The Persian Expedition

I recently finished reading this; I find I manage one or two classic histories every year.



The book is of course, as you must all know, Xenophon's personal account of his experience as part of Prince Cyrus' attempt on the throne of the Persian Empire.  The book is often known as the Ten Thousand, for the number of Greek troops involved.  Xenophon's history has been criticised for potentially over egging his involvement in the campaign to extricate the Greeks from their predicament after the Battle of Cunaxa; but I felt that in any considered reading of the volume the fact that Xenophon was not in sole command was clear enough.  Of course he writes himself well, that is the nature of a personal account, and clearly he did have the odd axe to grind.  But I think in the context these can be overlooked.

Taking the time to read the introduction rather than just diving in will reward you, but for the wargamer the details of Greek military tactics, and the accounts of numerous small and large engagements are the items that will appeal; and will probably result in a number of bookmarked passages.

Overall, it's easy to see why this is seen as a favourite read for schoolboys of a certain generation (presumably the generation that wore well pressed shorts and learnt Latin still, the age of the George Cawkwell - who wrote the introduction - would suggest he has in mind the 1950's, or earlier still!).  Unlike many history books it is not dry, and positively jogs along with plenty of action and the odd stirring (surprisingly well 'recalled') speech.

If you fancy taking your warring Greeks to face the Persians, Thracians or other assembled tribal masses on the their own turf, or have more than just a passing interest in classical history; this really should be on your reading list.

Warlord Games Zulus

Aside from my own display game, the Leeds Nightowls are doing at least a couple of other shows this year, and Andy is organising a Zulu War display for at least one of them.  To help with the preparation, I've been roped in to paint a few models, which I agreed to do on the proviso that I wasn't to be allowed to keep any!

That may sound like madness, but as I already have unfinished 15mm Zulus, and many thousands of models already in boxes, I really don't want to be led into another unplanned project!  Still I get to assemble and paint some of the models so here follows the fruits of that labour and a review.

A box contains 32 plastic and one metal model, although we divided up the spoils of a rather large club purchase and I went home with a mix of Married and Unmarried troops.  I assembled the Unmarried troops in a standard (for our game) unit of 16 for starters:

The models only come with four basic poses, but a variety of arms and heads.  I must say that these are really well engineered and hide what few joins there are.  To be fair the Unmarried troops are adorned more for parade than battle, but for the gamer who wants visual appeal rather than accuracy they will look attractive.

Painting was a breeze, after all being naked there's very little to do.  I did feel obliged to do three different skin tones to help vary them up.  An I selected the shields of the Imgombamakhosi regiment:

Two bases 80x40mm in my fairly standard fashion.  And a close up:

So do I like the models?  Well yes, they are very nice.  The details are generally spot on, with a mix of small and large shields, knobkerries, axes and Iklwa; I can criticise the fact that some of the spears seem a little long, but that's easily adapted.  And though I feel the Unmarried troops are overdressed, you can minimise the use of luxury kit, or simply just buy the more believable married troops.  With some conversion I'm sure you cold get even more out of the poses (a rather limiting set of rifle arms are included too).

Overall a solid eight out of ten.

Croatian Houses

For my upcoming display game I need more buildings, the thing is you can't really buy the look off the shelf:







Not being conveniently located in northern France, the middle ages or the 41st millennium, appropriate model buildings that at least give the impression of these ruins are few and far between.  True, some of the German made model railway buildings, and even a handful of the very basic British ones pass for the Balkans, but they are small, expensive, and often difficult to get hold of.

Therefore it was time to get the foam board out instead:

I wanted to give the impression of the airy Mediterranean style of the rural Yugoslavian buildings, making them as distinct as possible from the WW2 buildings I made last year.  Part of this was to include balconies and raised entrances, making these far trickier architectural projects than most of my foam buildings.  The other thing of course being lots of damage, 30mm cannon, 100mm tank rounds and mortar shells...

They went together really well, especially the one on the right, however; and I was able to knock up the burnt out house from the scrap of the others.  All four models came out of one A3 sheet.

