Painting - Greeks

Hello All,

So I have had a chance to get a bunch more Greeks painted up. I still have an alternate warlord to finish, and maybe a bit more stuff but maybe not. Anyway here is a look at the stuff I have got completed in the last couple of weeks.

First up is a second unit of hearthguard. This time one of them has a horn because I thought it seemed cool. Also I switched to painting their shirts red and decided that it looks better that way. Some of the decals are a bit messed up on these guys, it is hard to get them to lie perfectly flat on the doomed surface. But I started to put more effort into them after this being more careful pressing them down and using some softener to try and melt them down.

I also finished up a second unit of warriors with spears. This time in more of a stabbing people pose. I am quite fond of the ship decal!

And I thought I would take a quick group shot as well since technically this is everything I need for a full army in our campaign. This was a last minuet idea so I didn't bother to take them off the box and set them up. At this point I have roughly half of the Victrix box of hoplites done, there is quite allot of guys in there! But I am kind of in a groove of painting these guys so I am tempted to keep going. I think this would make a good candidate for a game with the GW Lord of the Rings rules, and could be fun to get some mythlogical monsters as well. But I have other stuff to work on as well so we shall see.

Pledge Status 2016:
Bought: 199
Painted: 236 
Total: +37

Thanks;
Mike

Battle Report - Saga Trojan Campaign - Game 4

So had another Wednesday war gaming, this time continuing on with the Trojan War campaign. Might as well squeeze in as many games as possible since we went through the trouble of painting all these armies!

Agamemnon is at 36 renown to start which means it is time to end the story. I decided to go for the blood option instead of retirement. So I need my Warlord to die heroically in the mission or else my epic is not written down, if I do I get to start over at 11 Renown.

We rolled for a mission and ended up with Darn Attack from Crescent and Cross, which turned out to be pretty interesting actually.

I had 1 hearthguard sitting out the battle injured, and I think Paris had 2 warriors out.

So we sent up the terrain using the system in Crescent and Cross and got going. This scenario has the units hidden under tokens until you reveal them or they get revealed which is interesting. I had my warlord and a big unit of warriros on the right by the houses, and hearthguard a big unit of of warriros with javelins, and a small unit of javelins on the left. My plan was to get some action with my warlord and his unit, and keep everyone else out of the fight to prevent the Trojans from getting vps or renown from killing units!

Then I revealed my units and moved up to reveal the 3 Trojan counters. I had my dice set for a big attack but I messed up as was short an activation, so I just tossed some javelins and killed a chariot guy. The Trojans of course attacked on their turn anyway so no big deal. First the chariots and Paris charged in. I used a Saga ability to kill 3 guys and get a bunch of extra attacks, and another to re-roll missed hits. I decided to throw 3 attack dice again Paris, and got extremely lucky. all 3 charioteers died, and I got 2 hits on Paris without any 1s and he failed both causing him to die as well! Of to a good start. Allot of my warriors were dead but that is ok.

Next the big unit of 8 hearthguard charged Agamemnon. I had set up Hercules so again I got double dice and reroll misses. This resulted in 4 dead hearthguard, and also a dead Agamemnon. So mission accomplished.

The angry Trojans then cleaned up the last few warriors.

That great bit of luck put me ahead on points I think so I decided to fall back with my units. The Trojans were moving in close so I decided to send my smaller unit of bow warriors, hoping to trade units basically.

I did the usual method of sacrificing guys for extra attacks and re-rolling hits, but annoyingly the Trojans passed allot of defense rolls and most of my guys died. This meant I would have to play the game again crap.

So I made a pretty basic attack with the hearthguard and got some decent luck again and killed all but 2 of those warriors. At this point both sides had very few Saga dice left so that was pretty much the end, but it was basically the last turn anyway.

In the final tally for victory points I ended up ahead by 2 I think it was 21-19. You need to win by 3 for a victory in this scenario so we had a draw. They way the points work is every unit is worth 4 points and warlords are worth 3, special warlords like we have are worth 7! Considering that my warlord had to die the only way for me to have a chance was to also kill Paris, and it was really dumb luck that he died I didn't expect that or realize how much it mattered until after.

