Hot Lead 2012 all the rest

I have realised that I don't have time to post all the individual games in the style of the first one.
So rather than wait weeks to get them all posted, here's some brief write ups and pictures.

Game Two
I was drawn to play Francis and his Vikings. I've met Francis at numerous WAB events in the past and he assures me we've played each other on several occasions. My memory is not what it was, so he's probably quite correct.
This battle was the River Crossing scenario and I was the 1500 point attacker. I "ordered" a general advance, and rather than any complicated reforming malarkey simply splashed across the river at 1/2 rate.

 Splish, splash, splosh

 The summer sound of spear on shield

 Run away!

Let the taunting commence!

Although I seemed to spend a lot of time running away I managed to get both units of Gedrith across the water. Stupidly I charge with the mounted fellas on the last turn and what could have been a mighty victory turned into me being narrowly ahead on points.
A splendid game, with Francis receiving able assistance from his son Keiran, and Mrs Francis even making me a cup of tea. A fine way to play soldiers

Game Three
I was playing my regular nemesis Scrivs in the Attack on the Camp scenario with my fierce warband army attempting to hold onto a small palisade. It did not go well.

 Right, all we have to do is stand still...

 Yikes!

 There in't 'alf a lot of 'em

 Come back, come b...oh

 Reckon we can handle this lot

 The Spanish seize the camp

View from the other side

Scrivs, as is his wont, played very well. My Gedrith disgraced themselves and the end result was a Lots to Nil thrashing. I think Scrivs felt bad, but we had a fun game as usual. There's a report (and handsome* picture) on Scrivs Blog

Game Four
This was against Neil and I was back on the table I started on, playing against some El Cid Arabs - Almoravids in this case. We were playing the Miraculous Shrine scenario the one I'd played in my warm up game with Scrivs though due to an accounting error I was using my 1500 point army for the third time which was mildly irritating as I'd already packed the extras away (I suspect I played the wrong side in game one - so the error was probably mine).
Neil and I played Age of Arthur armies at the weekender at Maelstrom a year or so back. He won at a canter on that occasion, so wasn't expecting this to be easy. I was right.

 May Allah guide our arrows!

 Watch that flank!

 Andalusian cavalry doing what they do best

 Where are you all going?

 Nearly there

Ouch!

I almost sneaked getting more men nearest Neil's Needle (stop tittering at the back) but some well aimed javelins saw the lads off and it was a big win for Neil.
Another great fun game that saw plenty of swings back and forth and some unexpected fleeing that turned the game a couple of times. Great WAB stuff with a splendid opponent.

In the final tallying of points I wasn't quite last. John claimed moral superiority on an alphabetical basis. Martin has listed the results here.

On the way home Brother Scrivs** and I switched from setting wargaming to rights to addressing the problems of the world in general while John adopted a foetal position and let out brief mewling sounds.

Looking forward to Cold Steel already.

And a reminder if this has whetted your appetite for some one day WABbing Scrivs and I are running an event in October at Maelstrom. Details here

*opinions vary
** Scrivens-Smith and Webster-Deakin. The kind of double barrelled names you'd expect to be first against the wall come the Revolution.

Hot Lead 2012 Game One

And so, once more down to Evesham by mini for another Hot Lead at Gripping Beast Towers.
Scrivs kindly picked John and myself up and we passed the journey in the traditional manner, Scrivs and I "putting the wargaming world to rights" while John lay in the rear seat with his fingers in his ears begging us to shut up for the duration.
On arrival in beautiful downtown Evesham we played again the much loved "Hunt the Golden Arches" game that we like to use to pass the time as we've arrived too early. Several roundabouts later we were sitting in McDonalds tucking into a McHeartyRepast or somesuch and getting third degree mouth burns from the coffee.
Suitably revived we made our way back to GB Towers, only to find the gates barred against us! Fortunately, before the assembled wargames fraternity began to fight over the conch shell and make fire, Martin arrived in his car, and something vaguely resembling a heavily tatooed and even more heavily hungover member of the human race stumbled from the passanger seat and let us in. Morning Darren!

For this event I'd decided to give the Early Saxons a run out. Mainly because I'd played with the Almoravids at a few recent GB events and fancied a change. To add extra spice I also decided to use the Sea Raiders list from Age of Arthur. To make it even more exciting I decided to only write the army list at ten pm the night before the event and not play any games with the list at all. Ever. A plan without flaws I'm sure you'll agree.

