Anne's Double Triple Secret Giveaway + Inter Arma Playtest

1. Anne's Giveaway

Behold, by the powers of the Internet, here is shared the news of Anne's blog having a magnificent giveaway. Find it with the rules here. Mandatory info: This give away is being sponsored in part by author Patrick Hatt. You can find Mr. Hatt's Amazon Writers Page at http://www.amazon.com/Pat-Hatt/e/B00AGFMYVC.

2. Inter Arma 2x Level 2 Commanders Playtest. 
I've set up five different skirmish lists for playing Inter Arma and was trying to see the outcomes of putting up those against each other. The parties would have two level 2 commanders (35 points on an Infantry and 58 on a Cavalry commander). The starting lot was the Swedish cavalry patrol with commanded musketeers:

Scratchbuilding frenzy - the Jazygian Campaign

The house was empty for a week so I planned a massive gaming event, the table was set 24/7 and battles raged to save or capture the mountain land of Jazygia. I could not document the gaming sessions though because the 'good' camera was taken by the family to their trip.

Few words of mighty Jazygia: a sort of Balkanian state, her leader is Ebhard Magnutörk, Great Prince. The country is just after a war with Ahbania to the west and the main armed forces are divided. The aggressor Visigothians plan a combined attack through a bridgehead and a shallow river crossing with boats and whatnot. The bad guys were the Strelets KuK infantry featured earlier. They were stopped at the capital but had some great losses before.

Obviously for an early WW2/1930s setting I could not use the armor and other equipment I had around - time to improvise. I had glue and paper and scratch. So what I put together is:

2 monoplanes
3 armored cars
2 tanks
1 APC
2 cannons
4 MG pill boxes

The whole lot with figures for comparison

One Page Fleets Seafarers mod

I have been tinkering with the OPF rules for a while. It's a solid little ruleset and very easy to play, but it needs some work to make it better. Here are the links through which you can access both the original version and the one modified by me. I have not made major changes in game mechanics and mostly copied the integral parts of the original set to have it on one page, as its title advertises.

Here is the link for the original One Page Fleets rules.

Here is the link for the modified rules for naval use.

A mighty battle rages between pirates and a convoy guarded by three frigates.

During the playtest the rules have proven effective. We fought a frigate duel to try different riggings and the battle above where we covered the basics.

Martian Rebellion Campaign Ep. 2. - Zaqasdari Incursion

The united Martian-Terran fleet has to cope with the xeno threat. The battlefield is kind of 'hard terrain' with a large asteroid field and an ancient shipwreck occupying the centre. 

The Zaqasdari have a slight disatvantage in points which they make worse by moving in linear formation. The opposing fleets station on the two sides of the asteroid field and plan to launch their fighter squadrons throughout the field impassable for larger units.

Two small notices before continuing: first to welcome Warlord Paul, the 77th follower, and to tell I am not entirely sure I will be able to finish this campaign because I plan other uses for the Lego material involved - an Age of Sail naval game along the lines of One Page Fleets. Working on some terrain right now, well perhaps I could scratchbuild some ships too.

Martian Rebellion Campaign Ep. 1 - Viribus Unitis

The Martian Red Fleet was well prepared for an attack of the Terrans. They knew too well the conflict won't end peacefully this time. However the fleet commanders did not favor the violence with which the Overseers met, there was just enough patriotism in them to launch the fleet, trying to intercept the Terran attack. 

That attack came soon enough. 

The Terran centre of battlecruisers moves forward slowly.

Tiger Hunt

Brought the freshly painted Tigers to battle against a Russian tank column. 2 Tigers vs. a KV-1, a T-34/76, a T-26 and a BT-5. One Russian tank actually survived.

The Tigers were looking for positions when the T-26 intercepted them. Caring little about it the Germans pushed forward and engaged with the main Soviet force. The first casualty was the BT-5, it went out with a large boom.

The Tigers changed positions quickly and took out the  KV-1 as it was too slow to turn and was caught in its rear. The remaining two then failed the morale test and then the re-roll. 

The T-26 was lucky enough to get off the table but with a long shot one of the Tigers destroyed the T-34. Was it Tiger Hunt or Tigers Hunt now?

Inter Arma 'The Valley' campaign concludes

Part 1 is here; Part 2 is here.

Most of the bandits defeated in the area (or so they thought), our adventurers sat down around a campfire and began thinking about further matters. 

The end of this convent was that they would attack the BBEG in the northern mountains and deal with him/her/it forever. 

The room was too dark and most of my homemade equipment is shown below on the photos. We played two WW2 games and a quick course of SDS (Sharpe's got beaten after shooting 4 Frenchmen, nothing to be seen) but then I dropped the camera and the memory card fell out, so no pictures to be found. Shame. The use of the camera flash, on the other hand, gives these photos a good old-fashioned look.

Arriving at the lair, a pack of cultists was beaten easily, the boss not so much. Sadly, in the moments of action, I missed the photos of the big bird. Because, well, he was the mastermind of all this robbing and thieving and murder. As I said there.

A level 6 Magic user has a lot of tricks, especially when he can fly too. The Boss Bird knocked the melee fighters back, exchanged bolts of magical energy with the party's mage, Disoriented the Paladin, then wounded two party members in one turn... Then he took a fatal hit and fell. A short but sweaty fight.

However, a magic automatism, as soon as the Boss Bird died, blew the horns up the mountains and a large group of cultists, bandits and dentists launched their final attack on the Valley. 

Here's a welcome to Mike Reynolds a.k.a. The Dark Templar, many awesome things going on his blog.

