CONFESSIONS OF A WARGAMER

Strandhogg: Dwarves, Goblins, and Mules

2011-11-04T01:12:00.001+08:00

I think it was Nietzsche who said that to a man with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.

Well, the wargamer corollary of that might be that if you have a mule train, they'll feature in every scenario. Capt Arjun's love of pack mules extends to almost every scale - I believe he has them from 15mm clear to 28mm, and they were the focus of this Strandhogg game.

It was a surprisingly close ending: Strandhogg's combat resolution is one of those multi-step types (roll to see if you run away; roll to see if you can enter combat; competitive roll to hit; roll to save; and a few more steps for mounted units on top of that) which makes conclusive resolution unlikely. There is too much room for a single bad roll to de-rail the whole delicate chain of events required to score a hit.

There are better photos up at Cor Blog Me, but you can see the mules in the background of the photo as the Goblin King faces off against his treacherous kin.

MOO2

2011-10-16T12:05:00.001+08:00

That's what we used to call Masters of Orion 2, an old PC Arjun and I used to play. When I saw that a version had been ported to the iPhone and iPad, I had to buy it!

(Aside: I suspect game industry analysts have an entire category of nostalgia driven games, banking on good experiences gamers had when they were teenagers to sell re-invented versions to them as adults)

Starbase Orion, as it is called, turns out to be a little bit clunky: it's not that they've made it any clunkier, it's that they haven't taken advantage of the iPad's touchscreen and tilt controls much. It's still very much a PC, mouse and keyboard game ported directly to iOS, ignoring the possibilities for improving the interface that the iPad offers. What was enjoyable 20 years ago with one interface is no longer as captivating now. I guess they must really be banking on nostalgia.

Warring States rules play-test

2011-10-03T00:35:00.001+08:00

I've been writing a set of rules for the Warring States period, and Arjun and I ran a play-test today.

I'll post the rules up when they're completed, but in a nutshell, it's a grid based system, with a focus on replicating the historical features of the period as represented in The Art of War - namely a differentiation between direct and indirect attacks (or orthodox and unorthodox, or ordinary and extraordinary, depending on the translation), a "rock paper scissors" mechanic between different troop types, and an over-arching army morale system based on a "Ying and Yang" mechanic.

... all of which makes no sense whatsoever unless you read the rules, so I'll shut up about the details until the rules are ready to post. The game itself worked quite well in highlighting various problems with the rules, and I'll be making improvements for the next game.

It was good to finally get the Warring States figures out for a game. Looks like we've got a new campaign in the works ... :)

Gaming in spurts

2011-09-19T12:32:00.001+08:00

Gaming is a sporadic activity now. I keep up with a few games with Arjun once in a while, I play the occasional round of Call of Duty, but the most sporadic game of all for me is World of Warcraft. An MMORPG simply takes up so much time that it can only be played during the holidays for me. It's a seasonal game now - something for the festive seasons, with long periods of hibernation in between. I re-enter the game to discover massive changes from patches and readjust anew each time to gameplay that has changed.

Franco-Prussian War Game 1

2011-02-27T18:50:00.008+08:00

The map battle reports for the FPW Campaign will be posted at Cor Blog Me.

The first of 4 games played between me (French) and Martin (Prussian), this one was the "river" map. The larger aim for the French is to either reduce the Prussian forces, or to delay them, such that the Prussian forces approaching along this route would arrive late, or diminished, for the final battle (the fourth game). A more detailed description of the campaign can be read here.

The top of the map is East, and the bottom of the map, from which French forces must retreat and Prussian forces give chase, is West, towards Paris. Game mechanics allowed for competitive placement of terrain, and I chose as many pieces of difficult terrain as possible - three hills overlooking the river, and swamps to obstruct movement. Martin got to place the two bridges though, and they were placed in the only remaining avenues of movement, on the northen-most and southern-most edges of the board.

I set up the Divisional Commander in the village, with the reserve (a regiment of Zouaves, hidden) so he could move them to whichever bridge the Prussian main attack developed on.

On the right side of the table, the southern bridge was held by 2 regiments of the division, with the bulk of the divisional artillery.

As it turns out, the main Prussian attack came across this bridge.

With a 2 to 1 advantage, and a preponderance of artillery, the Prussians quickly forced the crossing, and established a bridgehead.

The French reserve was committed from the village towards the Southern bridge ...

... where the most bitter fighting of the game occurred. Seeing that I had committed my reserves, Martin, ever the crafty Prussian, launched his secondary attack on the Northern bridge, which I more or less decided was a lost cause. In the end, the regiment at that sector beat a hasty retreat after sustaining losses, and inflicting some damage. Not nearly enough though.

In the end, I made the maximum time limit to delay the Prussian forces, and barely kept the routes of retreat open for the French forces to live and fight another day. A final charge by a lone unit of Prussian Hussars (seen above, charging in from left) just missed shutting the door on the retreat. Had they made contact, it would have been the only time in the game forces from the northern and southern half of the battlefield interacted - a sign of how badly the terrain divided the battle.

The French lost one entire regiment (the 45th, which I knew from the start was a forlorn hope), and most of their Divisional artillery (ouch). The Prussians lost fewer units, but received casualties throughout, and these two Divisions will arrive late for the final game.

The next two games are going to be tougher: this was the only map with the opportunity to channel the Prussians into clear lanes of advance covered by fire, but even so, the longer range of the Prussian cannon meant they had the advantage in firing.

The Railroad and Open map are going to see Prussian superiority in artillery tell, I suspect.

Crusades PBEM

2010-09-20T17:48:00.006+08:00

A short Crusades game hosted by Cpt Arjun. This game was the tactical play of a strategic First Crusades game, replaying the Battle of Antioch. The Crusaders (left of the river above) are attempting to break through and establish a bridgehead, relieving the siege of Antioch.

The initial setup. Ruleset was Warmaster Ancients. The Crusaders make the first attempt to storm the bridge: here, one unit has made it across, but is facing a counterattack.

Attrited down, the survivors try to maintain the tenuous foothold on the far bank while the remaining Crusaders try to cross over in this brief window of opportunity.

A counterattack, and the cavalry charge pins the survivors against the riverbank and wipes them out. The first bridgehead is destroyed.

A second attempt to storm the bridge is launched.

A battle of attrition quickly develops on the bridge as defenders surge forward to push the attackers back.

Bit by bit, the attacks make slow progress ...

... and finally manage to cross and deploy in force (what force that remains after the fighting ...)

They steel themselves for a counterattack.

Success! The crossing is achieved ...

... but an entire intact enemy division still remains to be faced!

Final face off. Neither side offered battle, so the game was called on account of darkness =)

tags:gaming,wargames

Wings of War

2010-01-10T09:42:00.006+08:00

Some pics from the Wings Of War game the Doc and I played yesterday.

We faced off with two Spitfires versus two Messerschmitts: the terrain was set up more for visual interest than with any view to an effect on the game, so we tried to recreate an archetypal English countryside look.

The game is turn based but simultaneous movement, with maneuvers plotted two turns in advance, which meant that predicting where your target would be in 2 turns is really the key skill.

After bringing guns to bear on an enemy, the amount of damage needed to shoot it down is also quite high. In general, I found the use of counters for allocating damage and marking speeds to be a bit fiddly.

The combination of free form movement (i.e. rather than a hex map) with precise firing arcs meant that, for a serious competition, there would very likely be disputes over whether or not a plane had been nudged off position. A plain flat map, devoid of anything but painted on terrain, would probably help the playing field more level, so to speak, but also much less visually interesting.

After a few hours of maneuvering around, we ended up doing Immelmann turns all the time to stay within the playing area.

The game ended with a plane shot down for each of us, and me forfeiting the game when an Immelmann turn brought my last plane outside the playing area.

All in all, a reasonably fun game, but we both agreed that had there been more players and more planes, the turn sequence would have slowed down tremendously.

Warring States Game

2009-08-09T20:00:00.008+08:00

The Doctor and I finally got to field our Warring States Armies today. (here's a link to a pic of the army)

Simple set-up, my army is on the left, the Doctor's on the right. Both armies are the same except that I have chariots and fanatic swordsmen, he has light horse, cavalry and peasant hordes. The terrain was kept simple, but the two hills made a big difference when I realised that chariots couldn't drive over them (rough ground).

I opened the battle with a general advance - as with Warmaster, inevitably not all the army makes the command roll. The archers on the left did well, gaining the hill and firing down on the spearmen below (1 and 2, below), while one block of spearmen advanced down the middle (3) and the chariots pushed ahead (4). This was when I realised that the chariots would never be able to go over the hill.

The Doctor responded by sending his spearmen, in line, to engage my troops. Light horse on his right (1) engaged my skirmishers in a shooting duel, while spearmen (2 and 3) attacked the spearmen.

At this point, a general attack developed in the centre, as my spearmen charged straight ahead (1) while the chariots crossed the frontage to take position in the middle, where they eventually charged in for the attack. The skirmishers stalemated the light horse (3) and the reserves (4) moved up too slowly to make a difference. Of note is (5): the two units of fanatic swordsmen, who in this picture are just beginning to move over the hill, and who would play an important role in the final action of this game. (6) shows my opponents cavalry, who would eventually thrown their weight into the centre and almost decided the outcome.

In the end, the centre developed into a massive melee that ate up several units on both sides, with the fanatics and the chariots deciding the outcome. Not the most exciting of games, but a good warm-up to exercise the troops, as it were, and to get ready for the campaign to follow.

The fruits of 4 weeks of PVP

2009-07-09T01:04:00.002+08:00

Just thought I'd post a little note here: after two weeks of PVPing (including a memorable Alterac Valley Holiday Weekend where I racked up in excess of 100,000 Honor Points), I've finally assembled a full set of the Hateful Gladiator's gear. Hoo-ah. Now, to rest.

Updates on WoW

2009-06-02T16:44:00.005+08:00

After a spell of playing Warhammer: Age of Reckoning, I've decided to come back to World of Warcraft. Even though Warhammer promised (and mostly delivered) better PVP action, in the end it was too much to maintain two MMOs, and the level of investment I have in WoW is too high. More importantly, the casual style of play I was after didn't manifest: it was another Guild, another set of politics, another round of issues.

So it's back on the horse (so to speak) again - and this time, I get to joust on it! =) The Argent Tournament brings (albeit in an extremely limited way) medieval style jousting to the game, which should be fun ... for a while. I wonder how long Blizzard can keep jostling the short attention spans of gamers.

As you can see, I am levelling my Warrior now mostly. The changes to the Prot tree are remarkable: not only do I find myself doing PvE in Prot, I'm PVPing in Prot. Yep, you heard me right: with the addition of several new stuns for the Prot-specced warrior, I find myself playing a different role in PVP - namely that of an interrupter (a utility role as some would call it), instead of the DPS role Arms and Fury specced warriors traditionally took on. Not only that, I'm enjoying it - and for those times when I miss the high DPS of Arms, Dual-Spec has taken care of that.

Fear of falling

2008-12-17T02:20:00.003+08:00

You know how dreams often involve falling? And how nightmares often involve being chased? Well, I've been playing a videogame now that combines both of these nerve-wracking experiences in one compelling and frustrating package.

In Mirror's Edge you play a "runner". Unsurprisingly, you spend most of the game running - away from police, away from bullets, away from a host of baddies bent on catching and killing you. Not that the running won't kill you either - the game involves executing parkour/free-running maneuvers on the rooftops of skyscrapers, leaping gaps that will kill you in one plummet. Let me first start by applauding the innovativeness of the game - in a market saturated with more-of-the-same first person shooters, this game emphasizes escape, evasion and maneuver. On top of that, everything is time-sensitive: the slower you run, and the more time you take to pause and take in the scenery, the faster your pursuers catch up with you, and the more you'll find bullets smacking into the ground around you.

Unfortunately, the game's a bit too realistic in some ways. When you miss a landing, and plummet into space (and this happens more often than is comfortable, even on "easy" mode) the last thing you see on screen is your hands, scrabbling and flailing for purchase on the thin air in front of you, as the screen wobbles and blurs to simulate your vision failing in your last moments (there's even a tunnel vision effect as darkness closes on you) and the sound rises to a roar in your ears. All in all: far too realistic, especially since the game's limited tutorial provides you little preparation, and death by falling occurs far too often.

Aside from that, the experienced of being chased and running away, combined with the fear of heights and falling, and the vaguely intellectual parts of figuring out the best route, make Mirror's Edge a visceral and primal experience. It taps into the basic experience of all prey creatures - running away from predators, and, make no mistake, in this game you are the prey creature, always on the run.

Completed Qin Dynasty army

2008-12-02T00:11:00.004+08:00

Well, with the delivery of the miniatures I sent off to DJD for painting, my Qin Dynasty army is complete.

It took me a long time to reconcile myself to the fact that I no longer had the time to paint large armies: I still feel a bit bad about out-sourcing the painting, but I really have no time to engage in major painting projects anymore. I did have to do the basing though, to make sure it concords with the existing bases.

I already had a core army which I painted myself (here), about 12 elements strong, for DBA, but the additional bases bring the total up to a good size for Warmaster and DBM.

In the photo above, I've lined them up according to the Terracotta Army in Pit 1, with Halberdiers in columns surrounded by unarmoured archers to each flank, and armoured crossbowmen to the front as a vanguard. The chariots are up in front, and other diverse elements (light horse, swordsmen) are arranged off to one side.

War of the Roses Game Report

2008-11-24T23:31:00.006+08:00

Sometimes, you just need to get all the figures out of the box and give them a bit of exercise. That was my motivation for the War of the Roses game with Cpt Arjun yesterday. He'd just taken delivery of a whole bunch of figures, and I hadn't played with mine for a while, so we had a quick battle.

The picture above shows the initial set up. I had the defending army, at the bottom of the picture - larger than Arjun's by a ratio of 6 to 5, but with a command penalty of minus 1 (playing Warmaster Ancient's rules, of course).

I opened the game with a move on my right flank, pushing 4 units of bow and 4 of billmen in echelon, with the intention of turning his flank, as well as protecting myself from a similar action on my right. Arjun deployed his right and centre to face the approaching troops.

