Battle Companies - Campaign Update

Initial deployments getting set-up

Last week we managed to have a general get together with all the surviving players of the Battle Companies Campaign and staged the last random scenario and Campaign Scenario III play-offs.

Still in the game are Andy W's Mordor Orcs, Andy K's Easterling's, Kenny's Easterling's, Leigh's Hobbits, Kev's Warg Riders, Dave K's Rivendell Elves, and my Arnor Company. We also had Alan standing in with some more Easterling's so the pair-offs were equal and everyone could get the games played.

The initial match ups were games paired up with similar (or as close as possible) Battle Company ratings with the Orcs vs the Warg Riders, Hobbits vs Easterling's, Arnor vs Easterling's and Elves vs Easterling's.

Three different random scenario's were played along with the Campaign Scenario III 'Bridge across the Mitheithel' Scenario being played by myself and Andy K's Easterling's.

This play through of the Campaign Scenario was pretty one sided as I was (only just) the lower warband rating so was the defender and in the first round as Andy's Easterlings approached the bridge my shooting was for the first time excellent and effective and took out one cataphract and putting the other on his feet and taking out a Easterling Warrior thus reducing the warband by almost 30%. Shortly followed by his only (hero type) archer.

Andy managed to reach the bridge and lining up with his surviving hero's and pike types behind pushed onto the bridge and with all in combat stopped the hail of arrows momentarily. Alas Andy's dice were appalling and after a short stalemate in combat another couple of his warriors dropped including his Captain and his warband broke leaving Arnor Victorious.

Elsewhere, the Elves routed Alan's Easterlings, the Hobbits got a bit of a trouncing from Kenny's Easterlings and the Wargs (counting as the 'good' force) beat up the Mordor Orcs.

The second round involved everyone moving one place left and playing the Campaign Scenario III against there new opponent with myself and Alan playing a random scenario.

So Andy's Mordor Orc's were now facing the might of the Hobbit's (but Andy had to rescue his leader having been lost in the previous encounter and Leigh also having to do the same), Andy K's reduced Easterling's (Andy having lost his Captain to death) were up against Kenny's Easterlings in a bit of a Civil War encounter and Kev's Warg horde facing the Dave's Elves defending the bridge crossing.

Hobbits close to the kill on the surviving Orcs

My game against Alans Easterling's, a 'Show of Strength' scenario was fairly short as my shooting seemed to be reasonable successful again and managing to take out all but three of the Easterlings to the loss of only one Ranger so pretty successful night all told for Arnor for a change.

The Warg's (having the best chance of any of the band's of successfully crossing the river) charged pell mell for the river and after a viscous fight on the banks managed to gain the crossing and getting a victory but only just by avoiding break point by one. (all after spotting a minor flaw in the scenario due to game length, which rule was promptly dropped in the best spirit of making things up to suit at the time, all in the greatest tradition, of course).

Andy's Easterling's managed to make the crossing against Kenny's company again in a hard fought melee.

And with the Orc's trying to gain the bridge and regain their Hero from the far side (and the Hobbits managing to regain theirs from the opposite side) sheer numbers (the only thing in the Hobbit Companies favour really) they managed to cut the Mordor Orc horde down to size and hold the crossing and getting the Campaign victory.

Another great round and most enjoyable. The results provided a 5/3 result to the side of 'Good' and a much needed boost to the good to the overall results now standing at 22/25 in Evils favour, so looking like Evil will have the advantage for the final assault on Arnor with only the penultimate game Scenario IV 'The Eye of the Needle' to go before the big punch up.

Wargames Symposium

A bit of a catch up post this time for the Wargame's Hobby Craft Symposium, organised and hosted by David Imrie over in Leven a couple of weeks ago. Held over a weekend with different activities on the Saturday and Sunday.

Put together to be a different sort of wargame's event with demonstrations and talk, painting clinic, painting competition, video conferencing and other modelling teach-ins and of course some gaming activities too.

I managed to attend on the Saturday and thoroughly enjoyed the mixed fayre on offer including chats with Thomas Foss who demonstrated his 'Broken Lances' jousting game, Matthew Bickley on sculpting tips and several bods on terrain making in general and MDF tarting up in particular.

WotR display game

Some of David Imrie's Claymore Castings

Sea Cadets Hall which event proceeds went to help

Food for the event was provided by the Sea Cadets staff and was easily some of the best fayre I've had at a wargames event, probably ever. The bacon rolls were worth the trip alone.

Some of the Painting Competition entries.

Thoroughly enjoyed the event and hats off to David and his helpers for putting on a different and thought provoking event. I look forward to hopefully attending next years get together.

