John puts the 3D printed galleys supplied by fellow club member Colin into battle. This is a solo battle report using the Galleys and Galleons rules.
Introduction.
Rum Baba, an infamous Barbary pirate had been driven eastwards by the Christian warships but was still a thorn in the side of Venice. It was decided to despatch one of the newly built Galleass to their base at Chania in Crete to rid the Mediterranean of this menace for ever. En route, the Galleass and it’s escort were ambushed by Rum Baba and his pirate crews.
The Opposing Squadrons (details in Appendix)
The Venetian Squadron comprised the Lanterna Flagship commanded by Linguine, the new Galleass and a small Galliot to act as scout and draw the attention of the Ottomans. The Ottomans comprised Rum Baba in the Lanterna and three swift but lightly armed Galliots.
The Ambushing Ottomans lie in wait
Move 1
The Ottomans win the initiative roll and will move first each move. At the start of each move every vessel has to roll up to three D6 and roll equal or above its Q value to gain a successful action
This Galliot has a Q value of 2 so gets 3 actions, two of which it can use for movement. The double 3 denotes a change in wind direction one point anticlockwise. This does not affect the Galliots but may affect the Galleass which is propelled by sail.
The Galliots rush towards the Venetian Galliot intent on its destruction. Meanwhile, the Venetians move up cautiously and the Galleass takes in sail to maintain formation.
Position after move 1 from the Venetian side. They approach cautiously hoping to get a close range shot in before boarding actions begin.
The Ottomans move up and use their final action to open fire at long range. One point of damage is inflicted on the Venetian Galliot from this fusillade.
These two Galliots have a base combat factor of 2. The range is Medium so no firing factors are added. If the target is doubled by the modified dice roll a point of damage is inflicted and the target then has to roll on the Critical Damage table. If the attackers roll is even, it causes one point of damage with no roll on the Critical Damage table.
The Venetians move into close range and fire back
In addition to it’s broadside the Galleass is equipped with Chaser Guns which have a combat value of 1. All firing vessels get a plus 1 for close range. BOOM!The Galleass rolls a 6. This is a critical hit and the Galliot has to roll on the Critical Hit table and sustains another point of damage. It’s hit again later in the move and now has 3 damage points, one more and it will strike. Ouch!The Ottomans strike back. The Lanterna causes a point of damage to the Venetian Galliot which closes with the Ottoman Galliot and takes another point of damage so 3 points of damage each!As the melee rages, the Galleass makes good it’s escape
Two Galliots and the Ottoman Lanterna close in on the outnumbered Venetian flagship and the two Galliots who have locked in combat fight to a standstill. The Galliots have the Derring Do special rule and attack with reckless ferocity. In the first round, all base combats are reduced to zero.
Here with base combat values at zero, the Lanterna is up against. Here it loses the combat but has the Veteran NCO special rule which gives a +1 bonus when losing by one or the adjusted roll is tied. Both vessels take a point of damage as the adjusted rolls are now tied.With the Venetian Flagship on 3 damage points, the Ottoman Lanterna moves in to deliver the Coup de Grace and Linguine Strikes his colours
With the Venetian Flagship on 3 damage points, the Ottoman Lanterna moves in to deliver the Coup de Grace and Linguine Strikes his colours
With the Galleass now a dot on the horizon, Rum Baba takes Linguine’s surrender and collects his prizes. He hoped for a profitable ransom for Linguine and whilst He would sleep well tonight in the company of concubines, that Galleass worried him. His captains had been reckless, they would need to be more savvy next time.
Appendix – Data sheets for vessels involved in the conflict
Jeremey puts the Romans to shame by building a marching camp in just a few hours!
This all started because I wanted to expand my Wars of the Roses army to the point where I could field both sides. In many rulesets dealing with Medieval warfare a camp is required for each army. I only had one camp as I previously only had one army.
I therefore set about making a camp from scratch. Yes I could have ordered some tents and camp equipment miniatures but I was in one of my “Just make something” moods.