The middle phase of the battle consisted of jostling back and forth on the right and centre. Both Arjun and I failed to bring our reserves fully into the battle, but it was worse for me as mine had further to go to reach the fight.

At this point, Arjun sprang an ambush with one unit of cavalry on the right, which proceeded to roll up all the bowmen and billmen on that flank. Faced with impending collapse on that flank, I managed to push 3 units of bill, and the retinue, forward into the centre, to try and end the game quickly. In the final turn, I was 1 unit from breakpoint, and he was 2, and the final combats in the centre ended with my army breaking first. All in all, a fun game, and an interesting one with good maneuver as well

At long last ...

2008-11-14T22:17:00.002+08:00

Possibly the only reason I got Wrath of the Lich King: Rhinos.

I think you'd have to a Hunter (and probably a beastmaster) to understand the obsession Hunters in Warcraft have with taming the right pets. Whilst Warriors may obsess over getting the right gear and weapon, Hunter's obsess over getting the right pet for our needs. This here Rhino will be my tanking weapon, but he has a nice AOE knockback for PVP as well. I already have 2 cats, one core hound (but perhaps a two headed hound counts as two pets?) and a silithid, so I can't tame anymore, but this latest addition rounds out my collection quite nicely.

Warhammer Online, after one month of play

2008-10-22T22:32:00.004+08:00

My Black Orc has reached rank 26 after about a month of gameplay, which is slow by the standards of the hardcore players out there, but perfectly fine by me.

Game play is excellent, and becomes progressively more interesting at higher ranks. The PVP element is well managed, with a seamless move from PVE to PVP. There's less of a difference in gameplay between PVE and PVP than in World of Warcraft: whereas a WoW player specced for PVP might find himself unable to PVE effectively, and vice versa, in Warhammer Online, a simple change of tactics sets is often all that's needed.

At Tier 3 now, the main irritation seems to be that the only Scenario that's popping is Tor Anroc - or Tor Punt-roc as some call it (summary: skills and stats don't really matter for this scenario - the only thing that matters is whether you can knockback your opponents into the lava). This seems to be the only scenario that the Order side has a chance of winning, and there seems to be a concerted effort by them to only queue for that Scenario. In all the Scenarios I've run, something other than Tor Anroc has only popped 3 times - and once was a walkover for us, as the Order players simply quit the scenario en masse.

The quest system is excellent, and the provision of multiple sources of gear and rewards means everyone can build up a good set of equipment. Questing gets you rewards, but Public Quests (which are really just a sophisticated form of grinding, with a boss thrown in at the end) also offer a separate set of gear rewards, and PVPing gets you renown gear. I haven't even stepped into the instances yet (which have to be unlocked), but those will also have their set of rewards. All in all, the reward system is generous, and almost everything you do that feels like you've put in effort for something is recognised by the game and rewarded accordingly.

I look forward to trying to reach rank 40 before the end of the year, but for casual players like me, it's tough. Having said that, because the game makes it so easy to log in and play a limited amount of time (a quick Scenario, or a Public Quest) it's much easier than Warcraft in this respect.

Warhammer: Age of Reckoning Collector's Edition

2008-09-20T18:02:00.003+08:00

So this is my birthday present from Packrat: the Warhammer Online Collector's Edition - and what an edition it is! The two books (one of concept art from the game designers, the other a graphic novel prequel to the events of the game) are beautifully made (the word 'production values' comes to mind) but the real gem in here are the miniatures of Grumlok and Gazbag. It's a shame 28mm figures are my speciality, but I can think of a few people who could do a good job with these figures.

Warhammer Online: Rush to wait, wait to rush ...

2008-09-16T21:49:00.003+08:00

I've been playing the headstart for Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning the past few days, and the experience reminds me of when I used to go to the Singapore Aerospace expos as a kid:

Fun, but long queues.

How long? 45 minutes to get into my realm. I can start logging in, go have dinner, and still make it back in time to watch my place in queue tick down to 1. Just tonight, in the middle of scenario, the game crashed, and that was basically it for the whole night's gaming, as queuing again to get into the server would have taken another hour.

As for the fun part, well, if you're familiar with the Warhammer tabletop games (which I've played casually, though my experience is more with their niche products in the historical gaming branch, namely Warhammer Ancient Battles and Warmaster Ancients) the rowdy, fun atmosphere is evident. Of course, bear in mind I am playing an Orc: the other races and starting areas are distinctly darker and moodier. The Dark Elf starting area, in particular, makes me want to scream "Get over it!" to all the NPCs, who look like a bunch of rejects from the local Emo/Goth tribe. And don't get me started on the Chaos starting area ... it's ... dark to say the least.

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning

2008-09-02T13:03:00.004+08:00

Warhammer Online is almost upon us. I've been a beta tester for the past month though, I'm ashamed to say, not a very active one. I've been too busy at work for any gaming (miniatures, computer, or otherwise) so I've only scratched the surface of what Warhammer (or WAR, as Warhammer: Age of Reckoning is abbreviated) has to offer.

For those not familiar with WAR, it's a massively multiplayer online role playing game, of the genre most recently epitomised by World of Warcraft (which I've been playing for the past 3 years). Those of us from the demographic that used to play Dungeons and Dragons will have a starting reference point: those who don't , think of it as adventure gaming in a alternate universe.

As I said earlier, I've been playing WoW for the past 3 years, but will be making the switch to WAR as soon as it goes live. This is not a move to be taken lightly - for most people, the investment in time to level up a character in either Warcraft or Warhammer is heavy, and to start playing a second game is to lose ground in the first. I have no complaints about WoW, but there are several things that have attracted me to Warhammer.

First and foremost, the sheer joy evidenced by its makers. This is hard to explain, but if you go to the Warhmmer website and watch the video posts by the game makers, their enthusiasm for the game is palpable and contagious. If they're having so much fun making the game, then it bodes well for how much fun I'll have playing it

Secondly, it's all PVP (player-versus-player). Over the years, I find myself increasingly only playing those elements of WoW that are PVP anyway, and it makes sense to transit to a game that's designed from the ground up for PVP.

Lastly, it's had time to learn from the various mistakes and rough edges of WoW, and smooth them out. The Tome of Knowledge is one example of such a good idea, as are Public Quests and a better Guild system. In fact, these ideas are so relevant and good that Warcraft themselves have begun to retroactively add these features.

tags:gaming,wargames

Work in progress: Sarmatians

2008-03-26T22:49:00.003+08:00

I painted up 2 bases of the Sarmatians as a test batch. The paint scheme of the barding is meant to replicate the armour made of split hooves/animal horn that is reported by ancient writers. I've assumed that the common Sarmatian warrior would be able to afford metal armour for himself, but would opt for the cheaper - and lighter - armour for his horse.

Paint Scheme for Warring States Army

2008-03-17T00:17:00.003+08:00

Here's a reference photograph showing the current paint scheme of my Warring States army. Click on it for a larger view.

Warring States: the Core Army

2008-03-13T21:48:00.003+08:00

I've reached a point where I more money than time to paint - which is not to say I'm fabulously rich, but rather to note that the amount of time it takes me to paint an army is prohibitively expensive - in time lost with family, friends, time lost at work, and time lost in sleep. Certainly, DBM-sized armies are no longer a reasonable proposition. I'll soon be sending off a bunch of unpainted Warring States figures to a painting service, to swell the ranks of this core DBA army. It's a surprisingly hard decision.

I know they'll not turn out exactly the way I want them to, or the way I would have done them. I know I'll feel less of a connection with figures I didn't sweat over to paint. But I also know that I'll appreciate the time I didn't lose painting them.

I'm not giving up painting altogether, just to be clear - I am starting on a DBA Sarmatian army soon, after all - but the day of the large project is over. It's small little cohorts of armies for me now, or the painting service.

The above figures are the DBA Warring States army that I completed recently. This is an all options army for any of the 7 Warring States.

Ilkhanid Mongols Versus Late Byzantines

2008-03-09T22:03:00.007+08:00

Something a little different for this week's battle report: presented in comic book style =)
Click on each picture for a larger image.

In the saddle again: The Mongol Horde

2008-03-07T23:49:00.006+08:00

This is my Mongol horde, ready for their coming battle with the Mamluks this Sunday. Slightly more than half are figures I painted, and the rest (the greener looking bases) were bought off eBay. A Mongol army from Tabletop Games was the first set of lead miniatures I had, though I've since thrown that first lot away: it was atrocious. (it was a DBA army, and Cpt Arjun got the Alexandrian Macedonian, while another friend got an Early Imperial Roman and a Tang Dynasty army. Ah, the old days ...) This current horde is all Essex, and contains almost every type of light horse figure - you'll find Cumans and Sung mixed in with the Mongols.

All in all, this army comprises 38 Light Horse bases (inclusive of 4 Camel bases I just painted up) and 16 Cavalry bases. There are 5 General bases that are also Cavalry, making a total of 21 Cavalry. After painting an all infantry army (Sea Peoples) and playing an infantry heavy army (Polybian Romans), I've decided to go all Cavalry for a change. My next target is a DBA Sarmatian army: 12 bases of Knights and nothing else ...

Sea Peoples Campaign: The Finale

2008-02-10T19:18:00.000+08:00

The Sea Peoples Invasion campaign came to a spectacular end this Sunday, with the last two battles fought back to back.

The Sea Peoples started game 3 with their largest army to date - 3 full brigades of the dreaded warbands were in evidence (well, nearly 3: one was missing a base, and so could not benefit from the warband rule in Warmaster Ancients).

The defenders had the usual line up, with their heavy chariots forming the core of their army. A thin line, but a powerful one.

By the mid-game, a clear fracture was developing in the Sea Peoples' line: the middle brigade of warband, and the two units of elite troops, had failed all their command rolls and were not making it into the fight: the clash between the slow moving warbands and the Hittite chariots (capable of archery, skirmishing, and evading) was played out after the Sea Peoples' screen of chariots and skirmishers were swept away, and the warbands could not close in with the evasive chariots. Both wings were crushed under the weight of the Hittite attack, and the Hittites won a famous victory, turning the tide of the Sea Peoples' advance. The only minor consolation for the Sea Peoples was the elimination of one general on the opposing side, but they would now go into the fourth and final game will a much reduced force.

With no chariots or skirmishers, the last battle was a complete rout for the Sea Peoples: their reduced force could not make it back to the coast for a retreat, so there was no Dunkirk for them.

All in all, the Sea Peoples campaign has been a zippy and fast-paced one, which let the Napnuts re-acquaint themselves with the Warmaster rules.

Sea Peoples Campaign Battle 2

2008-02-03T20:38:00.000+08:00

We played the second game of the Sea Peoples Invasion Campaign today.

The game started with the Sea Peoples advancing on the left (1, above), where a brigade of warband took up a strong position on hill. (I've merged several photos to show the "before" and "after" of each turn: the final positions of units that moved are the red portions of the image) The Sea People centre and right stalled in their advance, and the screen of skirmishers on the right were driven back by the Hittite Chariots (3). The defending Hittite army advanced strongly in the centre, with archers deploying in front of the main force (2).

The Sea Peoples' left wing charged into battle, and that flank quickly broke up into a series of small battles, with the warbands pursuing the retreating Syro-Canannites in all directions (2, 3 and 4 above). In the middle, one unit of Chariots took the brunt of a Hittite attack and stalled it (1), while another charged an exposed enemy unit aided by one unit of Elite foot (5), wiping out the centre units in what was to prove to be the decisive action of the battle (the defenders reached their break point in this melee and were forced to retreat). On the right, an advance by the Hittite foot was counter-attacked by the Sea Peoples' warbands, and driven back into the brush (7). The remaining Hittite Chariots were kept out of the action by archery from the skirmishers which pushed them back (6).

The Sea Peoples took minimal losses and won a major victory ... but their next battle will see them facing even heavier opposition, as the Hittites bring their heavy chariots into play ...
tags:gaming,wargames

Invasion of the Sea Peoples: Our New Campaign

2008-01-20T18:07:00.000+08:00

Cpt Arjun and I kicked off our new campaign with a low-key game today.

The opening skirmish represented the first contact between the vanguard of the Sea Peoples' migration and the local Syro-Canaanite defenders. Warmaster Ancients was the ruleset used, and the game was a straightforward encounter battle.

The invading Sea Peoples out-pointed the defenders 3 to 2, and were all infantry, while the defenders had equal numbers of chariots, infantry and skirmishers

The initial advance of the Sea Peoples was halted by skirmish fire from the chariots and skirmishers, driving the Sea Peoples' skirmishers back through the mass of their troops ande confusing some of them. A failed charge from the Sea Peoples' left their infantry hanging in front of the chariots, and was a followed by a general charge from the defenders, enveloping the mass of the infantry block on 3 sides. The melee that followed saw each side losing one entire unit, but the weight of numbers on the Sea Peoples' side overwhelmed the Syro-Canaanites, who broke when their general was killed.

The campaign is off to a suitably bloody start, and the next game will see the defenders rallying more troops to stem the tide of the Sea Peoples' advance.

tags:gaming,wargames

Hittites versus Mycenaeans: Playtest of "King David" rules

2006-12-25T00:39:00.000+08:00

Cpt Arjun and I ran a test game of the King David rules last week, to get a feel for how the rules might work in a campaign. My general sense of the rules was that they were typical of run of the mill rules, with a moderate degree of complexity (activation requires initiative rolls, alternate activation of units, and points expended for turning, stopping, etc) and some interesting elements added by the ability to play "favours of the gods" (allowing or forcing re-rolls by either player).

Here you see Arjun's Hittite chariots breaking through my Mycenaean spearmen. Chariots are emphasized in this ruleset: they are easily the most powerful, expensive, and difficult to handle unit.

More battle reports will come as we experiment with the rules.

tags:gaming,wargames, 15mm

More Qin Chariots

2006-04-30T23:02:00.000+08:00

More photos of the work in progress. One more Qin chariot painted up, this time a regular one. I've put it next to the General's chariot for comparison. I decided on a black and white colour scheme for the chariots, as opposed to the red and black for the general.

