Its been six months since my last post

It is almost a confession to my reader who might like to be brought up to date as to what has been occurring for me in wargaming.

I attended Little Wars in Adelaide as planned and experienced a great weekend.  I really enjoyed catching up with old friends like Nic Robson from Eureka Miniatures and making new ones.  The hospitality provided to me by Marcus Tregenza and his fellow members of Group North, was first class!

Over July to September, the real World intervened resulting in me becoming a nationally accredited mediator.

During this period, I also had to prepare for my participation at MOAB in Sydney over the October long weekend.  This required the basing of three 15mm and two 28mm armies – fives armies, madness! 

To accommodate the transportation of these armies, I decided to drive to the event, especially as I had just spent over $2,000 to have the clutch in my car replaced!  I faced the drive with some trepidation, but the car performed really well and though tiring – 13 hours driving to get to the motel at Miranda late on Friday evening and then 12 hours return drive on the following Tuesday, the long weekend was enjoyable.

I elected to play in the two day DBA competition professionally organized by Stephen Webb.  The first day, the games are based around a map campaign, its theme changes each year.  This year was a Successor Campaign, set between 320 and 315BC. 

I fielded the army, commanded by Antigonos (DBA Bk II/16(a)).  I experienced my usual poor dice rolling, particularly in critical rounds of combat.  It is difficult not to become disheartened when rounding two six to ones in the same round of combat!

At the conclusion of the campaign, I had managed to loss six games out six.  My country had been invaded and conquered several times over.  The winner of the campaign was Adrian Williams.

My spirits rallied that evening, when I gathered with Greg, Mark, Phil and David to consume a carnivore’s delight, washed down with a very nice red at the Gymea Tradies’, great venue, excellent company couldn’t ask for better.

The next day saw another six games of DBA contested, this time it was to be historical matched pairs.  I fielded Feudal French (DBA Bk IV/4(b)) and Early Muslim North Africa and Sicily (DBA Bk III/33).  Unfortunately, after six games, I ended with one draw, one win and four losses.  So, it was another trip to the Tradies to drown my sorrows with Greg and Mark.  We also watched the NRL Grand Final, though I still can’t work out why people like the game, its not like its rugby!

On Monday, I competed in the HOTT event organized by Victor Jamusz.  It was to be my first games of HOTT.  I had previously liaised with Victor and Terry Webb, in the US, for this event to be also the first leg of the internationally contested Good, Bad and Ugly tournament (‘GBnU’).  Thanks again Victor, for allowing this to occur!

Though there was a smaller than expected turn out, I enjoyed the experience greatly.  I particularly liked finally meeting Alan Saunders in person.  I have enjoyed his blog for quite some time.

As for my gaming, suffice to say, it was a marginally better day with the dice.

The GBnU requires some explanation.  It is an annual event, run over a number of legs, where competitors play in local competitions, but the final results are combined, with the outcomes of other legs, to produce an overall winner, and other place getters.  So, this year, the first leg was played in Australia, followed in no particular order by other legs played in Glasgow, Coventry in the UK and several US sites such as Nashville and Austin.  Terry did an excellently job in developing this concept, well done that man!

The theme for GBnU this year was Childrens’ books and movies.

The following are some photos of the event.  I must state that these are perhaps the worse photographs I have taken with my camera.  I can only blame operator error!

 

The competitors: Rear rank: Greg Kelleher and myself, Front rank: Victor Jamusz, Alan Suanders, Michael Chellew and Martin Stewart

The first round, I went up against Greg’s Saxon armies, so a battle of shield walls was contested.  Greg’s armies were based upon the books written by Bernard Cornwall.  I quickly lost my warlord and it went down hill from there.

Whilst this game was in progress, on the next table Alan and Victor were battling it out on Mars, using Alan’s imaginative armies, based upon the John Carter/ Baroom novels written by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

I must say I liked Alan’s creative terrain and seventies style tie dye terrain surface!

On the third table, Martin’s Napoleonic French and English, which he painted when he was eleven, were fighting it out!

I’m continually amazed at the imagination and creativeness that gamers bring to HOTT!

Round 2 and I went up against Victor, using my Clan War based fantasy samurai, the Mantis Clan under Yamamoto against the Ratlings or Nezumi under Tchickchuk of the Tattered Ear pack.  A close loss with me losing Tchickchuk.

