Author: Jeremey

Wars of the Roses – Battle of Stoke Field – Battle Report

Although we were only going to play the Battle of Stoke Field as a tie breaker if the main campaign ended in a draw. We thought for completeness we should play the battle.  The Lancastrians were definitely playing for the last scrap of honour they could muster with this battle having already lost the campaign.
Reading about the battle we decided for Stoke Field, the Yorkists should have at least half their army made up of mercenary and militia units to represent bringing together a rebel army. While for the Lancastrians, half of their army would start on the players baseline to simulate the King’s forces arriving late to the battle. Although not a big battle historically we decided to go big with 1000 points per side, with each side divided up into two commands. Stephen and Andy took up command of the Lancastrians (well Tudor) forces, while Tony G joined me to share the Yorkist (well Rebel) army.

I arrayed my forces in typical fashion with the archers in the front and infantry behind. When we play these high points games I normally have to bring everything I have painted, so I also brought my mercenary pike block and a fair bit of cavalry in the form of Mounted knights and currours. I put the pike block on the right and all of the cavalry on the left to try and outflank the enemy.

Tony G went for a similar deployment, Tony was facing Stephen as the Tudor King who had to deploy right at the far edge of the battlefield. I was facing Andy who had deployed as far forward as permitted.

Very much like the historical battle this meant that within the fist activation of units Andy and I were already in bow range before the King had even got moving. The initial exchange of arrows saw the Yorkists inflict more damage, but didn’t come away unscathed.

Some favourable activation dice also allow the Yorkist currours to quickly advance on the flank and threaten the Lancastrian archers. I’ve used this tactic in a number of battles. The cavalry cannot be ignored so I often find they end up drawing units away from the front line. Andy moved some archers to contest the cavalry, but I decided to be bold and charged my cavalry in.

The charge worked and first blood went to the Yorkists. This was to be the start of a trend on the Yorkist left. With four cavalry units the Lancastrians were in for a hard time having brought no cavalry of their own.

Meanwhile on the Lancastrian left Stephen had started to move his forces forward, but the dice were not being kind and so the advance was somewhat piecemeal.

Back on the Yorkist left and emboldened by the initial cavalry success I decided to continue the charges. These were not as successful, Andy’s archers managed to hold off one attack and he had brought forward his billmen units to halt a further charge.

The deployment for the game ended up turning it into a battle of two distinct halves. The Yorkists forces on their left had manage to almost wipe out the Lancastrian archers and had engaged in several rounds of melee combat with the cavalry charges, while on the Yorkist right not a single dice had been rolled in anger.

I had suggested to Tony as my fellow commander to just wait for Stephen’s forces to advance and not worry about moving forward to engage. With the unique activation system in Sword and Spear armies can often find themselves breaking up during an advance if the dice are not being kind.

On the Yorkist left the cavalry charges continued the Currours continued to be locked in combat but the first of the mounted knights pushed through a unit of billmen and charged off in pursuit of the fleeing Lancastrians.

Seeing the Lancastrian casualties mount up I suggested to Tony to ditch the idea of setting up a defence and to take the fight to Stephens forces. Losing no time Tony got his archers into range and started the customary exchange of arrows.

Tony like me had moved his cavalry into a position of harassment on the right. Stephen had attempted to get his crossbows to within firing range but the restrictions on Crossbows not being able to move and fire hampered his efforts. But Tony decided to follow my example and charge in his currours. Unfortunately the Yorkist fortunes had turned and the cavalry were halted.

Tony soon sent in his other unit of currours but it wasn’t enough and the Lancastrian crossbows had prevailed. But the rest of the Yorkist forces on the right were starting make an impression, adding to the growing Lancastrian loses.

Not wanting to wait for the archery duel to play out Tony charged in some billmen, but they could not dislodge the enemy archers. To counter Stephen charged in his highlanders but they were checked in turn by Tony’s infantry.

After what seemed an age Stephen finally managed to move his three large units of pikes in to melee, this was certainly not to little, but it was too late. The Lancastrian forces had already passed their first morale check, which saw a number of units suffer a loss of strength. They failed to destroy the archers giving me time to move my own pike block into the melee.

