Sunday, March 25, 2012

Old Glory Chinese

By batch of Old Glory Chinese arrived...so...I took out an assortment of miniatures and painted them up. I like to do this when I get a batch of varied miniatures in. In this shipment there are:

1. Heavy Cavalry
2. Medium Infantry
3. Heavy Infantry
4. Crossbow-armed Light Infantry
5. Light Bolt Throwers

I painted up a little of all of them except the heavy infantry - a painting sample of them is still in progress.

This army is of Wei...most of the units will be black as the primary color, but not all of them - not that it really matters. The black flags will be used to tie together the army.

A unit of artillery - bolt throwers

Heavy cavalry

Medium infantry

Light infantry - with crossbows

Friday, March 23, 2012

Farms for ACW Field of Battle

I made up a couple of "town sections" for Field of Battle that will be used in my American Civil War games. The represent a cluster of farm buildings rather than a town. In Field of Battle, only one unit at a time can occupy a town section, so it is only necessary to have enough room for one stand of the unit. Being farms, I decided that the cluster of structures should not be dense.


As my buddy Matt and I found out in a recent FoB2 game is that is is nice to have these little features dotting some of our battlefields. They provide great little strongpoints!

They are 6"X6" with the buildings a bit undersized. The buildings are chunks of 2X4.



Yankees occupy the farm.



Rebels plunder the Pennsylvania farm!

Monday, March 19, 2012

Song of Drums and Shakos - Old West Skirmish

We have been enjoying Napoleonic skirmish games of Songs of Drums and Shakos at the club meeting. And, recently, we played a game of the SDS "large battle" Napoleonic rules - which were pretty cool. In fact, these rules prompted me to take a couple of their features and slap them into normal SDS - and go all "Cowboys and Indians" with it!

Namely, I enjoyed the concept of "unreliable" troops who roll an average die when testing anything against their Quality rating...and...I liked the concept of activation failures giving the enemy an opportunity to "interrupt"! Also, we used a variation of the "Approach" rules for charging into melee.

So, my good friend Matt was over on Sunday and we threw some stuff on the table and gave it a try...I laid out the newly arrived Texas Ranch House from Miniature Building Authority and 6 civilian defenders. Attacking the homestead were 16 Apache warriors. Arriving at an unknown time would be 5 mounted U.S. Cavalrymen. We set up a wagon, a fenced in area and threw down many rocks and patches of grass and cactus to provide the Apaches with some cover out there!

A couple of the Apaches were armed with bows, and another couple only had tomahawks. Four of them were armed with captured cavalry carbines and the remainder were armed with repeating rifles (darn those unscrupulous gun traders!). One Apache, the Leader, was mounted. Two of the Apaches were designated as having Quality 3 and Combat 3 while the remainder were Quality 4 and Combat 2. Three of the Apaches were "Unreliable".

The six cowboys were all Quality 4 and Combat 2 except the Leader who was Quality 3 and Combat 3 - we called the leader "John Wayne" since the miniature is very much like the Duke! Five of the men were armed with repeating rifles and one was armed with a buffalo rifle.

The 5 cavalrymen were all Quality 4 and Combat 2 except the Leader who was Quality 3 and Combat 3. All were armed with single-shot carbines, revolvers and sabres. The four troopers were "unreliable" too (so, really, their Quality was variable).

The battle was great fun - the unreliable stuff was a hoot and the opponent being able to steal portions of the turn to interrupt was really fun and effective! In fact, the first loss of the game, a cowboy, was caused because of a failed activation that gave an Apache a shot!

In the end, the cowboys held out - the cavalry was almost worthless in this fight: they arrived much later than I hoped and just could not do much right other than look impressive on the mounts and cause the Apaches to move away. John Wayne was awesome - in many thrilling exchanges I think he took out like 10 of the Apaches himself!

The Apaches did manage to break into the house and kill three of the cowboys and also killed or chased off all but 2 of the cavalrymen. But the house held (in large part to John Wayne's excellent luck that day)!

Looking forward to the next attempt!













The Duke (Center)

Sunday, March 18, 2012

Napoleonic Spanish Campaign - Game 2

Not only was yesterday St. Patty's day, but it was game day - game two in our three game campaign. Both armies got a nice write up from Brent before the game:

The British
The British army, under the Duke of Wellington, have moved methodically toward their ultimate objective - Madrid. After having blunted the French attack at the Battle of Andujar, the British and their allies are in good spirits at the height of campaign season.


Hoping to press the advantage, Wellington has stolen a march on the French, but to no avail. The Spanish allied contingent is once again tardy, resulting in a delay that allowed the French to gain a position between the army and Madrid. While this is the homeland of the Spanish allies, Wellington has not managed to gain much advantage from the numerous bands of guerrillas nipping at the French army's heels. Compounding the situation are the bad maps the army is saddled with - little more than sketches, really.

As dawn approaches on the morning of May 17, muffled sounds of drums and marching feet are noticed in the distance, beyond a wooded river...

The French
Marshall Lannes is not pleased. The Emperor personally selected him to clean this mess up, and this is the army he is saddled with? The fiber of the army seems adequate - event though the army doesn't seem to possess outstanding quality units - they have shown that they fight well enough. The officer corps on the other hand...how could this be? Had the climate softened their wits? They would never have lasted in their postings if they were under the watchful eye of their Emperor.

