Night of the Goats

A black and grey mass of Beastmen advanced menacingly into the realm of Sylvania; set upon pillage and destruction.  In response, Lady Alcourasta sent forth the minions of vampires to make their bodies part of her own army of undeath....

Battle lines formed.  A large body of Grave guard with one of Alcourasta's trusted aide, Melkhani was flanked by ghouls and Skeletons with the necromancer, Bayern the Crooked.  Ahead of them masses of brooding creatures, half man, half goat, assembled, flanked by massive minotaurs and chariots.

Melkhani led her troops forward, and began summoning forth the dark powers of undeath, to both speed her allies and cast a pall upon the enemy.  To her left, wraiths swept through the blackened grass as floating spectres of fear and death, their ethereal forms string terror into those before them who knew they could do them no harm.

Nonetheless the Beastmen cam on in their fashion, and tried to make contact with what they saw as brittle bones.  Bayern had summoned the long dead in thin lines to block their advance however, and so it was at every turn the goats found the clear stench of rotting flesh between them and their true goal.  Elsewhere the Wraiths swept Ungors before them, and floated nightmarishly into a hapless chariot bearing one of the Beastmen's shaman.

The Ghouls and Wraiths made short work of many of the enemy, including the Minotaurs; but Bayern was in great danger, having finally been engaged by forces that had cut through his wall of Zombies.  Moreover one of the Gor units, at the cost of it's own lives, had thinned out the numbers of Grave Guard.

Melkhani responded by summoning up her undead in still greater numbers, and turned for what would be the titanic struggle of the night.

It was in single combat that the undead came undone, After a long struggle, it was only misfortune for Melkhani, as a might Beastlord hacked her down.  From this point on the army of Undead began to crumble in such a fashion as to ensure the Beasts the field.  They were badly bruised force too, but theirs would be the victory and the spoils of Sylvania were now open to them.

This was a 2500 point game that for the first four turns was all going my way; in particular James had not magic weapons to counter my Wraiths and so they pretty much instantly beat anyone they contacted.  My magic was more effective than his too and helped put him on the back foot.  But his two combat units were able between them to take down my Deathstar unit; and with that gone the army was helpless.  One unit was doing flaming attacks, which nullified my regeneration, and the other was using magic to maximise it's character attacks, and sought to maximise the unit attacks too against my Vampire.

She let me down in particular by failing two 5+ ward and then both 4+ regens in the same turn, left on one hit, she was always going to go down to massed attacks.

A good tough game, and a fun match up; I hope to face the beasts again, and give em what for!

Iron Owl Trophy - LWC's First Painting Competition

Promotional time again.

[Click image for a bigger picture]

The Leeds Wargames Centre, mainly thanks to the organisation of Wayne Pashley of the Leeds NightOwls, is to hold a free and open painting competition on the 6th August.  Entry is for anyone who can get their models there on the day, and victory will be based on voting by any attendees during the event.

There will be prizes; a Malifaux boxed set and blisters from Wyrd miniatures, paint sets and miniatures from Mantic, boxed set and blisters from Corvus Belli (infinity), a few boxsets from The Wargaming Centre (whatever craig chooses to donate) and a pair of limited edition Wolfen miniatures by Rackham (again donated by Craig).

Full terms and conditions are here.

There's no theme, and pretty much anything can be entered.  I already have an idea for what I'm going to put forward, and I'm going to play to my strengths; but for the best of reasons I may be a little cagey about showing progress towards it on the blog beforehand.  Given that the club has a couple of Golden Demon standard painters it may be no more than an honourable mention for effort for me.

And of course, banging up publicity on my blog, may well bring in a ringer for the day too!

13th Cuirassiers

Originally part of the 3rd Regiment, in 1807 a detachment was sent to Spain where it was combined with detachments from the 1st and 2nd Cuirassiers and the 1st and 2nd Carabiniers to form the 1st Provisional Heavy Cavalry (designated the 13th Cuirassiers at the end of 1808), operating exclusively in the east against mainly Spanish opposition. 

