Carronade '14

Yesterday was the FDWC annual show Carronade 14 and once again, a busy and successful day was had by all.

With an increase in the number of Traders and Clubs putting on games and an increase in the number of bodies through the door, Flea Market Traders and Painting Competition entries, everything was on the up, which is nice.

I think the Traders and games is now at the maximum the venue could reasonably hold so it's going to hard to beat this years show in terms of the quantities on offer.

Not sure if the weather helped or hindered as it was yuch in the morning but brightened up in the afternoon, so likely a bit of both.

The games on offer this year were generally very good with a couple standing out for me; Kirriemuir's 'Alexander vs the Thracians', Durham's 54mm 'D'Erlion's attack at Waterloo in 54mm' was quite spectacular, The Old Comtempibles 'Gleaning Katana's' and Dumfries' 'Tajima at the Bridge' were both excellent oriental games and the League of Augsburg was the usual eye candy and Border Reivers 'The Battle of Trafalgar Square' were all excellent games but there were a lot of games I liked and good to see more than half the games were public participation too.

Didn't get a chance to see the whole venue's games missing out on the upstair's games totally and indeed didn't get a chance to go round the trader's at all with being tied up with the painting competition and otherwise catching up with people you only see at the shows, but no complaint's at all. Good day all round.

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The Painting Competition was as I said up in the number of entries from last year, which was good to see with a very good standard in the entries. A bit disappointed in that the number of Junior entries was down significantly as was the Single Historical category, but otherwise up everywhere else.

Congrats to all the winners and runner's up in the categories and to Christopher Miller who picked up the Best of Show as well as the Single Fantasy category as well.

Junior - 1st Jonathan Miller  - Cultist
2nd Ryan Herd - Herald of Nurgle

Fighting Vehicle - 1st Andy Kirkwood - KV-1
2nd Mark McNaught - Khador Battlewagon 

Single Historical - 1st David Marshall - WW1 German Sniper
2nd Bill Ferguson - 101st Bar Gunner

Historical Unit - 1st David Jarvis - Frederick the Great & Generals
2nd - Stewart Ramsay - 1st Louisiana Special Btn Wheats Tiger's

Single Fantasy - 1st Christopher Miller - Infinity Uxia (Best of Show)
2nd Caroline Watson - Nurgle Champion

Fantasy Unit - 1st Christopher Miller (again :-) ) - Nomads
2nd Paul Laurie - Everblight Warspears

FDWC Open - 1st Marco Grillanda - Scratch Built Colonial House
2nd John Martin - Dragon

Hope everyone attending had a good day, I certainly did, and I'm looking forward to the next one already (though not the table moving). A well done to everyone at the club who organised another great day.

Assault Trooper Trial Figure

Just finished off this trial conversion of an assault trooper. The plan is to do a small unit of twelve of these chaps for my on going Lornian Campaign.

The figure is a conversion of one of the Perry's designed GW Dogs of War range Republican Guard with a Bretonnian Men at Arms plastic head swap, hand and hammer from the Empire Knights and the pavaise is from the Perry's own Orleans range.

All the bit's fitted together quite nicely and the simple paint job brings it all together. Overall quite pleased with the result and it turned out pretty much as I originally imagined the idea. Not a hundred percent happy with the shield design but that can be tidied up and remedied with the rest of the unit, now that I know the idea works.

If you want to know a wee bit more about the background fluff behind the unit you can check it out on the Lornian Chronicles blog.

I'll start on the rest of the unit now and hopefully post the final results realively soon.

Mordheim Season 2 - The Egondorf Exit

Being the eighth episode of the ten episode season 2, things are hotting up with the bands getting quite experienced and the latest game proved to be the longest, hardest fought game so far.

With the hunt for the Necromancer Allek getting closer, the bands close in on one of the Necromancers minions, running him to ground in the ruined village of Egondorf where the mage is raising undead from the dead among the ruins. Holed up in the shattered remains of the great hall in the village the bands surround the junior necromancer and try and take him out to finally get the intel on the hide out of his master Allek.

The scenario is one of general mayhem with the only hook being that the mage and his skeleton bodyguards will make a break for it in a random direction from the second turn on a roll of 6 on that turn, on a 5 the following and so on. The band winning the game gets the intel first and gets it's choice of deployment in the following game.

The usual bands were in for the kill, Andy's Sisters, Kev's Beastmen, Dave's Marienburger's Ian's Reiklander's and my slightly depleated Kislevite's were all present for the mayhem to follow.

With the usual random deployment, it was clockwise Beastmen, Reiklanders, Sisters, Marienburger's and Kislevite's. Pretty much the same set up as the last engagement only with the Sister's and Reiklander's swapped.

The Beastmen started things up and the first move saw little effect with everyone eyeing up each other and seeing who was going to go where. Only the Sister's commited early going straight towards the Necromancer and his minions.

