The Raid on Wallei, part two

Last night was the second game of two in the Raid on Wallei SAGA campaign. Owen, my opponent, has a video battle report on his blog. The video report on the first battle can be found here. The battle was a little strange, mainly due to the scenario. We played the Challenge scenario which would seem fine on the surface. Warlords begin the game within 4" of each other forcing them into combat on the first turn. They each have twelve wounds allowing them to survive a few rounds at least. The armies are deployed as normal on average about twelve inches behind the warlords. Our battle started with a few rouns of comabt. I was able to exhaust the Viking warlord twice, pinning him in place and getting repeated charges on him. However as I was charging with fatigue on me accompanied by lowly Ceorls (Warriors) I was consistently losing the combat. While this was going on I wasn't able to get my army into a dominant position and when my Ceorls were wiped out I was completely stopped in my tracks due to almost my entire army gaining fatigue.

Once that happened the Vikings withdrew forcing me to slowly come onto them and being whittled down in the process. The fact that I had more wounds on my warlord than my opponents allowed them to run down the clock and win by default. It was pretty annoying that the scenario allowed for this. I assume I would have still lost as I was in a bad position but the scenario should force the warlord to fight each other much more! I shall have my revenge and burn the Viking ships yet!

More Goff Boyz

Some more Goffs got finished last night. I feel like I am flying through models at the moment. The Orks have really simple schemes and while the Goffs are somewhat more involved than the Bad Moon Boyz they are still quite fast to paint. The check pattern makes these guys really distinctive in comparison to the other mob I have done. I might eventually revisit the Bad Moons to use some stronger yellow to them. I did most of them in fairly boring colours. So next thing for these guys is to get a heavy stubber in there. I never know if they are that useful but it is better to have them and not need them I guess.

Killa-Kan Mob

I got the Killa-Kan mob finished over the weekend. These are a nice addition to my small Ork army. I have inventoried what I have left to paint for them in the pile. There are two bike mobs, a Deff Kopta mob, a Battlewagon, some Nobz, and some small random bits. I want to get the Goff 'Ard Bozy finished so I will progress with them. I will probably have the Battlewagon as their transport so I will paint it black once I have the whole squad done. I want to get back to the beastmen and my Khador soon too.

SAGA news

I seem to have a lot to say about SAGA at the moment. There is an offical blog from the game developers here.It previews the Norse-Gael warband and their challenge mechanic. It sounds very interesting and gives a distinct flavour to the Norse-Gaels. There is also a description of the Franks whom I am not too interested in. The game is expanding eastwards a little and it may end up divorcing itself a little from its historical roots. The Byzantines were released in Wwargames Illustrated 301 I believe. While they would have clashed with the Rus I don't really seeing them fighting the Welsh very much. It was always something that bothered me with games like the Lord of the Rings where if you both had a good guys force you could end up playing each other. It just doesn't seem right. The most infuriating thing is having to wait to get my miniatures. I have them all sitting in a box in Ireland. You can expect to be blasted with SAGA warbands once I get my hands on them.

Friday Showcase- Ork Trukk

This model isn't finished! I am kind of cheating my putting it up on my Friday showcase. All that needs to be done is to finish the tires. However I don't want to do that without basing the model. I know that 40k vehicles don't come with a base but the model doesn't look finished until the base is done! I don't know what to use but I would like to have it similar to a normal GW base. Maybe one of the new fantasy bases would fit, something a little bigger than a chariot base. I have to find another that fits the battlewagon, that is going to be an even bigger pain!

Another Kan

The Killa-Kans paint up really quickly. I have the second one finished. It helps that I kept the paint scheme really simple. Balck and yellow go together very well and Iyanden Darksun (GW) really allows me to get great coverage really quickly. I just washed the yellow with some Gryphone Sepia (GW). This shades it down perfectly. I pick out some of the highlights in a brighter yellow. Then I add the battle damage with some red and silver. The metals are really dark as close to black as I can get them really. I do some extreme edging highlights to break up the dullness and to define the shapes. I then pick out some of the details in a bright red. The addition of some checking and that is it, really simple!

SAGA Campaign: The raid on Wallei

Having discussed SAGA on mondays post I actually managed to get a game in. I usually play Warmachine via VASSAL with Owen from Farfaraway.org on a Tuesday evening but he made an excellent module so we could play SAGA. I tried out the Anglo-Danes and I was quite pleased. The scenario is part of a small narrative campaign we will play. The first battle involved the Viking attack on an Anglo-Dane force escorting their Lords daughters to his Hall while nearby the rest of the Vikings try to overwhelm the Hall.