One thing that is very obvious from this photo is how the 40x40mm base that DBA mandates for chariots is quite inadequate for 15mm figures. Every chariot I've got - Mycenaean, Sea Peoples, and Chin, can't fit properly on a 40mm base depth. They're based either with half a wheel sticking out the back (as seen here) or on a 50/60mm base (as with the Sea Peoples).

They should simply change the basing to 40x50mm, or 40x60mm. An added benefit of this is that the manuever for chariots becomes more complex: square bases are always easier to maneuver on the gaming board, since they occupy the same space with each 90º turn, whereas turning with a group of chariots that are deeper than they are wide would mean a change in frontage and depth for the group. It's messier, and more approapriate for a unit that historically was very sensitive to terrain and difficult to turn and wheel.

tags:gaming,wargames,DBA,15mm

Work in Progress: Qin Chariot

2006-04-27T22:48:00.000+08:00

My buying and painting cycles are about 6 months off-sync - in other words, I tend to buy something and only start painting it half a year later. Part of this is due to the backlog of things waiting to be painted: part of this is because I buy miniatures in excitement and optimism, and receive my miniatures in nervous realisation of how much work that little pile of lead implies.

I received reinforcements for my small Qin force sometime last year, but tonight (after an inspiring viewing of Hero) I started on the Emperor's chariot. What you see is still work in progress, but is mostly done except for final touches and basing. The tiger skins on the backs of the horses were a joy to paint.

The canopy is the only part not from the kit, and is based on drawings of chariots from that era that I've seen: reference this picture for example:

Although possibly out of place on a war chariot, the canopy is appropriate for an Emperor (or the King of Qin, as he is at this stage). Civilian chariots, as seen above, also featured seated drivers, which seem to be lacking in the Essex models. Presumably everyone stood in a fighting chariot.

The canopy itself I owe to my good friend LK, oddly enough: it's the top piece of foil from a bottle of Pol Roger 1996 champagne that he and I had some time back (well, he more than me, since I don't drink). At the end of it all, he suggested I keep the foil, which he found useful for things like stowage and tarps on his 1/72 tanks. It was the only thing in my "bitz box" that had the suitable shape for the shallow saucer-shaped dome, and it worked perfectly.

In all, the Essex Qin I bought last year will add another 2 chariots, 2 bases of crossbows, 2 bases of light horse, and 4 bases of spears to the army you see below, bringing it up to a proper DBA size. I've gone for a very stark colour scheme for this army - black, white, and red, shaded in greys and off-whites (greatly influenced by the look of the Qin army in the movie "Hero").

tags:gaming,wargames,DBA,Qin,chariot

Vikings blooded

2006-04-23T23:54:00.000+08:00

The Vikings had their first outing today: you can read the battle report here.

It feels a bit odd to be playing with figures that you haven't painted yourself - it's hard to feel a sense of attachment to them, since they were bought off eBay. One thought in retrospect though - perhaps this detachment is beneficial, since it prevents you from having a "favourite" unit or base. After all, our tactical decisions on the gaming table might be clouded by the emotional attachment we have to, for example, a base of figures that we spent extra effort in painting up. The scythed chariots in my 20mm WAB Persian army were something like that - horrible track record, and very little value for money, yet I kept fielding them.

Something to think about.

tags:gaming,wargames,vikings

The Vikings are coming!

2006-04-23T11:01:00.000+08:00

The War of the Roses campaign hasn't ended, and we've already moved on to preparations for another campaign. This time round it's the 1066 campaign Cpt Arjun is organising.

As part of that, I'm fielding a bunch of Vikings, won on eBay through Cpt Arjun. More pics of those later, since the glue's still drying on the magna-sheet bases, but here's a pic of an old Viking ship I've had for some time. The model is by Heller, and is called the "Drakkar".

The base is new, having been put together last night and painted this morning. Wall filler was used to sculpt the waves, left to dry overnight, and given a simple paint job this morning.

tags:gaming,wargames

War of the Roses Army: King Edward IV Command Base

2006-03-11T09:50:00.000+08:00

Edward has a posse

It's the last 10% to complete a project that takes up 90% of your time. I'm still painting up the last drips and drabs of the Yorkist army. Here we have the mounted command base, with Edward, his standard bearer, and two knights as bodyguard. This is one knight too many for DBx mounting, but as I had a knight spare that wouldn't have gone anywhere, I thought I might as well mount them all on one base. This also helps distinguish the commander base from other bases.

The knight on the right bears a small shield with my best effort at a falcon-and-fetterlock design: his friend on the far left bears a shield with a Yorkist white rose. The standard bearer carries a long-tailed standard with a crowned lion and Yorkist suns in splendour.

tags:gaming,wargames

War of the Roses: Casualty Figures

2006-03-09T22:13:00.000+08:00

Finally got round to painting the casualty figures for the War of the Roses campaign. These guys come in poses that just make you want to caption them ...

(1) "My contact lenses ... where're my contact lenses?!"
(2) "You have failed me for the last time ..."
(3) Thomas hated having his pager go off in the middle of a battle.
(4) "Err ... your Majesty? Wake up: I think the battle's starting ..."

tags:gaming,wargames

War of the Roses Campaign

2006-03-06T11:42:00.000+08:00

Just a quick post to point out the battle reports for the War of the Roses campaign, which I've been writing over at the Napnuts blog. I'm playing the Yorkist side of the campaign.

The battle reports can be read here:
Game 1
Game 2
Game 3
Game 4

So far the battles have escalated in ferocity and intensity from game to game. Royals have died twice (both Lancastrian); battles have been won by attrition, by betrayal, and by death of the opposing commander, covering every outcome Arjun wrote into the rules (that's what I call play-testing). We've stretched Warmaster Ancients to the limits (and some would say broken it). All in all, a good campaign so far.

tags:gaming,wargames,warmaster,15mm

Captain Tight Pants

2006-02-20T22:37:00.000+08:00

Those of you familiar with Firefly will recognise this figure (Heresy miniatures) from his gun. As yet unpainted, the coat will, of course, be brown. In the meantime, he's just shiny.

(You must excuse the unusual background - glimpses of resin 15mm tents can be seen, as well as the remainder of the War of the Roses army)

tags:gaming,wargames,firefly,browncoat

Yorkist Banners and Standards

2006-02-05T12:34:00.000+08:00

The best part (from a painter's point of view) of gaming the Wars of the Roses must be the colourful heraldry, especially the flags. Here are a selection of the Yorkist flags I'm using.

(1) and (2) are Standards used by Edward IV. (1) depicts the white rose of York, within a sun (a rose en soleil, the sun in splendour)

(3) is the Royal Banner

(4) is the Falcon and Fetterlock, a device used by Edward IV and his father Richard Duke of York before him

(5) is the White Boar of Edwards's youngest brother, Richard Duke of Gloucester (later Richard III

(6) is the Black Bull of George, Duke of Clarence, Edward's other brother.

tags:gaming,wargames,flags

WOTR: Game 1

2006-02-01T00:04:00.000+08:00

The game report for our first battle in the War the Roses campaign is up here. The short summary is that FG and Arjun did all the hard work, slugging it out over a hill in a vicious battle that ended with the death of Henry VI himself. Looks like the campaign is off a bloody start, as Queen Margaret takes over the reins of the Lancastrian government and prepares for the next battle ...

tags:gaming,wargames

The Wars of the Roses

2006-01-31T10:53:00.000+08:00

The Napnuts' War of the Roses campaign kicks off today!

Another marathon painting session brought the bulk of my Yorkist contingent to completion. Not shown in the photo above is the artiller base, off to the right. The standard front and centre is Edward IV's, depicting a white rose en soleil. To the left of this command base are some crazy loonies with 2-handed swords. To the rear are Yorkist billmen, in murray and blue, the colours of Edward's house.

I bought the bulk of the figures as DBA army packs from Essex, with the intention that after the campaign was over, I would have a separate Yorkist and Lancastrian army to play with - hence the billmen lurking behind in the suspiciously Lancastrian colours of white and blue. I won't put any Lancastrian standards or banners on until after the campaign though.

The next step is to finish up the light cavalry, some skirmishers, and the billmen I have spare. Might put some other flags and banners on - like a boar for Richard.

tags:gaming,wargames

"Diorama" photography

2006-01-28T16:32:00.000+08:00

Miniatures wargaming and photography are two of my hobbies, and so I read this article with great interest: link.

This photographer takes photos of real cities and landscapes, and makes them look like dioramas and miniatures. It's surreal ... for someone who tries to do the reverse (make dioramas look like the real thing) it's strange to see the real thing made to look fake.

Anyway, I hope to put up some photos of the War of The Roses armies I've been working on the past month. The Napnuts are starting a WoTR campaign soon (an idea that had it's genesis in a coversation Arjun and I had over tea in the coffeeshop) and I'll be fielding a contingent of troops for it. More on that later ... after I emerge from a Chinese New Year holidays spent bottled up in the study, painting.

tags:gaming,wargames

Scale Creep

2005-12-22T20:49:00.000+08:00

Miniature painters and wargamers are used to the problems that scale creep bring to trying to create an army that looks consistent. The definition of "15mm", for example, varies ever so slightly between manufacturers, enough in some cases to be obvious.

I've never seen scale creep quite as bad as this though, and all within one set of miniatures. Unfortunately, I can't remember which manufacturer this is: I have a habit of buying figures that I paint only months, sometimes years later (who doesn't?) and this set has been lying around for a long time gathering dust.

This is a 15mm elephant and crew. Each square on the grid is 10mm. Starting from left, note the size of the elephant. Now look at the mahout - a bit short, but he's squating, so fair enough. Look at the javeliner - about 16-17mm from foot to eye-line. Look at the standard bearer to his right: a 20mm figure in all but name. Now look at the general, furthest on the right - clearly a 20mm figure, and he comes up to the shoulder of the elephant.

Scale creep between different units is bad enough, but this is ridiculous - assuming you could fit all of them into the fighting tower (which you can't: another problem), the size disparity would be stare you in the face.

tags:gaming,wargames

Carthaginian Spearmen

2005-12-21T23:49:00.000+08:00

15mm figures from Corvus Bel li, shield decals from Veni Vidi Vici.

This completes the main infantry component of my Carthaginians. I have Spanish scutarii to paint up, and am waiting for some Gauls to beef up the force, but the main part of the army is complete. With judicious borrowing from other forces (for example, borrowing the cavalry base from my Spartan army, and some Polybian legionaries to act as veterans in acquired Roman gear) I could field this as a DBA army now. I'll post a photo of the full force once I finish flocking all the bases. The other components of the army can be seen here, and here.

tags:gaming,wargames,miniatures,15mm

Balearic Slingers

2005-12-20T12:41:00.000+08:00

Just completed 8 bases of Balearic slingers - mercenaries who served famously in many mediterranean armies in the classical era. Coolest thing about them? Hair-nets (yep: they wore hair-nets). Most difficult thing to paint? That's right: hair-nets.

They are posed in front of the remaining Carthaginian forces: in the back, you can just seen the Poeni spearmen, and on the left, one of the elephants. I really should give those elephants names ...

tags:gaming,wargames,15mm,miniatures

Elephants, Camels, and Mules

2005-12-19T00:57:00.000+08:00

Latest paint work:

(1) Carthaginian Elephants. These are the latest additions to my growing Carthaginian force.

(2) Pack Camel. This will serve as a baggage element for my nomadic horde type armies.

(3) Pack Mules. Always useful as baggage elements. I got the idea for the basing from Mike Sng: the bases are flocked to look like the mules are travelling along a track, which adds a little something to the look.

tags:gaming,wargames,15mm,miniatures

Testing a Miniatures Bag

2005-12-10T11:08:00.000+08:00

One of the biggest headaches going up to Gamecon was transporting my miniatures. For day to day travel, I transport them in metal biscuit tins (as shown here). All of my miniatures have a magnasheet layer on the bottom, so they stick to the tin, minimizing movement.

Long distance travel is another issue altogether. Carrying several heavy box of miniatures on a 5 hour coach journey is a challenge - even though the bases are magnetised, the boxes musn't be jolted or the bases will come loose and start scratching the paint off each other. On our trip to and from Kuala Lumpur for Gamecon1 last week, the bag with my armies had to be delicately hand-carried throughout. I use a bag with roller wheels, but have discovered that unless the floor is perfectly smooth (and even tiled floors aren't), the jolting and bumping from irregular floors was still enough to upset the figures. In the course of both coach journeys, bumps in the road were enough to cause 3 or 4 figures per box to be out of place after every trip. Each one is like a loose cannon on a rolling deck, liable to scratch other figures.

I mention all this because Damien, the proprietor of Paradigm Infinitum, showed me this bag when I dropped by the other day, and asked if I wouldn't mind reviewing it. "Sure", I said.

The Bag

The bag is basically a holder for 6 foam trays, each with 30 cut-outs to hold miniatures. The foam trays are made with a harder layer underneath as a base, and softer foam on top. This sort of foam tray has been around for some time for the Warhammer players, but this one is cut more for the historical wargaming crowd. The bag zips open to allow access to all layers at once, has a pocket in front large enough to hold rule books in A4, and an internal zipped pocket for dice, tape-measures etc. There's a shoulder strap as well as a carrying handle.

The first thing to mention is the cut-outs in the foam layers are all 40mm by 20mm, whereas figure basing varies widely in historical wargaming (from Napoleonics to WW2 to Ancients). However, the majority of ancients and medieval wargames adopt the DBx basing, which (for 15mm figures, the dominant scale) is 40mm wide by varying depths (up to 40mm), and this is what the various layers of foam in this bag are cut for. In fact, at 40x20mm, they'll fit (in DBx terminology) Spears, Pikes, Warbands, Blades, Psiloi, Auxilia, but not mounted figures (which are 40mm by 30mm at least).

You could cut your own holes, which is not a bad idea: if I were using this bag, I'd want to store one DBA army (12 bases minimum, with up to 20 for some armies because of the options) in one layer for convenience, and the only way to do that would be to take knife to foam and customize it myself - no big deal, and most gamers have a do-it-yourself mentality anyway. With 6 layers, and maximum efficiency, one could transport an entire DBM army in this bag.

