Hadwin Returns

Last night I reprised the Saga scenario I reported on here. This was the last Trumpeter meeting before the convention at the end of March, and I wanted to have one more go at it before I host the game there.

As is normal in Saga, it was a bloodbath. The result was very close - the Picts resigned close to the end of the allotted time, but I think the VPs would have been close to even, despite the casualties.

Vikings mass on one side of the river, Picts on the other.

The first band of Viking Warriors race across the ford and attack the
 Picts in and around the near building, but are rebuffed 
without casualties on either side.

Reinforcements from the neighbouring farm race across the farmstead to engage the Vikings on their left.

More Vikings fight across the river, but the Picts hold fast and prevent them from gaining a foothold on the near bank.

The Viking Warlord enters the ford, while his Berserkers
slog across through the deeper water.

A band of Viking Hearthguard achieve the far side of the bank, but the Pict Warlord and his Hearthguard race forward
on ponies to intercept.

On the other flank, the Vikings have smashed the defending Pict Levy and gained the bank.

The Pict reinforcements race to stop the Vikings.

The Vikings have destroyed a unit of Pict Warriors and surge across the ford, but the Pict Warlord and his Hearthguard
still stand between them and the main building.

The Viking and Pict Warlords face each other at the bank.

The Pict Warlord and his reduced Hearthguard still hold fast on the other side.

The Viking Warlord and his berserkers manage to kill the Pict Warlord.

In the final act of the Saga, the Pict Warlord and the Viking Warlord exchange blows over several activations,
but the Viking eventually manages to slay the Pict and the Picts surrender.

New Year Catch-up: Vikings and Picts

I have been a bit neglectful of my phlog recently, so it's time for a bit of a catch-up with some of the miniatures I have been painting recently.

First up, my 15mm Vikings and Picts for Saga:

Some loot objectives for the Vikings: some freshly-captured "wives", chests of booty, and a cart full of beverage.

Some loot objectives for the Vikings: some freshly-captured "wives", chests of booty, and a cart full of beverage.

Viking Warlords.

Viking Warlords.

The whole Viking band together - 6 units of Hearthguard, 3 units of Warriors,  and 2 Warlords.

Some Pictish reinforcements: a unit of mounted Hearthguard, with a mounted Warlord.

Some Pictish reinforcements: a unit of mounted Hearthguard, with a mounted Warlord.

I finished painting these guys ages ago, but I can't remember what I have already photographed for the phlog, so here are a bunch. The total forces comprise four 4-point warbands, two Viking and two Pict, with some extra units available in case I want to change things up a bit. The Picts are all Splintered Light figures (very nice) and the Vikings are Khurasan (also very nice), with the exception of the loot-hauling objective counters, which are Peter Pig (also very nice). I have a few more objectives that are awaiting paint, including some priestly types.

The Saga of Hadwin Hairy-Breeches

I ran a 4-way game of Saga at the club on Friday, using my new board and a scenario I devised for it:



The Saga Of Hadwin Hairy-Breeches


Uncertain loyalties rule the day when Hadwin Hairy-Breeches and his half-brother, Snorri Most-Beard, raid a Pictish farmstead. The brothers haven't stopped sniping at each other since they left their home fjord, but the heat of battle will test their familial ties once and for all. Defending the farm is an equally divided band of Picts - how far can Drosten the farmer trust in the aid of Onuis, his neighbor, when Onuis has made no secret of his lust for Drosten's lands?

Hadwin Hairy-Breeches
It’s time for some new wives! You have traveled across the vicious seas for days, and you have one thing in mind: capture some slaves to bring home for sale. Your half-brother, Snorri, though, has been argumentative and disrespectful for the whole journey. He would bear watching.
Plunder victory points:
Each unit that stays in contact with one of the buildings in the farmstead (that is not occupied by fighting men) for one full turn may capture its inhabitants. Each batch of inhabitants you carry off the board (by any edge) gives you +3 VP.