Another view of the WotR display game

Carlist Wars display game

Killteam Trial - Tau vs Genestealers

Last week I managed to arrange a trial game of Killteam with Kev at t'Club. A matched play between my Tau and Kev's Genestealer Cult.

Just a quick set down with a smattering of terrain and had at it to run through the rules and get a flavour of the game.

The scenario was a simple enough affair with each of the teams looking to get off the opposite side of the board with as many of the troops as you could muster before breakpoint. Most off wins.

The two teams were pretty much opposites with the Tau shooty and the Genestealers choppy, so I had to shoot as many as possible before coming to blows, so Kev advanced as quickly as possible keeping to cover and I stayed put and shot lots hoping to break him before he got any of his team off the board.

Needless to say, this was only partially successful as the board was pretty small so the Genestealers managed to get into combat though not until round 4, but only after losing half their number to the Tau shooting. But once reached, my Tau went down pretty quickly in combat.

The game did go the full distance in rounds with Kev managing to get two off the board at the end and gained the victory.

The game was pretty simple to run through though we did get a couple of things wrong but enjoyable game all told and will be looking to get another couple of games under the belt to see if I can improve and get a handle on the nuances of the rules. Maybe organise a mini campaign to get a bit of flavour too.

Battle Companies Campaign Update

Elves advance on the Hobbits

Another round of catch-up games for the Battle Companies Campaign earlier this week with myself, Dave K, and Leigh taking part (with apologies from Andy K, who fell asleep on the couch after a long shift, but will catch up later this month) with us all getting two games in (mine not counting to campaign progress) with first up Dave K's Rivendell Elves against Leigh's Hobbitses in the 'Show of Strength' scenario with the Hobbits at a severe disadvantage.

The Hobbits tried to get as many shooting attacks in as possible before the Elves closed in to melee but this was only marginally effective before the crunch and a short fracas produced the expected result and the Hobbits broke when reaching 75% casualties.

After game results were productive with the Hobbits losses one of their number but gaining a couple re-enforcements and the Elves likewise gained another Rivendell Knight.

Hobbits and Arnorians converge on the Troll

Next up was the hero's of Arnor against the now multitudinous Hobbits in a round of 'Tame the Beast' where the two companies competed to slay a 'troll' who was wandering about.

This game was pretty brief with the Hobbits ganging up on the trolol first with volley firing taking a wound off the Troll and then mobbing it with all they had and successfully taking two wounds in the second round of combat to no casualties. The Hobbits lost a couple of casualties from shooting from the Arnor forces but in slaying the Troll won the game.

The Hobbits mob the Troll

Next up was a round of the Arnorian's versus the Rivendell Elves. This time the Scenario was 'Hold the Line' with the Arnorian's being the attackers.

The two Companies having pretty similar ratings with the Elves just getting the advantage it was going to be hard to get 33% of the Arnorian company off the opposite table edge intact with the numbers being very similar and four of my number hobbits which move at 4".

Anyway, the Arnorians advanced and exchanged fire generally having the advantage in the shooting but the Elven armour minimizing the effectiveness of this and the Elves closed to combat on the lreft flank and had the advantage in combat due to their higher fight values and again all armoured where half my number were rangers.

All in all the scenario went as expected and though 20% off the table edge was reasonable, eleven of the company were taken down so meaning it was impossible to get the 33% but the Arnorians did cause reasonable casualties in return but he victory went the Dave's Elves.

The campaign scores on the doors this time were 2 Good wins and one Evil win putting the campaign running total with the Evil side still ahead at 17/22.

More games over the coming month with a couple of catch up games and the third campaign scenerio 'Bridge over the Mitheithal' hopefully before the month end.

Vapnartak 2019

Last Sunday was the 2019 Varpartnak show in York and once again the FDWC put on a bus for all interested to take a jaunt down to the show and I managed to make it along this year.

The day started early with all picking up the bus at 5:00 am and after a leisurely trip arrived before the doors opened and made it inside fairly quickly to avoid the cold.

Early morning crossing the Pennines

A warm welcome was had at the door along with a free figure 'Bjorn the Berserker' as long as stocks lasted. 

The usual traders were present and a fair number of games on too but not many participation games which was a shame. The show was pretty busy from the start and became pretty warm and crushing around the middle of the day but this is to be expected so not an issue. There was always somewhere you could escape if you felt the need and plenty of area's for sitting if you wanted especially round the competition game area on the top floor.

There were a few games on of note but only the big pirate display really caught the eye but this appeared to be static. The Colonial game was anything but and produced much noise and merriment which was good to see.