The Start of a basic palisade
I thought the easiest option would be a stockade/Palisade style camp. I already had a base and dug out the air drying clay to make the bank and interior terrain of the camp.
It was at this point things just didn’t work, the clay just would not stick to the wooden base as I was sculpting it into shape. So I took it off the base and continued on the work mat. But then I realised I needed to make an indentation for the cocktail sticks, sorry wooden palisade fence before the clay dried.
At this point I threw my toys out of the pram as I couldn’t see it working and I’d have to wait for the clay to dry. Then I had a eureka moment and turned to my old modelling friend EVA foam. I make everything out of the stuff so why not the camp.
The air drying clay is ditched in favour of foam
I cut off of a EVA foam floor mat a couple of strips to act as the defensive bank and also (just because I could) another couple of pieces to turn into a hut/shed.
Life would not be worth living without a hot glue gun
I then fired up the hot glue gun and stuck the foam to the base. Instant results and no waiting for clay to dry.
20 minutes later and the palisade is complete!
Ah I hear you cry but how did you create a gap for the palisade. All that was needed was to cut down through the top of the foam bank and then push the cocktail stick down through the cut. I simply used a little bit of superglue to stick them together. I then went across the top with my wire cutters to trim all the sticks to the same height.
Back to the hot glue gun
At this point I could have gone back to some for of putty/clay to model the inside terrain of the camp. But I was on a roll and wanted the camp finished in a day!
So I went back to the hot glue gun and used it to build up the ground against the foam banking, and I also used it to create the muddy path between the two entrances. This is easy to do, you just use the nozzle of the glue gun to melt the glue as you run back through it. I also made a little pile of logs for scenery.
A splash of brown and a bit of flock
I then turned to painting the camp. A simply covering of brown followed by a bit of dry brushing with lighter shades took care of the camp and surrounding palisade. Once the paint had dried a bit I spread PVA glue and sprinkled some flock.
The hut/shed takes form
Having to pause to let the PVA glue dry I turned to the other piece of scenery the hut/shed. To build this I stuck two pieces of foam together wit the glue gun and then cut out the entrance, I then cut the top of the block into a slanted roof shape. The roof was made by cutting a very thin layer off the foam floor tile and sticking it down on top. This formed a nice curving roof.
To create the look that it was thatched was done by drawing the craft knife gently across the top. Just enough to score it not cut it.
The finished camp
A quick paint job on the hut including painting on the wooden beams in the wall for that medieval look took moments and then I stuck it in place.
At this point for finishing flourish I added some different flock to break up the grass areas. I do have a couple of figures I might add to this, but for a model that took me about 3 hours I’m really pleased with the results.
Jeremey shows off his Wars of the Roses army now that it’s complete (well almost).
On the 17th February 2020 I put up a blog post about the first Wars of the Roses units I had managed to paint up. This was the start of my very first historical army. Fellow club member Stephen was also painting up his own Wars of the Roses with the idea of fighting the various battles thoughout the year.
We managed one battle before lockdown scuppered getting down to the club.
First battle to test our Wars of the Roses armies
So I packed up the army for the following months and turned to other ptojects. But I kept drifting back to the army and found myself making terrain. Given the first Battle of St Albans was essentially a town battle I started making tudor houses.
Still a lot of work to do on these buildings. More plasterwork and thatched roofs
But Stephen started to post a few solo battles using his army and mentioned adding a few additional units, so I caved and ordered some more for my army. using the Sword and Spear army lists I went for a few of the support units. Welsh Longbows, Welsh Spearmen, General Spearmen and Mercenary Crossbows.
Welsh Longbows and Spearmen on the Painting Table
I painted these using the same method as my existing units. Stephen had painted his units in uniform colours but I wanted a much bigger variety. Although armies of this time were starting to wear their lords Livery, but I didn’t want to tie my units down to any particular faction.
I picked out a range of colours (various, browns, greens and the odd khaki shade) and painted different parts of each miniature so that no two miniatures were the same. This was potentially more time consuming but I still went through the miniatures like a production line.