So after the usual meeting and greetingI was directed to table seven to play the Abbey scenario against James and his Almohads because Martin had assumed I'd be bringing Almoravids and that would be a good and historicalish match-up. The benefits of not writing a list writ large. Ahem.

Anyway James had just flown in from the US of Stateside and so had borrowed an army. One that he'd never used before. And he'd not played any WAB since Hot lead last year. That's taking the "no preparation" approach to a whole new level. Respect. Sadly he'd been in the country for about five days, so my hopes that jet-lag would kick in half way through the game leaving me with an easy victory were to be dashed.
Actually I've played James at least a couple of times at events before and always had a good time, he's a great chap and it was nice to see him back in the country again, so I was looking forward to the game.

After some confusion sown by a nameless former owner of Wargames Illustrated I established that I was the defender and would be using my 1500pt list, attempting to stop the dastardly Arabs from annexing the church and adding a minarette or two. Though quite why my rampaging pagans were defending a church we never quite figured out.
My list was as follows
Atheling
Scop
Wiglera
15 Gedrith in light armour
8 Mtd Gedrith led by a Thegn
3x24 Geoguth
13 Skirmishing Geoguth
9 Slingers

By sticking the three foot characters in the Gedrith I was able to ensure that almost the entire army was Fierce and would be failing Warband tests on a 1 or 2. I find this helps with those tough "Shall I charge or not?" decisions.

The Almohad side had but 1000points and was a couple of large mixed units of spear and bow, some skirmishing slingers and a unit of the reliably irritating Andalusian horse.


Anyway I despatched Bob Dillaen, my Scop to defend the building, James set up his army and we were off.

 The hairy horde surges forward

 The Almohads stand firm

 Saxon horse spy their prey

 But are distracted by pesky Andalusians

 The battle-lines close

 Bob Dillaen is asked to keep the noise down

The Gedrith crash home

At this point I got all excited and forgot to take any more pictures.
In the end I managed to keep the marauding Arabs from the Abbey. Bob Dillaen acquitting himself well against the skirmishers. This was a pretty good scenario for me, my fast moving open order troops were always likely to get to the building more easily than the big Almohad blocks and I was able to keep enough troops alive to deny James a win, despite some rather hairy moments.
A good start to the day against a splendid opponent.

Hot Lead 2011 - Battle Four

And so to the final game of the day.
Before the event I had confided to my regular opponent that what I most feared facing in the An Heroic Example scenario was a tooled up Norman Lord. On a Warhorse.
So it was inevitable that my final game would have Normans as my opponents.
Still, at least I wouldn’t have any warbands with their pesky “autobreak” to worry about.
What’s that you say? First what? Oh, First Charge. How’s that work then...?

After my more forthright adventures in Snowdonia in the previous round I reverted to the horseshoe formation with the Kamel Korps on the left and my horse on the right. Carl had massed his Mounted Scary Dudes (I think that’s how they’re listed in the Shieldwall book) on his right. Meat and drink to the Kamel Korps I shouldn’t wonder.

 Phew, at least they're not warbands!

 Slow 'em down, fellas

However before we could find that out there was the small matter of Abd Inuff getting run over by the Early Medieval equivalent of a dump truck. On a warhorse.

So with the sound of Mrs Inuff’s (Abd’s mum) lamentations ringing in our ears the battle could begin. On the left the Kamel Korps managed to get a charge off against some Milites. They counter charged and the resulting overrun saw them crash into some Berbers, but at least the dreaded First Charge was now blown.

 Crunch. Stab. Die.

Sadly they still possessed sufficient Gallic flair to be able to finish off the spearmen in short order.
To the right the Berber horse narrowly lost to some light horse, but the curse of Abd Inuff’s early demise (“Give it a rest Mrs Inuff!”) meant they promptly failed the test ran off and were cut down.

  No, I can't tell the difference between these two shots, either.

Over in the centre the Black Guard too discovered exactly how and why charging knights transformed Dark Age warfare leaving but a single unit of Berbers to be chased into a wood and slaughtered.

 Ibn Coldir v Dux. On a warhorse

 Note large Ibn Coldir shaped space in front of Dux

Surrounded!

