Fred’s 2024 Painting and Gaming log

Started by fred., 20 July 2024, 09:04:43 AM

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fred.

Feels slightly odd to be starting a gaming dairy in July!

But it's been a busy old year so far - and whilst I've got plenty of games in (and taken photos of them) getting round to posting them has been another matter. Painting has very much been on the back burner (not entirely sure why). 

So this is probably going to be a bit of a trip back through the year to document games, and a bit of painting. And perhaps some painting mojo strikes and more stuff gets painted!

2011 Painting Competition - Winner!
2012 Painting Competition - 2 x Runner-Up
2016 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2017 Paint-Off - 3 x Winner!

My wife's creations: Jewellery and decorations with sparkle and shine at http://www.Etsy.com/uk/shop/ISCHIOCrafts

fred.

Warmaster XL - Nippon vs Empire

We've been playing quite a lot of Warmaster XL - this is a home brew variant of Warmaster Revolution, basically with double sized units, no support and a single round of combat. Seems to work really well, gives all the good bits of WM and gets rid of all the fiddly grinding combats.

Last night's game was East vs West, Nippon vs Empire, Pendraken vs Games Workshop, all the classic match ups  ;D




Jumping straight in - this will be around turn 2. Nippon are nearest the camera, advancing on a fairly static Empire line.

Empire had deployed with Knights and Pistolliers on each flank, and infantry in the middle. I'd deployed my Nippon in almost the reverse, with infantry on the flanks, and in the middle my temple demons and cavalry. I was also trying to avoid the Empire cannon until either my Tengu or Ninjas could deal with them.

On the left the green Empire knights lurk just off camera, their Crossbows and Halberdiers have run forward to grab the village, whilst my advance got rather slowed by a marsh.

In the centre one unit of red Oni have charged some crossbows in a wood whilst in the centre the yellow Temple Dogs have deployed but didn't quite get the charge off. Behind them is a second unit of Oni and two units of Samurai cavalry.

On the right not a lot happening.

Right at the back of the board my two units of Tengu have flown behind the cannon - but these long moves put them out of command, which will give Empire chance to react next turn.


A couple of turns later


The green knights continue to lurk on the left flank - I don't think they moved all game!

The next few shots are from the same turn as above, but covering each part of the battlefield



Right flank. The second unit of Oni have charged the Steam Tank - in a rather ineffective fight - the tank is only hit on 5+ and saves on 3+ so is very hard to damage, but conversely it doesn't have a lot of attacks.

In the village the Ashigaru are grinding through the Empire troops - helped by attacking on the flank.

These turned out to be the crucial battles of the game, with the loss of these 3 units and the hell blaster in the background this broke the Empire army. On the next turn the Oni charged the Steam Tank again - which rolled at least six 1s when trying to save.



In the centre some Empire troops lurk in the wood, whilst my cavalry hold the centre ground.
The Tengu were unsuccessful against the central cannon - they had landed behind them, but then the cannons where able to turn and shoot, which didn't kill too many stands, but easily drove them backwards off the table - should have landed closer! Made little difference in the end as the other cavalry was able to mop them up.



Over on the right the other Tengu were successful against the cannon, as they failed to get orders off to counter the Tengu. The Tengu then charged on the the flanks of the blue Knights - this was rather less succesful and turned into a couple of turns of combat, with the Pistoleers charging in to clear the Tengu up.

Overall a big victory to Nippon, who only lost 4 units (all temple demons) vs breaking the Empire army (I think 12 units lost).

The Ninjas remained elusive for the whole game - who knows where they were?

2011 Painting Competition - Winner!
2012 Painting Competition - 2 x Runner-Up
2016 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2017 Paint-Off - 3 x Winner!

My wife's creations: Jewellery and decorations with sparkle and shine at http://www.Etsy.com/uk/shop/ISCHIOCrafts

Raider4

:-bd :-bd :-bd 

Great to see Warmaster still being played. Never heard of the 'XL' variant before. Lovely looking game. 

fred.

Cheers!

You won't have heard of the XL version as its a home brew variant!
2011 Painting Competition - Winner!
2012 Painting Competition - 2 x Runner-Up
2016 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2017 Paint-Off - 3 x Winner!

My wife's creations: Jewellery and decorations with sparkle and shine at http://www.Etsy.com/uk/shop/ISCHIOCrafts

Corso

Nice work

Really interested in picking up some 10mm Samurai

2024 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!

fred.

Thanks

The Pendraken range is great! The Samurai can be tricky to paint, but I do have some I am using the contrast style that Wargames Atlantic have showed and I'm pleased with that method 
2011 Painting Competition - Winner!
2012 Painting Competition - 2 x Runner-Up
2016 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2017 Paint-Off - 3 x Winner!

My wife's creations: Jewellery and decorations with sparkle and shine at http://www.Etsy.com/uk/shop/ISCHIOCrafts

FierceKitty

Quote from: fred. on 20 July 2024, 09:04:43 AM...starting a gaming dairy....

Cow wars, is it? The BEEF expeditionary force in France?
I don't drink coffee to wake up. I wake up to drink coffee.