The Lancastrian cavalry woes continued over on their right flank. The Yorkist knights had managed to defeat several billman units and were running rampant behind the Lancastrian front line.

Tony continued his assault and managed to defeat the last of the Kings archers pushing them over their break point and handing victory to the Yorkist cause. As the last of the turn was played out the Lancastrians suffered yet more units destroyed despite committing more of their forces in an attempt to even the score.

Stephen’s pike blocks had managed to destroy a the unit of archers with a second unit reducing the Yorkist pike block to half strength.

The Lancastrian Highlanders fought hard with a bonus dice in the melee to try and push aside some of Tony’s billmen, but it ended in stalemate.

In the centre of the field I’d made the mistake of putting a bonus dice on my crossbows (crossbows can’t use bonus dice for shooting attacks), and neither did they have a valid target, so with nothing to lose I charged them into the flank of the pike block. It was far closer than it should have been and the crossbows took the pike block to just two remaining strength points, losing only one themselves.

And thus ended the turn and the battle. This was a really interesting fight with mine and Andy’s forces engaged in the fight from turn two, on one side of the battlefield, while on the other side Stephen and Tony’s forces did not even exchange missile fire until around turn five. By that time the Lancastrians had almost reached their first army morale point. Things could still have been turned around but being so far behind in casualties gave the Yorkists forces a morale boost and the confidence to throw caution to the wind and step up the attacks.

The Lancastrians retreated from this final battle adding to what had been a disastrous campaign, but historically the Lancastrians lost more of the major battles during the war they just managed to win the important ones, sadly that wasn’t to be this time round.

Yorkist Loses
3 Units of Currours (12 points)
1 Unit of Billmen (4 points)
3 Units of Militia Archers (9 points)
Total loses 25 points (Army break point 57)

Lancastrian Loses
1 Unit of Crossbows (3 points)
5 Units of Billmen (20 points)
10 Units of Longbows (30 points)
3 Units of Dismounted Men at Arms (12 points)
Total loses 65 points (Army break point 55)

 

Work in Progress Wednesday

Welcome to another Work in Progress Wednesday, we’re starting with lots of rocks this week. I bought a bag of 3D printed bits from Beowulf Miniatures at the Cavalier Wargames show, and really didn’t know what I would use them for. In the bag was a large oval hex covered base. So I surrounded it with black foam rocks.

I also made some more rock outcrops, just need to add some dry brushing to these. I also finished painting some more 3mm sci-fi buildings.

Moving on and Tony F has been busy creating some road junctions, hedges and trees for his 6mm forces.

Sticking with Sci-fi and Mark J has been painting up some raised platforms for his forthcoming Legions Imperialis game.

And last but by no means least Stephen has put together and old model of a UH1 helicopter as a crash site for a Vietnam game.

And with that we will see you next Wednesday.

Work in Progress Wednesday

Welcome to another work in progress Wednesday. We start this week with Tony F and a toy bin lorry. With a little bit of re-painting work it looks really good next to a 28mm miniature.

Moving on we have an eclectic mix from Stephen this week, starting with some buildings intended for a WW2 setting, showing them both whole and destroyed.

Then we have a hot wheel Speeder from Star Wars, hard to tell the scale on this but I believe it will be fine for 15mm.

And finally from Stephen we have some more aliens, this time Grayson Grey a Grisian from the planet Gris, and an unpainted field researcher from Betelgeuse

Mark J has continued working on more Legions Imperialis miniatures, this time some Solar Auxillia.

Sticking with the Legions Imperialis theme and Felix has been painting a Reaver Titan.

And lastly for this week I’ve been painting some rocks. These were cut from a foam Yoga block and painted black.

I then applied a gloss varnish so they had a shine to them, they will work any scale miniatures, here we have them with both 3mm and 28mm miniatures.

And with that we will see you next week.

Work in Progress Wednesday

It’s another Wednesday and for a change let’s start this week with my efforts. Above we have some new 3mm sci-fi buildings from Brigade Models that I’ve started to paint up. Primed them in grey but don’t want to just do grey concrete so will need to experiment with different colours.

Next up some finished ships from John La for his Anglo Dutch wars fleet.

Next up a random direction change for Stephen who has decided to paint up some troopers with a 3D printed Vader and Tardis. Yes we know the torments that awaits him for mixing up franchises!

