Thursday, 8 September 2016

Tribola at Hereward

On Sunday I motored across to Peterborough for the Hereward show, where mates James Morris, Mog and Matt were putting on a spectacular game using "To the Strongest!". I travelled up with mate Dug who very kindly took these photos.

Our "Tribola" game featured an attack on a Roman column by Lusitanian freedom fighter led by Viriatus. I won't write much about it as I understand that James plans to publish the scenario in one of the magazines. As well as James and Mog's minis, the game featured James' superb mountain that was used for Keren, admirably re-purposed as well as some new rocky outcrops.


In the game a Roman column of four legions has been lured into a trap by vengeful Lusitanian rebels. You may just be able to make out the grid which was marked with tufts; the shot is taken at the start of the battle.


James' mountain towered over the other end of the table. It is absolutely huge and the build quality is superb; the design is really well thought out with panels bolting on to a wooden frame.


Above, a shot from late in the battle, when the action became confused as Lusitanian horse harrassed isolated Roman units. The minis were beautifully painted by James and Mog. Below, I contributed a few units of Roman baggage to the game- pack mules from Tiger Miniatures, some lightly converted, temporarily based to match James' terrain.

 

We played the scenario twice and it was a lot of fun. We used the "experimental" Polybian list which has more resilient Roman units that performed well even when attacked from multiple directions- "Form orbis!"

This was the Hereward show's second year and somewhat larger than the first. The venue was very good and the event has become a regular in my gaming calendar.

Tuesday, 23 August 2016

Raphia at t'other Partizan

I had a fine weekend travelling to Newark for my favourite wargames show, Partizan. My extended Raphia  had its first public outing.


Above, the view from behind the Ptolemaic left; those are the (supposedly) inferior African elephants. In the photo below are the more numerous and heftier Seleucid pachyderms.

The cloths we used are the new Sagebrush Steppe mats from Deep Cut Studios. I was really pleased with these as I had them designed to match my bases.  Note that they have a good deal of green in them, as well as the dusty beiges and ochres; indeed very much more green than the Deep Cut thumbnail would suggest...


The game was particularly exciting. Usually the Seleucid Indian elephants sweep all before them, but yesterday the Ptolemaic African beasts overthrew them. To add insult to injury, the inferior and outnumbered Ptolemaic cavalry managed to seriously wound Antiochus the Great (next to the man on the white horse, below), who retired from the field.


In the centre (below) both phalanx hit each other and became locked in a shoving match in which honours were broadly even.


On the other wing, though, the Seleucids gained the upper hand and routed the Ptolemaic cavalry. They then turned onto the flank of the Galatians (below) and were well positioned to roll up the Ptolemaic line; it was looking sticky.

Just at this point a wonderful wargaming event occurred.  A 13-year-old named Matthew was commanding the Ptolemaic centre- he'd had a fairly uneventful battle, so far, but had picked up the basics of the rules. He noticed that a couple of units on the Seleucid left had failed to advance, leaving the left hand side of their phalanx temporarily unsupported; it was "hanging in the air". Matthew saw an opportunity to turn his rightmost phalanx unit onto the Seleucid flank. This might have gone very badly for him (I told him it was very risky), as it exposed this unit's own flank, but luckily the opposing Seleucid general was temporarily distracted and the young Alexander proceeded to slaughter not one but two phalanx with flank attacks, winning the game for Ptolemy! I should imagine he won't forget that in a while.  :-)

Many thanks to all who played and all who helped, especially Ian Notter (who took the photos), Andrew Brentnall and Dave Lycett who helped hugely with packing. Another fantastic show organised by Tricks, Laurence and the Newark Irregulars! Oh and we won the raffle, too.  ;-)

Friday, 19 August 2016

Yet more basing

Here's another project I have been working on this summer for a gig at the Wargames Holiday Centre in late September. Each unit consists of nine or ten Numidian light cavalry mounted on two of my 20cm grid bat bases that lock together. The riders are depicted circling to throw javelins, and include some Roman casualties. All are metal miniatures, mostly Foundry, A&A, Companion and conversions.


I have more or less finished basing seven-and-a-half units (below) out of a required ten. A lot of the minis are from my collection, retouched and re-based, but others have been freshly painted by mate Shaun McTague.


I am also in the process of basing eleven units each of 18 light infantry. When fully mustered this army will include 100 light cavalry without bridles, 200 light infantry, 100 formed infantry, 6 elephants and some bodyguard cavalry. Enough to fill 10 Really Useful Boxes...