Lord Kermit of Birkenhead

Quote from: FierceKitty on 21 July 2024, 05:29:57 AMCow wars, is it? The BEEF expeditionary force in France?

 GET YOUR COAT
FOG IN CHANNEL - EUROPE CUT OFF
Lord Kermit of Birkenhead
Muppet of the year 2019, 2020 and 2021

fred.


QuoteCow wars, is it? The BEEF expeditionary force in France?
At least someone is reading closely!
2011 Painting Competition - Winner!
2012 Painting Competition - 2 x Runner-Up
2016 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2017 Paint-Off - 3 x Winner!

My wife's creations: Jewellery and decorations with sparkle and shine at http://www.Etsy.com/uk/shop/ISCHIOCrafts

Last Hussar

Quote from: fred. on 21 July 2024, 07:29:53 AMAt least someone is reading closely!

I read the entire thread just to see if someone else beat me to it.  :'(
I have neither the time nor the crayons to explain why you are wrong.

"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."
Franklin D. Roosevelt

GNU PTerry

FierceKitty

I don't drink coffee to wake up. I wake up to drink coffee.

Lord Kermit of Birkenhead

FOG IN CHANNEL - EUROPE CUT OFF
Lord Kermit of Birkenhead
Muppet of the year 2019, 2020 and 2021

fred.

Altar of Freedom - ACW

All change this week, new rules, new period and new scale!

After several years of no progress with the big ACW Epic box from Warlord my mate Jon has decided to get the figures on the table - with the painting of the Union figures outsourced to Mark, and himself getting several hundred condfederates painted in a few weeks - go contrast paint!

We didn't go with Black Powder rules as we where throughly underwhelmed with them for this period when we tried them a few years ago. Instead we used the grand tactical rules Altar of Freedom. The core mechanics of these rules are simple - and in many ways have similiarities with Blucher. One of the key concepts is the turn clock and assigning command points to control this and to determine the priority of your divisions. 

We went with the battle of Shiloh - which was badged as a starter scenario...



The terrain is heavily wooded - each area with a few model trees is a large wooded area. The Union forces are to the top of the picture, defending the landing on the right. The Confederates are nearest the camera, and as they caught the Union by surprise have a free first turn (which given the option to spend command points to re-position units after moving, and not needing to spend many points to activate, they effectively got 2 moves at the start of the game. So got up close to the Union defensive line. 



Close up view of the centre of the game, from the other side of the table - with much light coming through the windows!



Towards the end of the evening - only half-way through the expected number of turns. 

The Conferderates have had reasonable success in the middle of the battle field, and are advanicing a reserve division down the road. But Union reserves are there! On the right, largely a stalemate. On the left some success, especially as this was more of a holding flank for my attack. 



Close up of the left flank - confederate attackers are rather disrupted. 



Close up of the right flank - lots of Confederate artillery - rather blocked by its own troops - but having some success in pushing back the Union forces, including a reinforcement Division. 


2011 Painting Competition - Winner!
2012 Painting Competition - 2 x Runner-Up
2016 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2017 Paint-Off - 3 x Winner!

My wife's creations: Jewellery and decorations with sparkle and shine at http://www.Etsy.com/uk/shop/ISCHIOCrafts

fred.

Altar of Freedom is an intersting ruleset - definately interested in playing it again - as I feel I have a much better understanding of how all the bits fit together now. It does feel very much a high level ruleset - you are fighting a battle, with units taking fatigue and suffering attrition over multiple turns. 

The command system takes some getting used to - in this scenario the Union command is very simple, with just US Grant as the single army commander, with 20 command points to spend on his divisions. The Confederates have 4 Corps commanders as well as an army commander. What I hadn't realised was the Corp commanders still need to assign their command points to the separate divisions, not just to their Corps. And with the figures for each brigade being essentially the same, even with small labels, it was a bit hard to keep track of who was commanding where. But this is as much player organisation as anything else. 

As to Shiloh being a starter scenario - I'm not sure! We only got half-way through it, and whilst these are new rules to us, we are very experienced gamers. We didn't spend much time flicking through the rules - the Quick Ref sheet is pretty much all that's needed to play. It's just there are a lot of units, terrain is constricted. And the assigning of command points started to take a while in the middle turns whilst I worked out what I could spend where.

As to Warlord Epic figures - lots has been written about them already - overall they are fine, they are very cheap - 2500 figures in the box set. There isn't much variety, basically 2 infantry strips, and a command strip (1 in 10 of those). Some cavalry, commanders and artillery. So you get everything you need. Different commander figures would help quite a bit. The figures are much taller than 10mm, and they look very tall and thin - which is very unusual for wargames figures. I've been given some to paint - so will see how that goes.  

2011 Painting Competition - Winner!
2012 Painting Competition - 2 x Runner-Up
2016 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2017 Paint-Off - 3 x Winner!

My wife's creations: Jewellery and decorations with sparkle and shine at http://www.Etsy.com/uk/shop/ISCHIOCrafts

paulr

Good to see the figures on the table, hopefully the game will inspire getting them finished :)
Lord Lensman of Wellington
2018 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2022 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!
2023 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!