William "Iron Arm" strikes again.

 Well William did it again......got his butt kicked ...but managed to pull the fat out of the fire...

In his second move he launched his army deeper into Lombard territory (Duchy of Capua) to fight a 'step 2' battle. In this case, after defeating the main Lombard army in a (step 1) encounter battle between 'equal forces' he advanced and had to fight a Lombard army in a defensive position.

The defending Lombards. The Lombards anchored their flanks on two large woods and had a row of hills in front of their position. A solid defensive spot that was going to be a tough nut for William's army to crack.

The Norman line. On the far left all the cavalry.
In this battle William had a lot less cavalry. He dismounted much of it as he needed the extra 'punch' to smash the Lombard defensive line.

Normans in Italy - Move 1 - William 'Iron Arm' Hauteville

 Game 1 has been played! 

Ross has taken on the role of William Iron Arm and has launched his first attack on the Duchy of Capua - attacking the province of Amalfi. 

The Lombard defenders ( played by yours truly) were waiting. 

As a 'Step One' the battle is an encounter battle with 'equal' points forces. 
William weighted his cavalry on one flank- the sight of 8 units of Normans on one flank was intimidating!
Naturally they came forward in an attempt to swamp my right......

The Lombard center- spearman and archers holding a hill

This was one of the toughest and closest fought games I have played in years.  By turn three it looked like it was going to go one way.....but the game finished on a very surprising set of die rolls!!

Normans in Italy

 After our last Norman vs Norman punch up I was reading the book by John Julius Norwich about that other Norman conquest; the conquest of southern Italy in the 11th Century.  Ross and I both had Norman armies, I have the core of a Lombard force, he has Byzantines and we both have Arabs that can easily be used as the emirates of Sicily at the time.

I came across a website dedicated to DBA campaigns and borrowed the map (with a few small changes) and realised that all these things had the making of a great little campaign. Rather than have every 'side' represented, our campaign was to focus on both regular players being Normans competing to conquer areas. They don't fight each other, but various opponents in an attempt to conquer 'the fastest with the mostest'. This way it can be run as a two player campaign, but able to accommodate other players who can pop in to play the Normans' opponents. 

Battle of Kalamata September 14th 1685.

 As part of my WIP for the battle of Vienna I have the forces for many of the conflicts of the same time. Looking at "A Taste of Victory" from  Barry Hilton, who is one of my favourite 'dealers of product', I realised could play one of the games described in the book.  One of the scenarios is the battle of Kalamata, fought in the Peloponnese during the Morea War when Venice took the region from the Ottoman Empire. 

My layout- the picture is not a good one as the Saxons aren't included and the Ottomans facing them are not in it either!

The scenario book!

WIP VIENNA 1683

 

I have got the figures ready, the objective markers are done,  the scenario is clear.....just need to give the rules a run. I have a home grown set that are fairly brief and bloody that I have used consistently for the last 10 years for my big games in the period 1680-1720. There are tweaks for specific battles and in general they work ( it wouldn't be worth all this effort of they didn't!)
With this dry run, I learnt some valuable lessons.

I think it's ready. Time to gather All the Brothers.

The Relieving force- From the Right: Imperial Foot, Imperial cuirassiers, Bavarian cuirassiers and Dragoons, Saxon Cuirassiers and at the far end with all those flags, the Bavarian and Saxon foot.

The Turkish command tent- The Turkenschanze! An Orta of Janissaries in front!

Fraustadt- testing the rules.

 So I had some Saxon battalions out and the Swedes charging them- to see how they game could possibly progress.

Four Veteran Swedish battalions vs 6 Raw Saxon Battalions and 2 guns

The whole Saxon line behind field defences.

WIP - SAXONS Great Northern War

 

I had the opportunity to take all my GNW Saxons out the other day and put them on a large table. I have been planning the Battle of Fraustadt 1706 and I now have enough units to do it,  along with the Russians. I was experimenting with the frontage of the allied army and its deployment. I won't be fielding the complete order of battle ( see below) but a scaled down version.

The Saxons all laid out- 9 Regiments of Foot , 1 regiment of Dragoons ( 2 Squadrons) and 4 Regiments of Cuirassiers ( 8 Squadrons) with three guns. 

Saxon Foot with chevaux de frise

QUEBEC 1759

 I had cut the article describing this battle from an old Wargames Illustrated a long time ago and had it filed away in my 'scenarios' folder - yes..PAPER....not an electronic copy.