From 1809 on it left the peninsular and served in the battles of Eckmühl, Essling, Wagram, Ostrowono, Smolensk, Borodino, Dresden, Liebertwolkwitz, Leipzig, Champaubert, Fère-Champenoise.


During the First Restoration (1814), the regiment was named the Régiment de Cuirassiers du Dauphin. With the return of Napoleon I in 1815, the regiment was renamed 3eme Régiment de Cuirassiers. It fought at Ligny and Waterloo. It was disbanded with the Second Restoration on 25 November.

 I've kept it simple and gone for the uniform as shown on the Perry's painting guide (supplied with the models).

I must admit I did the horses with only the most basic washes.  This was the first time I tried painting the riders separately, but it made the job marginally easier, and I will probably do it more frequently in future.  Odd that I never had before!

It's my first Napoleonic unit in months, but with a big game and a show coming up in June, I'm looking forward to getting some horse and musket action going again.

Speed Painting Ghouls

Alright so back in the mists of time I produced a post on speed painting, with a unit of Goblins finished in about 5 hours. Given that was now close to five years ago,I was inspired to have another pop at this knowing that it would be suited to my Undead . I've opted for a unit of Ghouls with a Necro/humanoid Ghast as leader.

The models are made from 10 Mantic and 10 GW Ghouls (cheers Craig!) mashed together. They work quite well with a little trimming and filling of the middles. The Necro is a Heroclix model who I scrounged, that looked well, like a Necromancer to me.

The models were given a light spray of white undercoat, as this will suit the following technique best. Fine sand was then glued to the bases. None of this prep will count towards the painting time, but allowing for drying, assembly and priming probably accounted for about 90 minutes.

So we begin; Hour One:

First job was to seal the bases with a brown emulsion. This got an extra coat on the sides. Within this time , flesh, with a little army green mixed in was applied to the first half dozen ghouls.

Hour Two:

Keeping the basic flesh colour 'live' by adding lighter flesh tones and then a touch of blue and a different green, I continued to paint three or four ghouls at a time in various tones, so the unit as a whole has lots of variety. The next job is to start on the clothing, a little slower as it requires some neatness. I started with a brown base and added reds and other colours to it to make up muted tones.

Hour Three:

In this hour all the cloth was completed, including some alternate colours. A start was made on the Necro. All the bone was painted an off white mix, then the teeth, then the hair which was mainly on the GW parts.

Hour Four:

In the finish of the base coating, all the metals were done, and the eyes on the ghouls were given a dot of red. The Necro got a half hour of attention now, which included putting life into his robes and his fussy breastplate-cum-necklace.

In crude terms they are as good as painted at this stage. But not all that attractive to look at. So it's time for some shading and basing.

Hour Five:

Time first of all to mix up some 'Dip'. Though I only ever paint it on. I use the following three ingredients in the indicated proportions...

This is then applied with a large soft brush to the models. Any large areas of pooling should be dealt with after a few minutes to avoid too dark a finish. Models with flowing robes like the Necro need care to avoid excessive pooling; one option is to allow the model to dry upside down, which tends to produce more realistic shadows.

And so finally, still in the fifth hour (excepting a pause of half an hour to allow the varnish to dry) I apply a drybrush of sand-brown to the bases and then glue on some static grass and turf, mixed together. At this stage, within just about five hours of painting, the models are ready to go on the tabletop:

I grant you, fairly easy models, lacking uniforms, armour or shields, but nonetheless, a speedy job. The other key thing to consider for this sort of project, is 'Choose your subject carefully'. This is not the method to produce great results on all subjects; but used wisely it is a time saving and effective technique.

Sheffield Triples 2011

I managed to hook up a lift to the Sheffield show on Sunday, and have a good old look around.  With a blog to fill with pictures I always go with a first intention to see the display games, with the hope of seeing a few impressive showpieces. 

This show didn't disappoint with several corkers, but the 'TooMuchLead - Best in Show' award, without any bias goes to my old pals, the Grimsby Wargames Society with their War of the Spanish succession game:

Some 3,000 28mm models laid out on a 20 foot by 6 foot table.  With an actual game being played to boot!

