Tuesday 30 January 2018

Painting Update - uruk-Hai and Haldir

Hello All,

Time for another painting update! Bit of a smaller one this time, all these fellows are going to be in a game tomorrow, and my policy is that it is best to have the photo shoot before any action goes down, so there you go. Still working on the Lord of the Rings stuff, getting ready for Cangames. Shouldn't be a problem to have all the attackers and defenders done early but there are some other things to do as well so busy busy.

Haldir:


First up I have Mr. Haldir, really great model from the Heroes of Helms Deep set I got from Duncan (all the other heros are on the painting table now). He came out pretty good. As you can see I had a spare Helms Deep around so decided to take the pictures there.

Uruk-Hai:


Bunch more Uruk-Hai to kill pointy eared people (also humans no discrimination). 5 more guys with shields, 5 more with pikes, 2 berserkers and 4 more ladders. Saruman loves ladders....

This actually brings me up to an even 50 warriors for Isengard, plus all the heroes and the troll. But there is actually still like 30 more plus a balista, getting there! These guys are fast to paint so hoping to make it to 100% on the Isengard stuff I have in hand.

As I said not that much stuff, but not bad for a week.


Pledge Status, 2017:

Bought: 11 (Seige Ballista + some Warmaster stuff)
Painted: 40
Total: 29

Thanks;
Mike

Thursday 25 January 2018

Battle Report - The Deeping Wall

Hello Folks,

Time for another Wednesday wargaming battle report! This week we are doing the first Helmsdeep scenario from the Two Towers Journey Book. There are 4 or 5 of them. Anyway this one has the Uruk Hai trying to break into the deeping wall.

We done have any rohan guys on foot painted so Serge used wood elves, and built the terrain.

Also I included worm young for fun.

The forces of Isengard win by getting 10 models past the wall, the defenders have to kill half of the attackers to win.



Uruk-Hai lined up ready to attack. I only had 2 ladders painted so stuck with that. But the attacker is meant to start 24"back and thus us about 12 si let's say that cancels out.


Defenders on the wall.


The drummer sounds the advance and the Uruk-Hai surge forward. Just trading arrows shots at this point. I think we hot 1 kill each or there about. Legolas is off his game. But I have a bunch of crossbow guys and they are bound to kill a poncy  elf now and then.

The berserkers with brands to light the bombs settler behind the troll for safety.


Ladders up and bomb in place. But the Elves manage to bring down the first berserker so no boom.


Assault begins in earnest with guys climbing up and getting killed. 1 Uruk falls off the ladder to his death. Galadriel was able to I'm oblige the other berserker so again no boom.


Next turn after getting frustrated the Uruk-Hai resort to kicking the bomb. The third one gets it which vaporizes all three and brings down the wall. Meanwhile the crossbows have been doing a good job of clearing the southern ramparts.


Ugluk made it to the top and fought through niw he us fighting everyone. Looking back thus might gave been s time to reveal wormtounge, but he was busy bothering galadriel.


Sadly Ugluk died and there are problems pushing through the breach.


The drumber and berserker are giving a good try thou.


Sadly eventually half the Uruk-Hai die and the only person inside the walls is wormtounge. He us not quite 10 models so a win for the defender this time!

Next week into the breach. Tge woodleves he the gap but what can aragon do?

Thanks;
Mike

Tuesday 23 January 2018

Painting Update - Osgiliath, Elves, and Uruk-Hai!

Hello All,

Time for the first painting post of 2018! Been busy so I do have a bit of stuff to show. Mostly have been working on terrain, but a few other bits, and starting last weekend I had a mad rush of Uruk-Hai to get ready to seige the Deeping Wall (Helms Deep) tomorrow.

Sadly the app I was using to trim pictures and upload them to google photos is not working anymore. The new one still lets me upload, but is not giving the trimmed versions which is annoying but oh well.

Anyway here is the stuff I have to show:

Elrond and Gil-Galad:


Always best to start the year off with elves. If I am honest I got these guys just because I wanted Elrond, basically working on a White Council collection. But he comes with a pal so why not have a king as well right?

The Three Amigos:


Next on the list some Evil guys, here we have Lurta, Ugluk and Vrasku from left to right. Some special characters to lead the assault.

Troll:


A big bruiser is of course needed to beat up on the good guys. Ended up picking this kit up on Ebay and it shipped from Russia of all places, hopefully he is not a communist troll!

Ladders:


On to a pair of Evil Ladders! Best used to scale the deeping wall. Have lots more of these to do, but just got 2 painted for now.

Breachers:


If the walls prove to hard to climb, there is always the option of blowing them to bits. Here I have a pair of mines, and a bunch of Uruk-Hai with no special gear so they have a free hand to carry stuff. At this point half of them mines and half ladders! Have the torch guys done previously.