Another new aspect for this army was to make the flags changable, in order to allow my army to represent any side in the conflict, or for when several lords bring forces to the battlefield.
Changable Flags for my Units
I simpy glued the flags together and left a loop to fit over the flag poles on the units.
And so finally I got to a point where I had a large enough army for a real epic battle.
The whole army with a multitude of flagsThe Left Flank of the ArmyThe Right Flank of the Army
Stephen continues his refight of the War of the Roses…
This one was never going to go well for the Lancastrians.
This is the third battle in my plan to re-fight all major encounters of the War of the Roses. Like previous games I am using the Basic Impetus rules. There were a couple of important aspects to this battle that had to be reflected if it were to be a faithful re-fight.
Firstly, due to the rain (typical British summer) the Lancastrian artillery could not fire due to wet powder. They were in the line but totally ineffective. That was easily dealt with.
The Lancastrian Battle Line
The second, and most important thing, was Lord Grey’s betrayal of King Henry. As Warwick and the Yorkist army marched north they entered into secret talks with Grey and promised they would not harm him in return for his help. What happened in the actual battle was that the Earl of March (on the Yorkist left flank) advanced against Grey (on the Lancastrian right). As March’s retinue crossed the ditch and bank Grey’s men gave way and allowed them to roll up the Lancastrian line and capture King Henry.
This would have to be reflected. I was in two minds about how to deal with this. It didn’t help that this would be a solo game so I could hardly spring a surprise on myself. In the end, I decided that if March’s troops neither fired nor attacked Grey’s troops then Grey would give way when contacted (effectively counting as loses against the Lancastrian army). This, of course, would have a major impact on the Lancastrian army, but then that’s exactly what it had in reality!
Order of Battle
OK, so let’s get on with the battle.
The Lancastrian army had ensconced themselves in a bend in the river Nene on the opposite bank from Northampton. They had put a ditch and defences in front of their position. King Henry VI was with them but the army was led by the Duke of Buckingham.
The Yorkist forces were led by the Earl of Warwick with Lord Fauconberg on the right and the Earl of March on the left. With Warwick’s skullduggery and plotting with Grey, the advance of the Yorkist forces was led by March.
Armies Deployed
Like the previous two battles, this was little more than an attack on a prepared position. Therefore, I gave the Yorkists the initiative until things got within bow range.
The last thing the Lancastrians wanted was poor dice rolling. Being in a stationary position meant their fire should be more effective. But no. The God of Battles (the dice) were against them. Warwick’s troops in the centre got within bow range of the artillery and they soon sent the gunners packing.
Warwick Urges His Men Forward
March’s men started moving up. Now, it may seem like it would be a done deal – why would I engage the Lancastrian line with March’s men? However, I did decide that if the Lancastrians gave a good account and their bowfire proved effective, and the Yorkist looked like they would take a beating, that this would prove enough motivation for Grey to reconsider and then engage March’s troops. However, the poor rolls by the Lancastrians made that look unlikely.
Fauconberg also started exchanging bowfire with the Earl of Shrewsbury.
A couple more turns, and it still wasn’t looking good for Buckingham and his men. In truth, neither side was rolling that well for their archers, but the Yorkists had the edge. March’s men carried on with their advance, still holding back from loosing their arrows.
The First Casualties
Buckingham moved up his plate armoured men at arms and his billmen, hoping the Yorkists would have the decency to engage in melee rather then sit back and keep shooting.
March’s Troops Contact Grey’s
Finally, March’s men started clambering over the Lancastrian defences. No casualties had been caused to Grey’s men and so Grey dutifully pulled back and allowed March into the Lancastrian defences!
Across The Line They Go
It was now only a matter of time. It wasn’t a case of if the Lancastrians would lose but how much damage they could cause the Yorkists before they did.
March Engages Buckingham
Buckingham swung his billmen around to try and put something in the way of March’s assault. However, the levy spearmen in March’s retinue got stuck in and charged the Lancastrian archers. After a brief melee the archers fell to the spearmen.