Campaign wise Agamemnon has died heroically and had his epic written down, so I get to start a new warband at 11 renown for the next campaign day. I think I will go with his brother Menelaus since Agamenons son was very young apparently but not sure. Paris gained 4 renown and is now at 34, so 2 away from being able to complete an epic.


Thanks;
Mike

Battle Report - Trojan War Campaign - Game 3

So we had the second day of our Trojan war campaign last Friday, only got to fit in one game due to the crappiness of the Friday slot which I wasn't very happy about. But anyway here is a breif report on that game!

Unfortunately I was a bit late remembering to take pictures. I was set to play against Serge so we had a great battle between Paris and Agememnon. We ended up playing the Escalation scenario which is one of the campaign ones. Basically you start off with 3 point of units on the table and the rest are in reserve and you can roll to see if you get a unit at the end of your turn. We also had some interference from the Gods as Zeus was occasionally raining down lightning bolts. They affected both sides evenly so I suppose it was just an off day for him. The goal of this mission is to kill the other guys Warlord, or at least kill more of his guys.

For my 3 points I went with 2 units of 12 Warriors with commanders as per my hero special powers, and Paris had a big unit of 12 Hearthguard.

The Trojans brought up that big unit of Hearthguard to fight me very early, using a divine intervention to have to fatigue. But I used my own divine intervention to re-roll missed hits and did some good damage and only lots half a unit.

On my turn I counter charged with my unit of Javelin guys and more or less traded them for the rest of those Hearthguard. We both had gotten most of our reserves now so was time for a second round of fighting.

In this picture you can see my remaining units, 6 hearthguard and 6 warriors, I also had a small unit of 4 warriors I put way over on the right side where they wouldn't die. Thinking small units are vulnerable and not that useful.

The Trojans got a small unit of warriors in from reserve, so they now had 1 of 4 1 of 12 and 12 levy. I sent up my 6 warriors to charge hoping I could kill the 4 warriors and get a fatigue on the big warriors. But annoyingly one survived the onslaught.

Of course my 6 were quickly dispatched by the 12, that is only numbers. So next turn I sent in the hearthguard against that big unit of warriors. Again they killed all but one! Gah and the remaining couple I had were killed by Paris.

At this point we both had our warlords left, and I had 4 warriors and the Trojans had 2 warriors and 12 levy. I figured we must be very close on points so better get a few more. Experience tells me it's not a super great idea to fight Paris. So Agamemnon decided it was time to beat up on some peasants. I figured this was the least risk to him killed since they have so few attacks. So I moved up threw some javelins using a saga ability and then made a good charge in. This got rid of about half of them. Netting me 2 points.

At the finally tally it was 21 Points for the Greeks, and 20 points for the Trojans so I was up by 1! The mission didn't have clear victory conditions so this was considered to be a minor victory. Although really it should have been a draw probably.

With all the renown gained Agamemnon is now at 36. So I can either retire and drink wine, or die a heroic death in the next game and become a legend. So we all now how that is going.

Thanks;
Mike

Painting - Greeks and By Fire and Sword

So time for another painting update I guess. No battle report this week as Serge wasn't able to make it and I was to lazy to try and find a replacement! But I have been pretty busy painting away so no matter.

Greek Warlord, AKA Agememnon:

This is a metal guy from Warlord, I decided that I needed someone that looked a bit more different from the plastic ones, which don't really have that many options to customize. So there we go now have a commander.

Greek Warriors:

I also got a unit of Greek Warriors done to re-enforce things. Only one unit away from what is needed for the campaign now hah. These Victrix are starting to gow on me a bit I must admit. It is really the big round shields and LBMS transfers that make them look cool. Also the more of them you get together the better they look. I think this is because they are intended for ranked up armies not as individuals.

Due to the curvature at edge of the shields it is really hard to keep the transfers neat and flat to the shields. I don't really have an answer for that, but they look fine from a distance.

Imperial Pikemen:

In addition to the Pikemen I also got a few bases done for me By Fire and Sword Holy Romans. Working on the out opst defense force now which is a defensive skirmish force with mostly musketeers, but also pikemen. So here are these guys, they look quite nice with all the pikes when you get them together.

Imperial Musketeers:

Also completed a few bases of guys with guns.

