Fred’s 2025 Painting and Gaming Diary

[fred.]

Daimyo Playtest Rules

I've now played these rules twice, and have enjoyed both games.

First game was 1v1 with 3 sonae a side. The second was 2v2 players, but still with 3 sonae a side, I 'umpired' the second game.

The rules are very well put together - considering they are a play test version, we had fewer questions than with many published sets of rules. The latest version (3.3) tidies up a number of bits and adds loads of scenarios and siege rules.

The core of the game is the order tokens - these work very well as a mechanism as you start with lots so have lots of flexibility, then as the battle progresses you never have enough to hand to do what you want to do! They also let each sonae do clever things if you want to try to replicate historical tactics.

Some photos - using 10mm Pendraken figures, but with the footprint of 28mm units in the game. Unfortunately only have 1 army's worth of Japanese figures so far.










Game two




Order tokens

[fred.]

Harlem Heights - Live Free or Die

We played another AWI game with Live Free or Die rules this week - as a couple of our gaming group wanted to try the rules.

It's been a few months since we last played - so need a quick refresh of the rules ahead of the game. Harlem Heights is a smaller scenario with around 50 bases per side - which nicely fitted with what we have painted.

The game is a 10 turn, escalating meeting engagement, with both sides adding in troops from turns 3 to 6.


Starting positions American formed troops to the right (NE) with skirmishers nearest the camera. The British have 2 large regiments of Light troops in skirmish formation between the woods, and a regiment of highlanders way off camera to the left.


Turn 3 - on the right the British skirmishers have infiltrated around the woods - but then were rudely met by American reinforcements. In the centre the Americans have advanced against the other Regt of Light troops. The American skirmishers have advanced to the wood to engage the Highlanders. And more American troops come on at the bottom of the picture - this brigade is under Nathaneal Greene.

The Americans had tried to charge the Light Infantry to drive them off - but due to the low quality of Hitchock's RI infantry - they failed in the charge and ended up suffering casualties and retreating!


Battle lines have formed. The Light infantry using their mobility have pulled back to the second wood, whilst that second Regt has moved into the centre of the table. The Americans were struggling to cause meaningful casualties on the Light troops in skirmish formation [6s where needed to hit them, and due to their mobility and high quality they were able to rally off quite a lot the hits caused] And whilst they weren't putting out that much firepower it kept adding up, and the Americans were less able to rally it off.


A continuous line of Light Infantry screen the British. As their reinforcements start to arrive both from the left, and Hessian's at the bottom.


Nearest the camera Maj General Greene is getting stuck into the action - but his Regt is facing 3 Britsh ones - the weight of fire tells, they loose 2 stands, and Greene is lightly wounded.


The Americans continue to suffer casualties - with units retreating and causing further disruption to friendly units.

Overall a decisive British victory as they caused 11 stands loss on the Americans, and only suffered 1. The historical result was about 4 stands each.

The two British Light regiments where a major problem for the Americans - they couldn't cause meaningful casualties to them, and their mobility allowed them to dance around the battlefield, and combined with their quality allowed them to rally off disruptions fairly easily.

The Hessians arriving on the bottom edge of the table was historically plausible - and did perhaps tip things the British way, as the rest of their reinforcements didn't get into the game - mainly as they spent a lot of time traversing terrain rather than marching around it.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

It's a good scenario, good write up
We found the light infantry really powerful too. Our losses definitely weren't that one-sided!

[fred.]

I think some dice rolling came into it too. The British seemed to roll generally a bit better and the Americans a bit worse than expected results 

[paulr]

    

[fred.]

Thanks Paul

As my wife was away this weekend (and the weather was not great) I got a few games in!

Next up Devilry Afoot - 28mm skirmish on a small playing area as a change of everything!


It's set in 16-17th Century, but due to figure (and terrain) availability I've moved forward to Victorian times (at least visually, I've not changed any rules at this stage for the move to cartridge weapons over ball and powder ones). I am largely hoping to do this as a game with existing figures - and perhaps as a way of getting some of the lead mountain painted.

The Dance Macabre

I picked this scenario simply as it was the second one in the book, and I didn't think I had the witch figures for the first scenario. In retrospect this wasn't a great first scenario!

I'd drafted up a group of Hunters during the week - as with any new game it took a little while to work through the various options and how they interact. I went with
Corto - A Gentleman
Mr Jones - A Scholar
Preacher Ted - A Religious
The Commander - A Soldier

The scenario was based around a burial ground which the hunters needed to un-curse by quoting scripture in the centre three times. This was complicated by the presence of a Revenant and a Spectre. Which doesn't sound too bad, but each time the Revenant activated it had a 30% chance of triggering another Revenant to appear...



A couple of turns in - and a second Revenant has been summoned.  Mr Jones and the Commander are advancing from the top, whilst Corto, his follower and Preacher Ted are moving in from the centre left. Preacher Ted was effective at Quoting Scripture at the Spectre and causing damage to it. The Revenants tended to move very slowly


A couple of turns later, Jones and the Commander are engaged in an ineffectual melee with one Revenant. Corto's nameless follower has been taken out, whilst Corto is now engaged with a second Revenant after getting successful shots off at the first one to take it out.

3 more revenants have been summoned!

And by this stage their were so many that the unpainted ones needed to be used 

Preacher Ted has made it to the centre of the burial ground to start Quoting Scripture (he is particularly good at this due is class, his Theology Skill and his Bible) - which is good as QS normally requires an activation test at -4 so a 7 or 8+ on a d10. Ted knocks this down to a -1, and gets to roll twice. So needing a 4+ on 1 of 2 d10 for a succes.