Moving on and although he’s missed Christmas Tony F has managed to snag some bargain bin mini trees. They come pre frosted but Tony decided to spray them green.

This worked out quite well as the white frosted parts added some contrast when sprayed. He now has a sizable forest.

And last but not least this week Mark J has made more progress on his Legions Imperialis miniatures, this time some Alpha Legion vehicles.

And with that we will see you next week.

Work in Progress Wednesday

Welcome to another work in progress Wednesday post. We start this week with some armour from Mark J for a cold war gone hot game.

And sticking with the armour theme Mark has also started painting a titan for Legions Imperialis.

Moving on and Peter M has been creating some more sci-fi scenery.

Peter has taken various toys and some 3D printed terrain pieces combining them to make new terrain features.

We have something a little different now from Marcus. He’s been scratch building a 6mm ship from Lego and various domestic plastic pieces, be interesting to see how this turns out.

Stephen has been busy painting up some converted miniatures to populate a sci-fi bar he is creating. It’s going to be a villainy and scum type of establishment apparently.

And last but not least for this week I’ve finished some 3mm and 6mm mechs. I’m using the 6mm mechs as heavy mechs for my 3mm army. They fit in quite well.

And with that we will see you next week.

Work in Progress Wednesday – Coffee Stirrer Special

A little departure from our normal work in progress posts. We recently embarked on a coffee stirrer challenge. The idea being to make something for wargaming from wooden coffee stirrers. A few of us accepted the challenge and present the results here.

We start with my effort, I went a bit over the top and decided to make a small wooden boat.

Stephen decided to make something very practical for gaming with, in the form of some archer mantlets.

Meanwhile Tony F seized the opportunity to make a piece of scenery needed for an upcoming game. He created the gate to Bree for a Lord of the Rings game.

And our final entry was from Andy who created a couple of terrain pieces. The first being a barricade.

And to follow Andy made a section of fencing, but decided to keep going and ended up making an entire fenced area.

This was an interesting challenge and a fun one to try an see what wargaming terrain we could make out of something as simple as a coffee stirrer.

We hope you enjoyed this slight distraction, we’ll get back to our usual work in progress next week.

Work in Progress Wednesday

Welcome to a very rainy (well in our part of the world) Wednesday for some more progress by our members. Going to start with myself for a change and the box monster I’m currently working on. Someone asked me to make this for a game and I just couldn’t refuse.

Next up and John La has been painting up some Anglo-Dutch War 1/2400 scale ships.

Moving on and Mark H is beginning work on some aircraft. I’ll let Mark explain them better “Planes are four USN Skyraiders and four North Korean Yak9P – the latter minor conversions from the WW2 era version of the YAK9 that Tumbling Dice provide”

For this week Stephen didn’t have any miniatures or terrain to show but we thought we’d mention, he’s been busy putting paints from dropper bottles into paint bottles with lids. I’m undecided as I’ve only just started using paint manufacturers with those bottles.

And lastly for this week Tony F has been basing up a load of K&M trees that he didn’t know he had.

And some sand worm style miniatures that he has 3D printed. These we are assured will be making an appearance in a Stargrave game some time in the future (oh joy!)

See you next week.

Marshes, Low Ground and a bit of Scatter

Stephen takes us through some terrain building ideas.

Having just completed a correspondence course with the University of Magrathea I thought I would embark on a bit of world building.

Well, start small with some terrain at first.

This is about a few terrain pieces I’ve made over the last couple of weeks and I thought I’d share my process. There’s going to be three different kinds here – some marsh/swamp areas, an area of low ground, and some scatter terrain items (log piles). These are nominally for use with 15mm games (but the swamps could be used as smaller pieces for 28mm games).

Let’s look at the area terrain pieces first, the swamps and low ground. As a basis I use modeller’s light ply bought from a local modelling shop. This is mainly used in radio-controlled aircraft. I buy sheets of 2mm thick ply. They are cut into shapes and then the edges are chamfered.

Both the swamps and low ground need raised edges, but different kinds.