This is coming from the Imperial Infantry Regiment box, so that is all of the Pikemen, and I think a quarter of the infantry with guns. This will give me access to pretty much the full Skirmish force, minus a couple of regimental guns which I have to get.


So there is where I am at with painting this week be sure to let me know what you think. We have another campaign day at the club for the Trojan war this evening so should be some battle reports over the weekend.

Pledge Status 2016:
Bought: 199 (Greek Commanders, and more Greek archers (accidental purchase, Opps!))
Painted: 224 
Total: +18

Thanks;
Mike

Battle Report - By Fire and Sword

So after many years I have finally gotten around to trying out a game of By Fire and Sword. I was a backer of the first kickstarter which funded way back in 2013. Various other projects kept causing me to delay painting for various reasons, but I also backed the second kickstarter. I think last year I gave away a couple of the Skirmish sets I got hoping to get others to paint them and get me some opponents. I painted my Holy Roman Empire set hoping to get a game for Cold Wars which didn't work out, but now Serge has finished painting his Polish skirmish set so time for a game!

The Holy Roman skirmish set has 8 bases of cuirassier 2 of dragoons and a commander, and I did a second commander to bring it close to the polish force which is more points. The Polish force has 3 bases of Pancerni, 4 of Cossack style cavalry, and 3 of Wallachian cavalry. Pancerni being the best hitting unit, and Wallachian being light scout cavalary.

We played the patrol scenario so the objective is to recon the hill bridge and town and kill some bad guys.

To start things I decided to split my force, I think this was a decent idea but should have split it more to put pressure on the Poles single commander. I put the armored cuirassier on the left of the river with my major, and had the other unit and the dragoons along with the colonel on the right. The poles had the scout cav and some Cossacks on the left and the good guys on the right. The Poles had a reconnaissance advantage of 5, and choose to use that to find a prisoner to explain all my pans to them. This meant I started with no orders and had to put them face up for turn 1. The poles likewise had some problems with their Cossacks one unit was robbers and also insubordinate so they also lost their order. Finally I had to roll for desertion as my guys consider this Polish campaign to be a shit show and I lost one point from each unit.

So here we are deployed and ready to go I got some order dials from Jeff to use as command points. My plan is to send the Dragoons into the town, and charge in with my guys left of the river. I am not confident to fight the Pancerni as I am not confident of victory, but not much choice. The Poles cavalry is all ellite which means that they can stay in open order and only close ranks during a charge. My guys have better military drill and can shoot pistols which charging but have to stay ranked up. Anyways turn one we just move up.

I got my guys into the village, and tried to hold back with my cavalary, but the Poles are coming in whether I like it or not.

It ended up that the Pancerni broke my cuirassier pretty handily, and the cossack style cavalary charged into the village through a hail of ineffective gun fire and crushed my infantry. But on the hill I had a decent time against the cossacks getting a draw but loosing a base.

We played a few more turns but I didn't get more pictures. The rest of my guys to the right of the river got chased off or killed, including the colonel. But I forces the cossacks to flee and withstood a rear charge from the light cavalry.

In the end it was a strategic victory for the Poles. I quite enjoyed the game thou and hopefully will get to try it again soon. Personally I like this game especially the skirmish scale of it. Is a little bit easier to figure out then Field of Glory Ren and is easier to get an army for. What we have here is on the small side for skirmish forces, so I think it would be better with a bit bigger armies say double this on the high side for skirmish forces so one charge won't decide things.

I am working on some Holy Roman foot now so maybe will give that a try next time. We have a pike and shoot club day coming up in August after all!

Thanks;
Mike

Battle Report - Saga Trojan Campaign

So this past Sunday we got started on the Trojan Saga campaign. Basically you have to win games to get more renown to try and become a great hero. You get different bonuses for having more renown points as things go on. My hero is Agamemnon (using the Athelstan characteristics)  , but the hero powers weren't in play for the first game.

Game 1: Vs Jeff (Aeneas)

We rolled for a mission using the campaign table and got Clash of Warlords, we played a 4 point game as that is how many points Jeff had. Since we are not using the hero powers my warriors javelins and bows don't count so they are just normal guys.

Here we are just after deployment, I went for 3 units of warriors and 1 of Hearthguard, with my hero in the middle behind the woods. The Trojans had 2 points of warriors and 2 of Hearthguard with the hero by the river. My plan is to advance to my left around the woods and kill off his troops to expose the Warlord and then kill him.