I always thought it would make an interesting, if fairly straight forward, table encounter. Ross had his SYW French. We didn't have Wolfe's Redcoats ( but I had the Osprey book!!) but I had more than enough AWI British troops that could double up. Now I can hear the screams about accuracy and purity of representation - total poo of course. The figures are nice- they look about right so I used them!

The cover of the issue!

The Redcoats on the left. French on the right. Indians and Coureur de Bois in the woods on the British flank.

                    

   The original article was for WRG Horse and Musket rules which is one of my most played and favourite rulesets of all time. We have moved on from it ( sadly I guess) and translated it across to the rules we currently use, Honours of War. 

Assyrians and Elamites.....part 5

 The ongoing saga between these two historical opponents saw another chapter added...and an Elamite victory!!

Remembering the lessons from my last game- I weighted my left and withheld my right.

My right- here the Elamites were going to face the full weight of the Assyrian Chariots/

One damned Unit.....that's all it took.

 Spyros' Romans wanted another crack at his Germans- so Ross and he played the Romans and I played the Germans...and I had them on the ropes....a collapsed flank....morale tests...but one damned unit held up my advance.....by mid game it looked like the Germans had done it......but it wasn't to be.....because of those %$%#^*& Praetorians!!! 

The initial deployment. ( The orange dice just represent the deployment area)

WIP- 1683- The Ottoman Camps.

 The 'objective markers' for my Vienna game are coming along nicely. I settled on four different objectives that will be across various points of the table.  It's probably going to be a 12'x6' .

The Allies will each have a specific objective- and the Ottoman task is to stop them!

The four objectives:

1) The Vizier's tent        (The Polish objective)
2) The Grand Battery    (The Bavarian Objective)
3) The Foundry             (The Imperial/Austrian Objective)
4) The Wagon Park.      (The Saxon Objective)

Now this is fairly arbitrary but what it means is that each contingent can 'win' even if the allied relief force fails overall, that is, if the Turks stop them. The Vizier's tent will be the decider in the event that each side holds two objectives each.

Now I just have to paint up the last of the Saxon and Bavarian Dragoons.

Objective 2: The Grand Battery

Objective 1: The Grand Vizier's Tent- The Turkenschanze!

Warhammer 40K

 My son wanted a game- he is creating something called a 'Death Guard'. I asked if that was some sort of sacrificial Roman unit- he told me that dad jokes weren't permitted.

So as was perfectly rational to this type of discussion, I set up a table that resembled ancient Egyptian ruins.

The table with my Tyranids to the left- his 'Death Guard' to the right. they have a big tank!

Cheriton 1644 (Twice!) 10mm and 28mm

 Richard has a collection of 10mm ECW which I find so inspirational every time I see them out on the table. The chance for a game was too good to pass up and he had chosen the battle of Cheriton in 1644.

Richard's 10mm - Parliament Foote.
The big bases with the large numbers of figures look sensational to me!

WIP - Project 1683- Ottomans

 Working away steadily on my big game for the end of the year - or maybe earlier (it would be nice to get it ready for the 342nd anniversary in September). I plan to have a small section of the walls of Vienna with a rather large gun battery facing it- and making the battery one of the objectives for the allied army; probably the Imperials and Bavarians. The Poles will be aiming for Kara Mustafa's tent and the Saxons and other Imperials will be aiming for the wagon park and supply area.

Spanish vs Maximilian's Imperials

 The Spanish came out to do battle with the knights and landsknechts of Maximilian. Lots of pike, heavy knights, men with crossbows, arquebus and other inventive ways of killing each other.

My Spanish pikemen

Maximilian on the left, my Spanish on the right.

Normans...Normans...Normans.....

 Unable to sleep due to the humiliation of my last defeat and not being left alone by the ghosts of William the Conqueror, Robert Guiscard and Bohemond of Antioch, I had to get my Normans out again to wipe the smug look off Ross' face. 

Mid-game- close and bloody melee.

Normans at it again

 Two evenly matched Norman armies clashed one afternoon - and it had the makings of a bloodbath.

Rampaging knights, crossbow men , mercenary spearmen and archers were all part of a game that turned into a huge melee ....and a lucky crossbow shot changed the direction of the game!

A very close fought game that had the potential to be a very bloody draw.....but ended prematurely....

My right flank

My left flank

WIP- Vienna 1683

 Working slowly on adding Saxon infantry units for the Relief of Vienna.  The unfortunate part (for me and my painting!) is that the uniforms for the Saxons at Vienna were different for the Great Northern War- so with the exception of the Guards,( red coat and white cuffs) all the other regiments at Vienna wore grey uniforms. It's unfortunate because I have nine other battalions of Saxons for the GNW but only the Guard is suitable.  More painting!