And that was that!
The Battle Is Over
A Yorkist win. It had been a convincing win at that – Warwick’s troops hadn’t taken a single casualty. Exactly how it happened historically. The real battle lasted less than an hour and my re-fight took only a bit longer.
Next up then, is the battle of Wakefield. Unfortunately I will have to bypass that one – Wakefield was a large cavalry engagement and I don’t have anywhere near enough cavalry bases. Shame, because the castle would make a great backdrop to the battle. This one would make a good club game when we can get back together.
Stephen gives us the lowdown on his latest painting project…
When Lockdown Part 1 kicked off I decided that I would not be buying loads of new miniatures since there was no knowing when we would be meeting again.
I bought some odds and sods to fill gaps in collections but wouldn’t be starting any new projects. And I’ve kept to that.
However.
Just before Christmas I saw Conqueror Models’ range of 28mm dwarves. These were of the same style as the original Vendel Miniatures dwarves. There’s a good reason for that – same sculptor (Colin Patten). Years ago I bought a few of the Vendel dwarves and always intended on buying some more. Before I could do that Vendel stopped selling them and they just disappeared.
I was absolutely gutted.
I’ve always liked the idea of a dwarven army but hadn’t really liked the style of dwarves that have been available up until now – I’m really not a fan of that GW cartoon style where it’s all belly and no legs.
So seeing the Conqueror Models range I thought, ‘That’s it! That’s what I want!’
Having been stung by the Vendel range disappearing I decided that I wasn’t going to let this lot pass me by. And so, since Christmas was on the horizon and because I realised that, on balance, this year I had been a good boy, I decided that I would treat myself and buy myself lots of dwarves – enough for a whole army, just in case the same happened to these.
Since they were of the same style as the Vendel ones, and since I had some Vendel dwarves, I mixed them in with the units I bought.
I decided to build these in Dragon Rampant sized units. Although, given their ‘historical’ style in arms and armour, I think I will be tempted to use them with the Anglo Dane battleboard in Saga as well (yeah, I know there’s Saga Myth & Magic, but from what I’ve heard that falls in to the same trap as nearly all fantasy rules – lots of ‘special’ rules that are exceptions to the main rules and just tie it in knots).
Anyway.
Conqueror actually do unarmoured dwarven fyrd as well, but I didn’t get any of them. To my mind I wanted my dwarves to comprise predominantly heavy infantry in mail. I bought a few packs of the spearmen which, when mixed in with the Vendel models with hand weapons,, would give a good mix to the unit. I also chose to buy the thrusting spear poses (you can get them upright) because they make the unit look more dynamic. I did two units of 12 each having the same shield design and a war-banner.
Warriors 1Warriors 2
Conqueror do armoured and unarmoured archers (we’ll come to them in a minute), but I went with crossbows to make two units of heavy missiles.
Crossbows 1Crossbows 2
Then came the axemen. I swapped the axes that came with the models (because the axe head looked a little large) and used some spare Gripping Beast dane-axes I had. These axemen can be used in one of two ways – either two units of elite infantry or as a single unit of heavy infantry (with the Offensive Weapons upgrade).
Daneaxes
And so on to the archers. I bought a pack of the unarmoured archers to use as dwarven scouts/rangers. And because of that I painted them in suitably earthy/green tones.
Scouts
Leading this bunch are the heroes and commander. I did a couple of weapon swaps here. One of them came with a daneaxe but I decided that I would put in a spare two-handed sword for variety. Other spare Gripping Beast hand weapons were used on some of the others.
Commander and Heroes
To round things out are a couple of beast units. First up is a pack of wolves (lesser warbeasts) and to scare the enemy is a Reaper Bones warbear (greater warbeasts).
Wolves and Warbear
That’s my dwarven army done. I can muster about 50 odd points (in Dragon Rampant terms) which means I can have a dwarven civil war or put together a single large dwarven host for a big smack up.