The Layers

The foam layers can be seen in this photo below:

The shallowest layer (Layer 1) is 25mm deep. A base of my Carthaginian Poeni spearmen fit with no problems. The Qin's spears stick out a bit, and the Spartans stick out a lot. This depth would fit most Blades, Psiloi, and non-spear types. Two of this layer came with the bag. The foam grips the sides of the bases quite well: even though these bases were 40x15mm in a 40x20mm cut-out, the snug fit means that you could turn the foam layer upside down and they wouldn't move. Why you would want to do so is another matter altogether.

The next layer (Layer 2 above) is 35mm deep: I've placed the ruler next to the chunk of foam that comes out to show you the depth. If you look closely at the photo, you can see that while the Carthaginians have sunk completely out of sight, and the Qin spears are sticking out by the barest millimetre, the Spartans are still sticking out. At this point, I should mention that the Qin are from Essex Miniatures, and are thus a fairly reliable guide to the length of spears out there, while the Spartans were equiped with brass spears of my own making, and are probably as long as most Pike figures. Two of this layer come with the bag.

Layer 3 is 50mm deep. No problems. This layer should hold all but the longest Pikes. It's deep enough that removing the figures becomes a delicate affair. This is where the 40x20mm size helps, with the extra room for fingers to manuever to grip the base for removal. At this point, I began to think that a 40x30mm size might be an even better idea: you can fit all types of bases in (excepting Chariots, Elephants, and Baggage), the foam keeps smaller sized bases snug, and the extra space facillitates removal. One of this type of layer comes with the bag.

Layer 4 is almost 80mm deep. If you have 15mm figures with Pikes that long, then you have serious insecurity issues. Switch to 28mm - you get longer spears there. One of this layer comes with the bag, but I can't see myself using this depth at all. Better to get two more of Layer 1 or Layer 2.

"Take it home, try it out, kick it around a bit ...", he said.

OK then.

I put one base of the Qin spearmen in the bag (in a 35mm deep layer, 3rd from the top, corner pocket - since the corner pocket is the most vulnerable) and proceeded to ... well, kick it around a bit. I threw the bag. I kicked the bag. I put the bag on a ledge and had it fall off (this is when I discovered the shoulder strap, which I used to tug the bag off the ledge. This is not, I should add, the normal use of the shoulder strap). I even exposed the bag to the savagery of my household cats. As you can see from the picture above, the cats couldn't have cared less about the bag - which is a shame, since I was looking forward to adding a section to this review along the lines of "Resistance to Attack by Wild Creatures".

The bag survived with nary a scuff (don't worry Damien). The figures?

Spears slightly bent, no other damage. Those of us who paint miniatures know that this is par for the course: lead spears will bend at the slightest provocation. The only decent way to get around it is to get brass or steel spears. I should also point out that I kicked that bag really hard, and when I say I threw it, I really threw it (see photos of said bag airborne, above), so this is not the kind of treatment you'd expect the bag to have to protect your figures from (unless you decide to check in the bag at the arirport and leave it to the mercy of baggage handlers - who will treat it like this). All in all, the foam did its job well.

More importantly, the biggest advantage of using foam like this is isolation of figures: bent spears I can deal with, but scratches and dings inflicted by one lead figure slamming into another are more serious.

In conclusion? Not bad at all. I can think of some people (including a friend who has always had problems transporting his delicate model tanks when he flies in from Hong Kong) who could use a bag like this (or at least the foam trays). Cons include the larger overall bulk (I could pack in 3 times as many figures into the same volume, but with obviously less protection) and the limited range of the cut-outs at only 40x20mm - but as I said before, if I were using this, I'd modify the trays myself anyway to customise them for my own army.

To be honest, I'd probably still use my metal tins for day to day movement in Singapore, but this would've been really useful for the 5 hour trip to KL last week. I sat in that coach with my bag under my chair, wincing at every bump in the highway and wondering what the damage would be like when I unpacked them at journey's end, an experience I'm not eager to repeat soon.

tags:gaming,wargames,review

Terrain Building: Mycenaean Tholos Tomb

2005-12-07T20:46:00.000+08:00

Here's a piece of themed terrain I built for my Mycenaean army, modelled on the tholos tombs the Mycenaeans built. The flat area on top is large enough to hold one base of figures, so this can function as a camp element.

The tomb itself was shaped from styrofoam, then covered in putty filler. The masonry was from a 1/35 diorama kit I bought some years back, and which is still supplying my masonry needs in all sorts of scales - in 15mm, they look like large stones, in 1/72, large bricks. After the filler set, the whole thing was covered in sand, sprayed black, and then dry-brushed in successively lighter shades of brown towards the top.

Here's a link to a wikipedia article about Mycenaean tholos tombs.

tags:gaming,wargames,15mm,DBA

The Napnuts at Gamecon1

2005-12-06T23:43:00.000+08:00

This photo is best viewed large. 25 separate shots went into this composite, showing a panoramic view of the Napnuts and Broken Bayonets' exhibition area at Gamecon1. At left, you can make out two floating heads belonging to David and Mike (an unfortunate side effect of people moving around when you're taking stitched-together panoramas like this). Seated at the table are Boon (with two heads showing - see previous comment), Corbon, and two of the BB who I can't quite make out from this angle.

On the main table facing us is the Austerlitz game (at left) and the Zama game (at right). Just visible at far right is the DBA game between my wife and me - her first game, where she beat me using the Sea Peoples versus the Mycenaeans. In the background we can see what the exhibition hall at Gamecon1 looked like.

For a better view of the hall, check out the original, super-large size here.

tags:gaming,wargames,miniatures

DBA Battle Reports: Mycenaeans vs Sea Peoples

2005-12-06T16:51:00.000+08:00

I played 5 DBA games over the weekend at Gamecon1, managing to blood my newly painted Mycenaean and Nubian armies.

The first game I played Mycenaeans versus the Sea Peoples, commanded by my dearest wife. The battle unfolds in the three panel photograph below.

(1) I set up with all my Heavy Chariots (Knights) on the left, and the pikes on the right with a line of skimishers (Psiloi) screening to the front. She set up with two groups of blades in column on the road, a reserve in the middle, and Psiloi in the woods.
(2) I split my chariots into two groups, the nearer one to engage the centre in co-operation with the pikes, the further one to hook left and try and catch the Sea Peoples in the flank (or at least tie up some of their forces to guard against me). My wife very adroitly redeployed her columns to face this threat, aided by good PIP rolls versus lower PIP rolls from me. In fact, once the centre became engaged, all my PIPs were tied up trying to work out the developing ~~mess~~ battle, and the flank attack never hit home.
(3) By this point, the Mycenaeans are on the wrong end of the Sea Peoples blades. I've lost 2 Psiloi units in on the right, and one of my chariots has been flanked and chopped to pieces. You can still see the empty 40mm by 40mm square space formerly occupied by the hapless chariot. The battle was clearly over by now, with me only one element away from break-point.

Lessons learned?
- Expect a new army to lose on its first outing.
- Expect to lose against your wife.
- Roll higher next time.

tags:gamecon1,DBA,wargames,gaming

Gamecon1

2005-12-06T16:27:00.000+08:00

A few photographs from the convention in KL.

A copy of Polybius looks over our recreation of the battle of Zama. In a convention geared more towards boardgames and the Warhammer crowd, our historical games didn't attract that much attention. A few curious passers-by stopped to take photographs, but we were mostly left alone to play the game. The notable exception was a couple of kids appeared quite interested in the battle, and who I roped in to roll dice for us. The game ground to a halt more or less as you see above: the Roman left is in disarray, caught up in a swirling cavalry battle, the Roman right is similarly engaged, and main line of Gallic mercenaries is poised to clash with the Roman legions.

Here's a photo of our WW2 set-up.

Cosplay! Or maybe it's just plain old dressing up, which is what we used to call it. I'm not sure what one has to do to be considered cosplay, but on Gamecon's stage, you could see the Trek, LOTR, and Star Wars universes collide.

Finally, here we see the Napnuts reaching out to the next generation of young DBx players =)

tags:DBA,gamecon1,gaming

Gamecon1: Back from KL

2005-12-06T00:54:00.000+08:00

Just got back from Gamecon1 in Kuala Lumpur.

Not quite the most happening convention ever, but fun nonetheless. I spent most of the time teaching my wife to play DBA ... and losing to her. In fact, I lost 3 out of 4 games to her, and the last I won only barely (and I had a little girl rolling the dice for me, which always helps). It was great to meet the Broken Bayonets gang (and finally put a face to all those forum nicknames!) at last.

More pics of my appalling DBA losses will follow, once I get them loaded up.

tags:gamecon1,DBA,wargames

You know you've been reading too many DBM army lists when ...

2005-12-01T14:26:00.000+08:00

... you type "Lancaster" instead of "York" into a work-related email, because the War of the Roses flashes across your mind the moment you see the word "York".

In the meantime, I've been planning what other armies to paint to complement my existing stock. I see myself with the Bronze Age theme" talking to Capt Arjun last night, we figured that a Hittite army would be a good choice, having historical conflicts with the New Kingdom Egyptians, Sea Peoples, and being co-extant with the Mycenaeans (though I know of no recorded conflict between them). They also have chariots, which always look good on the table.

Getting Ready for Gamecon: Mycenaean DBA Army

2005-11-30T02:13:00.000+08:00

OK, that's it. Painting the equivalent of 3 DBA armies in 3 days has completely exhausted me.

Today I present to you the Mycenaean army. I started painting one of the chariots a few months back (here), but only finished the remainder tonight, in one 6 hour burst of painting.

This army fields 4 chariots (counting as Knights), 4 Pikes, and 4 Psiloi. I don't have enough Psiloi at the moment, so 2 from the Nubian army will have to stand in until I can order some more. What I like about this army is the Bronze Age look: the cow-hide figure of 8 shields, the chariots with lance-wielding warriors in Dendra panoply, and the primitive looking slingers. Game-wise, I'm looking forward to the combination of Pikes and Knights: the pikes as a pinning and holding force, and the heavy chariots as the strike for - hammer and anvil tactics. This army is co-extant with the Sea Peoples, as well as the Nubian/Lybian army, so I have enough to field two sides of a (more or less) historical match-up.

With this army complete, my preparations for Gamecon are done. I might do up my gaming boards a bit, and touch up the figures some more, but I'm laying down my brushes for the time being and getting some rest.

tags:wargames,Miniatures,15mm,DBA

Getting Ready for Gamecon: Polybian Romans

2005-11-29T10:32:00.000+08:00

These are the Polybian Romans that I'll be fielding at Gamecon. They're showing their age a bit, and they were never very well painted to begin with - but a large shield will cover over a mulitude of sins in a 15mm figure, and the numbers are what matters with a uniform army like this. The white shields are the hastati, the red the principes, and the fellows lounging in the rear with the long spears are the triarii.

All in all, enough bases to fill one Cadbury's chocolate tin ... = )

tags:wargames,Miniatures,15mm,DBA

Getting Ready for Gamecon: The Nubians

2005-11-28T23:35:00.000+08:00

Although the main games we're displaying for Gamecon are Zama and a WW2 game, we're also planning to put up some DBA games on the side, so I'm pressing on to complete some of my backlog of DBA armies.

First up are the DBA Nubians. These guys are from Chariot miniatures (I think ... they've been sitting on the shelf for months now), and they form a DBA army with 1 Bow (General), 2 Warbands, and 9 Psiloi. The Psiloi (not pictured above) are carrying strange club-like things that sources described as "throwing sticks": they look more like policemen's truncheons to me.

There are enough figures for them to be fielded alternatively as an Early Libyan army (also from Book 1) - 1 General in a Chariot, 3 Warbands, 3 Bows, and 5 Psiloi: they don't exactly look early Libyan, but are close enought to pass muster in a pinch.

Not the type of army that'll last long in a battle, except in rough terrain, but a colourful addition to my existing forces. The leopard spots on the archers are my proudest part of this painting job: it took me some time to figure out the best way to paint leopard spots (3 elongated dots in a rough circle for every "spot").

tags:wargames,Miniatures,15mm,DBA

Terracotta Zombies!

2005-11-28T22:51:00.000+08:00

I received these in the mail from John Jenkins (over at John Jenkins Designs) for my participation in a caption contest he ran on his website a while back (here: my caption's number 8 on the list).

I didn't win, but he very graciously sent me a pack of the Terracotta Zombies anyway - which is extremely nice of him. If you're reading this, cheers John!

tags:wargames,miniatures,28mm

Getting Ready for Gamecon: The Numidians, and Basing Tips

2005-11-26T17:25:00.000+08:00

The Napnuts are heading down to Gamecon this weekend, where we'll be putting up the Battle of Zama in 15mm. I'm contributing the Polybian Roman Army forces, as well as a contingent of Numidians, which were hastily painted up over the weekend.

I thought I'd give a run down of the process I go through with basing my minatures and a few basing tips that I've discovered over the years.

After the basics (wash, remove flash) I left the figures to dry while I prepped the bases. These figures are from Corvus Belli, which makes a high quality (if limited) range of 15mm miniatures. Pic A shows the unpainted figures.

For the Numidians, I used wooden bases rather than my usual mounting board bases. I stick magnasheet on the bottom of the bases so I can carry them around in metal tins (usually chocolate tins ... although a large protion of my WW2 armies do travel in a group of Girl Guide Cookie tins ...).

One trick I've learned is to ensure that the magnasheet is aligned the same way on each base: on earlier figures, I discovered that some bases would not sit snugly next to each other in the box because the magnasheets were repelling. What I do I mark the top right hand corner of each magnasheet with a check mark (just visible in picture B, above) and the bases the same way. This way, even after they're glued on, I know they're aligned in the same direction.

Wood tends to warp, so it's important to weigh them down as they dry (Pic C). Anything will do. but in this case my esoteric collection of magazines finally came in useful. I knew I was keeping all those copies of Foreign Policy around for a reason ...