Having barely arrived to the theater in  time, Lannes whipped the army into motion in just enough time to block Wellington's ragtag army near Talavera. Lannes felt as if he was preparing for battle as a blind man - the army had only a limited number of maps - bad ones - how could that be tolerated?


Lannes had learned through the years of hard fought battlefield experience, an army that marches to the sound of guns could usually overpower an enemy, if not through skill at least through numbers. The English army was so different from what he was used to fighting. A seemingly endless number of guerrillas and light troops pestered his army. No matter how much he tried to get a clear view of what the battlefield held for positioning his army, his scouts were scattered and reported back with limited, almost useless information.


However, Lannes had received reports that Wellington had positioned his army across the shallow river to his front. No doubt he was intimidated by Lannes' reputation...

So, before the battle, Brent - as the campaign master - had per-determined the modifiers for both army's Fate and Command Decision dice - and those results were woven into the narratives above! Very creative! Excellent work! Dovetailed with the rules system too...many of the words in the above are from the F & CD tables!

So, fresh of a rather brutal loss to the Allies, the French army was brought to battle in a surprisingly wooded area along a waterway. Delayed en-route to the battle, no doubt by the poor maps which plague both armies, the Light Brigade of the allied army was absent as the allies deployed aggressively in the woodline with English and Portuguese troops and artillery - a fine defensive position upon which they hoped the French would bleed themselves further.


Behind this line, more English and the Spanish deployed on the hillock, with cavalry screening the flank.

Opposing this, the French lines prepared to assault the enemy in the woodline. The best-rated French commander lead the attack, launching his troops into the Portuguese following an effective bombardment...and pretty quickly, the defensive line began to crumble. Both batteries were out of action and the Portuguese were fleeing. The flank of the remaining English seemed in jeopardy!

At the same time, the English and Spanish on the hillock sallied forth, but did not move to the center, rather they swung wide and smashed into the large bulge of woods on the French left. Here they met some successes - driving into the woods and drawing the French there into a fierce attrition battle.

On the other extreme of the field, the opposing horsemen lined each other up, with the French aggressively crossing the waterway. This movement was not well looked upon by the French commander!

Just as the French were about to completely smash the remaining defenders in the woods, the leader of the assault was unhorsed! (Editor's note: I seem to get a commander killed in each engagement, and usually at a really bad time...to the endless delight of my gaming friends! Quite funny really!). The general - being hit rather grotesquely just below his left knee - was heard to tell his weeping orderly to "stop crying, you'll have one less boot to polish now!" By the time a new leader got things reorganized, the opportunity had slipped by.

The British Light Brigade, marching to the sounds of the guns, had now arrived. But, they did something unexpected! They did not reinforce the crumbling center, as we French expected - they arrogantly and expertly advanced upon the French cavalry! A big volley doing good damage to my Dragoons...the French commander, reminding me of the folly of my maneuverings with the cavalry was not pleased! If fate, or my own foolish determination, had willed me to stay there and engage the infantry, we could have lost the battle and the flank. Luckily, I was able to extract the horsemen and prepare a battery to cover them. There was no further trouble on this flank - and my cavalry commander no doubt avoided arrest!

The game ended soon thereafter, with the English being out of Army Morale (having given us 3 additional points from their losses) and failing the test. The French had loss less than half of the Army Morale Points it had.

So, in terms of the battle, it was a solid French victory in my eyes - but perhaps the Army Morale losses for the English will factor more largely in the final battle?



Here are some pics...

Before the onslaught!





The defense begins to give way!


Chris and Greg tangle in the woods

Right fine gentlemen, this lot


Breakthrough! And a downed General!


Smart looking lines in this assault!

French cavalry withdraws

Attrition rules in the bloody woods!

Thursday, March 15, 2012

Walking Dead Characters for All Things Zombie

I dig the graphic novels and I dig the television show...and...I dig All Things Zombie (ATZ) by Two Hour Wargames. So, why not draft up some characters from the t.v. show?

OK, I will then! Here is a first pass at them. If you're a fan of the show and play ATZ, too - share your thoughts!

Rick Grimes

Police; Rep: 5; BA Pistol; Shotgun; Born Leader; Stone Cold

Shane Walsh

Police; Rep: 4; Pistol; Shotgun; Brawler; Poser

Lori Grimes

Survivor; Rep: 3; Pistol

Glenn

Survivor; Rep: 3; Bat; Semi-Automatic Rifle; Pistol; Agile

Andrea

Survivor; Rep: 3; Semi-Automatic Rifle; Pistol; Marksman

Dale Horvath

Survivor; Rep: 3; Semi-Automatic Rifle; Slow; Wuss

Daryl Dixon

Survivor; Rep: 4; Crossbow; Athlete; Knifeman

Monday, March 5, 2012

More Chinese

I got the last of the Curtey's Miniatures cavalry painted up...and...I got some Old Glory ordered up. What is on the way is some heavy cavalry, armored and unarmored infantry, unarmored crossbowmen and some light bolt throwers.

The new unit


Both units together


After that, time to go back to Curtey's for some things that Old Glory doesn't make: Fire Oxen, Camp/Supply stuff and peasant levies.

I also cranked out another "farm" town section for the coming battles. My pal Matt and I talked over another section representing a walled town - that will be fun to make!

New Farm Section - Front

New Farm Section  Rear

Two sections together - a large farm!