The painting was carried out in a frenzied evening and mainly revolved around a tester pot of Homebase 'Moonlight' white, initially with a tiny amount of Panzer Grey added, then highlighted with the raw colour, followed by Moonlight plus white, then pure white.  The method to these layers being to paint down from the roof, leaving some of the lower levels showing at the base, hence the walls get lighter as you move up them.  The lower three (scale) feet of wall or so also get a layer of dust and dirt applied.

I think the look the part, but I still need to do maybe three or four more.  Then as space is tight, they can be donated to the clubs after I'm done with them.

Well, that's that done for another three months!

Had my first game of Warhammer fantasy in a while last Thursday.

I ran an experimental Dogs of War list, in so far as it featured mostly new or nearly new units in less than typical builds.  The results were to be honest, a bit of a disaster.

A lot of my army was invested in Asarnil the Dragon Lord; probably the weediest hero ever mounted on a tough as nails dragon; he's really only a dragon delivery system.  He went on the attack naturally enough, but carelessly I let him attack a unit of High Elves with Occam's Mindrazor cast on them.

This shows that I really wasn't paying attention; charging a unit with Always Strikes first, that swapped its' Strength of 3 for its' Leadership of 9 was a supremely dumb move.  30 or so strength 9 spear hits ruined my dragon in seconds.

Thereafter my army was on the back foot; there was a slight chance for my Knights and duellists to break the thin connective tissue of Mikes army and break onto its' flanks:

But it wasn't to be.  The rest of the army cowered behind a large hill in the centre of the field, and simply tried to weather the storm.  Braganza's Besiegers were taking the brunt of it now.  And it was only a matter of time.

At the last they lost their banner, and as this was the Blood and Glory scenario I found myself 2-0 down at the end.  And to be honest, that didn't reflect how one-sided it had been.

Frankly I played like a chump, but I can at least blame the tools for being unfamiliar, I didn't use them well and paid the price.

Unlike my troops, I get to live and learn.

By the next time I'm sure I'll have forgotten though!

News and Leftovers

Firstly today more new releases on their way in the plastic variety, this one is bound to appeal to a wide variety of gamers, as Warlord are about to release a plastic set of three ruins:


These are 28mm scaled and seem to come with plenty of variety, a set of three buildings costs £35.  I would have to see them in the flesh to decide if they are really worth that asking price; but it is a pleasing development.

Elsewhere I took a few extra pictures last week at the club and should release them before they become irrelevant.  Andy and Mark were playing Saga, over Andy's glorious new terrain:

Also there was a 40k Tournament on; not my thing these days obviously, but I did find Ralph's work on his Grey Knights worthy of a shot.

That's all for today, big game write ups to follow!

Monsterpocalypse

Matt took me through one of the worlds many collectible miniatures games last week; this one featuring Toho Cinema and anime inspired monsters duelling each other across a defenceless metropolis.

The game itself is from Privateer Press, and seems at least to have been well supported, though not perhaps the initial success they might have liked; despite this hollywood is apparently keen to make a film adaptation (and if they are prepared to make an adaptation of Battleship* into a film, who knows where they'll draw the line).

The models are in some cases very impressive, this was my Xaxor, an alien gribbly clocking in, according to its' stat card, at 30,000 tonnes!

In real life he's a few grams of prepainted transparent plastic.  Quality varies, I felt my models were nicely turned out, but Matt's robot monsters were much less polished.  The base uses a variety of stats and icons to detail the in game performance of the models.  Each side has one main monster and access to a variety of smaller units.

Game play revolves around the management of three sorts of dice to allow units to act.  White dice are used to summon units, move and fight, and when used by or for units are transferred to the main monster, who in turn can use them to move, fight and a few other special actions.  This means that usually you alternate rounds between small units and the big monster, but in some cases it can be possible to manage two successive turns with your monster.

Red dice are power-ups, and can only be used by the big monster to augment attacks, the can be earned in a variety of ways.  Lastly blue dice are bonuses that can only be used in attacks, each unit adds its' own values of these.