Once dried, the magnasheet serves another useful purpose: when flocking the bases, the wood tend to warp a second time (in the other direction) so leaving them on a metal surface allows the magnasheet to pull down on the base and minimise warping. I'm leaving the base as desert for the time being, without any grass (Pic D).

After that, I did a basic paint job on them - two layers of paint, base and highlights, skipping the mid-tones completely - and they're good to go for Zama and Gamecon.

tags:wargames,miniatures,15mm

Make-up for your tanks

2005-08-23T09:18:00.000+08:00

Capt Arjun pointed this one out to the guys on the Napnuts forum, and it is truly blogworthy. (picture from Hobby Link Japan: click on the post title to go to the article in question)

According to the site, with the Tamiya Weathering Master Set B:
"... a few light strokes on the raised edges, suspension, etc. of your model with the enclosed brush and you'll have a superbly realistic effect just as good as traditional dry-brushing, but with a lot less work..."

What gets me though is the look of the packaging, which is in the same visual genre as "ladies make-up compact", down to the brush. Either this is a case of economies of scale (Tamiya leveraging the existing stock of cases and brushes already produced by suppliers, to avoid having to custom make a case) or Tamiya senses that its customers are really, really secure people.

Even the range of colours resembles those that I've seen on my wife's make-up kits. The irony of it is that my wife recently threw out a bunch of make-up powder compacts which had got too old: I salvaged the containers (which look like the one pictured here) because I thought they looked as if they could hold something useful - but now it seems that I should have saved the whole thing! My tanks could use a bit of a makeover ... and Estee Lauder has just that right shade of rust ...

tags:
wargames
miniatures
painting

Historicity in Wargames

2005-08-17T00:02:00.000+08:00

Capt Arjun linked to this article, which in turn referred to an article in this month's Wargames Illustrated bemoaning the lack of historicity in "historical wargaming" today. The Capt's point (which I agree with) is that the spending of us wargamers (the "free market") is the key factor in shaping our hobby.

Reading through the article in Wargames Illustrated, the most interesting thing for me however was how the writer has divided rulesets into three groups, based on his personal preferences -

"Liked" (Tactica Ancients, WAB, WRG 6th Edition, to name the first few)
"Not liked" (WRG 7th edition, Vis Bellica, Fire and Fury, and DBM, amongst others)
and
"Hated" (DBA, Tactica Medieval, DBR)

The point I would make (on the understanding that rules preferences are intensely personal) is that gameplay suceeds or fails on the spirit that players take to the rules. Yes, a bad set of rules can encourage bad play, and yes, a faulty set of rules (contradictions, clearly malfunctioning mechanics etc) will definitely wreck a game, no matter how good the players are. However, the vast majority of mainstream rulesets are not broken or faulty.

I think of them as falling into the category of "can be made to work" - or to fail, depending on the spirit players choose to take the rules in. Once again, personal preference matters: if a ruleset turns you off, for whatever reason, you're less likely to be charitable with its shortcomings. Conversely, if a ruleset appeals to you (again for whatever reason - you like the historical period, or you've always wanted a Roman/VSF/Pulp/Starship Troopers/[fill in the blank] army) you're likely to give it the benefit of the doubt.

If it's the success or failure of gameplay we're talking about (rather than an assessment of the perfection of the ruleset) then it's as much the players as the rules that matter. Looking at the list that the writer of the Wargames Illustrated article (who goes by the pseudonym "D.I.S. Gusted, Lt Col (retd)") has made, the first thing I would say was that most of those rulesets can be made to work - the challenge is perhaps finding the right players for them. It requires that players be charitable to the rules, and focus instead on the game.

On the issue of historicity, for example, the writer already admits that a game need not be based on history to be "historical", giving an example of a game based on 70s TV police shows. It's the effort put in by the rules writers to evoke the atmosphere and spirit of the era (even if it is a fictional era, as with sci-fi or fantasy rules) - and I would add to that the effort made by the players to keep within the internal logic of that era.

After all, how do you stop un-historical play? If you knew that ancient Greek phalanxes never (to our knowledge) employed sweeping manouveres on the battlefield, you can either (a) write the rules to make it impossible for players to do so (b) write the rules to severely penalise players who do so or (c) hope that the players don't. (a) and (b) are only part of the solution: it's hard to write rules that prohibit actions without overly hampering players' freedom of play, and which penalise the majority of players for a minority's potential actions (in other words, (a) is a large hammer for a small nail). (b) is retroactive: the offending player may loose the game, but the game is lost for both sides anyway - there's not much fun to winning a game if your opponent incurs the wrath of the rules and accumulates a load of minuses by doing something ahistorical. It takes the fun out of it.

(c) seems overly optimstic at first glace - depend on the goodwill of players? But there is something we can do to encourage (though we can never guarantee) reasonable and historical play - and that is to make it easier for players to sense the historical period. In fantasy wargames, we call this fluff: background, maps, stories, pictures and illustrations etc, that help establish a sense of mood and environment.

Ultimately, this is also why I prefer historical wargaming to fantasy. I find the fluff more compelling and believable (it's hard not to: it has the advantage of actually having happened), and I can get into it more.

tag:
wargames
history

Additions to the local wargaming blogosphere

2005-08-16T23:10:00.000+08:00

Here's an official welcome to the new blogs that have sprung up from our wargaming circle.

Napnuts News, started by good old Dom, is his companion blog to our Napnuts webpage.

Wargames Correspondence is by an old friend of mine, Capt Arjun, and Lord-Horatio.

yarrr ... Pirates ...

2005-08-04T22:23:00.000+08:00

I've been woefully remiss in updating this blog, I know. Unlike fatgoblin, I haven't found that much time to paint. But I have been doing other things ...

... namely ... PIRATES! (yarr...)

I'm talking about the Pirates Constructible Card Game, of course.

I must admit to being rather taken by this game (yes, merchandising and all), which comes in a packs which, for 6 of our dollars here, gets you 2 plasticard assemble-it-yourself ships, some treasure, and a little cardboard island (the lovely vessel you see above is the pirate ship Sea Nymph). I must confess there's a delightful joy and anticipation in opening new packs, hoping for a new ship, preferably something rare. (Omigod, I have so fallen for this collectible card game thing ...)

To try and redeem myself, I'm going to bend this whole thing back towards real wargaming. The rules for the 2 player game revolve more around acquiring treasure than sinking the enemy fleet, but I've been thinking that with a few modifications, a nice little age of sail fleet game can be had. Here's my suggested House Rules to turn the Pirates game into a true wargame (i.e. none of that getting treasure stuff, just good old sinking the enemy).

1. All the current rules of apply (see them here, in pdf, for all 3 pirates games - that's Pirates of the Spanish Main, Pirates of the Crimson Coast, and Pirates of the Revolution)

2. Games now come with no point limit - 30, 40, 50 points per player, as much as you can field.

3. Terrain set-up is as per the normal rules, except no treasure is placed on the islands.

4. Wind direction is now a factor in the game: At the beginning of the game, roll 1d6 to choose the wind direction: 1=from the north, 2=from the east, 3=from the south, 4=from the west, 5 or 6= roll again. At the beginning of every turn, before any movement, firing or actions, roll 1d6: 1=shift wind clockwise 1 cardinal direction (e.g. a northerly wind becomes an easterly) 2=shift wind clockwise 1 cardinal direction, all other numbers mean no change in wind direction. At the start of the game, randomly determine who gets to be Player A and Player B (see below).

5. Wind direction determines the order in which ships in each player's fleet move. Ships facing into the wind (within a 180º arc of the wind) move first. Movement order goes like this:

Player A's wind-facing ships move and shoot
Player B's wind-facing ships move and shoot
Player B's remaining ships move and shoot
Player A's remaining ships move and shoot

The next turn, the other is reversed - i.e.

Player B's wind-facing ... etc

6. All actions for a ship are resolved before moving on to the next one (i.e. finish moving, shooting, ramming, boarding etc before the next ship.

[the reason for this mechanic is two-fold: firstly, to introduce wind into the game as a tactical factor, for realism; secondly to take into account the fact that movement order is extremely important in Pirates. Given that most ships can only either move or shoot in a turn, the order in which ships move often determines who gets to shoot first, which in this game can mean your ship gets sunk before it can fire a shot. A player who gets the wind gauge, getting all his ships facing off the wind, could force his opponent to move some ships into range, and then use his action to fire first instead of moving.]

7. Forts and derelict ships (even those which have oarsmen) always act as if they were ships facing into the wind.

That's about it really. I'm going to try and get some real painting done soon, perhaps over the holiday weekend, but in the meantime plasticard ships are about all I can manage for the time being. In the spirit of the whole pirates thing though, here's a link to Talk Like A Pirate Day website, so come 19th Sep, you too can go ... yarrr!

grrr ... internet explorer ... grrr ...

2005-07-19T19:36:00.000+08:00

I live in a 3 Mac household, and work in a Wintel office. I just spent the better part of my lunch hour wondering why the heck the sidebar on this blog was suddenly a bottom-right-bar, when the same page loaded perfectly fine in the morning. Nothing had changed between morning and afternoon - no new posts, no additions to the links in the sidebar, no changes of the template. In frustration, I changed templates, only to find the same problem.

A minor problem, you might say. A small matter of some misalignment, somewhere. People can still scroll down and access the sidebar, and read the links. But it tasked me. It tasked me, and I would have it!

Finally, I decided it could all wait till I got home (besides the fact that lunch hour was burnt and gone, and there was plenty of work to be done).

They load fine on my iBook. They load fine in Safari. They load fine in Firefox. Heaven forgive me, I even started up Internet Explorer (which I haven't used on my iBook since Safari came out) and they load fine. It's just something about Windows, or something about IE, or something about the unholy partnership of Windows and IE that exploded my blog template this afternoon.

Anyway, if you're using a Windows machine, and my blog still looks odd (as in the sidebar has is curled up in the bottom right corner of the screen, whimpering traumatically) please leave a comment so I know it's still not alright. It seems that there's no problems with Macs+Safari/Firefox(and even IE), so I'm going to find out tomorrow if it's something wrong with the machine at work.

Oh, and one more time ...

... grrr

Creating snow on bases

2005-07-04T14:12:00.000+08:00

I decided the two winter panzers needed some snow on the bases, so this is how I did it.

The bases were prepared in the usual manner: sand (normal beach sand) glued onto a balsa wood base, with magnasheet stuck underneath, and sprayed black. After that, I sprayed a thin layer of white paint at an oblique angle from all sides, to give the sand a bit of a dusting of white - faster than spray painting.

I originally wanted to stop at this point, to keep the bases simple. You can see what this stage looks like in the earlier post on the winter panzers. I thought there was something missing though, so I decided to try and put some snow on the bases.

Options included using white glue mixed with white paint (since white glue sets clear), and putty wall filler. The first would've resulted in smooth globs, which I didn't quite want, and the second is a bit harder to control (though I thought it might give the effect of packed snow quite well).

In the end, I settled on the modelling snow I bought some time back. This is a specialised flock, made from some sort of plastic. It looks white, but is actually semi-transparent (as I found out the first time I tried to use it some years ago), so I mixed up equal parts of white glue, water and white paint, and then stirred in the snow until I got a putty like consistency, which was then slopped onto the bases.

The white paint counters the transparency of the flock, and the glue globs it together. I opted not to cover the base entirely, aiming for a spring thaw look to the whole thing (extending my options: this way, the models won't be limited to only deep winter scenarios, but could possibly be used up to early spring).

In retrospect, I might want to try the putty filler for the next time I do this - it might make a better basing material for deep snow.

Hasegawa Jagdpanzer IV

2005-07-02T14:41:00.000+08:00

Latest model to roll off the production line: a Hasegawa 1/72 scale Jagdpanzer.

The original intention was to paint this in a winter whitewash to match the other two winter panzers, but after laying on the 3-tone camouflage, I realised I quite like the look.

This is my first time trying to paint on 3-tone camo. I don't have an airbrush, so I drybrushed the green and brown over the base dunkelgreb. It took quite a long time - this type of drybrushing is (for want of a better way of describing it) especially dry, with slow layering to try and replicate the effect of spray painting.

As you can see, the model still needs a few finishing touches. The inside of the hatches will be done next, and then the highlighting, after which the base still has to be painted and flocked.

Winter Panzers

2005-07-01T15:30:00.000+08:00

Here are some photos of the two most recent models I've completed:

This Stug III is an Airfix kit. Airfix kits have a bit of a chequered history with me: I've struggled with the poor quality moulding (the words you see imprinted on the inside of the kit, before you seal the upper hull to the lower, are "Copyright Airfix 1967", which gives you an idea how old the moulds must be) and poorer fit of parts. Building their T-34 left me with plenty of broken parts, and not enough swear words to go around.

However, this particular kit wasn't all that bad - I actually completed the build while watching two episodes from the first season DVD of "Dead Like Me", which tells you how much attentiveness is required, and painted the next day in about the same time. The poor moulding has left plenty of flash to be trimmed, but has retained nice detail in the upper deck (take a look at the dotted pattern on the hull above the tracks), which were easy to pick out in the painting process. I did my usual clumsy thing, and wrecked the gun barrel during assembly, but the brass tube I replaced it with is probably better anyway.

The Hasegawa Panzer IV Ausf G, on the other hand, is a totally different breed of kit - refined, well thought out, easy to build yet clean and crisp in detail. I have nothing but praise for Hasegawa's work. These two are part of my effort to diversify my 1/72 wargaming collection. My current stockpile includes a substantial Russian force: a bucketload of T-34s (Airfix, Fujimi and Italeri), two SU-85s, a KV-1 and a KV-2, two companies of infantry (based for Crossfire).

The German side is a bit skimpier - no infantry, a Tiger and a Panther. These two tanks are part of my effort to broaden my opposing force collection, as well as to cover a period that we (the Napnuts) don't have - a good collection of tanks in winter whitewash. With these two, we should be able to game a few Eastern Front scenarios for the winters of '41-'44.

