This weekend saw a game with a difference, myself and JTM decided to try something with a bit more bite than our usual Mordheim skirmish game but decided to make it 'bigger' by having each side 3 warbands instead of just one. Not a free for all but sides - 'good vs bad', make your own mind up who is who!
So, we decided that each side should be made up of any warbands but not obviously impossible allies, (like witch hunters allied with Chaos Carnival etc etc). Each side could have one warband of up to 300pts rating, one of up to 200pts and one of up to 100pts rating. After our choosing process, mine being fairly easy, JTMs' being a bit more difficult we settled on, in rating order;
The Good Guys - Protectorate of Sigmar, Witch Hunters, and Kislevites
The Bad Guys - Black Orcs, Beastmen and Bandits (Good alliteration there!).
A 6' x 4' table was set up with fairly even terrain with just a couple more difficult areas and then the warbands were each determined to have a random entry point (entry points being each 2' around the table) and a random order of moving. JTMs' deployment was a bit scattered with his Black Orcs starting beside my Protectorate, his Beastmen out on their own in the middle of one side of the table, and his Bandits between my Kislevites and Witch Hunters (who were beside my Protectorate).
The game kicked off with the Protectorate and the Black Orcs rushing towards each other and locking each other in combat pretty quickly with the superior number s of the Protectorate quickly gaining the upper hand with the Witch Hunters giving support while heading off the Beatmen preventing them from lending a hand to their allies.
The Bandits, being the lightest of the bad guys thought that discretion was the better part of valour and headed away from the fray and attempted to intercept the Kislevites who were down the other end of the table.
The Kislevites advanced warily towards the Bandits who also moved cautiously with a mutually ineffective exchange of fire. Mean while the Black Orcs were getting butchered by the righteous might of the Protectorate and their Witch Hunter brethren and the Beastmen finally got into combat against a wall of steel presented by the Witch Hunter heavies, who kept their flanks secure and stopped the Beastmen numbers getting in.
Soon the Black Orcs were cut down to an orc, bellowing defiance to the last (they made their break test saves convincingly, and the Beastmen decided that they were on to the same and decided that they had some very important business else where. The Bandits also faired badly when the Kislevites charged in and cut down four of their number in one round. At this point we called it a night with two of the Black Orcs surrounded by about fifteen or so, the Beastmen in full retreat and the Bandits looking bloodied all for ... not a sigle casualty on the Good Guys side.
Interesting game but with JTMs dice throwing being pretty abysmal, lots of hits but almost no wounds it was a pretty one sided affair with the Bad Guys lack of fire power being noticeable and an unlucky deployment adding to tip the balance.
Next time I think a more their side and our side deployment, or at least a bit more choice would be more interesting. At least this time the villagers can sleep safe in their beds, but next time it might not be so simple....
At tonights club night I had a game of Urban War futuristic skirmish game with fellow club members Kev, and Dave K. (Dave ably assisting myself with a bit of suppressing fire on the right flank).
Kev supplied all the troops and most of the terrain too. This was a pity, as Kevs' luck with the dice was abysmal for the whole game failing to wound even once and my dice rolling was above average, so the result was a bit one sided to say the least. Sorry Kev.
I do like the Urban War system with it's order chits indicating the basic 'stance' of each figure which simply translates to a pretty fluid game even when the rules are fairly new, ie to the likes of me has only had a handful of games. (sorry again Kev. It must have been beginners luck ;-) ).
I think a contibuting factor to the result was also the troops. Kev playing the Junkers faction (basically close combat specialist slave soldiers and beasties, and mine were the VASA (the UN in space) who are more tradition marine types with some jump troops, more shooty. The mix seemed unbalanced with the lack of fire power for the Junkers not made up for with the mediocre advantage in combat.
Still, an enjoyable game, for me and Dave at least.
Just finished painting a Mordheim Ogre which I picked up on ebay earlier this year. The model is the OOP GW figure which was a joy to paint, lots of detail to pick out the shape, and good movement in the figure.
Painted pretty quickly for me. Generally pleased with the result though the base was a bit hurried but still acceptable.
The base itself is a Gale Force 9 magnetic base. I quite like these bases and use them particularly for plastic figures as they lend a bit of weight to the models making them less prone to falling over.
I've just come across the online magazine 'Irregular'.
Something I had previously seen, but not really picked up on it. Current issue 6 has the usual mix of Sci-Fi and Fantasy articles with lots of GW stuff, but a healthy dose of other manufacturers too.
The mag also sports a good selection of historical, modelling, painting and review/convention articles which make this mag a step above the rest. And interestingly, and not a little refreshing but no advertising, just articles.
Definately worth checking out on http://irregularmagazine.com/
Finally got the Resources section of ALBAtwo up and running with a copy of a very good article from Bob Black from back in 1986 from Military Modelling magazine.
The article deals with the forgotten Jan Jiskra, a contemporary with Jan Hunyadi and Mattias Corvinus etc from 15th Century Hungary. The Article comes complete with three plates (the above pic being the first of the three) of Hungarian Troops of the period by Richard Judson (More folically challenged readers, like myself, will recognise his works from the likes of WRGs Ian Heath books etc). The Gallery has downloads of good resolution scans of the figure plates for those interested.
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/albatwo2/resources.html for the article
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/albatwo2/hungariangallery.html for the Hungarian Gallery
Recommended reading for those interested in Eastern Medieval history, and the plates are nice. Bobs writing on this kind of subject, including the Lance and Longbows publication on John Hunyadi are excellently researched and among the few publications on the subject in English.
Just had another recent game of Crusader using my Berbers, with club member Dave K on our Club night this week.
Ended in another victory for the Berbers but not without some close moments. Really like the Crusader Rules and have always enjoyed the games I have played using these rules. As with most fast play rules, there are always situations where the rules appear silly or annoyingly won't let you do what you want to do but all in all a recommended set for anyone playing Ancient/Dark Age/Medieval games.
The picture above is of our Crusader game at the end of August, a narrow victory to the Berbers but only because of running out of time on the club night.