The Beastmen move furtively towards the Kislevite's

The Beastmen shuffled about a bit but slightly towards the Kislevite's, the Reiklander's generally took cover but moving forward, the Reiklander's doing the same. The Kislevite's also took cover with their depleted number's and two hero's down but did try a couple of early shot's at the anyone they could see but to no effect.

The stalwart Kislevite's take cover

The inactivity didn't last long as it never does, and with the Beastmen's Centigor failing it's stupidity and charging the nearest enemy (the Kislevite's), theBeastmen were committed and Kev duly moved purposefully towards the Oblast's finest.

The Centigor charged in but failed to take out the Kilevite Merc Ogre.

The Kislevite's fired into the advancing herd and interestingly managed to take out two of the mass surging towards them.

The Beastmen pounce

The Reiklander's position further but Ian is playing thing's very cagey, and watching what transpire's eslewhere and is playing the waiting game on this one.

The Sister's move in but on the first run in, fail most of their fear test's and only a couple of gals go in but they manage to do a bit of damage to a couple of the skeleton bodyguard's anyway.

The Sister's move in for the kill on the Necromancer Jr

The Marienburger's spread out and move toward's the Sister's keeping to cover and generally keeping out of site as they move from cover to cover.

The Necromancer then chose to make a break for it, striaght towards the Kislevite's, who were now not really very happy.

After a brief and bloody engagement,
the Kislevite's have only two standing

The Beastmen now charge into the Kislevite's en-masse and although a brief struggle ensue's the Kislevite's go down hardly having time to swing an axe. Kev even managing to get two spells off in one turn (more than he has managed in the rest of the campaign in total.

The last remaining two Kislevite's although I'd have liked to do a last daring charge into the horde and possibly cause a casualty (and force a morale check) my own morale failed (un-surprisingly really) and the Kislevite's were toast. Hardly causing a speed bump.

One down, who's to follow?

While this was going on, the Sister's manfully strode forward and in the space of a round or two managed to swamp the Jr Necromancer and his skeleton guards in pretty short order though they did lose a casualty in the process, but caught the mage before he could escape his hideout. As they moved into the Necromancer they also took a side step toward's the Marienburger's who were now getting pretty close.

The Sister's and The Marienburger's move into the contact

This now proved the next event as the Marienburger's  jumped in and very bloody melee ensued around the hideout as the Sister's tried to get as many in as possible but were slightly more spread out after dealing with the last skeleton earlier.

The Beastmen paused in their advance after taking out the Kislevite's and re-shuffled slightly and then began to move slowly towards the Marienburger/Sister fight.

The Reiklander's still hadn't committed yet but had taken up position toward's the centre of the table.

The Reiklander's begin to position themselves

The Sisters/Marienburger melee continues

The melee with the Sister's and the Marienburger's continued for a couple of rounds with both side's taking casualties but in the end after a bad round with the greater part of the Sister's going down, their morale broke and the Sister's fled the field. Two down.

The Beastmen enjoy a brief snack (Kislevite's) among the ruins

The Reiklander move forward

With the Sister's leaving the field the remaining three bands were left fairly evenly spaced around the table. The Marienburger's began moving toward's the Reiklander's, the Reiklander's moved into cover behind a couple of the larger building's and the Beastmen began circling round towards the Marienburger's also keeping to cover. All of which meant that the three band's were all moving clockwise round the table in a merry-go-round kind of way. 

The Merry-go-round begins

This state of play lasted only for a round or two because of the distance's to travel.

The merry-go-round continues

The stalemate only lasted for a short while as the Reiklandr's stood their ground pretty quickly and the Marienburger's moved into contact. A few shots were exchanged as they moved in but the unscathed Reiklander's were obviously the stronger here so Dave tried to move his band into the high ground and occupy the large town market where the Reiklander's would have to come up the stair's to get him or else trade shot's where the Marienburger's would have the advantage of the cover shooting from window's.

The Reiklander's quickly pounced to prevent this and with a short engagement took out a couple of the Marienburger's as they struggled to get into the building. This took the Marienburger's loses into the dangerous zone and Dave took the voluntary rout to limit the damage to his band. Three down.

The Marienburger's try to take cover

The Beastmen now took the direct route and moved straight through the centre of the ruins and the Necromancers hide out towards the victorious Reiklander's.

The Beastmen move through the ruins to make
the decisive move

The Reiklander's moved forward and re-formed on the other side of the market building and prepared to meet the Beastmen.

Crunch time

The Beastmen, keeping together moved in for the kill but in keeping cohesion meant giving the initiative to the Reiklander's as they emerged from the ruined hideout but Ian's gambled on a round of shooting to force a rout test on the Beastmen (who only needed one casualty to have to test) rather than risking the charge and getting the chop in first.