We still have a couple of spaces for the gaming weekend which will be held in Basingstoke over the weekend 22nd to 24th September- if you fancy coming along, please email me at the address on my blog and I'll mail you details.

Thursday, 18 August 2016

The basathon continueth


Above are my first Tarentines and the twentieth phalanx from my last post, now grouted but as yet un-flocked. Below is Alexander's second squadron of Companions; presumably led by Hephaestion. I have a slow burn project to depict Alexander's army of the Persian campaign. These were painted by Nick Speller with some highlighting by me.


Lastly below are my first unit of Thracians from a purchase on eBay or LAF. Lovely work by the original painter.


Most of these are intended for the large Raphia game on Sunday at Partizan in Newark- if you are coming please do say hello, or stay and turn a few cards!

Sunday, 7 August 2016

The last phalanx


I'm sure that this isn't my last ever phalanx, but it is almost certainly the last one I'll base this year. This is my twentieth phalanx block; a suitably round number to pause on. Most of the minis were painted by Shaun McTague, with some detailing added by me. They are a mix of Foundry and Polemarch phalangites and all have Sidon helmets, my favourite style of ancient head-ware; they join my Ptolemaic phalanx.

When deployed four ranks deep the entire phalanx will cover a frontage of four metres. Later I hope to add an Alexandrian phalanx and an Antigonid Macedonian phalanx, and perhaps a couple of units of Spartan phalangites. I would love (one day) to accumulate 32 units so that I could depict a 1:1 taxeis of 1500 minis, drawn up 16 ranks deep. Muwhhahaha....

When the basing is finished this unit will join the throng for my big Raphia "to the Strongest!" game at t'other Partizan on Sunday week, 21st August. If you'd like to play in the game (and haven't already) please drop me a line and the address on the front of the blog. I hope to run it twice and, with around 2K minis, there will be room for plenty of generals!

Wednesday, 27 July 2016

A Civil English War


Had a fun day of chat and play-testing my forthcoming ECW rules with Andrew Brentnall (co-writer) in his Suffolk fastness. Above and below is the warm-up scenario, Montgomery 1644. I lost two of my three commanders in turn two, but still almost managed to turn the game around.

Below, for the main event, Naseby, Andrew has brought in a senior military advisor in the form of John D-Z. Andrew's 10mm ECW minis were both very numerous and beautifully painted, and the below wasn't the half of them. The terrain wasn't too shabby, either.



Above the lines are closing; below my Royalist veterans were gaining a slight ascendancy over the riff-raff in Parliament's front line. On the whole, though, the battle as a whole was not going well for ye Kinge (me) by the time I needed to hit the road. Prince Rupert was wounded and his cavalry were recoiling. The mechanics worked very well, though, so I was pretty chuffed!


Sunday, 10 July 2016

New Sagebrush steppe mat

On Friday I received the first batch of a new Deep-Cut mat design. It is so new that it doesn't yet have a name but I am calling it "Sagebrush steppe".


This is a design that I encouraged Deep-Cut to make, because I wanted something a more arid surface than the green "plains" mat that I use for most of my gaming. It has patches of a dry soil with faded grass and bushes depicted- here it can be seen with some of the Numidians I am in the process of re-basing. It matches my bases pretty well, which is very convenient and not entirely accidental. I think it'll suit parts of Spain, Italy, Asia and North Africa. It is also perfect for the Old West and will do service for Prax when I get my high llamas on the table.

In the official close-up image (below) the mats look more arid and more yellow ochre than they do on the table in daylight. There's a lot more green in them than the below image suggests.


The new mats are in the Bigredbatshop in a variety of sizes and with and without grids.

n.b. Next week it is very likely I'll have to put up the prices of all the mats in the shop - I buy in Euros and, post-Brexit, costs have risen by over 10%. If you are buying in Dollars or Euros, of course, the mats are currently very much cheaper than they were two weeks ago!

Saturday, 9 July 2016

Ten Green Bottles...

...turn out to be highly efficient weights for holding down Batbases whilst the superglue cures, that will hold the magnets in place.