It’s hard to represent low lying ground on the wargames’ table. Realistically the only way you can do it is by placing something on top of the table and declaring it as sunken ground. So that’s what this is going to be. Since I wanted a more robust edge, to give the idea of looking up/down to anyone on the edge, I chose to use air-dry clay. I tend to use the terracotta colour so if it chips it doesn’t glare out at you. It also takes a couple of days to dry properly. Thing with clay is that it shrinks as it dries and when this happens I’ll fill the gaps with something – in this case, Milliput, because…

The swamps. I just wanted a shallow, thin, lip around the surface because I intended on pouring resin into it and it was just something to hold it in. I rolled a big ball of Milliput and then put a bead around the edges and smoothed that out. Then left that to dry.

Here’s a thing I do. 99% of the time you end up mixing too much putty. Rather than throw the excess away I make scenic items. Things like sacks, jugs, bowls, bottles. That kind of thing. It makes use of the surplus and means you have a ready supply if you want to put together some baggage elements or just as dressing around the bases of other modelling projects.

Let’s put the paint on. I gave the sunken ground an all over with a khaki brown. The two swamp pieces had the edges done khaki and the swamp area in a lighter brown.

Once the paint had dried the sunken ground got an all-over covering of fine ballast (bought from a model railway shop). When the ballast had dried I then flocked the sunken ground with static grass but left areas of ballast showing for texture and variety. The swamps had the edges done with static grass.

Now put that aside and let it all dry.

And whilst drying let’s move on to the log piles. These are to represent stacks of pine logs for east European WW2 games. Whilst out for a walk in the local woods I collected some sticks. In actual fact, these are just model pine stacks, they are actual pine stacks because I collected pine twigs. The things I do in the name of authenticity. They are given a good scrub to get rid of any dirt and then left to dry out. Once dry I got out the hobby tool and chopped them all to the right length.

These are then all stuck together. I used a couple of different glues. The first one I did with PVA. But after doing it I realised it would take an age to dry (I went in thick to ensure it got all around the edges). So on the second two I used a cyanoacrylate. Much quicker drying time!

Back to the area features. I had some clump foliage and this was stuck in patches to the sunken ground to represent areas of weeds and undergrowth. That would be that for the sunken ground.

For the swamps I wanted to fill them with resin and then stick some clump foliage in that. The resin would give a nice shiny effect to look like water. Since I would only be using a relatively little amount of resin I used a proprietary two-part epoxy resin. Shop around and you might find a budget brand, but I already had some Araldite Rapid so that’s what I used. To the resin mix I added the smallest of small blobs of khaki acrylic paint. It really does only need to be a small amount, barely enough to cover the end of the barbecue skewer I used to mix it. Once that’s been poured in I just got bits of clump foliage and pressed them in the setting resin.

Once I complete a model what I do next is put it aside for a couple of days for everything to properly dry out. There’s always going to be some residual moisture in there somewhere.

But now I have some more terrain (you can never have too much, eh?) for a bit of variety on the table top. These were all very simple builds as well.

Work in Progress Wednesday

Despite over half of the membership regularly playing historical based games, this weeks progress is dominated by Sci-Fi. We start with Mark J and some more progress on his Legions Imperialis forces.

Next up and Stephen has been mixing various plastic kits to come up with some interesting characters. I think these are destined for a hive of scum and villainy somewhere.

Andy has also made progress with his various projects. The Werewolves have been primed along with a robot.

The Einherjar (space dwarves) have also been primed but Andy is also experimenting with zenithal highlighting.

That’s also been applied to his Sneakfeet (space halflings), will be interesting to see the results.

And last but not least this week, I’ve been painting some more of my 3mm sci-fi miniatures. This time some light mechs, just need to do the basing.

We will see you next week with more progress on our projects.

Work in Progress Wednesday

Welcome to another work in progress Wednesday. We start this week with Marcus who has been busy basing his 6mm miniatures for a sea based game. Above we have some VTOLs and below a mixture of naval units and hover tanks.

Next up Andy has been prepping a number of miniatures for various projects. Firstly some space dwarves.

Some halflings (called Sneak feet apparently) snipers.

And some werewolves.

Meanwhile Tony has created some turrets on what look like some sea based platforms.

And he’s also been painting up some new roads.

And finally for this week Stephen has painted a useful piece of packaging and created this sci-fi building.

And with that we will see you next week.