In 901AD a band of Norse-Gaels under the leadership of Harald Hvitbeinn are 'gone a viking' in Northumbria. Travelling up the river Ribble and its tributary the Calder the Vikings are attempting to reach the monastery of St. Paulinus and the village of Wallei. Having left their boats moored at the village of Langho Harald moved through the Crow Wood to arrive at Wallei before anyone could be alerted to his presence. Travelling to Wallei at the same time the family of Ivar Trätälja stumbled onto the Vikings just before they reached the relative safety of the village. Ivar's three daughters had been sent from York once the Scottish raids across the Ribble had been stopped. The countryside had been subdued for the most part with the saxons accepting the leadership of the Anglo-Danes. Unfortunately for them nobody had anticipated the Viking raid. Harald had no choice but to engage the armoured escort. Splitting his force in two he engaged the escort while the bulk of his force moved into the village before Ivar's Hucarls could form a defence.

Harald's son Rorik advanced on the escort as they hurried along the forest path. His Hirdmen held the centre with Bondi at both edges of his shieldwall to hold his flanks. Egill, the commander of the escort, quickly dispersed his force amongst the rough terrain. His Geburs moved up to harry the Vikings with bow shot. His Ceorls moved out to flanks the viking shieldwall while the Huscarls advanced on the Hirdmen. The daughters knowing they were in mortal danger split up and attempted to slip around the Vikings when they were engaged. Battle was quickly joined to the right and a great slaughter ensued. Rorik's impetuousness however led to the left flank breaking completely. As the Bondi on the right became embroiled in the fight they were slowly shoved backwards. Seeing this and and looming threat of the Huscarls Rorik sent his centre into the fray. These bogged down in front of the Anglo-Dane shieldwall and when the Huscarls did finally engage they were overwhelmed. Again Rorik overcommitted throwing himself into the fight. The shieldwall was defeated but the battle was already lost. Egill had moved cautiously up the centre. As more and more the the Vikings were forced to the right he concentrated on the right. The Bondi on the right were suffering poorly the attention of the Gebur. The final reserve of Hirdmen moved to disrupt the Gebur bowmen and reinforce their beleagured comrades. Egill took the chance to commit to the combat personally slaying three of the Hirdmen and throwing the entire flank into disarry. Two of Ivar's daughters slipped through the rapidly disintegrating Viking line. The third daughter was less fortunate and was captured by Rorik.

The battle was a victory for the Anglo-Danes as they managed to get two of the three objectives off of the board. In the next scenario these objectives can be used to generate an extra SAGA dice, up to the usual maximum of eight. The next scenario will be the meeting of Ivar and Harald at the village of Wallei in a Clash of Warlords scenario. The historical facts mentioned here aren't historical at all. The locations are real however and the events are possible. Wallei is the old name of Whalley in Lancashire and there is evidence of an early church or monastery on the site, most likely founded around 628AD. This would be a very likely target for a Viking raid from Dublin or Mann. Three to four ships could easily enough navigate the Ribble though I am unsure if the Calder was navigable at all. Therefore the Viking ships are moored at Langho. The area was probably densely forested, even today it seems to be much more forested than usual.

Killa-Kan

I seem to be plumbing the depths of miniatures backlog at the moment. I bought the Killa Kans when they came out. I was still enthusiastic about collecting Orks at that point. The models are great and I really wanted to have some. The metal ones were fairly boring and expensive. These are relatively cheap. I painted them up to suit the Bad Moonz rather than the Goffs. A simple black paint scheme would have been really fast to do but I wanted them to match the main part of my army. This model was fairly fast to paint up. I think it took about five hours from start to finish which for this standard seems reasonable. I didn't do much for highlights and kept the scheme very simple. The more metal the faster it goes!

One of the problems with these is that you don't really get weapon options. I would have prefered to have more rocket launchers on them but I had to arm them as shown as the box just doesn't have to options available. I guess it would only be a problem in tournaments. Putting the kits together was interesting. A lot of the pieces are fairly complex in comparison to what I expect from GW. These must have been digitally sculpted. I should get a second finished tomorrow!

The Raven's Shadow

SAGA is getting yet another four factions and I am looking forward to it. Studio Tomahawk are releasing the Ravens Shadow over the coming months. I haven't played SAGA much but a few others here in Hamburg are getting warbands together. The Irish are represented twice in the book between the Irish faction and the Norse-Gaels. The Franks and Strthclyde Welsh make up the other two factions. I am interested to see how they continue to add variance to the factions and keep the balance. At the moment there are three styles of Warband. The Normans, and soon the Franks, represent a mounted combat style. The Bretons, Scottish and Welsh represent a lightly armed skirmishing style while the rest of the factions mainly use shieldwalls. I don't see Studio Tomahawk being able to bring out any other style. The dark ages were not the most experimental when it came to warfare. So far though they have succesfully kept the game dynamic and interesting. I guess that Raven's Shadow won't be any any different.

Once I get home to Ireland next I will pick up the two hundred or so models I have there. I bought them what sems like an age ago to use as a Warhammer Ancients army. I can easily see them becoming four or five warbands soon! While the Saxons are the faction I have used I think I will go for the Anglo-Danes. I was checking through the rules for them and the main trick they have is to put fatigue on the enemy. It seems very powerful as fatigue can quickly exhaust a unit and force them to rest. The Saxon play very differently than this depending on numbers to overwhelm the opponent. I have only played against the Vikings and this makes for a bloody affair.