The terrain is interactive, and provides its' own bonuses and penalties; but my Xaxor quickly found they were a way to earn red dice, so managed to smash four of them in one attack.

Gain enough power and you can transform into an 'Ultra' form:

The stats improve, but it is basically an unpainted version of the standard model.  Incidentally the plastic is quite brittle, and several of the models were damaged in transit.  Superglue repairs them fine, but it is as well to be aware that product perfection cannot be guaranteed.

As battle continued I soon defeated Matt's alpha form, and it became a battle between our ultras.  Both units could use particular combo-attacks, and the small units could provide certain supports.

In the end I was able to coordinate more damage on his robot, and having defeated both its' forms I won the game.

For a collectible game there seemed to be a lot to learn up front, but once in play it was easy to pick up and quite entertaining.

I'd certainly give it another go, though of course I will always be wary of the dangers of the collectible format, and if it was me I'd want to repaint the bases as much as possible.

Formigny: 15 April 1450

Our latest Hail Caesar battle was to be a late medieval re-fight to allow Richard to field his new acquisitions for a fledgling War of the Roses army.  To this end I dipped in to my history of the Hundred Years War and went straight to the end, y'know - the bit we English tend to forget about as it doesn't shower us in all that much glory.

Formigny was the response to the French recapture of Normandy in 1449.  Thomas Kyriell Assembled a dismally small force even by English standards, and landed at Cherbourg with scarcely half a plan.  By the time he started heading inland toward Bayeux a month after landing his force had swelled a little to 4,000 men, comprising 800 men at arms and the remainder of his force being archers.

On route, the Constable of Richemont and the Count of Cleremont planned to intercept the English.  They had a force of roughly similar numbers but had the advantage of being able to attack at their leisure, being well provisioned, and having access to both mounted knights and artillery.

Thus the grounds for the battle were set, and in keeping with the historical scenario I set the forces and battlefield up:

The English deployed along a ridge with their right flank covered by a brook, and their rear by enclosed gardens.  On the day they had time to dig small pits and place some stakes to their front, but these were not considered significant, so in game terms they would nullify the clash value of attackers and would be lost if an English unit chose to move.  Richard as the English had 2 units of Men at Arms, 4 of Veteran Bowmen and 4 of Shire levy bows.  He placed the latter in the front line whilst the rest formed a solid line on the hill behind stakes, with the men at arms in the centre.

By contrast the French were initially only the troops of Claremont; 2 small units of mounted knights, 2 full sized groups on foot, 2 units of Pavisiers, one of Brigans and one of crossbowmen, and finally a detachment of Culverins.  The French had reserves in the shape of Richemont, but these could not be expected to arrive for four or five turns at the very least.

In an attempt to emulate history I threw forward a general attack, but only getting an order off to the infantry, meant Claremont unintentionally left his cavalry and artillery in reserve.

Some of the English bowmen came forward to meet the attack and were able to hold the French at bay, driving several units back every time they advanced.  In fact at this stage the battle seemed to be going so well for the English, that Kyiell considered a full fledged counter attack.  He knew there were other French in the area, but not where or when they might arrive.

In the end he erred on the side of caution perhaps a little too long.  For just as he released half his regular troops from the defensive lines, the men of Richemont arrived:

Richemont had a full unit of mounted Knights, alongside a unit of Pavisiers backed up by yet more Brigans.  And as soon as they arrived, the French chivalry were up for the less than chivalrous action of charging the distant English archers in the rear.

This began a frenzied phase for the French in which four English archer units were destroyed, three by the Knights and one by the men at arms of Claremont, supported by brigans. In amongst this a rash personal charge by Kyriell had resulted in his death, and he was to be replaced by a less able, but sterner commander.

However, when Richmont tried to order his horse onto the now exposed flank of the English, their exhaustion and confusion over orders led rather to their retiring pell mell toward their own lines

For a little time the attempt to lead the attack reverted to Claremont, who finally was able to bring up his artillery and cavalry, having withdrawn him most demoralised troops.  The artillery finally began to fire, at extreme range, on the English; who themselves took time to reform their defensive cordon.

