Mid-August 2014 - Storming ahead into the Gates of Antares!

Hello again folks,

I have some interesting stuff to mention!

I didn't manage to have a game last week at Dice and Decks Gaming Club, much to my dissappointment, as my new Bolt Action book, the Tank War supplement, which I ordered earlier in the week arrived, along with, my playtester exclusive Algoryn AI Squad for Beyond the Gates of Antares, which is also currently in production and development by Warlord Games, it consists of 5 models, a squad leader, two troopers with different weapons and two regular armed troops. They are fairly big, much bigger than any Infantry seen in Bolt Action, and are very well cast.

I have also been working on 1 of 3 Cromwell tanks for Bolt Action: Tank War, which combined with my Sherman Firefly will form my basic platoon for any Tank War games in Bolt Action.

The first Cromwell is nearly assembled and ready for painting

However, after another day of Airsoft at C3 Tactical, I have had a game of Hail Caesar organised at Pegasus Hobbies and Games in Monmouth, using my Caesar's Legions Roman Army, which I spent a few days between Sunday and Thursday building as many extra troops as I could manage in time for the game. The invitation for a game of Hail Caesar came as a pleasant surprise as I've been waiting for a chance to throw my in progress legion onto a table and have a game! It plays in quite a similar fashion to Kings of War, I managed to play through 2 games, losing both! I didn't have enough infantry to hold off flank and rear charges, although I got my charging hits in first in the 1st game, before waiting for an advance in the 2nd game.

Archer Unit 1

Archers 2

My Light Artillery - Roman Scorpions!

My first game of Hail Caesar - Romans vs Romans, this shows the battle lines meeting each other.

Cohort matches Cohort blow for blow!

Veteran Cohort vs Veteran Cohort

My end game in the 1st match, a single cohort vs two warbands of Celts and a cohort of romans (on the left)

My battleline ready for game 2

During my time at Pegasus Hobbies and Games in Monmouth for the Hail Caesar game, I also got myself a box of Warlord Games Napoleonic Penisular War British Line Infantry, so I'm assembling these for the future, as Black Powder, if anywhere near Hail Caesar, will be something I fancy playing! Although in both Hail Caesar and Black Powder, I use whole boxed sets for 1 unit (well, I decided to use 32 men for a standard unit in Black Powder), so it'll be some time before my force is useable for this, unless I motivate myself to assemble them.

I have also assembled and painted a Sergeant made from the Eisenkern Stormtroopers I bought off Ebay, made by Dreamforge Games, this was for a Dice and Decks Painting Competition, and is painted as an Imperial Stormtrooper Sandtrooper Sergeant from Star Wars, the below pictures show work from assembly through to fully painted (fully painted picture in my next post):

2 of my other Stormtroopers, an officer and another Sergeant, this picture shows up the armour plates well

Nearly finished, as each plate was blacklined this process of painting each armour plate white took its time!

The finished product - one battle damaged Sergeant of Stormtroopers

Rear view of the finished Stromtrooper

I have also had another game of Bolt Action last Friday (29th August), which ended with three models on my opponent's side left, and me with two, a 20mm AA gun and 1 Panzer IV. So it was a very brutal and very close run game! Germans vs Germans, most of my infantry was lost in close combat with enemy infantry squads attacking my transports, which forces the transported unit to disembark and fight, which meant they were attacked by my opponent first, so I lost attacks, which combined with bad dice rolls led to me barely landing a hit back. This led to me losing the combats, which lost the squad. This meant my only successes were by unusual combats, my favourites being a Hanomag belonging to the enemy being assaulted by my two-man sniper team, only to find a single Lieutenant in it, who was promptly killed! Even more amusing was the 5 man assault-rifle armed squad that was in the same transport but had disembarked previously, assaulted my 5 man heavy howitzer crew, and somehow lost, without scoring a hit on the crew! All in all, one of my more memorable games of Bolt Action.

Panzer IV, Spotter for the Howitzer and 20mm AA Gun. The squad behind is a destroyed unit, due to an assault on their Hanomag transport.