There were several smaller games on the upper level area and a couple of these caught the eye but all pretty much game mat and bought terrain affairs which appear to be the norm nowadays. The bright day outside and large amount of glazing did make things difficult for photo's. I did like the Post-Apocalypse game particularly though.

The competition's seemed to be fairly well attended and a couple of the Infinity boards for the comp looked quite nice and interesting to play on.

Once everyone had done the rounds and spent all their pennies we all headed back to the bus for 3:00 and headed back up the road. Once again a good day oot but quite a long day, but nice to see York gaming again and no doubt will do it all again next year. Looking forward to the adventure already.

Medieval Tabletop Wargaming Day - Lion Rampant

Last weekend saw my first wargaming outing of the year in the form of attending a Medieval wargaming day organised by messrs David Imrie and Ian Beal over in Leven.

There were twelve participants in the first game if the day which was a six a-side barney using the Lion Rampant rules. The terrain and setting provided by David along with a good dollop of the troops with some of the others bringing along a goodly amount of re-enforcement's.

The battle was a grand affair and lasted slightly longer than planned but I think the Lancastrian's getting the advantage by the end the game overall.

The second game of the day was aa slay of three tag team games with everyone teaming up with their previous opponent against another tag team with a 25pt a piece force made up of troops you had available again using the Lion Rampant Rules.

This game played a bit quicker as was to be expected and my team mate and I fought to a defeat by a narrow margin.

Great day out and thanks to David and Ian for organising the day. Looking forward to the next one.

Battle Companies Campaign Update

Another small get together this week to keep the Battle Companies Campaign alive with four attendees; myself Andy W, Kev and Kenny mustering their Arnor, Mordor Orcs, Warg Riders and Easterlings respectively, playing a round robin bout, two games each with random generated scenarios.

First up for myself was a game against Kenny's Easterlings. Kenny's band was down a fair bit from my Arnor Company so went the defender in a 'Stand your Ground' scenario. This was pretty straight forward and I won the tussle but the Easterling two bows did significantly better than my eight and managed to take down half my Company before submitting to the higher numbers once combat was joined. No losses were incurred on either side but I ended up gaining an Arnor Warrior and have two hobbit archers sitting out the next game. Kenny managed to increase his band by two warriors.

My next game as we all moved round a chair was up against Kev's Warg Riders. His Company had a significant higher rating than mine so I started with six re-rolls and the same Influence points right off the bat. With two hobbit archers sitting out the game and Kev only having one scout type sitting out the game, things seemed a bit stacked against me in rating and in numbers. The scenario rolled was 'Recovery', with five counters in the middle, one the 'relic' searched for and each band starting at opposite ends and objective to find the relic and take it off the opposite side from deployment.

Deployment for Recovery Scenario

The Companies advanced and the Arnor forces managed an early kill to archery for a change as they advanced and reaching the line of counters first too due to Kev keeping as much to cover as possible as he advanced. The first counter approached proved to be the relic so all was down to the fight to follow.

Early game was a mixed affair with casualties on both sides and an early good round from Kev where his scout took down two of the Arnor force in one round and the Orc numbers looked to begin to tell.

Mid-late game Orc numbers telling

The Arnor force now seemed to pick up a step (mainly down to Kev's inability to get the wound rolls in) and the warriors carrying the relic took a fair bit to drop but they eventually did, but the Arnor Warriors, (including the Captain who managed to get his first kills of the campaign, and getting two to boot) managed to pick up the pace and the tide turned quite spectacularly and managed to turn the numbers round with the Arnor forces outnumbering the Orcs by a good margin at the end.

Kev went for the objective though and leaving a couple to slow down the Arnor troops managed to get two orcs on the relic and managed a free move towards the base line with only his captain intervening. Last round and the Orcs got he initiative and the win but with only three orcs alive and narrowly loosing his captain too.

Great game with big loses on both sides but I was happy with the way my band stood up to uneven odds at the beginning and nearly pulling out the win but Kev's tactics at the end getting the well deserved win.

The other two games of Kev's Warg Riders versus Andy's Mordor Orcs was a hard fought game too with Kev just managing a win in a 'Show of Strength' scenario, and Kenny's Easterlings against Andy's Orcs which though quite one sided ended up with the Easterlings getting a whopping 13 Influence points and a much needed injection to the Company.

The scores on the doors of three Evil wins and 1 Good win were added to the running total and the Evil side moves further ahead to 15/21.

Next up more random scenarios for the other four players and the next Campaign Scenario; 'Bridge over the Mitheithel'.