All in all not my best game. I threw my troops forward with a casual disregard for their worthless metallic lives and played right into Carl’s hands. I was also a bit on the back foot as soon as the initial challenge went against me, -1Ld is a big penalty on an army whose general is only Ld8. Nevertheless a thoroughly pleasant and entertaining way to pass ninety or so minutes, and Carl was a charming and jolly opponent.

With the four games over there was the usual wrap-up. Despite not winning a single game I’d not coughed up enough VP’s to challenge for Wooden Spoon.
(Did I ever tell you about the time I came last in a Viking Event? They gave me the Woden Spoon.)
And nor had I won either best general or best painted army (I can dream can't I?). I had also given five pounds to charity in exchange for five dice that behaved as expected and failed to win me a single thing from Lord S’s sack of goodies.

So four losses, no prizes and a long journey home to look forward to, and yet I’d had another splendid day out. So unlike Orwell I wasn’t going home bitter and disillusioned, I was going home positive and happy with my hobby. Oh to try and explain to my wife that yes, I really needed some more soldiers, and no they weren’t really that expensive and yes I would paint these ones and no they wouldn't just be going in a box in the loft and...

Hot Lead 2011 - Battle Three

Game number three and I was playing James Morris, author of the El Cid list that I was using, and the Age of Arthur list that he was using. I’ve known James for a while now, but this was possibly the first time we’d actually played a game against each other. James Welsh army looked lovely. However, being an “in period purist” the slightly incongruous “time tunnel” (not to mention geographical unlikeliness) of the game was playing on James’ mind, perhaps I would be able to take advantage!

We were playing down the length of the table in the Battle in the Pass scenario. It was on the table I’d used for the previous game with two large woods that completely blocked the centre of the valley; apparently Darren hadn’t read the scenarios when setting up the tables, so deployment would be interesting. As it happened we both refused a flank meaning we inevitably swung around the woods to meet across the board in the middle. By this stage I was getting pretty bored with my defensive style of play (to be honest, maintaining it for two whole games was something of a triumph for me, despite the losses) and I knew James would favour getting stuck in, so that’s what happened. Sadly the Kamel Korps had no horse to cause fear in and so, clearly disillusioned by this turn of events they allowed themselves to be duffed up by some Welshmen in short order. The Berber horse promptly panicked and left the table, hmmm.

 What do you mean you forgot to mount up?

 The Even Thinner Than Usual White Line

Kamels in place, Skirmishers in place - right where we want 'em!

A noticably Kamel and Skirmisher free zone

In the centre my bow fire and javelining was proving ineffectual and soon enough my archers were spooked and fled abut the place getting in Ibn Coldir’s way.
Finally the battle lines clashed and James general issued a challenge. Abd Inuff bravely stepped up to the mark, but was outmatched and made his way off to paradise, followed by a significant proportion of his men. The rest were inevitably warbanded away (James felt bad about this), though they escaped, at least temporarily – allowing James to repeat the feat in subsequent turns and his warlord to amass a quite impressive flag collection.

The Saxons close in

 

Lots of colours, lots of sizes. They'll look lovely back in the rugby club.

Over on what was now my far right the Black Guard entered into a tense stand-off with a welsh warband wisely hugging their native arboreal protection. Sure enough they failed to fail a warband test and impatience and a desire to “hand it out” meant Ibn Coldir declared a charge. Penda stepped out to accept Ibn Coldir’s challenge and was (perhaps surprisingly) cut down. The welsh, fortified by their trees held out for a couple of turns, but finally broke as the game ended, coughing up their flag and allowing Ibn Coldir to claim a small amount of pride from the debacle.

Penda braces himself for an Ibn Coldir one liner

So, on balance a more aggressive style of play had, as expected, resulted in a rather heavier defeat. But it made for a good fun game. James army looked fab and he was a pleasure to play with.

Hot Lead 2011 Battle Two

Game two and I would be playing against Mark with his AoA early Saxons. The scenario was Hereditary Enemies so we diced for which units would have hatred. Inevitably my skirmishers were one of my units infected, but the Black Guard came good and was my second unit so blessed. Worryingly Marks Gedrith and a unit of Duguth both drew the hatred card, making already tough Warband units even harder.

