, fire and die or run away? Hell it's only plastic, fire away and ooch two damage, both are handed on to the back unit so no disorder or problems for the front guys, still every little helps for the Legions awaiting the main event.

Oh the joy, these two warbands crash into my poor bow troops and what happens? just a disorder thanks to some epic die rolling by me and average by Barry. Now my boys would stand for another turn allowing my flank troops to recover and make preparations to go in on the flank.

On their right I was still fighting off the `yes we can roll four sixes' and in fairness this was still any ones game. Both had survived another round of combat and both sides were becoming brittle, one more push could well have seen the winner though with the Chariot battle raging to the end how I would have reacted if I had won was up in the air but only bad things would have come from a Gallic win of this mini-fight.

Those damned Chariots!!, they seem to me at least far far too powerful on paper. In the game they just could not get the job done. One unit of Auxilia held all three off for the whole game but only by dicing Barry turn after turn after... you get the idea. The only bonus I had was that after a couple of rounds I was never facing more than two a turn and towards the end his strength was falling and losing these Chariots would have been high point values and a major blow but I was not in best of shape.

Well what should have been the easy battle (two or three dice advantage throughout) was at the start just a case of no result and then slowly gong my way before swinging to Barry right up to being down to one level left at game end. Still I had managed to halt, loose my disorder and was ready for that last charge, good rolls would win me the action but Barry pipping me with just a one 6 more than I had would kill my unit unless I rolled a 1 on the cohesion test. I would probably need two rounds to finish him off so odds were in favour of Barry in this one.

Well the kids needed collecting from school so we needed to call it at that point but it had been lots of fun and I can see that these rules work well for the limited number of units in play. The acid test was that I wanted to play to the end and I wanted to play another game soon. So we will try these rules again in the near future, however they are not without warts.

You don't shoot as your opponent charges in which is a big deal if they had the 2nd initiative in the last turn and first in the next. It seems not to pay any attention to armour or if you have shields or not. I don't like the idea of passing a cohesion test and because your disordered you lose a casualty anyway, why bother with the test for single casualties. It seems to be that if a unit lost three CP's if like I did it passes the CT then only a disorder happens? OK I had -3 o the test but the unit had 6 levels so still 50% chance to pass. Just quick fire problems that we can work out/through with more in depth play and maybe a house rule or two. Of course the real objective of these rules is to hook you to the main rules and get you to buy them. Barry is hooked but I already have the hook from Field of Glory and will be trying these out with the 15mm. Not sure I want to play both full sets for the two scales though taking a few bits from full Impetus and installing in the basic rules appeals. Once FoG has had a few games and we are happy (unhappy) with the rule set then I want to try out Impetus, that is unless FoG rocks, but does any rule set really tick all the boxes?