They will also provide a useful lubricant for the baser, later today during the basing process.   :-)

Thursday, 7 July 2016

A Midsummer Night's Gaming


I had a very pleasant outdoor game this evening with mate Ian using my new pike and shotte armies. The armies were freshly sprayed wooden blocks. It took about an hour to purchase and spray them, a useful investment of time compared to my usual insanely high ratio of painting to gaming time. Youl'll be able to make out the pike battalia and troops of horse. The terrain cloth is a very nice 4' x 3' Deep-Cut "fields" mat with a 10cm grid.

Tonight's game was based on the Montgomery 1644 scenario that I recently played with Andrew Brentnall. The game was literally ended by dusk, unfortunately at an interesting stage.We had chatted too much and drunk too much Gavi di Gavi to complete it. Still, it was a whole lot of fun.


This is very circular for me because I remember playing my very first ECW game with Lego brick regiments just after the film "Cromwell" came out in 1970, with a set of wargames rules that I wrote especially for the occasion. In 1970 I lost; couldn't even win with my own rules! ;-) Mind you I wasn't doing a whole lot better tonight; plus ca change.

Wednesday, 6 July 2016

Rebasathon II - Not a tray bake!


The Great Numidian Rebasathon continues apace. Above I've partially based 24 out of a required 40 stands. Each pair of stands will join together along the long edge to form a unit of ten light horse or eighteen light infantry - when complete, there will be around 300 "light"miniatures in this army. Most of the stands have been grouted.


Above is a close up of one of the units. The light cavalry will all be circling, and there will be quite a few casualty miniatures dotted around on the bases. My new large bases allow for very dynamic basing styles. The brown areas of the bases will need to be painted, of course. There's also a good amount of retouching to do, as well,  as I once dropped a couple of boxes of the cavalry and they are quite chipped. I was not amused.

Aside from the lights there will be a couple of units of militia, a couple of cohorts of imitation legionaries, half a dozen nellies and a small force of cavalry "with bridles" to provide bodyguards for the generals. Altogether, it will constitute a most unusual army that will first see the light of day at the Wargames Holiday Centre on 23rd September.

Friday, 1 July 2016

Rebasathon


Above are a pair of my new 19cm-wide BatbasesI designed these for my own collection and will gradually re-base many of my troops onto them. The idea is that the irregular edges, with a chambered profile, will blend into the terrain cloth. Below, I've started to rebase a few units of Numidians. I chamfered the edge of the bases, added magnets and primed them with some cheap auto-primer to seal them. I sliced the minis off of their card bases and mixed them in with some new recruits recently painted by Shaun McTague. 


Below, I like to salvage as much of the old base texture as possible as it saves time and money and reduce landfill.


Re-basing the Numidians will be a big job as I have 400 or more of them altogether- including over 100 cavalry. When finished I estimate they will fill ten 4L Really Useful boxes.

Wednesday, 22 June 2016

Montgomery 1644


I have a very enjoyable day, today, experimenting with ECW rules with Andrew Brentnall. Andrew has a fabulous 10mm ECW collection. We fought Montgomery 1644, above. I was defeated, but it was a close-fought battle. Below is one wing of Marston Moor, which we didn't have time to play. I have come away with some ideas for version 2 of the TtS ancients rules...


Wednesday, 15 June 2016

Thorakitai and t'other Partizan


This (clickable)  photo is of the latest unit to join my Hellenistic forces- a phalanx of early thorakitai. These are the armoured equivalents of thureophoroi, wearing a mixture of linen and bronze cuirasses (which were later replaces with mail as it became more common). The shield designs are based on Ptolemaic grave paintings. In To the Strongest! they are represented as spearmen, deep, veteran.

These boys will represent the Greek Mercenaries on the Seleucid right, tough fighters who defeated the Ptolemaic agema and peltastoi guards (who had, admittedly, already been trampled by their own elephants). Most of the minis are Foundry hoplites and hypaspists with replacement thureos shields. Some were painted by Shaun McTague and others are drawn from the boxes of "reserves" in my loft.

I'll be running my "too big for Salute" Raphia game at t'other Partizan in Newark on Sunday 21st August. With over 1600 minis, and with improved terrain, the extended game will be even bigger and better than the version played at the Wargames Holiday Centre, shown below. If you would like to play, please drop me a line and I'll book you in for a game. I'll also be in town the night before if anyone fancies a beer and a curry!








Sunday, 12 June 2016

Battle of Horn Gate

Today we played a jolly game set in Prax, using modified To the Strongest! rules, at Broadside in Sissinghurst.   It went very well and there were some hilarious incidents.  One poor young player drew a string of Aces, culminating in the loss of his general who I had nicknames Acus Maximus.