Middle of the table, a sort of No-Man's Land, where any unit that entered was destroyed by its opposition

My Artillery, and Sniper Team, next to an enemy Hanomag, which was carrying an Assault Rifle armed 5-man squad, and an SMG Lieutenant, both destroyed by the crew and the sniper team respectively

This Friday just passed, I played another game of Bolt Action, but we only succeeded in getting through around two turns, but it was a large points scale game. Germans vs British. We still managed to have some great moments, which the game allows, a Dingo Scout Car tried to ram my Howitzer, but we interpreted the rules to allow a reaction shot from said Artillery piece, which fired a direct shot which landed a huge number of hits and destroyed the vehicle just shy of hitting the artillery unit!

My Left flank, a 150mm Howitzer, Tiger I and 20mm AA Gun.

Tanks take aim at each other, the destroyed Churchill took a direct massive damage hit off my Tiger I, which is just to the left of the picture!

Mechanised Germans (my force) advance

In Airsoft news, my new boots arrived, but I'm not sure they fit or not, I can wear them, but they aren't at present, the most comfortable things around. I have also got a rubber bayonet knife for my loadout, and a new M16A3 from G+P, which was tested yesterday at C3 tactical airsoft. Here's some pictures of my new kit before I leave you till next time!

My boots, based on Vietnam era jungle boots!

Rubber bayonet attached to my older M16VN

My new Airsoft M16A3 - I like this one, although it did seem a bit iffy at first test, although this was with one of my grey 20 round BB magazines, not the metal 130 round magazine that came with the Airsoft gun.  

Part 3 end of 2013: My Romans and Historical Wargaming News

One of Tribunes, my division commanders in Hail Caesar

The Dice and Decks Miniature swap Scorpion, nearly repainted for my colour scheme

I've had a month or two of Dropzone Commander and future based wargaming - but I'm know back building more Romans, with even more to do now Christmas has passed, hopefully in time for my first game of Warlord Games' Hail Caesar.




My army will hopefully consist of 8 units of Legionaries, with a two small units of archers, and a couple of Scorpion artillery pieces, with my opponent planning to use Ancient British Celts.




My birthday has recently passed and I have another Games Workshop Realm of Battle Gameboard - which I'm going to use as a grass board for the game. Although my brain is still trying to work out how to lengthen the game so that it doesn't consist of a first turn charge, second turn, fight, third turn win/lose scenario, as 6 foot by 4 foot might be a bit small for game when infantry can potentially move a mighty 18 inches per turn, as they can get 3 x 6 inch moves per turn on a good order dice roll.




I've been assembling more Legionaries, with nearly three units now assembled, I have been painting more of them as well, finishing one with injuries that looks like a grizzled veteran, although he just stands in the back of a pilum armed unit. I also have been painting a Scorpio, given to me as part of Dice and Decks Miniature swap - a secret santa style event of painting a miniature for someone else and then giving it to them at a set date

1st and 2nd Centuries, still on the table

Centurion for the unit in the picture directly above, midway through painting

One veteran Legionary, ready for action

 
The army is being painted as the famed 10th Legion, Julius Caesar's favourites from the campaign in Gaul (59bc) to the end of the Civil War and his murder in 44bc. My 1st Century with Eagle Bearer is modelled to contain Warlord Games' Pullo and Vorenus miniatures, and the rest have helmet crests which the rest of my force doesn't (unless I go even more nuts and build an entire legion plus, which even by my mad collecting standards, is alot of troops).

 

I've also got a box of Mantic Games; Deadzone, a game of Sci-fi Skirmish, but I also have extra scenery for the game, as well as a partially assembled box of Enforcers, so Mantic's bigger Sci-fi game of Warpath could be next on the cards with Enforcers being my force, so farI have nearly finished one Enforcer in a green colour scheme, where I painted each armour plate seperately. 

Nearly there

So there we are folks, back on track with updates up to the present moment, Happy New Year and I shall try to keep more up to date, as three months of catch-up isn;t great

End of July 2013 - Ave Romans!

Hello again Folks!

My preparations for Warlord Games attendance at my local Dice and Decks Gaming Club's charity event on the 17th August are proceeding well. I intend to have at least one side of a Hail Caesar game with me - which will be my army of the Late Roman Republic/Civil Wars and the First Emperor - Augustus. 