Featured terrain included a beautiful rendition of part of a Vauban fort.  Whilst at the other end of the battlefield was an enormous clash of horse.

What seemed to amaze visitors was that this was not an unusually large game for the Grimsby club; sure a bit larger than normal but in no way unprecedented.  I know from my years with them that sticking a couple of thousand models on the table of an evening is the way they like to do things. 

I was nevertheless impressed, and so too were the show judges, who gave the Grimsby lads the award for best display game.

Elsewhere there was plenty to see, kicking off with a lovely Viking raid game:

The standard terrain was really nice, but the beautiful water was particularly eye catching.  The ships were striking too.  With all that front of house, it was easy to lose track of the models...

Next stop in no particular order was the Mantic stand, with a chance to have a good close look at their latest releases.  The Chaos Dwarves looked better in the flesh than I expected, but I was more interested in the Orcs:

These were the Greatax Orcs.  Now, if I was starting an Orc army new, then no question I would use these models they are rather nice, but, they are a lot smaller than the GW equivalents (though based on 25mm bases and standing larger than their previous models) and the faces are a bit old-school 'cheesy grin'.  A less green paint scheme may help you know.

Still the metal characters are really nice.

Other interesting items to look at were the various Ancients rules, notable that nowhere had copies of Warhammer Ancients 2.0; but everywhere there were copies of Clash of Empires and Hail Caesar; I ended up buying the latter, as I love how Black Powder - it's companion piece - dealt with horse and musket period warfare; but if the former takes off for points based gaming I could see myself being tempted.

Next up was the Hammers Slammers game, I'm thinking it was the South London Warlords, well who else might it be?

Grimsby may have brought the most 28mm models, but the award for most figures went to the 6mm Battle of Towton game, with around 12-15,000 figures I guess.

Not sure they moved anything though.

More visually appealing was the Ilkley Lads Lake Trasimene game.  Lots of fine ancient Romans and Celts.

Along from that was a 6/10mm Napoleonics game, that claimed to be the battle of Barossa.  Having gamed this myself last year I was curious about this, not least their interpretation of the terrain.  I felt they shuffled the position of some key features, and over stressed the village at the expense of the open forests around Barossa hill that were pivotal to the historical accounts of the battle.

But it looked nice.  As did Legendary Wargames Battle of Lutzen.

The second room was smaller but did contain a couple of interesting bits.  The game below, seemed to be one of those 'A Very British Civil War' games, and featured an ambitious model railway and dockyard on the sort of terrain that suggested the builder did favour train sets.

I always like a nice model boat:

Back in the main room, there was this rather chaotic looking Desert War battle in 20mm.  Lots going on, but as a result, too confusing on the eye.  A bit of a mess.

Another new release was on the Plastic Soldier Company's stand; one that nearly tempted me.  PSC had their Russian 45mm anti tank guns on display.  The set actually allows you to make three different guns, and comes with lots of crew and accessories. 

Three complete guns for £12 or so, seems good to me.

It was pleasing to see an attractive English Civil War game in my favoured scale for it, 15mm.  Also using a set of rules (how closely adhering to the structure of them, I don't know) 'Regiment of Foote' that I rate greatly.

Lastly another scenic work of art, in 6mm again, with an alternate treatment of Gettysburg.

So overall I found it to be a good show, plenty of nice games, an opportunity to catch up or bump into lots of old mates (especially Neil, Paul, Tim, Jason and Mark) and lots of traders who don't usually come up my way.  Not that I bought much; aside from Hail Caesar I bought a box of Immortal Spartans and a pair of undead models, and nothing else.  The venue was light and airy, and had plenty of room.  If there is a criticism, it would be the lack of hot food on site (that I could see).

Nevertheless, a fine day out.

GW Resin Sneak Peek

Came across a photo today which throws more light on the nature of the GW wonder material:

Clearly, this is not being moulded in the traditional metal spinning machines, these look an awful lot like injection mouldings and so there would be an attendant retooling cost that at least goes some way to explaining the price increases.

Also indicated was that the material can be converted easily, it can be repositioned after soaking in hot water and can be cut reasonably easy - which suggests a better medium than old resins.