Above massed bison riders and below the Lunar centre, screened by expendable scorpionmen allies.



Above, the Bison riders tended to get the better of the exchange.  Below a view from the sable rider camp.



Above, Batty made a brief appearance; lots of people can over to talk about him.  Below, the sable tribe's ancestors turn up to lend a hand.


The magic rules worked pretty well and I have some excellent suggestions that Ian made on the way back, to digest.

The Broadside show was really excellent and I'm sure we'll be back next year!

Saturday, 11 June 2016

Scorpionmen

Here are the finished Scorpionmen for my resurrected Glorantha project, it has only been 11 years since Sebastian gave them to me.  A slow burner.




I have some more plans for there; a Queen, a hero and some swarms of smaller scorpions.  The balance of the army will consist of broo.

The minis are from Rapier and they are based on my BatBases, the deep unit-sized ones, which are just over 12cm wide. This means the bases will be roughly twice the size of the old Hordes of the Things bases, leaving plenty of room for modelling and accomodating the odd extra-large model (like Greg's 12" Gonn Orta and Batty!). Until we get the re-basing sorted, we will be using pairs of HoTT elements.  

Friday, 10 June 2016

Chitin dryin' in the sun

Here's another WIP shot of some of the fantasy minis I've been working on this week, with their matt varnish currently drying in the sun. The Scorpionmen are the first Gloranthan minis I've painted in a decade.


There's still a deal of flocking to do. For the scorpionmen, I am conflicted about base colours- I wanted to base them in a desert environment, but then the bases won't match Ian's Praxian minis, or indeed any of my other minis.  Ho hum. The werewolves will have their own portable Birnam Wood; they will be able to fight in the shade.

This week I've been working on the draft of V2 of the ancient rules which I'll use as the basis of the fantasy rules I will be writing. I've been giving some thought to magic systems and expect to have a very rough version ready for the game on Sunday at Broadside.

Tuesday, 7 June 2016

Scorpionmen WIP

A really terrible shot of some Rapier Miniatures scorpionmen that I'm working on for my recently-revivified Gloranthan project. These were given to me by Sebastian Rogers c2005. I'm completely re-painting and re-basing 2016-stylee, on deep-unit sized magnetic Bat Bases. So far they are just blocked-in, but I hope to field them at Broadside on Sunday.


In other news, I have a piece on Caesar's Legions in the latest WI; enjoy!

Sunday, 5 June 2016

Magnesia 190 BCE

Here's a shot of a scaled-down test game of the battle of Magnesia that Ian Notter, Andrew Brentnall and I plan to take to Crisis in November. The scenario worked very well- Antiochus smashed through one legion, whilst another legion did a number on the phalanx, so all in all pretty historical. We used 15mm minis and chits instead of playing cards. The cloth is a 4' x 3' Deep-Cut Wasteland mat with a 10cm grid.


We used the alternative Polybian list (which replaces the small hastati and principes unit with a single, special unit) - this worked really well. Do please drop me a line if you'd like a copy. In due course I'm likely to make this list "canon".

In other news, I will be at Broadside in Sittingbourne next Sunday with an experimental To the Strongest! fantasy game; hope to see some of you there!

Thursday, 2 June 2016

Hexing the square


Ray Ashton in Melbourne has been playing TtS! on a hex grid. This game used the TtS! Sengoku army lists, Baccus samurai miniatures on Hexon terrain. It looks very pretty and apparently it worked very well, with the required changes being pretty minor. I really should give hexes a try, myself.




Friday, 27 May 2016

Free Ballista is in the shop


Mate Keith at Aventine Miniatures very kindly gave me a small batch of the Young Ballista miniature that Adam sculpted for Harry Sidebottom. Ballista is the hero of Harry's "Warrior of Rome" series; a noble Angle whose fortunes rise (and occasionally fall) within the Roman military.

I am going to give one away with the next twenty orders over £30 in the BigRedBatshop. The link to the miniature in the shop is here. As well as the rules and bases, I recently received a big resupply of the excellent Deep-Cut cloth mats...


Adam painted one up and presented it to Harry, here he is! Adam has gone with the alternative spelling (there was a real Roman General called Balista).


Update- here's another version superbly painted by David Imrie.  Golly he's good.