Happy New Year. . . I get to start it with Covid.

 

Yup. I have The Covid. A mild case; one night of fever and two days - so far - of a sore throat and occasional cough - which I am attributing to being vaxxed and boosted. And quarantine. Hopefully the symptoms remain mild.

 

Now on to the gaming content. No predictions or goals or New Year resolutions as to how many minis I plan to paint this year. Sorry - just don't need the extra pressure at this time.

 

The last game I played was at The Baron's, of course: Flower of Chivalry published by The Canadian Wargames Group. Typical medieval mayhem so the photos will be hard to make sense of - the video can be accessed via this POST. I commanded the left flank battle of our side, which I failed to hold, and our side eventually lost.

 

 

It has been YEARS since I played FoC and it showed. But I was reminded what an intriguing set of rules it is, and its Battle Lust mechanism can give a basic "advance and bash" period some real flavor and nuance. So I found a used copy of the rules online with the thought I might adapt them to the earlier Norman Conquest, only to find the earlier armies/troop types already catered for in the rules. There is also a conversion guide for rules and troop types to the DBA, Tactica and WRG rules, which might also provide an indication to the age of rules, but is a bonus in that I like to base minis so they can be used for DBA (3.0 of course) too. Win win win!

 

See ya. . . after I kick Covid, of course.

What Am I Reading Now?

My Butterfly Brain is apparent in some of the books I've added to my reading list. I'm really looking forward to wading into Dr. Matthew's hefty book on the Macedonian pike phalanx. Also of "ancient" interest are new books on Rome and Syracusan tyrants, as well as a new set of fast-play wargame rules for classical naval battles from Osprey Publishing.

Here are a couple of new books on the French and Indian War. I highly recommend the new Osprey COMBAT  - it directly inspired my recent Black Powder game of La Belle Famille.

 Osprey just released a new Campaign book on the Gempei War, of course by Dr. Turnbull.

The recent wargaming "glossies" have relevant content, too. This one has a review of The Baron's Fistful of Lead rules by Lion and Dragon Rampant author Daniel Mersey, as well as a mention of his most excellent blog.

All have reviews of the new black-powder-era skirmish rules Sharp Practice 2 from Too Fat Lardies, which have a section devoted to the French and Indian War. The Norman Conquest issue features some Lion Rampant and Hail Caesar! articles to help scratch that Dark Ages itch.

 
See ya!
 

Hello to an Old Friend and a New Year

I finally received my new copy of DBA 3.0 - my Old Friend -  from On Military Matters. No surprises ensued as I have been avidly following online the development of this latest iteration of the "rules that brought me back to wargaming" and which remain, hands-down, my favorite wargame. I like every change made; see this review if you're interested in knowing more.

Lately I have been ruminating over all the varied rule sets and projects I've either started or bought figures or models for and feeling the need for some new prioritizing. It is purely coincidence that I've made some decisions at the beginning of a New Year, but I am just going to roll with it. . .

1. I have some more terrain to build and miniatures to varnish and base for my 54mm French and Indian War project. Getting close (wink) to having the "toys" completed.

2. New main focus is DBA/HOTTs in 28mm. I've already started to adapt some of my French and Indian War terrain for use with DBA/HOTTs and will build some more. Then I want to paint some more armies; Punic Wars- and Norman Conquest-era for DBA, and Orcs, Elves and Dwarves, not to mention completing the Undead, for HOTTs. I also have figures for the Greek and Macedonian Wars with Persia, the Republican Roman Civil Wars, Sengoku Jidai Samurai (and I want some Koreans!) and even Aztecs and Conquistadors! DBA/HOTTs just seems like the best way to make these armies possible.

Oh, did I mention John Carter and Barsoom? I have always admired The Stronghold's approach to Barsoom, but I have always thought that the world of ERB's John Carter should be played in a skirmish/RPG format. After playing around with several rule sets and feeling daunted by the kind of terrain I would need to build, I re-read the first five books. . . and realized that there are an awful lot of full-on battles described in the books between armies and navies outside of the great walled cities. Between the Leviathan models I described in an earlier post and the figures I've purchased from Bronze Age and Tinman, I can do several HOTTs armies in a similar format to those shown on The Stronghold, but in 28mm vs. 15mm. And perhaps even in this lifetime!