What it's really like still remains to be seen, but I suspect I will have to get one model just to see...

Kicking the little Guys, when they're down

Recently, I had a free Saturday (one of many to come I suspect), and managed to arrange a couple of small games of Warhammer; 1500 points.  Not having used them in a long time, I rolled out the Dwarves for a rare foray.

Faced with what seemed an obscene amount of Skaven, things did not look good, and indeed that was pretty much the case.  An army of numerous proxies included a doomwheel and two warp lightning cannons.  The main brutality was to come from the plague monks, with a war alter thing and a Seer.

Spells thinned out my numbers as badly as general misfortune (an irresistible force spell killed 15 Dwarf warriors straight away, making my horde formation worthless, and did pretty much no harm to it's caster; then my Grudge Thrower exploded).

At this stage the remainder of the Dwarven warriors got into combat, only to get blown up by exploding slaves.  My miners arrived to try and help, but the monks forced the Longbeards to attack, and that was it.  A ridiculous massacre of so one sided and complex a nature that my brain can no longer comprehend exactly what happened.  From a unit of 16, only two got to attack back (i.e. were still alive). 

Even though they stood; I conceded.  Why prolong the inevitable.

Why have one walkover defeat, when you can have two?

Next up were Demons, an army I'd never faced before.  It was far less one sided, with my Grudge Thrower having a much better game.  but still the result went comfortably in my opponents favour after about three turns.

Most of the Leeds Wargames Centre was devoted to a Malifaux tourney, but there were several games of Warhammer Fantasy on as well, including a massive 6,000 pointer between Jason, and a Tomb King player, Daz.

Ultimately the Tomb Kings won, but as an opportunity in squeezing as many models on to a 6x4 foot table, it was pretty impressive.

GW introduces Resin models to replace Metal.

So as I discussed last month, GW seem set to stop using metal in miniatures; well, it seems the first of their new 'Resin' models are about to be released.  Here is a list of kits coming out in resin on the 28th of May:

Starting from the 28th of May 120 products that were Games Workshop direct only items will be coming back on the shelves as resin or resin Hybrids. This new range “Citadel Fine Cast” range will be limited in number for the first few months, so we will be taking advance orders for them.

Here are the new recast products at the full RRP:

41-60 COMMANDER DANTE £10.50
53-60 LOGAN GRIMNAR £14.50
55-61 THE EMPERORS CHAMPION £9.50
48-63 SPACE MARINE CHAPLAIN WITH JUMP PACK £10.50
44-60 DARK ANGELS COMPANY MASTER £10.50
48-61 SM LIBRARIAN IN TERMINATOR ARMOUR £14.50
53-61 NJAL STORMCALLER £14.50
41-61 ASTORATH THE GRIM £12.50
43-60 ABADDON THE DESPOILER £14.50
43-61 HURON BLACKHEART £10.50
50-61 ORK WARBOSS WITH ATTACK SQUIG £14.50
50-63 ORK BIG MEK £14.50
50-65 ORK PAINBOY WITH GROT ORDERLY £10.50
46-61 ELDAR AUTARCH WITH POWER WEAPON £10.50
46-62 THE AVATAR OF KHAINE £22.50
46-63 HARLEQUIN DEATH JESTER £10.50
46-64 HARLEQUIN SHADOWSEER £10.50
47-61 COMMISSAR YARRICK £10.50
47-63 IMPERIAL GUARD LORD COMMISSAR £9.50
51-61 TYRANID ZOANTHROPE £15.50
51-63 TYRANID TYRANT GUARD £15.50
51-64 TYRANID HIVE GUARD £15.50
51-65 TYRANID BROODLORD £15.50
57-61 BROTHER CAPTAIN STERN £14.50
57-60 LORD KALDOR DRAIGO £14.50
57-62 CASTELLAN CROWE £10.50
57-63 INQUISITOR COTEAZ £10.50
45-60 DARK ELDAR ARCHON £9.50
45-64 LELITH HESPERAX £10.50
45-63 URIEN RAKARTH £10.50
45-61 DARK ELDAR SUCCUBUS £9.50
56-60 TAU ETHEREAL WITH HONOUR BLADE £9.50
83-62 CHAOS EXALTED HERO £9.50
83-63 CHAOS KHORNE EXALTED HERO £10.50
86-60 EMPIRE CAPTAIN WITH HAMMER & PISTOL £9.50
92-60 WOOD ELF HIGHBORN WITH GREAT WEAPON £9.50
84-60 DWARF LORD WITH HAMMER & SHIELD £9.50
84-61 DWARF RUNELORD WITH GREAT WEAPON £9.50
90-60 SKAVEN WARLORD £9.50
90-61 QUEEK HEADTAKER £10.50
90-62 DEATHMASTER SNIKCH £10.50
91-61 VAMPIRE LORD £9.50
89-60 GRIMGOR IRONHIDE £10.50
89-62 BLACK ORC BIG BOSS £10.50
87-60 CARADRYAN £10.50
85-61 DARK ELF ASSASSIN WITH TWO HAND WEAPONS £9.50
81-60 MALAGOR THE DARK OMEN £12.50
10-61 URUK-HAI WITH CROSSBOWS £14.00
10-62 URUK-HAI BERSERKERS £14.00
08-61 GOTHMOG (PELENNOR) £20.50
05-60 ELROND AND GIL-GALAD £15.00
10-60 SARUMAN AND GRIMA £15.00
02-60 GANDALF THE WHITE £20.50
04-60 ARAGORN (THE BLACK GATE) £20.50
04-62 THEODEN (HELM’S DEEP) £20.50
04-61 BOROMIR (ITHILIEN) £20.50
09-60 SULADAN THE SERPENT LORD £20.50
08-62 THE DARK MARSHAL (RINGWRAITH) £20.50
05-61 DAIN AND BALIN £15.00
97-60 SKULLTAKER £14.50
48-40 MARNEUS CALGAR AND HONOUR GUARD £36.00
48-41 SPACE MARINE TECHMARINE WITH SERVITORS £25.50
55-40 BLACK TEMPLARS SWORD BRETHREN SQUAD £25.50
48-42 SPACE MARINE STERNGUARD VETERAN SQUAD £25.50
48-43 SPACE MARINE VANGUARD VETERAN SQUAD £25.50
53-40 CANIS WOLFBORN £30.00
43-40 NURGLE DAEMON PRINCE £21.50
43-41 CHAOS SPACE MARINE RAPTORS £25.50
43-42 DEATH GUARD PLAGUE MARINES £25.50
50-43 BOSS ZAGSTRUK £14.50
50-40 GHAZGHKULL THRAKA £22.50
50-41 ORK TANKBUSTAS £25.50
50-42 ORK BIG MEK WITH SHOKK ATTACK GUN £23.00
46-41 ELDAR RANGERS £20.50
46-42 ELDAR DARK REAPERS £23.00
46-44 ELDAR STRIKING SCORPIONS £23.00
46-40 ELDAR FARSEER AND WARLOCKS £20.50
51-42 TYRANID LICTOR £15.50
51-40 TYRANID HIVE TYRANT £36.00
51-41 TYRANID PYROVORE £21.50
45-40 DARK ELDAR INCUBI £23.00
45-41 DARK ELDAR MANDRAKES £20.50
56-40 TAU SNIPER DRONE TEAM £23.00
83-42 ARCHAON THE EVERCHOSEN £30.00
83-43 CHAOS LORD ON DAEMONIC MOUNT £22.50
83-41 CHAOS DRAGON OGRE SHAGGOTH £36.00
86-41 LUDWIG SCHWARZHELM £22.50
86-40 KURT HELBORG £22.50
82-41 THE GREEN KNIGHT £22.50
82-40 KING LOUEN LEONCOEUR £30.00
92-42 WOOD ELVES TREE KIN £30.00
92-40 ORION KING IN THE WOODS £22.50
92-41 WOOD ELVES TREEMAN £36.00
84-40 THOREK IRONBROW £36.00
84-41 DWARF GYROCOPTER £23.00
84-42 DWARF BOLT THROWER £23.00
90-40 SKAVEN WARPLOCK JEZZAILS £30.00
91-40 VAMPIRE COUNTS VARGHULF £21.50
91-42 COUNT MANNFRED £22.50
91-41 VAMPIRE COUNTS BLOOD KNIGHTS £61.50
88-41 KROQ GAR £40.00
89-44 GOBLIN SPEAR CHUKKA £18.50
89-43 SAVAGE ORC GREAT SHAMAN ON WAR BOAR £15.50
89-41 ORC WARBOSS ON WYVERN £40.00
89-42 GOBLIN ROCK LOBBER £23.00
89-45 GORBAD IRONCLAW £30.00
89-40 AZHAG THE SLAUGHTERER £55.00
85-41 DARK ELVES REAPER BOLT THROWER £18.50
08-40 THE DARK LORD SAURON £25.50
08-42 GULAHVAR THE TERROR OF ARNOR £30.00
08-43 MORDOR TROLL CHIEFTAIN £25.50
02-40 THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING £37.00
97-42 FLAMERS OF TZEENTCH £15.50