The Reiklander's stand back and try to shoot before the melee
but the Beastmen charge is decisive

Unfortunately for the Reiklander's, the Beastmen's toughness was more than a match for their shooting and the Beastmen charge went in instead with a couple of the Reiklander's going down to the inevitable.

Ian having already had a lot of bad luck with casualties this campaign decided to cut his loses and made it off the table with his band (if not his honour) largely intact which left the Beastmen the victor's once again. They get the victory, the small treasure the Necromancer was carrying but more impotantly get the where about's of the Great Bad One and get to choose their deployment in the penultimate game, the assault on Allek's stronghold.

Another stonker of a game with lot's of back and forth-ness and the first game of Mordheim where we nearly ran out of time. Pretty good for a skirmish game all in all.

Next time, things start to get really serious.

Abbey Project Update

It's been a while, but I've finished off another (pretty small piece) of my Abbey Terrain Project, namely the Walled Garden wall which is the second last piece for the west range.

I won't tell you how long it's taken me to get around to getting them painted.

A couple of other bit's that have been looking to get finished off which I've finally gotten around to do were a couple of generic hills, which should be useful anyway.

Mordheim Season 2 - The Hanging Tree

Being the seventh exciting installment in our ongoing Mordheim Campaign and the crowd were as usual waiting with baited breath for the outcome.

The usual suspects were all out for the event with Kev's Beastmen, Dave's Marienburger's, Andy's Sisters, Ian's Reiklander's and my Kislevite's all out for a stroll in the sunny Talabec Border Country in search of 'The Hanging Tree'. A huge gnarled oak where-in is imprisoned the spirit of an old and evil necromancer, with it's branches festooned with the remains of past victims of it's malevolent spirit. The reason the bands are searching for this evilness is that there is a Mace of Undead slaying rumoured to be among the roots at the trees' base dropped from a past hero.

The clearing round the Hanging Tree will randomly raise 1-3 zombies at one of six points around the clearing at the end of every complete turn on a roll of 5+ on a D6 once anyone enters the vicinity of the tree.

Once again the bands were deployed at random with the Sister's close to the Beastmen, the Kislevite's next on the right of the Beastie Boys and then the Reiklanders a little away followed by the Marienburgers in the opposite corner from the Beastmen.

This led to an immediate pairing up of the Reiklanders vs the Marienburger's and as Kev's Beastmen were pretty much stuck between the Sister's and Kislevite's decided to make a dash for one (deciding to go for the Sister's first) so as not to get caught between the two.

The Beastie's charge through the woods towards the Sister's

The Kislevite's then started to move towards the the Beastmen in the hope that the Sister's would soften them up a bit before the crunch.

Kislevite's move out

The Reikland and Marienburg Mercs moved towards each other and a bit of sniping ensued as they approached with little effect both jockeying for position as they did.

The Reiklander's and Marienburger advance
 towards each other through the woods

In a very short order, the Beastmen rushed the Sister's and in what seemed the blink of an eye the Beastmen felled a number of the Venerable One's and Andy promptly failed his rout test on his next turn. Hardly able to swing a hammer in anger much to his chagrin, and an early bath ensued. While the Kislevite's continued to advance on the Beastmen extending their line and staggering it to hopefully blunt the coming unabashed storm.

The Beastmen hit the Sister's with an audible thwack

The battle on the other side of the clearing lasted a bit longer with the two Merc bands trading blow for blow in the woods but the Marienburger's coming out the worse for it and Dave deciding pretty early on to cut his losses and making the rout.

The Reiklander's and Marienburger's meet in a vicious scrum

With the Beastmen clear of the Sister's, they turned and rushed towards the advancing Kislevite's. Losing one dog to the usual paltry support fire from the Kislevite's, the almost unscathed Beastie's hit the front of the Kislevite line (in the form of the Merc Ogre and the Esaul) which had advanced ahead of the rest to hopefully break up the band a bit.

The Kislevite's extended line breaks up the Beastman charge

The barney was a great ding dong affair with the two bands trading blows and in the end with loses equal Kev was first to have to check for the rout and fail where I managed to hold but just.

With my numbers depleted I decided on the better part of valour and made a voluntary rout leaving the field to Ian's Reiklanders.

It was of course at this point where the tree managed a token defense and threw up 3 zombies right at the end where the Reiklander's made pretty short work of having no other distraction's at this point.

The Reiklander's deal with the Tree's token defense for the win.

And with the zombie's dispatched Ian got another victory under his belt and a tasty weapon to boot.

The post game round up threw up a couple of interesting results with the Beastman leader getting to fight in the pits (again) and loses all his equipment, the Kislevite Captain was slain with this being a pretty disastrous result for my band at this point in the campaign and losing the spell book too adds to that misery. The other bands didn't get too much of a mauling but Dave's luck with the after game rolls has been pretty dire up till now.

Another enjoyable outing for the bands and the campaign now enters it's final phase as they close on Allek and his minions.