The 5th turn was poor for the Hunters, Corto fled from the spectre's intimidation, Preacher Ted failed to QS (despite his good chances!), the melee continued. More revenants arrived - but at least the existing ones only shuffled forwards


Last turn - Corto and The Commander are both taken out by Revenants - who rolled very high on their wound rolls. Fortunately Preacher Ted cleanses the burial ground before him and Mr Jones are swarmed by the horde of Revenants.

Phew!

There was a lot going on in this game - the number of Revenants rapidly became too many. Not helped by poor melee rolls by the Hunters.

I'd missed that an opportunity attack can be conducted if an attacker fails to hit - which might have helped the Hunters.

And when writing this up I've seen that Revenants cause -1 to activations if within 4" which really wouldn't have helped them.

In the post game rolls - disaster both Corto and the Commander expired from their wounds!

And due to only killing 1 revenant the bounty was quite low (but at least not spread between that many Hunters!)

It was a good game - but with any new game a lot of bits to get my head around, and with playing solo there wasn't anyone to spot and correct some of my mistakes!

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Sounds like an equmanical manner!
Great report. 

[fred.]

Devilry Afoot game 2 - Lost in the Woods

Preacher Ted and Mr Jones sought out two new Hunters to return their numbers to 4. They were joined by Old Archie, a Goodman, equipped with a blunderbus and holy water, and The Hunter an enigmatic Soldier equipped with a sword and a couple of monster wards (an Elf bolt and a sprig of wolfsbane).

Preacher Ted traded in his blunderbus and club for a Dragon heavy pistol with silver shot and a sword. Mr Jones added a sword and several rounds of silver shot for his current pistol.

Hopefully this group would be less fated!

The scenario is Lost in the Woods - 2 innocents are lost in some fairly open woodland, there is an area of rough ground, and an area of Hungry Grass (hungry grass can cause humans to fall asleep and be lost to the fairy realm). There were just two bogeymen as monsters - due to figure availability one was a green zombie-esque figure they other more ghost like. All of these were randomly located, with both bogeymen turning up on the same side of the table.

Finally there was a pact devil in the bottom right corner - who would lure the innocents towards him



The hunters deployed at the top of the map. The innocents in the centre. The monsters to the right. Despite the sunniness of these photos it should be remembered these games are set at night with fairly limited visibility.

Mr Jones and The Hunter engaged the green bogeyman in melee - and despite suffering -2 on dice rolls due to its malevolence still managed to cause 2 wounds.

Preacher Ted advanced and quoted scripture at the other bogeyman scaring him off.
The innocents headed towards the pact devil.



Turn 2 - Old Archie throws his holy water on The Hunter to help him resist the bogeyman. The Hunter wounds the bogeyman again (the -2 on dice rolls has kept the BM in the fight). The BM then flees and intimidates the too closest hunters.

The innocents are now close to the other BM and therefore flee from it - this is good news as it takes them away from the monsters. This BM drifts around not doing much (monster activation is by dice rolls on tables - BM have quite an unusual table with quite a few different options possible).



Turn 3
Old Archie blasts the central BM with his blunderbus - and misses.

Preacher Ted who is closest to this BM fails to activate due to its malevolent aura

Mr Jones shoots the green BM and kills it - just causing a wound due to his silver shot.

Turn 4
The Hunter advances, Jones and Archie reload. Ted fails to activate (again) the -2 from the BM is significant.

But the BM does little, drifting around and attempting to intimidate, but the hunters resist.
This allows the innocents to escape off the table.

Turn 5
The remaining BM is forced to flee by Preacher Ted quoting scripture.

The Hunter decides to engage with the Pact Devil - gaining +1 to his attack value, but picks up the Drunkard secret.

The Hunters gain 70 shillings bounty.

This was a much more straightforward game than the first one - no respawning revanants to start with!

The bogeymen with their -2 dice modifier were very tough to engage in melee. What I found funny was that the two BM actually played to the style of their figures. With the stumpy green one getting involved in melee straight off. And the ghost like one, drifting around! A strange intersection of figures and dice rolls.

As the hunt was successful and the innocents were saved lots of experience all round. Preacher Ted and Mr Jones both gained enough experience for an upgrade. Mr Jones added to his shooting skill - perhaps having learned from taking out the BM.

Preacher Ted gains the Physician skill - given the problems after the first game with the effects of wounds. Not entirely sure of the narrative here - most of the scholarly skills feel a bit unlikely to be picked up after a game - but perhaps having seen two of his associates pass away he was driven to gain knowledge in this area...

This game was good fun - I was more sure of more of the gameplay so it flowed better. Though I still think I missed a few things - definitely the downside to solo games is remembering all the various modifiers that come into play at a point in time. But I'd rather the game keeps flowing then spending time double checking everything.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Nice report Forbes.
Like the idea of the Preacher taking healing, he's definitely feeling the guilt! 

[fred.]

Thanks, yes the preacher taking Physician skill feels a fit both from the story and it will be useful from a game play perspective. 

The only odd bit is that most of the 'Scholarly' skills feel a bit complex to have learned over a couple of adventures!

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Maybe it's a long term, behind the scenes project, and they become 'qualified' between episodes (carrier pigeon carrying diploma arrived).