70 followers, another nice number, and so close to 20,000 hits too, sometimes I believe I achieved things. 

Inter Arma and tanks

More of the endless play-tests, but this time with tanks. The secret 7th addidion to the rulebook will be the 'modern and armored' combat regulations. Including tanks. Surprisingly, I have some tanks so I decided to run a really quick test how they act in combat.

Germans

1x Pz38t, Light armor, Light gun

1x PzIV, Medium armor, Medium gun

Soviets

1x BT-7, Light armor, Light gun

1x T-34, Medium armor, Heavy gun

The situation can be seen above: the German armor arrives from two different directions, the Skoda behind the house and goes for the stone wall in the middle of the field, and the PzIV has to cross the bridge before engaging.

Inter Arma campaign session 1. - The valley

Gameplay on Saturday's campaign. Never had the opportunity to play this part of the rules, now I've had enough players. See the map of the environment above.

Viking Village Vendetta!

So Christmas activities, family together and whatnot, it seemed just right to have a classic Viking-style showdown on the dining table. Jarl Bjarni's goats were stolen by Jarl Eirik Storrison's men, who were a tad hungry and set up a feast as soon as they got home on their longship. 

The table featured a wooded hill, a longhouse (of wooden bricks apparently, as I ran out of glue and didn't want to make a cardboard one anyway), a river and a longship for decoration and some walls at the end of the longhouse's yard. 

The hungry Vikings drink a lot of ale too. Scenario rules:  only three men can leave the house in one turn. Each rolls an 'intoxication level' dice, 1 means the man's completely smashed, 2-3 means he has to roll direction dice after every move.

Playing with the new brigades

Testing the new brigades I painted in the weekend. I played the Fricklander vs. my brothers, the Crontaineviller generals,

Games Day part III - Retreat from Moscow

The last post on the Games Day topic is the game I participated in, a little scenario played with 28mm figs and the Song of Drums and Shakos rules. The French had to get their carriage through the table and the Russian Cossacks and Jäger planned an ambush to stop them. 

I played the French with a lot of support from the hosts then I picked up the pace, it was an interesting but time-consuming game and I had to leave it hanging in the air after two hours.

Out of courtesy I shot photos only while the enemy (the Russians) were moving so maybe I missed some of the action, here it is anyway:

Games Day part II - the inspiration

A follow-up on yesterday's post, this one to show all the eye-candy and tables I could visit.

Napoleonic battle between Brits and French: the British are enhanced with cola. There weren't any players around and it was like that for the rest of the day, sadly for me.

From the tables and the vendors I wandered to the competition table, and have been amazed by the quality of work. 'Army' category above.

Inter Arma gameplay - Fight for the keep

21 knights plus 3 archers against two warbands of 15 Vikings who tried to take the castle and the village. The keep is quite a centerpiece on the table; most of the knights were placed inside and couldn't move until the sentries had a sight of the attackers, and then they could only leave the keep in groups of five.

The sentries couldn't spot the attackers until they were close.  Trusting in their comrades' strenght, most of the foot knights getting out of the castle started running westwards to the woods, from where the second warband launched its attack, but their heavy armor slowed them down occasionally.

Welcome to Archduke Piccolo, thanks for dropping by; this also means the blog has hit 30 followers for which I am grateful for all of you!

Inter Arma playtest - knights vs. highwaymen

A group of highwaymen set up a trap in the woodlands, but they're trying to rob the wrong target: two knights with a retinue of five. 

The knights couldn't spot the enemy lurking in the woods until they've ran into the roadblock set up by two armored bandits and a third without chainmail. The foot soldiers quickly followed them and a melee began.

The cavaliers broke through the three bandits and attacked them in the back, killing one immediately.

Gold of the Vikings deathmatch

 Been playing a round of matches with my ruleset (named Gold of the Vikings as it is mostly about looting) this weekend.
Cards for the game here, one pack for initiative, one pack for ambush, one pack for close combat. The other two are for blessings of the gods and morale. As it is more often played against non-player opponents, we rolled the dice to decide who pulls them.

 Ruleset, only 10 pages, most of it covering the card text. I made the cover picture with a Bayeux tapestry customizer flash thingie, but don't know the source, searched through a bunch of websites until I finally found one.

 Round 1, Viking vs. Viking #2. I set up a shield wall, separated the command and bodyguards plus the berserker and three archers.

Before going on, I'd like to welcome the newest regular reader, The Angry Lurker... I just started following his blog and he returned the favor, I guess

Testing my rules #1

This time it was a scenario. The very first play test had bloody results as there were much high-class units (well lead and trained) and there were a lot of officers (giving bonus morale) resulting in a very few routs.

In this game, Jackewline (above) side had to fend off the two regiments quartered in their territory. The enemy troops had a very few officers compared to their army size, and were of low value (a class 2 chasseur regiment, a class 2 chevaux-légére squadron, a class 1 militia regiment, a battalion of class 3 guard chasseurs against a regiment of class 4 green grenadiers, two battalions of red guard grenadiers and a battery of field artillery).

Initial setup, the Jackewlinese moving in columns.

Screenshot selection for Cossacks - Back to War

I love this game because it is - mostly - realistic... well, not as the following up American Conquest or Napoleonic Wars, but it has a great variety of choices, even editor, where I can play my own little campaigns... The AI is quite dumb though (for a certain scale: like 2-3 AI players set to very hard are still beatable with 1 human player, but with more than 3 they simply overwhelm one).

An army ready to battle is always nicer than an army in a fight - at least because of the less smoke. There are overall three different formations for both cavalry and infantry.