Well it seems like something bad happened here, but I can't remember what. My unit is down to only 1 warrior thou, and it looks like only one Trojan is missing, so that is not good! Seems that I am a bit fuzzy on this game.

After this the Trojan moved around to reorganize a bit to attack, but ended up leaving a warlord outside of the 2" bubble where he could have people take wounds for him. So I decided to make an all out attack with some warriors and got the perfect Saga dice to do that. I moved them up twice to attack and was able to get rid of the fatigue with an ability, plus re-roll my attacks, and sacrifice 2 guys to double my attacks! This ended up with a dead Warlord so the scenario was a victory for me.

After a good loot roll I had 12 renown, and only 1 or 2 guys was wounded for the next game.

Game 2: Vs Brian (Hector)

For game 2 I was facing off against Hector, this time we got Parle gone Wrong as the scenario, which is  a pretty standard skirmish really. This time hero abilities were in play, so I had a big unit of warriors with javelins and another with bows, both with Hearthguard commanders, and then unit of 8 warriors, and 6 Hearthguard. I think the missing guy was from the Javelin warriors. After deployment you can swap 2 units of the other guys side, Hector switched my Hearthguard and javelin warriors, and I didn't bother. I now had some Divine Interventions due my renown so I assigned them to my big units. Turns out I also had 2 more from victories but forgot about that. But maybe it is better not to use to many in one game so they don't all get lost anyway.

This time my plan is to harass with shooting attacks and then charge in when I have an advantage, but really just kill everyone.

For turn 1 I just advanced everyone, and the Trojan did likewise.

On the second turn I advanced my bows and took some shoots in the enemies Hearth guard, but no effect, I then used my small warrior unit to screen my javelin guys from bow fire. The Trojans then brought in the Hearthguard behind the wood to fight me bow warriros, but I used my divine intervention to re-roll attack dice and killed them all for the loss of like 6 warriors. The other 4 in that area moved into the woods. On the other flank the Trojan archers tried to fire, but I had a Saga ability to turn their shooting into a movement, so they advanced the archers slightly.

On my turn I sent my unit of 6 Hearthguard into the forest to kill the Trojans in there, and we traded 4 for 4 leaving me with 2. I then sent in my small unit of warriors against the levy archers and killed most of them. Finally I through some javelins and the small unit of Hearthguard on the far right but no effect, wasn't a lucky day for shooting. The Trojans countered by attacking the 2 remaining Hearthguard int he woods with Hector but he only killed 1! Meanwhile it seems thier unit of 6 Hearthguard got up to some badness and killed the rest of my small unit.

For my turn I just attacked whatever was left of those 6 hearthguards with my javelins and used thier divine intervention to get all 6, but it was costly due to the low armor of the missile troops. Might be better off without that I dunno but it is fun to shoot. At this point the Trojans were getting really low on Saga dice so they had trouble powering abilities. I think Hector tried to kill my Hearthguard again but failed.

For my turn I moved up my bow warriors to start getting in range to attack Hector, and a combined attack with my Warlord and the rest of the Javelin guys killed the remaining unit of Trojan Warriors. Hector then killed my last Hearthguard in the woods finally!

To finish things off I now moved my hero along with the remaining Javelin guys to attack Hector, needed them all just to be safe. I ended up loosing all my warriors so that is a lost divine intervention, but Hector was down. Brian rolled a one for him and he got a leg wound, so he can now only move short unless he keeps riding his chariot (I am surprised chariots are so popular for heros I guess they just look cool or something).

After all that I ended up at 28 renown after another good loot roll, so lots of extra powers now and a base. A few more wounded guys as well but no big deal now due to extra troops from being so famous!

You get a little bit of a story type thing for renown so here is where I am on the table now.

0-5 Who are you boy?
6-10 Mmmm I know that name from somewhere.
11-15 I knew him when he was a little…
16-20 Arggghhh (insert name) is coming!
21-25 Get a mention in one verse
26-30 Opening Epic book (not everyone is listening yet).

 When you get to 36 points your story ends either in retirement, heroic death, or shame. Then you start over basically so another win or 2 could do it!