Osgiliath:


But the main thing I have been working on is getting terrain ready for an Osgiliath game I want to do at Cangames. My brother gave me the Ruined Hamlet set from Warlod for Christmas, so I painted that up. Huge fan of this kit it goes together and paints pretty fast and looks great. I got 2 big houses and 2 small ones which is nice. I put them on some wood tiles I from the art store for 79 cents, and used a couple of green stuff rollers to add some cobble stone and wood flooring effects on the base. They are meant to be old and half rotted away so the floors are not complete, just gives a bit of an idea. Also got a new mat in from Gamemat.eu as seen last week, so moving along well with this.

I have a couple of towers to do, including the dreadstone blight from GW, and ordered a second ruined hamlet and some other bits from warlord. Should be able to make a good showing.


Pledge Status, 2017:

Bought: 1 (An infinity guy)
Painted: 23
Total: 22

Thanks;
Mike

Friday 19 January 2018

Battle Report - Ill Met by Moonlight

Hello Folks,

Well Wednesday Wargaming is back in full spring, this week it is once again time gor some lord of the rings gaming. I decided to use some of the stuff I have been building up for Osgiliath,  still have lots more to do but I added on some other stuff to make a table.

This is they week for trying mounted troops so I have some Gondor guy plus some Riders of Rohan to fight some goblins aND Hunter Orcs. We dont have any separate dismounted models done yet really so no killing of mounts.

Scenario was as listed above, basically murder in the night. You get points for breaking the enemy killing leaders and killing all heroes. My leader is Boromir facing off against the Goblin King.


Starting set up. I put my mounted on the left, Gondor on the right with all the bows in the middle.


First of advancing a bit slowly. Kind of playing cat and mouse with the mounted. I wanted to set up a good line with terrain at the ends to be safe basically on either side of the boulders goin to either walls. Fight the horde of Goblins on my terms is the idea. Sadly the troll threw a rock at Boromir and did a wound!


Eventually the lines get closer. My bows got really lucky and killed 2 of the orcs and a goblin or 2! My Rohan guys started fighting the Goblins the scribe was calling into the back field. Doing pretty well with that as I was getting priority.


The lines press closer. I was able to set up my ideal formating with a nice line of spears anchored by the terrain, hopefully making it hard for the Goblins to make use of their numbers.


Next turn evil got the drop so hot the choose the engagements. This went pretty well for the with lots of riders getting eaten by orcs. But my line on the other side was holding well even against the king and troll!


The battle continued of course. At this point the orcs are cleanin up. Erkenbrand brand was brought down! But on the other side Boromir did very well and killed the troll in 1 turn! I brought in more of my guys and lots of goblins are going down.


Eventually the goblins and orcs star surrounding my lines but it is to late. On the same turn we both break and have to starting making courage tests. Luckily I loose priority that turn and the goblin king flubs his roll and runs away! That turned defeat into victory for me. Evil was winning due to the wound on Boromir but the fleering king counts as dead so I am up by 1 unless someone can kill all the heroes.


But with such low courage it's not long until the Goblins rout leaving me up by 1, 5 points to 4.

So one city is safe for now. Was a fun game, probably the closest we have done. More to come as we get stuff ready for cangames.

Well post better pictures of the new building in the next painting update.

Thanks;
Mike

Wednesday 17 January 2018

Battle Report - Double Feature! Walking Dead and Disposable Heroes

Hello All,

Have 2 reports for you today. Getting a bit behind on these I guess. First up is another zombie game, this past Sunday Duncan hosted me and Stan for a game at his place.


Walking Dead, Prison Troubles:





New set up of terrain for this one, instead of the usual mall we have a very cool prison setting. Basically the yard / entrance and some sells and what not.


I started out at the bottom with my hasslefree guys, Duncan  was way on the r8ght with Rick and Carl, Stan had some guys by the north entrance to the yard.


Start off just moving in fighting some zombies nothing serious. I have a few more visitors at this point but they knocked down a fence which was convineint.


Sadly I was not killing then that efficency and the were building up a bit over time.



Eventually I broke out a bit and got the fireman to the prison door but he is having a hard time getting in.


Also Stans guys start getting close which makes me uncomfortable, so I started shooting them a bit.


This escalates and makes things allot worse hah.



Things going sideways very fast, now we are fighting each other and zombies. The fireman finally got the door open but still has to fight zombies.


Carl and Rick having problems also, Rock is not having much luck with his assault rifle and they are stuck at the gate.




But just as Rick gets it open a bunch of them jump on Carl and gobble him up!





Not long afterm they get Rick!


But then we made our own problems as you can see! All our guys fighting here ended up as zombies! Maybe starting fights is not great.


In the end it was a clear win for the zombies. Only my leader escaped alive through the prison, and he had 0 supplies hah.

Disposable Heroes:

Last Wednesday I hosted a WW2 game with bad Duncan and Serge.  Germans and Russians battling it out to try a new game.




Terrain set up.


Germans advance towards the Russians trying to capture some points.


Shots fired! The Russians fire the first shot and cause some casualties.


After some mgs trading shots a Russian platoon deploys tp try and stop the Germans from taking ground.


But with 2 moves at the end the Russians are able to get the point!

I found the game was ok and has some interesting ideas. But there are a few points I don't like. Will have to g8ve it another shot at some point!


Thanks;
Mike