The sharp of eye will note that the basing task I set myself was not meet, but at least they are fully painted figures.

Whilst this was going on, Michael fielded his Daliks against Greg, who used Michael’s Teddy Bear Pirates!  The pirates are manufactured by Eureka Miniatures.

Round 3 and I was up against Martin and pulled out a rare win in the virtual last throw of the dice, Wellington had fallen!

Round 4 and I was up against a very experienced player in Alan.  An interesting game that though I lost I felt like I had learnt a lot about HOTT!

During this game, on another table Victor fielded his Orcs.

All in all, an entertaining day of pushing lead!

Since MOAB, I have been again busy with real world activities, but I have managed to get myself some great gaming mats manufactured by the US based Cigar Box games, through its excellent Australian supplier, Campaign Books and Games Logistics.  Shayne is a great person to do business with, I can't commend his service any higher!

In other posts, I’ll be setting out my purchases for the year and the status of the projects I have engaged in over the last twelve months.  I have achieved mixed results, but after my first year of this blog, I’m still gaming, and I’m back painting again and enjoying it!       

DBA with a Twist!

The first round of the Magister Militum per Capitoline Territorialis circuit, DBA with a Twist! will be held at the Austrian Australian Club at Mawson, in Canberra, on Sunday, 4 May 2014.

The circuit is made up of a number of DBA competitions, fought in Canberra, throughout the year, where points are amassed by gamers who compete in each round of the circuit, for the annual award of Magister Militum at the following year’s Cancon.

Each year, DBA with a Twist! is run with a different rule modification to the those  published in DBA 2.2 rules.  This year the command distance is restricted to 600 paces, so that if an element/group is further away from its army’s general, an additional PIP must be paid to permit movement of the element/group.

In every DBA competition I enter I like to play with a different army.  It certainly increases the level of difficulty for me, as it means I can be fielding an army, comprised of unfamiliar troop types.  This proved to be a disadvantage on several occasions at the last two Cancons, but I'm always up for a challenge!

So why field a new army? Simple, I have so many unpainted DBA armies, if I don’t do a new one each time, I’ll never get them all painted!

After careful consideration, and with some assistance from Greg, an excellent DBA gamer, I have decided to run Mound Builder Americans (DBA Bk IV/10).

This is definitely not an open competition army, but given the command restriction I feel it might have an improved chance.  Additionally, as Greg observed, running a litter general would be cool!

The army comprises of a litter bearing the general, one element of Honoured men (ie Blades), four elements of bow armed Honoured men, and two elements of skirmishers or psiloi, as these elements are referred to in DBA.  Finally, there are four elements of stinkards or warband comprising five models per element.  The requisite camp element depicts two warriors engaged in playing chunkey, a popular game with Native American tribes.

I am using 15mm scale figures, sculpted by Alan Marsh and supplied by Nic from Eureka Miniatures.  

The figures accurately show the use of atl-atl spear throwers and stone edged clubs wheeled by the warriors. The ‘Great Sun’ is depicted being carried on a litter.  A shaman is depicted carrying a severed head whilst wearing a long cloaks.  These Indians are believed to have taken the heads of their enemies as trophies, even though they were regarded as being less aggressive to neighbouring tribes.

Stage one of the army's construction: the figures are cleaned prior to being affixed to their bases.  There was minimal flash and mould lines evident.  I have replaced the cast on litter supports with others made of florist wire.  The warband figures armed with spears will have the upper portion of the spears replaced by wire.

Stage two: will see the army undercoated in black and then a coat of Vallejo ‘light brown’ applied to all exposed flesh.  Clothing, primarily loincloths will be painted in various shades of ochre for the ordinary troops.  The nobles will be depicted wearing red cloth with shell trim.  The colour red is believed to have been sacred to these Indians, as it is the colour of cedar wood, which is unique, in that the tree's leaves remain green all year round.

The Mound Builders were a tribe of Meso Americans, who flourished between the seventh and thirteen centuries AD in the Mississipian valley region of North America.  Their ‘empire’ stretched as far north as present day Canada and as far south as present day Texas.  The Indians constructed large mounds for burials and perhaps other ritualistic purposes.  It is believed ditches and palisades surrounded these mounds.

On the basis of this supposition I am using a mound with palisade as the army's camp.