Flames of War

2005-06-23T10:19:00.000+08:00

It's been a quiet month for wargaming and painting, so I haven't posted much. A quick update on some recent games:

We played a Flames of War game on 5th June, using our existing 20mm figures and 1/72 vehicles. The pictures more or less tell the story of how the game went: an overly cautious approach by the Brits (that would be me and LK) meant that we were fighting to hang on to a draw by the middle of the game. As a ruleset, FoW made little impression on me: it seems to be in the vein of the Warhammer type game that it resembles, where the fun is as much in drawing up an army list as it is in playing the game (not that I'm putting down army-lists: I for one enjoyed thoroughly army list composition when playing Warhammer Ancient Battles). I suspect this is one of those rulesets that I'd have to buy to get interested in.

In the meantime, I've been slowly massing my 15mm armies, finally adding the baggage element to the Sea People's to complete it, and have just painted up two German tanks in winter camo. Pictures will be posted next month, since I've maxed out my flickr account this month.

The German armour will come in handy for Eastern front scenarios, though I have to find a way to get some infantry (Soviet and German) in winter gear. The ski troopers I already have are not really ideal, since they were of marginal influence in the war, but will no doubt add some flavour to the table when fielded.

Current project: a Hasegawa Jagdpanzer IV that's sitting on my study table, lower hull assembled. When complete, it will join the other tanks in winter camo. I'm always impressed by the quality of Hasegawa's kits, and they are a joy to build - low on frustration, high on quality and ease.

Game report: Gear Krieg (lite)

2005-05-15T20:15:00.000+08:00

Played a Gear Krieg scenario today, trying out a modified version of the rules.

The game pitted 3 T34-76s against 2 Valkuries and and Uller. In retrospect, given that I had made all the German crews veteran, versus the greenhorn Russian crews, play-balance was terribly off: the effect of rolling 3 dice versus 2 was quite dramatic in game terms.

The Russians started with an unopposed crossing of the two bridges that separated their deployment area from the main battlefield. The Germans spent the first few turns working their way around the flank, sticking close to cover, and edging for a position in the church.

The Russians eventually established a position on a hill dominating the battlefield, but a lucky hit from the Germans jammed the turret in place - no big disadvantage for the Russians, who used the tank to cover a narrow angle and try and outshoot the Germans.

The T34 hid behind the hill, ducking back when hit, and popping back out to shoot at the Germans.

The shootout on that flank was ineffectual, until the German player manuevered the heavier guns of the Uller into action.

Meanwhile, a desparate ramming attack from a crippled T34 was averted when the reaction fire from the Germans first killed the driver, causing the damaged tank to lurch forward blindly, missing the German walker which neatly sidestepped it. Reaction fire from the walkers was partcularly deadly, as one of the walkers was in point blank range, and was hitting the top armour of the T34.

The Russians gained some ground back when concentrated fire from the T34s finally managed to blow up a Valkurie.

The pendulum swung back the other way when the Uller finally scored with its 75mm recoiless rifle, on a lucky die roll (6 versus a 1, a margin of success of 5, which was enough to penetrate even the front armour of a T34)

The aftermath of the battle saw the walkers striding triumphantly over the burning hulks of the T34s.

Lessons learned (as far as the modified ruleset I was using) were that crew quality is very important, and potentially unbalancing: if I were to umpire this game again, the fact that the Germans were all rolling 3 dice for gunnery and manuever (versus 2 for the Russians) would have to be compensated by 2 to 3 more Russian tanks, and possibly some infantry. On many occasions, the fact that the Germans could roll 3 dice on defence versus 2 from the Russians meant that they couldn't be hit: when they were, the results were dramatic, with the big gun on the T34 almost guaranteeing an explosive result. The 50% improvement (3 versus 3 dice) however was enough to keep them safe most of the time.

All in all, I'm quite pleased that the walkers got to see the battlefield again, instead of lying in a box somewhere, and that the game went pretty smoothly. The flamethrower walker wasn't featured in this scenario, but we took some pictures anyway for fun.

Flamethrower walker

2005-04-10T23:59:00.000+08:00

flamethrower walker, originally uploaded by Wahj.

Continuing with the Gear Krieg scratch-building, my latest project was this flamethrower equipped walker.

This one is almost entirely scratchbuilt, with only the fuel tanks on the back scavenged from an Airfix T-34 kit. The hull is from a series of walkers I built some time back - you can see the other 3 walkers from that series here.

The most challenging part of this model were the flames. I knew I wanted to model the flamethrower in action, but I didn't quite know how. My first attempt was with cotton wool, soaked in craft glue, and wrapped around a wire frame. It didn't work very well - the cotton wool clumped, and it was difficult to get the colour I wanted.

I eventually settled on moulding the flames in GW green stuff, although that had its own set of problems, the main one being the weight of the sculpted piece. This forced me to change the design of the walker: I had intended for the flamethrower to be attached to an arm, but instead mounted it under the 'chin' of the walker instead, as the arm would not have supported the weight well.

As you can see from the picture, the flames are detachable (makes the model easier to transport). The model still needs to be weathered, and details have to be painted in. I'm going to paint in a 'mouth' on the front, similar to the decorations we've seen on WW2 fighters. I may also experiment with a camouflaged paint scheme for the hull - dark green tiger stripes would be a nice compromise between the decorative and the functional.

This will probably be a one-off model. I still have one more hull from this series left-over, and I'll probably build it as another specialist vehicle. A command walker might be nice.

First Impressions

2005-04-04T11:50:00.000+08:00

We played a WW2 game using "I Ain't Been Shot Mum!" (we'll just call it IABSM) yesterday. First impression was that it makes for extremely volatile games.

Most of us learned to count the odds playing the generation of wargames that came from the 70s and 80s. Whether it was Avalon Hill, or Steve Jackson Games (the first wargame I played was Ogre and G.E.V.), they now (in retrospect) shared certain similarities - known and calculable odds for resolution of events, and fairly transparent game mechanisms, via outcome tables and charts.

We learned to count the odds, applying our growing knowledge of secondary school maths and statistics to the games (most direct application of education ever, really). Game decisions were dominated by probability concerns: you went for the course of action that had highest probability of success. Graduating from tactical thinking to higher order, game-winning strategies, involved considering bigger probabilities - going for the result that would put you in a position more probable to win the game, rather than just winning a combat.

There's been a move away from these deterministic systems, mostly by gamers who dislike the mathematical precision to which these wargames can be reduced, and I see IABSM as one of these games. IABSM uses a card-based activation system, coupled with an umpire's discretion to add special event cards, to mix up the game a bit. Of course, any game that involves rules is liable to number-crunching, but card based activation games seem less liable to it for the moment - probably because the numbers aren't fixed (varying based on the umpire's choice of what cards to add in), and because there's always the "Tea-Break" card that reshuffles the entire deck. Probabilities are much harder to calculate here - compare this with what people have done for DBA, for example, or G.E.V.) - although I'm sure somebody out there can do it. Perhaps it's only a matter of time before, in a sort of intellectual arms race, someone publishes an article on playing the odds in card based activation games. Gamers who dislike number crunching can either write new rules with more obtuse mechanisms (so you can't figure out the maths behind it - which often means there's no consistency, which most people agree is a Bad Thing), more randomness (the game is designed to swing wildly, discouraging number crunching since there's no longer any point) or to go back the old tradition of free-kriegspiel (where the players give verbal orders, without knowing the mechanism the umpire uses to resolve conflicts - in other words, the mechanisms are opaque to the player).

Our first IABSM wasn't really representative, but it was demonstrative of the extremes to which the game can swing. I commanded 3 platoons of Russian infantry, 3 tanks, a mortar and asniper, while my friend commanded a similar-sized German force. At crucial points in the early game, the Germans "lost a turn" because the "Tea-break" card was drawn, forcing a reshuffle. The Russians got to act, while the Germans didn't. Despite the umpire compensating by loading the deck with special cards for the Germans, the Russians had got an overwhelming advantage by the middle of the game. The final ratio of German to Russian cards drawn wasn't that disparate, and the Germans did get some luck in the form of a counterattack, but the early Russian luck gave a definite advantage: by the middle of the game, the Russians were squatting on 2 out of 3 victory condition objectives.

The danger of having a "trump" probabilty (in this game, the card that forces an end of the turn and a reshuffle) means that there's an over-riding probability of an event that neither player can influence with tactics, or gameplay. This means that no matter what your tactics are, you have to contend with the fact that X times out of ten, it won't happen because of the trump. Whether this has a 'positive' effect on the gaming experience depends on where your're coming from, and what your idea of a 'good game' is. If you prefer games to be 'realistic', and consider confusion, fog of war, and messiness to be representative of actual combat experience, then this sort of randomness will suit you: if, on the other hand, wargames are mostly games to you, systems that can either be good systems, or flawed systems, then games like IABSM might not be up your alley.

As for me, I've always believed that a single gameplay experience isn't all that informative, so I'm looking forward to a few more games of IABSM. Besides, my Russians haven't had an outing in years ..

Gear Krieg Kit-bashing

2005-04-02T18:55:00.000+08:00

right view, originally uploaded by Wahj.

I keep getting distracted. I know I'm supposed to be working on my DBA armies, but sometime last yesterday, I got it into my head to build one more walker for the Gear Krieg games.

This is the most ambitious kit-bash I've worked on to date. I put in a lot more detail into the mechanisms of the legs, and the details on the weapons, than for my previous walkers. This one is loosely based on the 'Uller' in the Gear Krieg rulebooks ('loosely', because Gear Krieg miniatures are all in 15mm scale, hence the need to scratchbuild or kitbash if one wants a miniature in 20mm scale). My previous Gear Krieg models are in this gallery.

The hull comes from an Airfix kit (Puma recce vehicle), and along with the tracks (Airfix US halftrack) and the front wheels, are the only 'kit' parts: everything else is the 'bashed' part. You can see from this photograph of the unpainted model the frankensteinian montage of parts assembled to make it.

Unpainted model, originally uploaded by Wahj.

The weapon in the right arm is what the rulebook calls a grosspanzerfaust, i.e. a Really Big Panzerfaust. Purely fictional, of course (but then again gigantic mecha in World War Two are about as fictional as can be). The weapon on the left arm is something of my own devising, a recoiless rifle with 6 rotating chambers, and a perforated venturi. It makes sense that on a vehicle that is less stable and massive than a tank, any large calibre weapons would be recoiless, to avoid toppling the vehicle over. I vaguely recalled reading about a German 75mm recoiless rifle that was developed for their fallschirmjager (parachutists), and I had that in mind when I designed the gun. The 6 chambers are there because I wondered how the crew could possibly reload the thing, so I gave them 6 rounds to fire before someone has the dicey job of crawling outside and manually reloading the weapons.

left view, originally uploaded by Wahj.

The strange 'shield' surrounding the grosspanzerfaust is something that appears in the Gear Krieg designs. Besides looking cool (which is why I included it), it is probably modelled after the shield on the panzerschrek, which was a much tinier thing designed to protect the firer's face from the blast as the rocket was launched. It has no real logical purpose on a vehicle, but, as I said, it looks cool. This is obviously a one-shot weapon, since the crew can't possibly reload it, but judging by the diameter of the shaped-charge, it should demolish any tank it hits - somewhere in my education I recall being told that a shaped charge could penetrate a thickness of armour at least 4 times the diameter of the charge, as a rough gauge. According to scale, that shaped-charge would be 72x5mm, or 360mm in diameter, and could reasonably slice through 2880mm of armour. If it were real.

front view, originally uploaded by Wahj.

Mighty Morphin' Armies

2005-03-25T11:37:00.000+08:00

One of the best ideas to come out of the DBA community was when someone realised, given that armour and uniform changed at a slow pace for a few centuries, if one was judicious in the choice of figures and paint schemes, one could assemble a single army that was useable as several others - in effect, several armies for the price (and painting effort) of one. Here are a few examples

- how to build 8 roman armies for the price of two,

- the same thing with Alexander and his successors,

- and with Egyptian armies.

Anything that saves me money, and effort, is a Good Thing as far as I'm concerned, and I've decided to try a morph of my own. I realised last night that the 15mm Nubians I've got from Chariot Miniatures give me enough figures to morph an Early Libyan army from them. I laid out all the unpainted figures this morning to see if the numbers work out, and this is what I can field with existing stock:

Nubians
1 x 3Bows (General)
2 x 3Warband
8 x 2Psiloi

I'm short of 1 more 2Psiloi base, which is easily remedied by bringing across the slingers from the Mycenaean army - one naked skirmisher is little different from another.

Early Libyans (1250BC to 660BC)
1 x LightChariot (General)
3 x 3Warband
3 x 3Bows
5 x 2Psiloi

I'll have to sacrifice my spare Sea Peoples chariot to provide the command base - which is alright, give that I have another chariot painted up. Although the chariot design is therefore a Sea Peoples one, the crossover is historically plausible, since the Libyans were closely allied with the Sea Peoples in the period I'm painting them in, and its likely that the Libyans could have used, or copied chariot designs from the Sea Peoples. According to the army list, the Libyans at this time were divided into the traditionalist Lubu (good old throwing spears and bows) and more 'advanced' Meshwesh tribes (new fangled swords and chariots) so I suppose I'll have an army consisting of Lubu luddites being led by a progressive Meshwesh chieftain. None of this makes any difference to the game, of course, but its always nice to know more about the armies you're painting, and it adds colour (verbal, rather than visual) to the game to be able to personalize your figures down to their tribes. Pictures will follow soon.

Essex Sea Peoples Figures

2005-03-23T20:13:00.000+08:00

Sea Peoples Blades, originally uploaded by Wahj.

Here are the photos of the Essex Sea Peoples Blades I was referring to. As you can see, the flock and basing material hasn't been done yet, but the figures are.

The Essex figures turned out quite nicely.

Sea Peoples Wagon, originally uploaded by Wahj.

Also completed last night was this scratch-built Sea Peoples wagon. I based it on illustrations from the Osprey Ancient Armies of the Middle East book, specifically on the reproduction of a relief from the temple at Medinet-Habu, showing a Sea Peoples wagon. The cows (well, we'll think of them as cattle) are from some manufacturer I've forgotten, while the driver perched on the shaft is an Essex figure with a whip made from wire (in place of the spear he originally carried).