To this end as you will have seen on my last post I have already assembled one century and started painting it. Converting the helmets of the troops to not have a top-knot on them, and thus make them more realistic to a war/battle scenario and less like a parade ground army. 

I bought 2 more boxes of legionaries, one with Gladius and the other with Pilum on Wednesday, and my 3 boxes (2 with Pilum and another with Gladius - which is to be my first century - and thus get to keep their helmet crests) plus the Heroes of Rome; Titus Pullo and Lucius Vorenus blister pack of metal characters from the HBO series of Rome ordered from Warlord Games have also arrived to make 6 units for my army, taking it up to the size needed for a game (I hope!). I have commanders from the Foundry set of Tribunes I found on Ebay a while ago.

One century with Pilum have been partially assembled and Vorenus and Pullo have also been assembled and started to be painted. I have yet to decide whether to give the first century cloaks to go with those found on the Vorenus and Pullo miniatures. 

Pictures as always are included here: 

Pullo and Vorenus undercoated

 

Vorenus as of this evening

Conicern from my first century

My mega box of Romans from Warlord Games - taking my army to 144 Romans plus Commanders

The first century in the background, and the second in the foreground  - the one I am currently constructing

One of my Tribunes - the commanders of my Hail Caesar divisions

And there we are for this week once again folks. Dice and Decks has a normal club night on Friday where I shall be building yet more Romans. This is complemented by a all day gaming session at the Ross-on-Wye scout hut this Saturday will allow me to make even more Romans for the army whereby hopefully I'll be right on track to having an army by the 17th August.

Early July 2013 update

Hello once again folks,

I apologise for once again neglecting to post as often as I should. But graduating university and job searching occupy my time a tad. Plus my phone has started playing up when it comes to uploading pictures, which is something I always do before publishing my blog posts.

Anyway, on to the fun stuff, what have I been doing in the hobby world since last time I posted?

Well, I've been delving into both the fictional, and the non-fictional worlds of wargaming. Working mainly in the non-fictional realm of history - by working on my 28mm Caesarian era Roman Soldiers from Warlord Games. I have been trying to get the whole box built, and try to paint and finish a few more. I have gotten close to doing so at the moment; finishing on of my slightly converted Romans - I used a head from the Auxilary sprue to represent a Coolus pattern helmet - which were used in conjunction with the Montefortino helmets in the time period I am basing my Romans from. Plus it adds a nice bit of variety to a rather same-looking unit, which despite the general representation of Romans - there were variations in colour of tunics, shields and types of armour/helmets. 

My latest finished unit member

"Command section" - the Centurion

The whole unit  - front two ranks carry swords, back rank carries slings to add a bit of variety.

I also have a set of 48 from Wargames Factory, which whilst being slightly smaller than the Warlord figures, I intended to have to quickly and cheaply bulk up the Legion's numbers. 

Two of the Wargames Factory Caesar's Legions - bad quality and will not be ordered again, the feet sort of melt into the base and have no definition to them

As well as this, I have been taking advantage of July's free postage from Warlord Games, where I ordered their 3 box set of Caesar's Legions for £48 and Pullo and Vorenus (in approriate military garb), the Heroes from the now slightly older HBO TV series of Rome.

My aim is to have as many Romans as possible ready for Dice and Decks Gaming Club's charity event on the 17th August at the Larrapez centre in Ross-on-Wye, which I've been helping to organise. All persons welcome (shameless advertising!) and we have a selection of tournaments, retailers and demo games going on from 0900-1700.

In other news, my Defiance Games UAMC infantry arrived last week and I am beginning to build and convert them into Colonial Marines for my home-grown Aliens rules. I have started painting one, but realised a large number of marines in the film actually have shoulder guards, which these models do not - time to go searching through my bits boxes! I have built three of the marines, although one with a helmet and arms from a Games Workshop Imperial Guard Cadian aren't quite right - coming in at slightly larger than the Defiance Games Marines. Pulse rifles are from Hasslefree Miniatures, and are just about the right size.

Defiance Games Marines, nice models

Out of the box - the contents

The first painted Marine so far, I have added camouflage since this picture was taken.

My latest playtest board, we tried more scenery and it seemed to help the rules balance out

 So there we have it, another update, prepare for another, hopefully this coming week. Until then folks....