Snorri Most-Beard
It has been nearly a year since your last raid, and you can already feel the red mist descending. But here’s Hadwin again, trying to tell you - you! - what to do and how to fight, just like when you were children. Well, you didn’t come all this way to line his pockets with slaves and plunder. You came here to do one thing: wet your sword and dance in the flames.
Savagery victory points:
Each unit that stays in contact with one of the buildings in the farmstead for one full turn may light that building on fire, OR slaughter its non-combatant inhabitants. You may not slaughter the inhabitants of a building if that building is on fire. Each burnt building or group of slaughtered inhabitants gives you +2 VP.

Drosten The Farmer
The northmen have come! You have secured the women and children in the hall and outbuildings, but the walls are thin and the thatch is dry. You have sent for help from Onuis over the hill, but he’s had designs on your lands for years, and you don’t know how far you can trust him. There’s only one thing to do: muster your men and try to keep the northmen from stealing or destroying everything you value.
Preservation victory points:
Each building in the farm that remains intact, with living inhabitants, by the end of the battle, earns you +3 VP.

Onuis The Farmer
A breathless messenger has just arrived from Drosten’s farm over the hill: the northmen have come! Honor requires you to ride to his aid, but Drosten has been sneaking his sheep onto your pastures for years and thumbing his nose at you in council. And besides, your son is of age and needs land if his own. Perhaps you can offer help, while advancing your own interests at the same time...
Betrayal victory points:
Each group of Drosten’s people that is kidnapped or slain by the northmen grants you +3 VP (no, you may not kidnap or slay them yourself), but each of his buildings that burns costs you -2 VP.





I had four people who wanted to play (including my lovely wife), so I just refereed the game. Here's how it went:

A band of bloodthirsty Northmen appear and charge across the ford.

Onuis and his liegemen arrive and charge on ponies to head off the Northemen at the right ford.

A band of Pict warriors manage to beat back the first wave of berserkers, but at great cost... only three remain, and
another group of Northmen mass across the stream!

Javelin-armed levy mass in the centre of the farmstead, near to Drosten, and shielded somewhat by a
small group of hearthguard.

The bigger picture: it's a small board, but works just fine for a 4-way game.

Northmen mass at the right ford and begin to charge across, as their Jarl and hearthguard wade across the
deeper part of the stream.

More fighting at the left ford as Onuis's troops rush to support.

Back at the right ford, Onuis and his mounted hearthguard splash into the stream to beat up on some
Northmen, while the warriors follow on foot.

Two groups of Northmen hearthguard - one of them berserkers - have been lurking around the far side
of the board all game, but now decide to wade into the stream and get into the fight.

Northmen gain the other side of the ford and get ready to beat off another Pict attack. 

Likewise, several Northmen have made it across the stream on the right side and things are getting
bloody. Onuis has ridden around behind them and has them somewhat surrounded.

One group of Northmen warriors manages to make it - barely - to the hall, but they are smashed before
they can take any prisoners. Meanwhile, the battle around the woodpile has been going on for
quite a while, with a lot of blood spilled on both sides, and several inconclusive battles
between Hadwin and Drosten.

More Northmen cross the left ford, but they have a lot of Picts arrayed against them.

Some of the Northmen, however, manage to make contact with the two small outbuildings and
slaughter the inhabitants, then set the buildings afire.

The Northmen at the left ford, having created all the havoc they came to create, retreat in good order
back across the ford.

At the end of the game, Drosten's troops were slain to a man (though one Hearthguard managed to survive for turn after turn against terrible odds... the future subject of an epic poem, perhaps?), but he had managed to put a lot of hurt onto the Vikings. A few of Onuis's troops remained, having mostly fought on the right side against Hadwin. Hadwin lost a lot of troops, but he survived and had the distinction of killing both of the opposing warlords. Snorri lost a few men and killed a few men, but he was the one who was most able to achieve his aims, burning and murdering the inhabitants of two of the three buildings.