I love these Conqueror dwarves. Stylistically it’s just what I was looking for. They’ve been a real pleasure to paint as well – not too many fussy extra bits, nice areas to add a few designs to, and good poses. Definitely painter’s models. I’ve finally got the dwarf collection I’ve always wanted. It’s my army d’jour.
Andy reports on a game of Dragon Rampant organised by Jeremey to follow our AGM, played in an MS Teams meeting. With observations and comments from Stephen and Jeremey.
Jeremey organised the forces and set the terrain, and arranged 3 different cameras to show the battlefield. Having to provide both armies allowed him to use his Celtos undead army and his completely scratch built Rock and Wood army.
One of the camera views captured by Andy
The combatants were Stephen, with Mother Nature’s Finest lead by a Rock Lord; and Andy, with the Army of Darkness commanded by a Necromancer. Both sides totalled 35 points.
Mother Nature’s Finest
The Rock Lord: Greater Warbeasts, Cunning, Mystical Armour. (10 pts)
Rock Trolls: Lesser Warbeasts.(4 Pts)
Mini Ents: Lesser Warbeasts, Cunning. (6 pts)
Light Rockmen: Light Foot (3pts)
2 x Heavy Rockmen: Heavy Foot, Offensive. (6 points each)
We decided that Jeremey would roll unit activation and courage tests, but that the generals would roll their attack and defence dice (Jeremey – we also decided that Andy and Steven were not allowed to moan about my dice rolling!). (Andy – Oh no we didn’t!)
Once the Armies were deployed the two Generals rolled for their Traits. Stephen’s 3D6 scored 13, lucky for him, this gave a result of Boneshaker, allowing him to automatically pass one Attack order per turn. Andy (or should I say Jeremey rolling on Andy’s behalf!) only scored 5, making his Necromancer Cowardly, no Attack orders for him. Well, there’s a certain narrative logic there.
After rolling for first turn Andy ordered his unit of Flesh Eaters (on the left flank) to advance to outflank Stephen’s Heavy Rockmen, needing a 5 or more on 2D6. It was not to be, sadly Jeremey rolled low and the Flesh Eater went nowhere. End of Andy’s first turn.
On Stephen’s turn all his movement activation rolls were successful (thanks Jeremey) and he advanced on a broad front.
The Skeleton Sicklemen occupy the hill
On Andy’s next turn he managed to advance a unit of Skeleton Sicklemen on the right flank to occupy a hill in front of Stephen’s Rock Trolls, but then failed the next activation. Back to Stephen.
Bonsai charge into the Zombies
Stephen’s Mini Ents (otherwise known as ‘Bonsais’) were now within movement range of Andy’s Zombies and were required to take a Wild Charge test, which they passed, so steamed in to the Zombies killing (?) 8 of the 12. The Zombies promptly failed their Courage test despite the proximity of the Necromancer, scoring less than 1, so they promptly routed of the board. Ta Jeremey.
The Wraiths counter attack and devestate the Bonsai
On Andy’s next turn the Mini Ents were now within Andy’s Wraiths move distance and following a Wild Charge Test the Wraiths went in, turning two Ents into kindling and causing the Ents to also catastrophically fail their courage test. One unit down on each side.
A wild charge sees the Rock Trolls hoping to take the top of the hill
On Stephen’s next turn his Rock Trolls were now within move distance of Andy’s Skeleton Sicklemen occupying the hill, they were obliged to take a Wild Charge test, which they passed and went in. One casualty on each side, both passed their courage tests and had taken equal losses, so the Rock Trolls bounced back leaving the Sicklemen controlling the hill. This would be replayed a couple of times, with the Rock Trolls throwing themselves at the Sicklemen and bouncing back until eventually they forced the Sicklemen back off the hill. The Rock Trolls followed up and eventually both sides had taken enough casualties for both to fail their courage tests and rout.