The largest known mound is Monk’s Mound, or the Great Sun mound, located at Cahokia in present day Illinois.  It is estimated that at its peak, Cahokia was home to more people than contemporary London. 

The mound is one hundred feet tall and covers an area of 16 acres.  It is but one of the mounds which remain in the area.  Given the dimensions of the mound and that the construction was completed by people carrying baskets filled with soil and the available workforce it has been estimated that the mound would have taken three hundred years to complete.

Prior to European invasion, these Indians died out.  The specific reason for the cause of their extinction is unknown, however the most likely cause was a combination of diseases associated with dense habituation, the use of permanent sites and poor sanitation.

Though the Indians lacked a known written language, it is believed that they were essentially a passive race, engaging in internal warfare only to gain arable land and water resources.

Historically, the army’s enemies were the Dog People and Pueblo Culture (DBA Bk III/41) and Eastern Forest Americans (DBA Bk IV/9).  I have both armies.  The former lies in the bowels of Mt Neverpaint whilst the latter is painted but awaiting the application of flock and tufts to its bases.  Another enemy were the Aztecs (DBA IV/63).  I don’t have suitable figures for this army as yet, so it will have to wait until next year at the earliest before it will join the collection.

A project is resurrected!

Having read and liked the mechanics of the Sam Mustafa rule set, Maurice and in keeping with my resolution to reduce Mt Neverpaint, whilst not buying any more lead, I have immersed myself in resurrecting a stalled project.

Back in the 1990s, I played a lot of war-games set in the Seven Year War with a friend’s 28mm figures, using the Warfare in the Age of Reason (‘WAR’) rule set. 

WAR is a set of rules written by Tod Kershner and Dale Wood and originally published in 1992 by Emperor’s Press Ltd.  It was a creditable attempt to cover an expansive period of history, which could arguably be described as the World’s ‘first world war'.

I do remember having to roll lots of dice during these games.

About this time, I had the opportunity to purchase some 15mm Old Glory figures at an excellent price.  Given my megalomaniac tendencies, I amassed forces for four fractions those of Austria, Prussia, French and Russia, plus the beginnings of an army for my Imagi nation – more on that in another post.

I had the talented sculptor, Mike Broadbent, a long time friend, paint my Austrians and I based them to the WAR requirements.  Unfortunately, that was as far as the project progressed for various reasons.

Matching what I had painted to the Maurice rules resulted in a requirement for me to paint two more cavalry regiments (ie 24 mounted figures), four artillery pieces and three crew (ie 12 figures) to be able to field a 100 point Austrian army.  

These are currently being cleaned and placed on tongue depressors for painting.

Oh, I forgot to mention, I also had to re-base nine infantry regiments (ie 216 infantry) and one regiment of cavalry, as well as some markers.  After two sessions over last weekend I managed to complete stage one.  Stage two will be the flocking and will be completed next weekend.

I reviewed my available terrain and located a great unpainted, resin chateau and some nice period resin buildings. 

The chateau was purchased from Battlefront back when they had a stand at MOAB about ten years ago. I have never seen another since so I am uncertain who manufactured it.

The other resin buildings I bought off Nic at Eureka, around the same time.  They required a bit of work to fill air bubbles and mould faults, but given the age of the moulds which were used they are quite good.  Unfortunately they are closer to 20mm, so these will not be used for this project but will no doubt find table time when I get around to painting my 20mm WWII AB Germans for use with the Chain of Command rules I recently downloaded.  

Last week I bought two 15mm 4ground buildings from War and Peace Games.  As usual the service was great and the end result is what I want on my table!

Once the Austrians are complete, I will be able to move on to painting another force as an opponent.  At this point, I am leaning towards either a Russian or French force, as the tricorne wearing, Old Glory Prussians are poorly casted figures in my view.  There is something disconcerting when a figure's head is attached to its left shoulder!   

So, this project means I will be gaming with rules I purchased at Cancon 2014, I will need to base all of my trees using resin bases purchased from Battlefield Accessories, again a purchase from Cancon 2014, whilst reducing my current lead surplus and I don’t have to purchase any more lead – right?  Hmm, I forgot about how I dislike the Old Glory cavalry mounts! 

Okay, so perhaps I will have to place an order with Nic for 36 AB cavalry remounts.  A small addition to the mountain if it means in excess of 200 15mm figures are painted.  Time will tell my wife says!

Finally, my wife gave me this interesting model for Valentine's Day.