I thought the rules worked quite well for a 4-player game. The learning curve is a fairly steep for people to just pick up the game and be confident in playing it, because the battle boards are a bit much to absorb all at once. My lovely wife thought that she would enjoy the game a lot more after having played it a few times, when she would have a better idea of what each warband was capable of and how their abilities worked.

Also, next time I should remember to bring some fatigue counters, so we don't have to use her knitting stitch markers!

Saga: Pictish Village!

It has been a loooong time since my last update, but I haven't been idle. I have been thinking about building myself a "permanent" board, i.e. one where all the terrain is built-in, rather than placed depending on the game, for ages. This summer I decided to finally get about it and planned out a 2x2 Pictish village for my 15mm Saga games.

This board has been in progress since mid-summer, working on it a bit here and a bit there. I had to learn some new techniques to build it - pouring an epoxy-resin river, for one - and I'm pretty happy with the results.

There are still a few things that need to be done before it's totally finished. I have more trees to make (what you see here is about half of what I have), the small buildings need doors, and I'd like to put some gaffer tape around the edges to make it look a little cleaner. It's play-able at this point, though, so I'm going to bring it to the Trumpeter club meeting this Friday.

I have a ton of new miniatures for the game as well, but photos of them will have to wait until a later date!

15mm Dux Brit: Movement Trays

I had my first game of Dux Britanniarum with Bryan this weekend. I may post some photos I took of the game in progress on Bryan's nice new custom terrain board, but I don't have them ready quite yet.

One thing that became clear in the process of playing is that using some movement stands for my miniatures would speed things up a great deal. When you're shuffling 5 groups of 6 figures around, that's a lot of fiddly little men to have to deal with.

So:

I got a 3/4" drill bit and used some styrene card to make 6 of these stands. I won't say the process was fun, as cutting the holes was really fiddly and clumsy, and I ended up with a lap-full of tiny plastic shreds that stick to everything with static. Hopefully they will be useful though.

Saga: Battle At The Ford

Saga: Battle at the Ford

I finally managed to get my 15mm Picts onto the table on Friday. Bryan and I have been making big plans for playing both Saga and Dux Brittaniarum with the Dark Ages figures we've been working on, so it was good to see them blooded at last.

I was in command of the Picts (using the Scots faction from Saga), while Bryan was in charge of the Anglo-Danes. We were "arguing" over a bridge and a ford that crossed a river.

Anglo-Danes arrayed for battle!

Picts arrayed for battle!

The starting dispositions - the majority of both forces set to contest the bridge on the right, with smaller detachments to attack the ford on the left.

We both weighted our forces more heavily to the bridge side than the ford side, maybe because the bridge looked more impressive than the ford. As it turned out, though, most of the decisive action was on the left, ford side.

The Pict left flank, with a large group of warriors skulking Pictishly in the woods!

The Anglo-Danes attacked across the ford first, which set the tone for the whole fight. The Scots faction in Saga is fairly defensive, and they can do a lot more damage when attacked than when they are the attackers. My warriors killed half the Hearthguard without suffering any losses, and pushed them back across the river. More back-and-forth followed in the succeeding turns, with that group of warriors suffering very few casualties but inflicting a lot of pain on the Anglo-Danes.

Anglo-Danish Hearthguard advance on the Left-flank ford, but are rebuffed by the Picts who catch them up to their waists in water.

On the bridge side it went the other way; I got the first charge in with my Thanes, but they got pretty badly beat up. The one remaining Thane ran away and hid behind the woods so I didn't lose his unit, which would have reduced my dice pool.

A lot more waffling occurred around the bridge until the final turns, when most of the Anglo-Dane manpower had been chewed up on the ford side and a crossing looked more possible.

The Pict warlord advances onto the bridge on the right, surrounded by his Thanes.

Anglo-Danes step forward to meet the Picts.

At the end of the fight both of our armies were still on the field, but I had a bunch of Picts on the far side of the river, earning me victory points, while the Anglo-Danes had none on my side. My warlord declared Pictory and we all had a feast.

Final dispositions: Pict Warriors and Levy across the river on the left, Thanes and Warlord across the bridge on right.