Richemont rallied his knights and they eagerly charged back up the hill for another attack.  At the same time Claremont tried to get his smaller squadrons of cavalry to act in the same way, but in general they were having nothing of it and constantly were deflected from the English line by a hail of arrows.

A hard battle atop the hill saw the French knights retire a spent force, but the English too by now were all but a broken force.  I n a last desperate throw of the dice Kyriell's junior led his men at arms against Richemonts pavisiers; but even here they failed to win a victory, and the English commander was lucky to escape alive this time.

Whilst his back was turned the infantry of Claremont had climbed the hill and engaged the archers in irresistible force.  By now it was a lost cause for the English and they sought only to escape in what numbers they could.

Despite an oft lacklustre attack from Claremont, the coordination of two separate attacks on the English line had proved their undoing.  And in that the re-fight was almost an exact replica of the original battle, should historical accounts be believed.

Kyriell too had little difficulty containing one enemy, even managing to capture the French guns, but was lost when Richemont's fresh troops arrived on his exposed flank.  In the event little more than 250 English escaped alive.  For once French losses did not seem significant.

For this game we played the rules fairly straight, using generally the higher stats for given heavy and missilery troop types.  I translated every 400 men in real life to a unit of 16 infantry, with the French also having one unit of 200 or so knights represented as 12 figures, and two groups of a hundred or so under Claremont in sixes.  Overall the battle seemed balanced by the reserves rule - that the number of French turns, plus the result of a 2d6 roll must equal or beat 15 for the reserves to arrive - and both sides had every chance of winning.  In the end it was a repeat of history, and a rare victory for my normally beleaguered French.

Huzzah!

Pike and Shotte

This morning I was tipped off that Pike and Shotte; the third set of rules from Warlord Games are now on pre-order on Amazon:



Now personally, I've found myself perfectly able to tweak Black Powder to suit my needs for the English Civil War, but I'm sure for the lazy gamer these may fit the bill instead.  My only concern being how they treat unit composition; my first game of Black Powder was Warlord's own ECW Demonstration game, in which they rather peculiarly chose to divide regiments into three sub-units.

I personally think I'll wait to flick through a copy, and doubtless Warlord will announce more details soon, which may clarify matters.

Lost in Translation

I don't know if it was the fact the game was originally written in German, the fact that only the game's owner had ever played it before, or the fact that he attempted to explain every rule in minutiae before beginning play; but either way by the time we began playing Goa, I hadn't a clue what the point of the game was any more, let alone what I had to do.

It's one of those Eurogames, that is to say it's obsessed with trading and building rather than conflict, and there are several legitimate routes to victory.  This plus a limited translation and far too many things to remember  made it frustratingly difficult to play at first, and for at least three or four turns I had no clue what I was doing.

Towards the end of the game I had grasped the basics though, and even formulated a strategy, I was able to generate a large population more readily than the other players and so concentrated on founding new colonies, indeed I was the only player to establish the maximum four colonies.  Others, including not surprisingly the game owner, had tighter plans from the start, and so I was unsurprised to find I only came third out of four players.

The game had merits, but is unlikely to be a favourite for me, and like Settlers of Catan, it's one I wouldn't recommend to casual gamers.

And not one I'd choose to play again; I might prefer to stick my fingers in the light sockets for the evening.

The Barabolya Horde

Infrequently, Ogres have made an appearance in my Dogs of War army; one of the reasons they didn't appear more often has been that, I only had a unit of four, which was far from optimum.  Threes are fine as little flank Pseudo-cavalry units, but under the present version of Warhammer at least blocks of 6 or 9 are favoured.

Over the last couple of years I had accumulated enough 'new' Ogre models to form such a sized unit, and finally I've got round to painting them up:

The hardest part was to match the new models to the old ones, which were originally painted for my Orc army back when you were allowed them as mercenaries.  Matching the skintone proved easy enough, but getting the level of glaze right was a harder task.  Rather, The old models were too dark, and the new one's too light.

Still it's a big angry unit of nine now or, for Kings of War, three units of three.

And less in the painting pile.