The cuirassiers are in the same boat- by the GNW they were in red coats, BUT they had the buff koller underneath. At Vienna, they had the buff coat and the lobster pot helmets. I decided that I may 'fudge' a few units so that the Saxons will have some red coated units at Vienna ( without lobster pot helmet) so that I can use them for GNW as well. The Wargame Gods will not be happy and someone will comment about uniform purity on the day of the game- and they will get a swift kick if they do!

Three Saxon Regiments ready to go.

Honours of War- Flank Attack.

 

The SYW Austrians and French came out for a run....by run I mean the opportunity to kick the crap out of each other's forces.

I took a scenario straight out of "Scenarios for Wargamer's" - "Flank attack" and gave the two commanders ( Paul and Ross) their briefs. The French ( Ross) were shown the table- given their deployment area and told to expect an assault from the front. After the French deployed, the Austrians were given their brief and allowed to deploy.

French position.

The very sparse Austrian holding force- primarily place to 'hold' the main French force while the flanking brigades did their job.

SAMURAI!

 

Chris' collection of Samurai have to be among the most magnificent figures I have ever seen. Each one beautifully painted, most with a sashimono, and the command stands are just amazing.

Placing as many as we could fit onto Ross' table we had a stoush that was fast, furious and bloody as two Samurai armies smashed away at each other one afternoon.

Chris and Ross took one force and Liam and I took the other. The armies have been painted with particular clans and daimyo represented but we just divided the forces in half so that both sides fielded mounted Samurai, foot Samurai, warrior monks, archers, ronin and ashigaru.

Just the opportunity to use these magnificent figures was a real treat!
My photos don't do them any justice at all.

My commander.....the detail is just amazing.

Elamites and Assyrians....again...round 4!

Well the current score between these two historical opponents currently stands at Elamites (me) 1, Assyrians ( Ross) 1 and a bloody draw...1:1:1.

So in the dying days of 2024, game four was fought on a warm summer night.

I made a significant flaw in my deployment by not concentrating my heavy chariots............

My ring flank. One of my heavy chariots backed up by the three kallipani. Not good in a fight, but they sure can shoot!

 

Assyrian left flank.......

The layout of both armies is obvious in the pictures above.

Carthaginians and Macedonians

Ross called up and threw down the gauntlet. I hadn't played him in an ancients game in a very long time ( nearly a year!!)

His Macedonians under Antigonus One-Eye were itching to fight. I looked over my armies and thought...'Early Carthaginians...why not?'. 

Now, non historical match-ups can be problematic but as these two armies were almost from the same time period we didn't think it was going to be an issue!!

Carthaginian Line

The Macedonians

Greek War of Independence - Using TMWWBK

 

An interesting scenario was played using the TMWWBK rules. A town in the Peloponnese was blockaded by the Ottomans until the arrival of siege guns that were to blast the walls down and allow the Ottoman forces to storm the town.

The besieged stormed out to join the attackers who were able to co-ordinate attacks from two different directions. Their aim was destroy the three siege guns. Casualties were unimportant as the loss of the town would be a huge blow to the rebellion. The guns had been positioned to fire at certain sections of the walls and as long as the Greek forces stayed out of that field of fire, the big guns could not cause casualties.

Three units of defenders prepared to charge out of the main gates as soon as they heard the firing of the relieving force. 

The siege guns were able to fire at the walls each turn rolling two dice per crewman. Hitting on a '6' only - they had to create 10 points of damage...they came very close......

 The Greeks had to neutralise the guns-  and the guns would keep firing until they had breached the walls OR the Greeks were driven off. 

Opening deployment

One of the Ottoman Siege guns

WIP- Vienna 1683.

I have been considering this for a while.
I have the Poles and I have the Ottomans.
And I've added Imperial and Bavarian Foote to play out the relief of Vienna in 1683. Many of my WSS Imperial Cuirassiers will be fine...and I have lots of them!
I need some Saxon Foote and Horse ( I might cheat and use some of my GNW Saxons...but don't tell anyone).

I guess it's one of those battles that all gamers have heard of and many have played, and I think as I have had the Ottomans for so long it's time to give it a crack.

It will mean a table with the Kahlenburg heights...and maybe a section of the walls of Vienna....and a Turkish camp.

Hmm.....time to get started.

The first of my Imperial regiments. ( I have to confess I didn't paint this unit!)