Price increases range from 30p to a few pounds in general, or 2.5-25%.

The new material itself is apparently being termed 'Finecast'; what that will turn out to be is anyones guess; but if it proves to be brittle or prone to air bubbles there will doubtless be many grumblings.  My expectation is something akin to what Mantic and Privateer have been using, but the real achievement here would seem to be making it possible to use existent moulds (though time will tell if this really is the case).

Zvezda - Art of Tactic kits...

Some of you may already be aware of the Art of Tactic range and for those who want more on the game itself I would direct you to it's homepage here.

Personally I'm more interested in the components for other games, I recently picked up a couple of sets from Halifax Modeller's World to see what the quality was like. 

Specifically, I stuck to my favoured scale, 1/72; and got hold of something familiar, German HMG teams, and something less commonplace, a soviet 37mm AA Gun.

Looking in detail at the moulds, well they're excellent.  The AA gun for example is a beautiful little kit.

It is made from a very stiff styrene, stiffer than most plastic soldiers, but not the sort of material plastic cement works on.  The model is snap together, but there are a lot of parts that you would probably prefer to glue, and so superglue is the way to go.  There is really no end of detail, considering this is essentially sold as a game component, even toy.  The control wheels, recoil valves, optics and towing bars are amongst the items featured, not to mention two crew and the option to build the model either on the integrated base or free standing.

Given this retails for £2.75/2.99 Euro, it's a bargain.  And far superior to metal counterparts.

The Machine gun teams are of a similar quality, but feature the MG-34 on a low level sustained fire mount, that was probably a more common set up in the field than it is in packs of model soldiers.

So from my stand point, great models; but of interest to many of you out there will be the armour and aircraft available in the range, for these are different, and very interesting scales:

In 1/100th scale they produce German and Russian tanks, half tracks and lorries including KV-1's, BT-5's, Panzer II, III and IV's, Hanomag half tracks, Zis-5 Trucks and other items.

In 1/144th scale there are Stuka and Sturmovik aircraft, with BF-109's and Yak fighters to follow.

Or in other words, perfectly scaled for Flames of War, and other 15mm scaled WW2 games; at one third the price of Battlefront's equivalent models it's hard to imagine these won't prove highly successful.

Black sun rises over Wissenschaft

Rather than watch class and privilege formalise it's breeding arrangements and monarchistic legitimacy the other week, I had my second game of Anima Tactics.  My opponent Steve was making his return to the club after several months away, and was new to the game; so alongside catching up, we took a leisurely pace through a game of 250 levels.

Steve had a Wissenschaft team comprising XII (a level 60 leader, I should add, rather obviously, that levels are the games' equivalent to a points value), Lorenzo and Rayne, all combat heavy.  These were backed up with Alessa Raincross, a ranged specialist, and IIRC a single Wissenschaft agent - essentially a rank and file fighter.

Steve deployed in cover (on this splendid little terrain board, originally made for Malifaux games), and used his advanced deployment abilities to reposition his troops after I had deployed.  In essence he bravely opted to hide from me!

Of course this was only a temporary ruse. 