The wagon itself is made of plasticard, and I eventually intend to fill it with baggage - I have some spare spears and shields that could represent loot, and I'll need to find some sacks or bags as well to complete the load. Alternatively, I could be lazy and just toss a few spears in. The paint-work obviously has to be done, of course, but I'm quite pleased with my first attempt at scratch-building in 15mm.

Making Miniatures Better

2005-03-23T16:12:00.000+08:00

I painted up 3 bases of 4Blades for my Sea Peoples army last night (photos will follow shortly) and I started thinking about the experience of painting Essex versus Venexia.

I don't think miniatures manufacturers pay enough attention to making figures easy to paint. Aside from the general (and obvious) observation that a well sculpted, well-cast figure is easier to paint than a shapeless lump of lead, there are many things a manufacturer can do to make painting easier. Here's a few that came to mind as I was painting

Quality of metal
One thing that struck me is how Essex's figures are case in a hard, durable alloy (don't know the exactly composition - mostly lead, possibly pewter?) that is distinctly different from Venexia's, or for that matter Corvus Belli's, Xyston's or Foundry's (which tells you how much unpainted lead I have on hand). Whatever mix Essex is using, their figures are smoother and shinier than other manufacturer's, and do not tarnish as much (or at all, in fact). However ...

Sharpness of Details
The one thing about Essex's figures is that they have correspondingly less distinct detail than, say Corvus Belli or Xyston. By this, I mean that the ridges, folds, and edges on the figures then to be rounded, lower in height, and less distinct than in Xyston figures.

This has possibly the biggest impact on painting. The sharper the detail, the easier the painter's job. A sharp crease in clothing or armour means that a painter simply has to run the brush across the feature to get a clean line. Dry-brushing is easier, and ink-washes settle more distinctly into recesses. Xyston's 15mm figures are a prime example of this. Essex's, on the other hand, are 'blurrier', meaning that painter has to do more work to bring out detail.

In other words, with a less well-designed figure, you have to paint in the detail: with a well cast one, the detail is there for you to paint in. Excellent figures, like Xyston's, almost paint themselves.

Flat Bases
I don't know why some manufacturers still cast figures with bases that are not completely flat. It's an additional burden for the painter, who has to file down the figure to make it fit properly on a base, and stand up straight so it won't flop over while it's being glued down. One particular source of irritation is how Essex casts horses with an irregular, uneven base that makes them unstable, and requires huge amounts of glue to get them standing straight up on a base. Casting the base of figures properly is no doubt low on the priority of manufacturers, but it adds an additional step to my painting process, and therefore affects the efficiency of the painting

Casting in One Piece
Anytime I have to glue anything on a 15mm figure, I get depressed - it's hard, and no doubt must be harder for people with larger fingers than mine. There's a balance here between detail, realism and variety on the one hand, and ease of assembly on the other. Casting in a single piece can lead to boring poses (like Essex's standard "spear held along the arm" pose, which is structurally sound and allows a robust casting of a figure with a spear), while casting with small pieces leads to people like me supergluing said pieces to fingertips. A sensible compromise, as mentioned in an earlier post, is to cast arms and weapons together, so the individual parts to be handled are larger, and the point of contact is more secure (gluing a spear onto an open hand in 15mm is hard: it's much easier to be gluing an arm into a socket)

Having said all of that, let me add that 15mm figures have come a long way in the last 10 years. My first figures were from Table-Top games in 1992 - they were a Mongol army with spindly legs, mounted on ponies that looked horrible and misshapen, and they were of very soft lead that bent at the slightest whisper. Compared to those, the current 15mms, with Essex establishing a sort of industry standard, are almost all of a quality that allows good painting. It's just that some of them make you work harder ...

Mycenaean Chariot

2005-03-21T10:36:00.000+08:00

Mycenaean Chariot
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

I set myself the small target of painting one chariot for Sunday night, partly because I was bored, and partly because I want to start somewhere on my Mycenaean DBA army.

The miniatures are from Museum Miniatures, and are generally well-moulded. The charioteer included in the pack was, for some unfathomable reason, holding a figure-of-eight shield and a spear, in such a manner than he couldn't fit into the chariot along with the driver. I replaced him with another figure that meant to be a dendra-armoured noble on foot, but whose posture made him perfect for a "lance"-using charioteer.

I've always been fascinated by the Dendra panoply that the Mycenaeans wore: people have described the overall effect as a walking bronze dustbin ( here's a link to a modern reconstruction of the Dendra armour that demonstrates exactly what this looks like), and I have to agree that it can look a bit funny, but it's also very cool precisely because it does not concord with our idea of what armour ought to look like. For a charioteer, who need only worry about exposing his torso and arms, the panoply works fine, and has that certain perfunctory beauty that comes with practical, functional things.

Venexia Sea Peoples DBA Army

2005-03-18T18:05:00.000+08:00

This is the first post for a long time, for the simple reason that I haven't been painting, or even gaming, much for the past few months, having been in Canada and all.

Here's what I have been working on for the past two weeks. A good friend of mine bought me a DBA Sea Peoples army from Venexia. Having got a DBM sized pile of unpainted Minoan/Mycenaean figures (from Chariot) in 15mm, and some Sea Peoples (Essex) as well, this works out fine as a first step towards building a larger army.

First things first: this is what you get from the Venexia army pack:

There's not quite enough figures for all the options in DBA 2.0. You have enough for 6 x 3Blades, 3 x 2Psiloi, and 3 x 3Auxilia, but since the Psiloi and Auxilia are either/or options in the army list, you still need 3 x 4Blades. However you arrange the figures, you can't quite get enough figures for the 3 x 4Blades. Not a worry for me, since I've got Essex figures as well, which I will paint up to supplement. The Essex figures are also Sherden, which will add some variety to the army: the Venexia figures are Pelest, and since the Sea Peoples were a coalition of various tribes, it would be nice to show visible differences in armour and dress.

Painted up and arrayed, they look like this:

I chose blue as the predominant colour. The nett result is a bit flat. For the subsequent additions to the army, I'll use red and white, to add some variety.

The chariot, which functions as the General unit in DBA, and which can dismount as a 4Blades (there are enough figures for this):

The Psiloi and Auxilia:

I liked the range of weapons supplied for the Auxilia - you can equip them all with spears, or with a mix of swords, including kopeshes (Egyptian sickle swords: the Sea Peoples both fought against, and for the Egyptians as mercenaries, so this is a nice historical touch) and axes. What I didn't like was the fact that you had to glue those tiny swords onto the hands. Any manufacturer that makes you do this in 15mm is just being sadistic. A far better way is to mould the sword and arm together - the extra bit of lead required doesn't really add much to the cost, and the resulting piece is also probably more structurally robust.

The Blades:

These fit nicely into the DBM army list's description of a 'normal' Sea Peoples warrior as carrrying two throwing spears, a shield, and a sword. I chose to mix up the two variants supplied, rather than base them homogenously. In general, for less 'uniform' armies, I try to introduce some randomness into the basing. Only phalanxes and legionaries do well in rigid, uniform poses. These fellows are a bit stiff themselves, and no doubt must be quite jealous of the Auxilia, who get the cool axes to wave around.

All in all, a nice little project to start the painting going again.

Unpainted Lead

2004-12-12T20:13:00.000+08:00

The Crusaders got their first game today, in a Crossfire game where they were pretty ineffectual (the 6 pounder guns historically having been quite blah in action, plus not having a decent HE round for use against infantry).

On the plus side, I've taken delivery of a whole bunch of new 15mm figures to paint: all in all, I've spent something close to $300 this month on figures. My Mycenaeans are getting a boost in the form of Sea Peoples allies (Sherdens, Pelests and Lukka), and my Carthaginians are getting another elephant, along with some Spanish cavalry. This is a year's worth of painting I've ordered in less than a month.

In the same way that physicians use the Body Mass Index as a means of measuring obesity, I think wargamers and figure painters should have an Unpainted Lead Ratio - total weight of unpainted figures divided by total weight of painted figures. Anything greater or equal to 1 should be normal for most gamers, I suspect. Hardcore painters would reach into the 2s, maybe 3s. Anyone with a ratio less than 1 is probably leading an unhealthy life, and should be made to go out and buy several kilograms of lead miniatures, pronto.

Crusader Platoon

2004-12-07T15:45:00.000+08:00

Crusader Platoon 1
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

Almost completed work on the Crusader platoon. Here we see them based, and with decals on. The tactical numbers were a bit difficult, since the Hasegawa kits all come as Number 3. I cut out the centres of the decals, and painted in numbers 1 and 2.

Crusader Platoon 2
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

The red and white recognition signs were a bit more difficult to place: in the end, I opted for putting them on the side of the toolboxes, stretching slightly onto the side skirts.

Carthaginian Spearmen

2004-12-07T15:12:00.000+08:00

Carthaginian Spearmen
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

A little update on my long-running projects. This one's a picture of the Carthaginian army I'm building for DBA. The figures are 15mm Corvus Bellis.

More Crusader Mk 3s

2004-11-27T17:40:00.000+08:00

Crusader skirts attached
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

Sometime ago I posted about the Hasegawa Crusader Mk 3. I've just completed two more of these (a very quick build - 24 hours from purchase to painted. well, mostly - still needs highlighting, basing, and decals) to match LK's troop of Crusaders - we'll be able to field two whole troops for the next Crossfire game.

I took the opportunity to try and the side skirts exactly right. The last time, I didn't put in the horizontal ridges: this time, I scored in horizontal grooves - you can see them on the photo of the unpainted model. The side skirts are made from plasticard.

It's a compromise: trying to make ridges that small would've been prohibitively difficult (read: not worth the effort and time, not to mention frustration), and grooves, though inaccurate, will at least give the impression of horizontal detail.

Crusader - with proper side skirts
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

Painted up, with an inkwash to being up the detail on the grooves, and it doesn't look half bad. There's something very satisfying about making your own modifications to a kit - rather than just building it off the shelf, you're customising it to make it really unique.

Crusader Platoon
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

Eventually, the two new tanks will get based and decalled like the existing one. I'm trying to decide how best to do the vehicle markings, since all the Hasegawa kits give you the big yellow number 3. Currently considering cutting out the centre of the decals, and hand painting the numbers 1 and 2 on the other two tanks.

Kitbashed Valkurie

2004-11-04T17:28:00.000+08:00

I'm in the process of transferring wargames related posts from my other blog. This one was originally posted on 22 March 2004. Since posting this I have gone on to make quite a few kit-bashed mecha, which I'll feature in a subsequent post.

Kit-bashing

No, nothing to do with Kit Chan.

Kit bashing is when wargamers like me decide that an existing model kit is just not good enough, and decide to make our own. In this case, the game in question is Gear Krieg, by Dream Pod 9.

Gear Krieg describes itself as "two-fisted pulp superscience in a world at war". The short translation: World War 2 with mecha. (you can see the appeal straight away - I've always been a sucker for the gigantic fighting robot genre of anime and games). I bought the rules some time back, and was sufficiently intrigued by them to want to start a game.

A brief rundown of what's interesting: Gear Krieg uses a "roll many dice, take the highest roll" system, with more dice being rolled for better units. It also uses a "margin of success multiplier" system, where the number you defeat your opponent by in an opposed roll is multiplied against a damage factor to determine the final damage. This is quite new to me - I've tried the "buckets o' dice" systems (e.g. Warhammer), I've played the traditional "consult many tables" systems (e.g. Squad/Panzer Leader), and I've tried the radical "let's muck around with abstracted time" systems (Crossfire being an excellent example, which, despite everything, is a very playable and fun game).

Two problems that have kept me from buying Dream Pod 9's miniatures. One: the price is exhorbitant - a single mecha costs around USD$15 (and since the mecha have a "walker" mode and a "ground" mode, you need two of them if you're anal enough ... and I am). Add shipping, and it comes to quite a bit. Two: DP9 sells its miniatures in 15mm scale - and the preponderance of WW2 figs owned by the Napnuts (the group I game with) is in 20mm scale.

Solution? Make my own mecha. The initial results of the kit bash are in this gallery.

Kitbashed Valkurie
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

*Update*
041104
Since starting to use Flickr, I've begun to refurbish old posts where I used to link to an external gallery. Here's a picture of the Valkurie in question. Clicking on it will take you to a larger version.

I've posted pics of the drawings from the Gear Krieg rulebook for comparison, and I'm quite pleased with the results. It took me till 2am last night, but I managed to kitbash a Valkurie walker from an Airfix SdKfz 222 kit, an Airfix M4 Halftrack kit, and a whole lot of plasticard.

Sometimes it's the simple things that keep you going ...

Helen of Troy and the Flying Tigers of Qin

2004-11-01T23:25:00.000+08:00

Two things to report:

I've finished the Helen of Troy figure. I chose purple (or porphyry, to be precise) for her outfit, based on a picture from the Oct 2004 National Geographic - an excellent feature article on the ancient Phoenicians which included a photograph of a model wearing a purple scarf, dyed in the extract from the murex shellfish (which, incidentally was the same colour the Spartans used to dye their famous red cloaks) and which, happily, I could match to an existing bottle of paint.

Helen of Troy, originally uploaded by Wahj.

I haven't quite figured out how to blend colours properly yet - her skin tones are not as smooth as I would like - hardly suitable for the face that launched a thousand ships - but I may return to her again in the future.

Qin Army 2
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

The second bit of work I did was to retrieve my Qin army from Paradigm Infinitum, where they'd been languishing in the bottom of a display cabinet for the longest time. This was a 15mm Essex miniatures army that I bought and painted for pure interest - I mean, who wouldn't want his own terracotta army? The first Emperor of China did - and since he had the decency to leave a life sized, 1:1 scale army as a reference for us, the least we could do is follow suit and make our own smaller versions. The Essex miniatures are quite decent, and clearly based on the terracotta army. I based them for DBA, and there's currently 4 bases of spears, 2 of crossbowmen, 2 warbands, and one base of cavalry.