A Horde Arrives

I managed to finish my Gor Horde. That is the first purpose built regiment for eighth edition. Aalmost every other one I have built over the years topped out at twenty or so models, maybe I stretched it to thirty with Skaven and Goblins. There are a few spacers in there and if arranged poorly they look bad as they really look like a hole. I think it is best to put threee models on a base rather than the two I have been doing. At least that way they don't combine with any placed beside them. As arranged the regiment has a few too many gaps. Considering that I made the entire regiment from thirty models it isn't so bad. Adding in the hounds helped and I think I will do it a little more often with the rest of the regiments. I think the addition of a few themed pieces will also be goo. I went for woodland bases and as such I don't really know what to add as a filler. Some ruins might work or some small standing stones. The problem sometimes is that Beastmen on there own have a fairly weak background. As simple forces of destruction there isn't much to latch onto to add a lot of character to the army. It would be fine to have the character shown by what they have destroyed. Fillers consisting of fallen banners and corpses would be okay but in some way that distracts from the beastmen by bringing the focus onto a different army. I will paint up some of the Bestigor over the next few days and ponder what I can do with the bases.

Deamon Prince

I found this fellow lurking at the back of my storage cabinet yesterday. Wwhile I hadn't forgotten I had him I have forgotten what I wanted to use him for. I never intended collecting a Deamon army, despite having a fair few models for one. I am thinking he would make at minimum a decent giant for the beasts if not a Ghorgon. The detail is rather astounding and paiting him would take a lot of effort.... I am not sure if I should start him now I keep going with the rank and file of the Beasts of Chaos.

More Gors!

I am almost finished with my Horde. I got a good start made on all the remaning Gors on Sunday. Yesterday with some spare time and a good audio book I ploughed through four more models. This time no spacers though as you can see in the pic. There are only so many of those that can be used before it breaks up the regiment too much. I just need to get another spacer done and that is all for the Horde. I am starting to get enthusiastic about the army again. It would be nice to at least finish all the models I have bought for it, especially as that means only another ten or so Bestigor. I don't have any Hordes or Warmachine stuff outstanding except I suppose for a few Khador 'Jacks. I could just get the army finished, I made a list for the first time in years recently and while I still have about fifty models to paint for it it is now well within the realms of possibility. I would have to buy some more models which is annoying but I suppose that is the nature of the hobby.

Gor reinforcements

I took a break from painting last week. I still haven't got my motivation back and there is no point in struggling and achieving nothing. I usually just end up staring at the models for ages rather than painting them. Rome: Total War stole most of my time anyway. I am looking forward to the next one coming out. I should really get myself the second Medieval: Total War but that would completely stop me from painting. For some reason there is a great joy to be found in running down peasant revolts with heavy cavalry!

I managed to paint over the weekend and make some decent progress on the Gor horde. I am still not sure if I will finish the army but finishing the Horde would be good. I added a few hounds to the spacer bases as I have some spare and it stops the base looking so empty. I had a spare box of hounds for some reason. I have twenty already assembled so I don't know why I would have bought yet another box. I am tempted to someday run a proper regiment of hounds. They are not so much more expensive than Ungors and they are much faster. It would be an excellent deterrent for other fast cavalry and disposable regiments which seem to be very prevalent in Warhammer at the moment.

Friday Showcase - Burna Boyz

Only four Burna Boyz come in the box for some weird reason and so I only have four of them built and painted. I had intended using them as reinforcements for a Kommando squad and then I decided to just build the rest even if I don't use them. I think I have a second set buried in the unassembled pile here so that would give me eight and the possibility for a Mek. I would like to get a custom Trukk for these sometime down the line but that is just dreaming!

Beast Reinforcements

It has been a while since I painted anything for Warhammer Fantasy. I don't have much left to paint fr Warmachine and Hordes so I decided to pick something from my shelf of abandoned models. It was either the beasts or some Warriors of Chaos. These won simply because they were assembled already. I lost impetus with the Beastmen after I realised how many I had to paint to have a viable army. I guess well over a hundred models in the end. I don't know if I will ever finish them all but little by little I may. I have three more bases like this to do to add to my Gor regiment. Once they are done I will be up to thirty six models and with only four more to hit that golden number of forty I might go for it. At least then it is one regiment finished!

Goff 'Ard Boyz

I gave in. After discussing Orks for the last few months and going through my collection I couldn't resist any longer. I had saved almost all the chainsword wielding Orks from three sets of Battle for Black Reach. I was considering using them, with some conversions, as Stormboyz. I never did anything with them and they just gathered dust. Last week I started glueing some of them together adding some armour pieces so I could use them as 'Ard Boyz. I was going to continue with them as Bad Moonz but I got creative and did them up as Goffs. I just wanted to see how the cheques would work out and I think they came out fine. I have four more glued together and I might get to painting them soon. I kind of scratched the itch and I am not too motivated to continue! Maybe showing off some more of my collection will make me more eager to paint them.