Thanks;
Mike

Painting - Greeks - Trojan War Campaign

Well very busy day painting today but managed to get some more units painted up for the Trojan War campaign which is starting tomorrow!

First a bunch of Archers, plastic models from Victrix. I am not very enthusiastic about these models, but they work and there done! Best part aboput the plastic archers is that you don't have to buy a giant box of 48 you just get a bag of 12 very much better for Saga.

I also manage to get one unit of Hearthguard completed. I am not super keen on these models either, again Victrix plastics. But I do like the big round shields with transfers from LBMS. The gian face ones I am particularly keen on.

So that is where I am at for now, including my Javelin guys this is 3 points of warriors, and 1 of Hearthruard, so 4 out of 6 points minus a warlord. I ordered a nice metal model after I decided I didn't like the plastics so hopefully that will be here before the next day.


i plan to take some pictures of the games and do some reports but sometimes I am lazy at club days so we shall see.

Pledge Status 2016:
Bought: 185 
Painted: 203 (Wow passed 200!)
Total: +18

Thanks;
Mike

Battle Report - Trojan War SAGA

So on Wednesday we decided to play a game of Saga and try out the rules which are to be sued for the Trojan war campaign at the club. I only had 1 unit painted so I added in some units from other forces to get the numbers. Very tough to do all the painting in such a short window after cangames!

Anyway I had Agamemnon and the Greeks, and Serge had Paris and the Trojans. We rolled and ended up with the challenge, which is the one where you are trying to do 12 wounds to each others warlords. I was not super enthusiastic about this as I thought I would be at a bit of a disadvantage, but never mind.

Here we are ready to get down to business Greeks on the left Trojans on the Right. Paris is in the chariot and Agamemnon is behind the ruins.

I moved up all my guys and fired of a few bow shots at Paris but no effect, the Trojans spent their turn 1 moving up as well.

On the next turn I had some good dice rolls so I decided to make an attack against Paris while his support was far away, sadly this meant sending in archers but that is ok. I used the Kelos ability to sacraface 3 models for extra attacks and Prometheus to re-roll failed his so my warriors had a whopping 26 attacks re-rolling and another 5 for my warlord. This turned out to be not such an amazing idea against Paris (with Gunnars rules), as he cancels hits on 4 in melee, and every 1 gives him 2! extra defense dice. So re-rolling is not necessarily helpful, this capped him on defense dice with double the number of hits I caused and in the end I only did one wound and my big warrior unit was severely depleted. At this point I knew I was in trouble hah. The Trojans moved up with the chariots unit and crushed the rest of my warriors.

I moved in with my javelin armed warriors and killed 1 chariot, and then got the next in an assault, but I am now getting lower on numbers, and there are still quite allot of rojan troops around.

By now my warlord has 2 wounds on him so I am starting to loose. The Trojans are closing the noose on the rest of my warriors.

They eventually get wiped out, leaving things a bit open.

I sent in my elite hearthguard and managed to get most of the Trojan warriors, but they still have a worryingly big hearthguard unit of there own there.

On the ensuing turn the Trojans are able to finish off most of my troops, and the polish off my Warlord for the win.

We rolled to see what the campaign effects would be, I had allot of guys not showing up for the next round. Paris gained something like 12 renown, and I got 0, -1 for warlord dieing and +1 for killing a unit.

Thanks;
Mike

Painting - Trojan War Greeks

Well time for another painting update. Not to much this time, I have been taking it easy a bit post can games. But I got one unit, actually a unit and a half done for our Trojan War campaign. I am playing Agamemnon and since he is the king you get some extra upgrade options for warriors, so I am not just stuck with hopplites.

I have 12 javelin armed warriors. These are from 2 different packs, some of them have fur cloaks, and some have helmets, the helmet guys are later I think and some fo the cloak guys are just throwing rocks, so I guess maybe they are more appropriate for the Trojan war. But I like the other ones better.

I have a similar amount of bows in progress and once they are done my army will be half done. To be honest I am procrastinating a bit on painting the spearmen as it turns out the models from Victrix are not great really. This is a rare case where the metals would have been preferable, and maybe cheaper also dang.

Pledge Status 2016:
Bought: 185 
Painted: 187
Total: +2, Back in the green nice!

Thanks;
Mike