Heavy Rockmen infantry charge the Skeleton Spears
On the opposite flank, Stephen had advanced his Rock Lord to within Andy’s Flesh Eater’s move distance so they also had to take a Wild Charge test, which they failed and stayed rooted to the spot. Andy did manage to get his Skeleton Spearmen to form up in Shieldwall, expecting to be charged by the Rock Lord.
One of Stephen’s Heavy Rockmen (AC/DC or Van Halen?) units then charged Andy’s Skeleton Spearmen, who managed to beat them back. Andy then charged his Wraiths into the Heavy Rockmen causing a few casualties on each side, but both passed their courage tests.
The Wraiths and Rockmen exchange blows
Stephen then sent the Heavy Rockmen back into the Wraiths, this time both units failed their courage tests and routed from the table.
The Rock Lord charges the Flesh Eaters
The Rock Lord finally charged into the Flesh Eaters, causing enough casualties for them to fail their Courage test and flee the field.
As the battle drew to a conclusion Andy only had his Necromancer on the table, whereas Stephen has both his Rock Lord and Light Rockmen (Heart and Bon Jovi fans).
The Necromancers fate is sealed
Totalling up the losses, and comparing successful Quests, gave a Stephen a total of 10 Glory, and Andy -2 Glory as none of his Quests were achieved. A decisive victory to the forces of Nature.
The Necromancer will skulk back to his lair and set about reanimating another army.
The view from the other side of the hill (or Stephen’s viewpoint):
The final Glory totals don’t reflect how close the game was – for most of the game it looked like Andy the Necromancer would win. I often had to use my units in pairs, sending in one unit to soften the enemy up and then sending in another to finish things off. Both Andy and myself were cursed with Jeremey’s bloody woeful dice rolling for Courage tests (Jeremey – we agreed not to moan about my dice rolling) (Andy – No we didn’t). Andy was also beleaguered with poor Activation rolls at the start, which allowed me to advance on him and put him on the defensive (he seemed to spend most of his time forming Wall of Spears – probably needed to increase the armour of his skeletons).
Playing via Teams worked OK. There’s always going to be compromises – some of them could be seen as fog of war. The fact that Dragon Rampant is a simple game and we all knew the rules helped. Ultimately, it was a good opportunity to play soldiers with friends, no matter what the results were.
Jeremey – for this game I deliberately picked a ruleset we knew, went for a small battlefield and only one unit had any ranged attacks. This was all to allow the game to flow with the players only able to see the battlefield from the camera views.
Jeremey discovers one of his previous projects that he never told anyone about.
After playing a number of Lord of the Rings games down the club, I kept seeing pictures of the official Ent miniature in the rules and thought it looked far to cartoonish compared to the rest of the miniatures. I also saw the price of it and that got me thinking.
So on my travels I started collecting sticks that had fallen from the local trees. I only wanted the sticks that had already come off the tree as these were dry and unlikely to change over time.
I probably collected more than necessary for this project
When collecting the sticks I tried to find ones that had natural bends in them to represent joints and movement in the figure. First task though was to wash the collected sticks, this was important because I’d picked them up from the ground. A good scrub with soapy water and an old toothbrush did the trick and didn’t rehydrate the wood.
Nice walking pose with some suitable sticks
To stick things together I used the trusty hot glue gun. If I did this project over I would drill holes and pin the sticks together for extra strength. But the glue gun worked well enough.
Arms and Legs done now to get creative on the head
The arms came next but I had to work out how to create a head for the Ent. I decided early on not to go for something like a carved face or small pieces of wood to act as eyes, nose etc. I thought that would end up looking like Mr Potato Head.
Head completed and additional branches being added
In the end I made a medieval style helmet from pices of bark I had also collected. The bark also worked for armour plates on some of the joints and as fingers on the hands. That was the basic figure done but it didn’t look enough like a tree and so I started stcking smaller branches to the back of the figure. I arranged these like a normal tree looks and made sure they extended above the head of the Ent. This also helped to strengthen the joints of the figure by having these additional branches stuck to the joints.