For my part I had what is my new expanded force, Led by Clover (at 70 levels), backed up by Promethea and Styx, Sphia Ilmora; and two Type 005's.

Mine was, and remained throughout the game a dense formation, as the three true combat units in my force needed the buffs and upgrades that Promethea and Sophia could offer.

Early in the game, Steve looked to hold the upper hand, being more manoeuvrable and seeking to target my Type 005's, he was to finish one off in short order, shooting it with XII and then sending Rayne in to finish it off.  But he was not aware of the effect killing one of these beasts had, and was surprised and severely wounded by it when the corpse exploded at the end of the turn.

Elsewhere Steve threw out his agent as a lure, in some sense I think he thought she was safe, but Clover used his dexterity to get around the cover she was in and executed her with a single devastating blow.

At this, Steve declared this was his plan all along and threw Lorenzo into the fray.  I think he was soon disappointed to discover that Lorenzo was no match for not only, Clover, but also for the tactical advice of Sophia, and magic of Promethea.  He ended up defeated too.  Though by this point Clover was also wounded.

I had by now lost both Type 005's as Alessa snuck around sniping at them and others.  Still feeling he held the upper hand, Steve launched XII in a grand attack Firing on Clover and then charging in.

Clover weathered the initial storm, and then received some welcome additional healing; one thing I'd learnt from my first game was that sequencing your actions is all important.  Steve had shot his bolt too early, and I was able to buff Clover with additional attack strength from both Sophia and Promethea before responding.

Over two rounds, Clover smashed XII into the ground, my second attack would have finished him off on its own.  With only a weakened Rayne and Alessa left; Steve conceded defeat.

Initially a tight game, I discovered that my Leader, properly supported, is an absolute monster!  His attack power is awesome, and his ability to self heal critical.  Steve had a well organised force, but much as I had in my first game, suffered for not sensing the subtleties of play until it was on the table.

Overall, a much better way to spend the time than watching a wedding.

Leeds Wargaming Centre (Sponsored Promotion?)

Not so many months ago I reviewed Geek Games, a new gaming store opened by a keen young lad in the Leeds area; well that small endeavour was only the start of his ambitions, and Geek Games has now transformed into,

The Leeds Wargaming Centre.

Craig, the owner, has managed to find a site within reach of the centre of Leeds with room for all his ambitions to develop, and with the aid of the Leeds Night Owls (my regular gaming club) has set up not just a shop, but a gaming venue for wargames enthusiasts to congregate and relax, as well as shop of course.

 The official opening was just this weekend, though informally the store had been open for several weeks.  Inside the spacious room there are currently 21 six by four foot tables set up, with plenty of themed scenery for many different games available.  A separate painting and modelling table is set up, and there is also a retail section for reinforcements and accessories.

Thanks to the generosity of friends and associates, the store has got it's hands on plenty of showpiece terrain for games, and the use of a table costs you just £1 each all day.  A good deal in my mind.

Craig hopes to run regular tournaments, this week kicking off with a Malifaux tourney that had 24 attendees (though I stuck to Warhammer), The Night Owls and others have already organised several tourneys for the rest of the year.  If there are any criticisms at present it would have to be the lack of stock to buy, though steadily improving as new stock trickles in, and the untidiness of some corners of the space; which still need a finishing touch or two.

Still it's a much more liberal space than your average Games Workshop, with any game being welcome, not just what Craig sells, and toilets and refreshments also available on site.

If your local, support it, it's worth it!

One issue you may have is finding it, the address for the LWC is:

Leeds Wargaming Centre

Norden House
1st floor (door is located on the main road)

322a Meanwood Road

Leeds   LS7 2JF

And the cunningly hidden entrance is here:

There is plenty of parking on side streets, but on the main road is limited.  At the weekend you can park round the back easily enough though.  Opening hours at the minute:

Wednesday - 4 to 11

Thursday - 12 to 6
Friday - 12 to 6
Saturday - 10 to 6
Sunday - 10 to 6

Right I think Craig's had enough of a plug out of me today.  I hope he appreciates what some free Ghoul models can get you in return (wink, wink).