3. Oh, and World War 2 with HOTTs?! I found an adaptation of HOTTs for WW2 a few years ago here. I wasn't convinced I wanted to play with battalions as the basic maneuver element, but Field of Battle: WW2 has me rethinking that. . . I have lots of MicroArmor that need some impetus for completion!

4. And how goes my butterfly infatuation with Star Trek? Still going. After enjoying a couple of cool new books. . .

. . . and watching a handful of TNG episodes (not as easy as it once was!) and doing a bit more research, I find I prefer the movie and TNG "world" as opposed to the Amarillo world (see my previous Star Trek post if in need of reference). So I gave the Star Trek: Attack Wing game another look, because that is the game that features all the ships I like, especially the Klingon and Romulan ships, and what do you know, I kinda like it. Rules are simple but pretty elegant, and the individual ship/crew builds, which kinda turned me off at first, make a lot more sense to me now. Still want to use the 1/2500 scale models - I got some for Christmas! - instead of the included models and make the scale/ranges longer, but otherwise I'm still interested. We'll see if I get any models built in the near future : )


Best wishes for 2015!

Got my Studio Tomahawk on!

Last week at my FLGS I picked up some new rulebooks. Saga has been all the rage lately and since I love me some Dark Ages, particularly the Norman Conquest kind, I decided to give it a closer look. Since we know the French and Indian War has some appeal for me, Muskets & Tomahawks, from Studio Tomahawk, the creators of Saga, seemed a natural pick-up, too. And since I like my current French and Indian War rules of choice so much, This Very Ground by Iron Ivan Games, I bought their World War Two skirmish set, Disposable Heroes & Coffin for Seven Brothers.

So if I like This Very Ground (TVG) so much, why bother with Muskets & Tomahawks (M&T)? Shiny object - I couldn't resist. And I have an ultimate plan. . .
A campaign, of course. I want to use GMT's boardgame, Wilderness War, as the basis of the campaign. 

I have been building my 10-man units with the John Jenkins miniatures to each represent 1 Strength Point from the boardgame. TVG perfectly handles the army level battles generated by the boardgame, but there's a "frontier ravaging" sub-game that is happening simultaneously with the army level that feels like it needs a more intimate scale than the army level. Hence I keep looking at rules. . .

After reading through M&T, I think it could easily fit the bill. In fact, it reads (disclaimer: I haven't played, yet) a lot like TVG. Both games are unit-based; each unit comprised of 4 to 12 soldiers in M&T, 5 to 20 in TVG. Both games activate a unit at a time, and alternate activations. TVG has a more interesting activation system, based on Initiative and player choice; M&T is card-driven, with an option to build hands instead of relying on the draw (I like the option). Again, in both games, each unit moves, shoots and fights before another unit activates. In TVG the soldiers are required to be in a formation and all take the same action. In M&T the soldiers can do different actions, which means that some can fire while others reload, and individual figures have to be marked for reloading. TVG uses a "Volume of Fire" mechanism that allows a single marker to be used for a unit, which I like.

In both games, each combatant has 3 defining characteristics. TVG bases these characteristics on a D10, M&T on a D6. This permits TVG to differentiate unit quality with numbers to a greater extent, M&T relies a bit more on "traits."

Shooting is handled the same in both games; each figure gets a die, rolling to hit and then rolling each hit to wound. Morale tests are taken by unit each time casualties are incurred. Both games handle morale degradation with 3 levels of decreasing effectiveness.

Officers are treated as individual units in both games; unit leaders are handled differently. In M&T, each unit has a leader who by virtue of being a leader is the last casualty in the unit. In TVG, each unit has one or more leaders (non-coms) that can become casualties as part of normal combat, and their loss can have a detrimental effect on unit performance. As officer mortality was quite high in the French and Indian War, I think TVG gets this right.

TVG provides some sample scenarios that can be strung together to form a mini-campaign and encourages the reader to devise their own scenarios, while M&T provides a neat scenario-generation system. M&T also has a system for random events and for "Side Plots" that add some fun and fanciful elements into the canned scenarios.

I like M&T enough to play a few games to get the feel of it, but I am not convinced I will switch from TVG. I may just be able to switch to smaller 5-man units to get the more intimate feel I want for the "frontier war". 

I'll get to Saga and Disposable Heroes later.

See ya.