Qin Army 1
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

I also took the opportunity to rebase some of the units as well, and since I had a spare cavalryman I decided to try and spruce up the warband.

flying tigers 1, originally uploaded by Wahj.

The DBM army list has the option for picked units of soldiers, which the ancient chinese called (literal translation) "dare to die" soldiers. These would be used as either crack troops or suicide troops to spearhead attacks. These units were also called by other names, one of which was the "Flying Tiger" squadron, and this was the one I chose to represent. I based the spare cavalryman behind the frontline of swordsmen, to represent the commanding officer riding behind and encouraging the troops. I had to turn his head slightly to make him look to his left, and I painted him in a black and white colour scheme - black being the state colour of the Qin Emperor's reign (in case you're wondering, his astrologers also told him that his element was water, and his number was 6, resulting in him commissioning an imperial chariot in black, and with all measurements in multiples of 6) and white being a colour traditionally associated with death in Chinese culture. The rest of the army are in black and red. The character on the shields reads "Tiger", in a script used for bronze inscriptions from the era, and the banner the officer is carrying reads "Flying Tiger". I thought it was quite appropriate, since DBM lists them as Wb(F) - that's "Warband, Fast", for those of us who can't read Barkerese.

Trojan Archers (Redoubt)

2004-10-18T13:05:00.000+08:00

Archers, originally uploaded by Wahj.

These are the archers from Redoubt's Trojan Wars line, painted over the weekend and today as I recuperate from my bout of flu. A few comments/complaints:

The bows are far too flimsy: while washing the figures, the upper limbs of two of the bows broke off, and I had to replace them with brass wire. In the photo above, the front-left figure is one of those with the repaired bows.

Other than that, the usual problems with flash and mould-lines persist: I hate dealing with flash, and I hate dealing with mould-lines even more. Problems with proportions are also evident: some of the archers have embarassingly large pecs, and some mysteriously have nipples (e.g. front left figure in the photo), and others don't (e.g. front right figure in the photo). I don't mind either way, but at least it should be consistent in the same line of figures.

In the end, it won't matter much since these guys will end up in the rear ranks of each formation I'm fielding, but it's the little things that irritate you and slow things down when you paint that really get to you.

Trojan Spearmen

2004-10-14T01:09:00.000+08:00

Trojan Spearmen 3, originally uploaded by Wahj.

Here are the first 6 of the Redoubt spearmen. Not too difficult a job in the end - they were primed over the weekend, and I spent about 3 hours tonight painting them. The sheer amount of skin showing is daunting: skin is particularly difficult to paint, especially since I've moved to using 3 layers (medium flesh over biege brown over flat brown) of paint.

This is also my first time painting up a 28mm army, and I'm having to adapt my techniques (which are geared towards 15mm) - some things just don't work at this scale.

Next up will be to paint up the archers, then finish up the rest of the spearmen before launching into the heroes and their chariots (I'm saving the best for last!)

Trojan War 28mm: Foundry vs Redoubt

2004-10-10T20:03:00.000+08:00

Sometime in April, I ordered some Trojan War figures from Redoubt Enterprises. I've only just received them two days ago, but I have to say that was probably my fault: having checked through the email correspondence, I realise that my mailing address was incomplete, and the figures had been sent back to them. Thankfully, some kind soul at Redoubt chose to follow on this matter by emailing me, and I've finally got my figures. To all the nice people at Redoubt, thanks for getting them to me.

I can now do something which I've wanted to for a long time, namely to compare Redoubt's Trojan War figures with Foundry's Trojan War line. The Foundry figures I got courtesy of Damien at Paradigm Infinitum, who brought them as part of an order for us (us being the Napnuts: take a look at our gallery).

Trojan 28mm 1
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

This first photo shows a general comparison: Foundry figures are on the left, Redoubt figures are on the right. As you can see, both are comparable in terms of size. Each green square is 10mm large, so the figures reach 28mm from foot to eyes, more or less. With head-dresses and helmets, they easily push into 30mm. Redoubt supplies lead spears, which are thicker and more easily bent out of shape than the long steel spear on the left from Foundry. I may in the end reject both and go for stiff plastic, but at the current moment, Foundry's spears look more durable. Foundry's shields are also more decorated, if slightly smaller - their tower shields don't really tower that much (compare top left with the Redoubt one's on the right), except for the one in the middle left, which comes from the hero pack and belongs to (you guessed it) Ajax of the Towering Shield.

Trojan Spearmen
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

Next, a close up of the spearmen. Once again, Foundry's on the left, Redoubt's on the right (for a bigger version of the pictures, click on them). No complaints here, only the observation that Redoubt's sculpting of musculature is slightly less realistic: look at the forearms and chest of both spearmen. Redoubt's has a slightly Popeye-the-sailorman look, and the legs are slightly spindlier. Nothing that would be obvious once painted up though.

Trojan Heroes
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

Now we look at the heroes. The figure on the left is Foundry's Paris (from the pack "Classical Heroes", TW1/5), while the one on the right is Redoubt's "Ajax, Prince of Salamis". The quality of scuplting is roughly the same, with nice detail from both sides - Ajax's feet are nicely detailed (though that's the part of the figure I pay least attention to when painting) and the leopard head on Paris' shoulder is a nice touch.

Trojan Heroes 2
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

Last but not least, the all important Helen of Troy (TX14): what game would be complete without her there to remind our brave warriors what they're fighting for? And boy does she remind them - Redoubt describes the figure as being in Minoan court dress, in which case I'd certainly like to see what informal dress was. I've put her next to Foundry's Odysseus (from the aforementioned Classical Heroes pack), since they don't have an equivalent. Both look distinctly top-heavy - Odysseus' mighty crested helmet seems to be covering a head disproportionately large for his body, and Helen ... well, see for yourself. She ends up looking slightly ... stout.

Nevertheless, both are really fine figures. I bought these to start a 28mm Warhammer Ancient Battles army: I've already got a 20mm plastic Persian army (pictures here), and it was about time to move into another scale. Redoubt's pricing is much more competitive than Foundry's: a pack of spearmen costs £5 from Redoubt and £12 from Foundry. Foundry's sculpting is better, yes, but not £7 better, in my opinion. I will, however, still be ordering from them, but mostly only heroes and characters, to bolster up my army: at these prices, the majority of my army will have to come from Redoubt.

Real wargames

2004-09-25T00:15:00.000+08:00

This blog will be a bit slow for the next few weeks, as I am going to be involved in real wargames for once. My reservist unit has been called up for its evaluation exercise, so instead of my usual weekend games, I'll be tramping around in the jungle with my men, trying to outsmart and outfight the aggressor. I'm getting a bit old for this, honestly: the last time I went for this sort of this thing, I was a spritely 24 ... = )

One more thing ...

2004-09-23T00:17:00.000+08:00

... I should mention:

Total build time for the Matilda and Crusader: approximately 9 working hours
Number of times I dropped, lost, and retrieved small parts after scrabbling around on the floor: approximately 10
Number of times I stabbed myself in the thumb with an X-acto knife: 1

That last one is actually a bit of a safety record for me really. =)

Crusader Mk 3

2004-09-22T23:44:00.000+08:00

Crusader 1
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

This Hasegawa Crusader Mk 3 kit was a breeze to build - but I had to make it complicated for myself.

All the reference materials I looked at show Mark 3s with full side skirts, but the Hasegawa kit has the partial skirts (front and back) that were characteristic of the Mark 1s and 2s. Naturally, I decided that this wouldn't do, and proceeded to scratch-build the side skirts.

My impatience naturally got the better of me: I had the hull assembled before I decided that I wanted to build the armoured skirts, and that meant I had to find a way to get the outline of the upper hull onto plasticard. Normally that would mean measuring the outline of the tank, and painstaking drawing the outline and cutting it out.

First attempt
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

But I'm lazy. Did I mention I was lazy? I decided there had to be an easier, faster way. The first attempt was using a soft graphite pencil to mark the sides of the tank, and then pressing the outline into the plasticard. That didn't work very well, but I decided the idea was on the right track. I tried again with black paint, and after a few tries, got a reasonable outline.

Second attempt
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

After some cutting and adjustments, I had two perfectly serviceable side skirts. Everything seemed fine at this point ...

Side skirts - or so we think ...
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

... but I had to change my mind. I decided that I didn't like the thinness of the plasticard I used - so back to the drawing board, teeth gritted in frustration and self-loathing. And this time, I measured it out - I guess there's no short cuts after all.

The thicker plasticard allowed me to cut the vertical grooves in the side skirts. I still haven't figured out how to make the horizontal ridges are are apparent in the photographs of actual Mark 3s, but I'll get round to it sometime.

Matilda (1/72 Airfix)

2004-09-21T22:33:00.000+08:00

Matilda, originally uploaded by Wahj.

This is the story of tank called Matilda, and the grief she caused me.

To begin with, she's an Airfix kit, and Airfix really needs to check their quality control - flash is a major problem, with difficult curved pieces like the turret and hatches needing to be trimmed before assembly. The fit's pretty bad as well: the top hull wouldn't meet the bottom hull when assembled - I eventually filled in the gap with some putty.

Front view
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

Then there's the fact that the Matilda has all these damned bogey wheels on the side sandwiched between two pieces of hull, requiring more dexterity than my clumsy fingers could manage - imaging trying to sandwich 14 small pieces of plastic between two larger ones, each one having to fit into a specific and (in the case of Airfix) often poorly moulded hole, all the while with glue squishing all over your fingers and time running out as the glue begins to set.

Another problem which cropped up was the vinyl tracks snapping. This was a surprise to me. I usually do a basecoat of black, paint on the main colour, and then assemble the tracks, but this time I decided to assemble everything before spraying on the base coat. Right after I did that, the tracks snapped at the rear, at the point of greatest curve (and presumably greatest stress). I suspect that the spray paint may have something to do with it - either a chemical reaction, or something to do with temperature change (sudden cold from the spray paint?) Either way, I'm not going to find out a second time, as it already took me good half hour to repair the damage - I had to cut up the vinyl tracks into smaller pieces and stick them on to match the curve.

After that, painting on the camouflage scheme was easy. One of things that attracted me to building this model was the chance to paint a caunter camouflage scheme, which consists of bright contrasting colours (here sand, brown, and grey) in abstract shapes, designed to break up the outline of the tank and make it less recognisable. One challenge was weathering the model: I usually use a lighter shade of the main colour, but for this tank, I tried to use lighter shades of all three main colours on the appropriate parts. It didn't work as well as I expected, and I may go back and just apply a general weathering over the entire tank.

Top view
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

The real problems began when I started applying the decals though. Small, fiddly decals and my clumsy fingers do not a good combination make. I tend to tear them, drop them, lose them. You see the decal that says "Drake"? (the British gave each tank in a squadron names starting with the same letter, in this case "D") Well, I almost had a tank called "Rake".

Drake
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

But the biggest "oh shit" moment came when I realised that one of the liscence plate decals went in an inaccesible spot at the back of the tank. This was when I put everything down, spent a good 5 minutes cursing and swearing, and wondering why I hadn't read the assembly instructions better. It then took me half an hour to manuever the decal in place.

Liscence plate
Originally uploaded by Wahj.

All in all, an enlightening experience. I've got the Fujimi version of this tank as well, which looks to slightly more challenging - double the number of pieces for the bogey wheels! Oh whoopee.

Here we go

2004-09-21T00:06:00.000+08:00

I've decided to move all my wargaming stuff to a separate blog, so here it is.

CONFESSIONS OF A WARGAMER

Strandhogg: Dwarves, Goblins, and Mules

MOO2

Warring States rules play-test

Gaming in spurts

Franco-Prussian War Game 1

Crusades PBEM

Wings of War

Warring States Game

The fruits of 4 weeks of PVP

Updates on WoW

Fear of falling

Completed Qin Dynasty army

War of the Roses Game Report

At long last ...

Warhammer Online, after one month of play

Warhammer: Age of Reckoning Collector's Edition

Warhammer Online: Rush to wait, wait to rush ...

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning

Work in progress: Sarmatians

Paint Scheme for Warring States Army

Warring States: the Core Army

Ilkhanid Mongols Versus Late Byzantines

In the saddle again: The Mongol Horde

Sea Peoples Campaign: The Finale

Sea Peoples Campaign Battle 2

Invasion of the Sea Peoples: Our New Campaign

Hittites versus Mycenaeans: Playtest of "King David" rules

More Qin Chariots

Work in Progress: Qin Chariot

Vikings blooded

The Vikings are coming!

War of the Roses Army: King Edward IV Command Base

War of the Roses: Casualty Figures

War of the Roses Campaign

Captain Tight Pants

Yorkist Banners and Standards

WOTR: Game 1

The Wars of the Roses

"Diorama" photography

Scale Creep

Carthaginian Spearmen

Balearic Slingers

Elephants, Camels, and Mules

Testing a Miniatures Bag

Terrain Building: Mycenaean Tholos Tomb

The Napnuts at Gamecon1

DBA Battle Reports: Mycenaeans vs Sea Peoples

Gamecon1

Gamecon1: Back from KL

You know you've been reading too many DBM army lists when ...

Getting Ready for Gamecon: Mycenaean DBA Army

Getting Ready for Gamecon: Polybian Romans

Getting Ready for Gamecon: The Nubians

Terracotta Zombies!

Getting Ready for Gamecon: The Numidians, and Basing Tips

Make-up for your tanks

Historicity in Wargames

Additions to the local wargaming blogosphere

yarrr ... Pirates ...

grrr ... internet explorer ... grrr ...

Creating snow on bases

Hasegawa Jagdpanzer IV

Winter Panzers

Flames of War

Game report: Gear Krieg (lite)

Flamethrower walker

More old posts

First Impressions

Gear Krieg Kit-bashing

Mighty Morphin' Armies

Essex Sea Peoples Figures

Making Miniatures Better

Mycenaean Chariot

Venexia Sea Peoples DBA Army

Unpainted Lead

Crusader Platoon

Carthaginian Spearmen

More Crusader Mk 3s

Kitbashed Valkurie