Legionary 2014 - what a SAGA.

I have often felt that the best way to learn a set of rules is to play them; not just as a Sunday afternoon experiment but by going the whole hog and entering a competition.

So yesterday, I found myself leaving home at 6.55am to drive to Exeter to play SAGA at the Legionary show staged by the Exmouth Wargames Club. Despite being a bank holiday weekend the A303 wasn't too bad and I made good time, arriving in around 2 hours from my home near to Devizes in Wiltshire.  With my newly painted Vikings ready for action it was appropriate that the podcast I decided to listen too was mostly about Vikings and the exhibition currently running at the British Museum.

It was a small competition with just six of us playing.

My first game was against a very kind opponent called David who was using Welsh. He was kind as he explained much about the game after  I had told him I have only ever played three games over a two year period, using a different army each time, and losing all of them.

So how would the Vikings do against Welsh? Not an force I knew anything much about and I'd not even looked at the SAGA  battle boards for anything other than Vikings or Normans before the weekend. Normans as that was an army I have painted and thought I'd use until I spotted that the battle board required many combinations of dice to get 'the good stuff' and as the competition was for a 4 point army I would only get six dice a turn. So a hasty painting of Vikings was called for.

Here are my Vikings (mostly berserkers in the shot) facing Welsh at the start of the game.

Athough I came second it was a good game. The Welsh javelin armed skirmishers did a fair bit of damage to me - especially from uphill. They 'taunted' my berserkers making them charge uphill and all but wiped them out!
 

My second game against Mike also found me facing Welsh - but with a different troop combination. As there were objectives in each game I decided to make a rush towards two fairly early on. This was a different tactic to my first game where I had opted to go past the objectives, eliminate the enemy and return to collect the spoils of war. As that failed it was time to try some thing new.

 So charging a sheep and a monk we rolled the die to see what would happen; a six in each case! This made the monk turn into a fighting bishop with good armour and five attacks - he killed three beserkers - and the sheep turned out to be an vicious ram killing a warrior.

It wasn't a good game for the Vikings. In one attack I rolled 16 dice needing 4 or above. A 50:50 roll you would think. No I got 12 come up with  1s, 2s and 3s.

 Needless to say I came second again!

My third and final game was against Franks. Two units of mounted Hearthguard and one unit of foot warriors. OK you ask where is the other point of troops? As it happens the mounted Hearthguard were 1.5 units each (6 figures each). This game was against Ralph who was really good at explaining things - especially as I haven't bought the supplement with the rather tricky Frankish battle board. Not that it would have helped if I had.

 Here come the mounted Hearthguard..

Well, in this game I came second once again. So after three more games I still have my 100% success rate of losing at SAGA unblemished.

Did it matter that I lost? No. It was great fun, I made some new friends and enjoyed playing something different.

What did I learn? LOTS! And the most important lesson is that Beserkers may best be left at home.

Finally, the rather nice buildings are produced by Adrian's Walls. 

New 28mm FIW figures from Forlorn Hope

I have received some really nice FIW figures from Forlorn Hope Games. There are Rangers and French Marines available - all with snowshoes.  Here is a view of one of the packs:

Now I need to find time away from the Dark Ages for painting!

Check out Forlorn Hope Games at http://www.forlornhopegames.co.uk/

Byzantine resurrection

Well they may be 40 years old but they are making a comeback! Bill Lamming Late Byzantines painted with Humbrol enamel paints back in the 1970s. I'm re-basing them for War & Conquest rules.

Here are the infantry so far.

 Byzantine cavalry.

 

And here are the first Viking unit for SAGA. There are some Conquest Games cavalry behind them and right at the back are some Gripping Beast Saxons.

A good day at DDWG yesterday

As far as club days go, DDWG has mixed fortunes. Meeting weekly numbers go up and down like a see-saw depending on who is available any particular Sunday afternoon.

Yesterday there were several games being played - and one almost played but one partner had gone see whilst the other had managed to saw. Maybe next week?

We had games of  Black Powder, 42mm British Bulldogs (a quick play WWII skirmish game for Home Guard Units -soon to be available for purchase) and Deadzone being played. Only the three games but hardly surprising as the club had run a day-long Full Thrust game on the day before. Nevertheless there were still 18 of us there.

Military Vehicles Partwork

Talking of Vietnam - which I was on the Meeples and Miniatures Facebook page - how many of you in the UK have spotted the Military Vehicles partwork that came out a week or so back? 

At a £1.99 introductory price for a magazine and 1/72 US Vietnam gun truck it seems like too good an offer to miss. OK I have one already, two on order and bought another three today :-)

The vehicle is diecast with plastic embellishments and ready painted. Next issue includes a Warrior IFV but the price goes up to £2.99. Even so it still makes the vehicles very cheap for gaming.

 Or you could just buy the vehicles direct from the supplier: Amercom Hobby - where you will find 1/72 helicopters too.

An absolute bargain

I found this in a newsagent today. It's the first in a new series of fortnightly publications and at just £1.99 for the first issue it's worth buying for the 1/72 scale Vietnam period US gun truck.

Next issue goes up to £2.99 and includes a 1/72 Warrior AFV. after that the price goes to £5.99 and there seems to be a mix of modern and WWII vehicles.

It has been a long time...

... since I posted anything. But there again I haven't done much by the way of painting or gaming.

My VCBW figures are milling about part painted; the LLedo Vehicles of Yesteryear that I bought at bargain price in a flea market are gathering dust and the half-formed project for a new VCBW unit remains just that - half formed!

However! I did find myself painting some test figures last night for Seven Years War. I have Prussians on the go in both 10mm and 15mm scale. Don't ask! It was just an idea and the Old Glory 15mm figures have been hiding in a drawer since I brought them back from the USA in 1999. They also cost less than half the UK price over there at that time :-)

Fortunately you can still get the 15mm Old Glory figures in the UK from Timecast and I am adding some FreiKorps 15 figures from QRF to the ranks.

I am looking at basing these Prussians for Die Kriegskunst rules so a departure from my usual set of choice - WRG 1685 - 1845.

The 10mm Prussians are part of a new idea I have, although the Pendraken figures have been hanging around for a year or two on the shelf in The Bunker, daring me to paint them. So I have made a start!