Nevertheless I stuck to my plans and once again deployed well back in a horseshoe. The camels and horses were despatched to the flanks to try and march bock/distract in hopes that the archers and skirmishers would thin Mark’s ranks sufficiently that my spear blocks might at least stand a chance…

The Thin White Line

Initially things went to plan, however my shooting proved ineffective and Mark clearly wasn’t in the mood to fail any warband tests, so was able to advance on my static positions as he wished (I was hoping he’d fail some and chase my skirmishers into the woods leaving me free to gang up on his Gedrith).

Be Veeewy Qwiet, I'm hunting Saxons

 

In the rear some skilful shooting meant my horsemen were wiped out without really contributing and the Kamel Korps were slowly whittled down to ineffectiveness.

My bowmen were charged by Pictish cavalry, but managed to hang in for a couple of rounds of combat, blocking the Saxon advance, and leaving the horsemen vulnerable to my javelins when they finally did expire

Tougher than expected...

 

Finally Mark was able to unleash his charges and although the Berbers and Black Guard fought bravely I’d not managed to reduce their numbers sufficiently, so charging Saxons Warbands with added hatred had the inevitable autobreak consequences and Ibn Coldir’s men were once again defeated.

Worryingly intact warbands advance

In retrospect I should probably have used the horse and Kamels sacrificially to try and pull Mark’s battle line apart and open up some flank charges, or at the very least charged the Saxons before they charged me to draw the warband sting a bit.

Despite the result it was another great game and Mark was a splendid opponent.

Next stop Mrs Miggins Slap-Up Feed!

Hot Lead 2011 - Battle One

And so once more I set forth to Beast Towers full of joy, hope and youthful optimism, kind of like George Orwell on his way to the Spanish Civil War. Would I return as beaten, embittered and disillusioned as him? My regular readership (thank-you both) can probably guess the answer, if you’re new here – read on to find out!

The journey down was largely uneventful, although Scriv’s Sat. Nav. took objection to being asked to locate a McDonalds for breakfast and took us on an entertaining and informative tour of the less travelled environs of greater Evesham.

Fortified (if that’s quite the word) by pancake, maple syrup and processed pork produce we arrived in plenty of time to locate tables, opponents and old chums. I was drawn to play Ian, who I’d not met before and had some form of Saxon Shieldwall army (Mercian?) with some scary looking Viking allies. Martin had prepared some cunning scenarios and we would be playing Watch Your Flanks for this game. I’d given this some thought, so kept my mounted troops in reserve and placed my spear blocks in a horseshoe shape in the centre of the board at my table edge. Come and get me…

Try getting past this, Infidels!

Unfortunately although I’d given it some thought I’d apparently not given it much reading, with a result that my cavalry came on inside my defensive horseshoe, disrupting my clever plan and generally getting in the way.

Out of the way you fools!

Fortunately for me it was not all going Ian’s way either. His flank force took a while to turn up and in the meantime he charged one of my spear blocks with a cavalry unit. Some lucky javelining and some poor dice rolls later and they were fleeing and would play no further part in the battle! Meanwhile in back field my tribal skirmishers were dealing with the Saxon archers, my plan seemed to be working!

Steady, warriors of Allah!

On my comand, unleash heat seeking javelins!

Random shot of Andy v James on the adjacent table. Niiice!

However Ian’s forces were closing in, particularly his fearsome looking Vikings who eventually crashed into one of my units of Berbers. Ulp! Imagine my surprise when they proved to be armed with comedy foam swords and rubber spears and Ibn Coldir’s regulars were able to beat them and run them down!

 It's all going too well...

 Send them to Valh-Allah!

Not wanting to let this success go to my head I spent the last turn reorganising my forces to what seemed like a safe position, confident that my spear block on the right could handle the onrushing warbands.
Sadly, however, I am used to playing my games of WAB using either El Cid or AoA, the first of which doesn’t feature warbands, the second of which modifies their rules. So to my horror the Berber block succumbed to the dreaded “autobreak” rule and fled from the board, taking their Sayid, Abd Inuff with them and turning a 300 point winning position into a 40 or so point loss!

A great fun game with a good guy opponent. I felt I’d actually played pretty well and was annoyed with myself for not remembering about warbands and autobreak, though to be fair I remembered in subsequent games but was unable to find an effective counter.