Finally I added some of that scenic lichen railway modellers use to make trees. The final model stands about a foot tall which isn’t bad considering it cost next to nothing to produce, and even if I do say so myself it looks better than the official one.
Sometimes I do worry about us miniature wargamers. Faced with the challenges of everyday life, their outlook can be slightly different to the non-hobbyist.
Recently there was a crashing sound and on investigation the utility room ceiling was no more. There were plaster board fragments everywhere. Dealing with reality first I cleaned the area up and started looking for someone to repair the damage.
Remains of the Ceiling and Collected Detritus
Not the sort of expense I wanted (but quite fitting given how 2020 was), however during the clean up operation I kept picking up bits of rubble and thinking how the chunks of plaster reminded me of concrete.
Proof of Concept
Before you could say “how much!” to the plasterer, I’d put together a proof of concept to turn the plaster fragments, into rubble for my 28mm troopers to fight over.
But I paused at this point when someone pointed out that old plasterboard could contain Asbestos! Well regardless of using the plasterboard for scenery I still had to tidy up my utility room. So I sent a sample off to be tested which came back as negative. So please do be cautious if you’re thinking of doing a similar project as this.
The plaster board rubble was very weak and dusty so I used a genuine DIY tip and painted the plaster with a watered down PVA glue solution to seal it. This made the plaster more like concrete and stopped it from crumbling while being handled.
Glue Gun to Stick it Together then more PVA
A lot of the rubble still had all the layers attached to it which I left in place to make it even more authentic looking. In the pictures I’ve done nothing but glue the pieces together and coated everything in a second layer of PVA glue.
These pieces have become very solid and are still very light, as light as resin would be. As you can imagine I have quite a lot of material to work with and so will be returning to the blog with an update on building an entire destroyed settlement.
You can play games with sides who have equal points and just happen to turn up and have a smack up in the middle for no particular reason only so many times.
So to create a bit of variety I decided to make some objective markers so that games can have a bit more variety and meaning.
Of course, you can use simple tokens, or even dice, to be objectives. But I decided to make some sci fi themed objectives.
These are made from a variety of bits – some from odds and ends out of the spares bag, some from other household items, and some from good old fashioned modelling and sculpting.
This first one is a comms station. The core is a bit of balsa. This was then skinned with Miliput and some details etched in. When the putty had hardened I gave it a quick whizz on some fine wet and dry paper to smooth it out. The radar dish was from the spares bag. I’ve no idea where it came from – I have a few of them, so must have ordered them from somewhere but for the life of me I can’t remember ever buying them.
Comms Station
The next one is a supply cache. These bits are all from the spares bag. The gas cylinders were freebies with an order from Scotia/Grendel. Not sure who the crates are by. I must confess, I wanted more ‘sci fi’ looking crates, but I had none and wasn’t in the mood to make any – I just wanted a fourth objective marker and wanted to throw it together sooner than later.
Supply Cache
The other two are what we’ll call ‘gubbins’. Or ‘tech’. Or something like that. They were made from oddments I had around. The cylindrical one is made from a sewing thread bobbin. It has a couple of round slotta bases stuck together on top, half a bomb from a Stuka model on top of that, and I glued some plasticard to the barrel of the bobbin. The other one hasn’t had so much done to it. It was a weapon pod that came from a toy spaceship bought in The Works. I just put it on its end and then some plasticard bits to cover the slot where it attaches to the model.
Gubbins, before painting
On to the painting.
The two ‘tech’ objectives were given a once over with grey and then a dark brown wash. They were then dry-brushed with grey that had a little bit of brown added to it (to take off the harshness of the grey). I went down quite light with them. I wanted the blue sections to represent internal lights and power generation. So a royal blue base, and then taken down with pale blue and a final white section. To try and give it a glowing effect I dry brushed the surrounding parts of the model with one of the paler blues to represent the light reflecting on the surfaces and glowing.
Gubbins, after painting
The comms station was a simple paint job – field green. I decided to do the cylinders on the supply cache in different colours to represent different contents. For no reason that I can think of I just went with white crates. Glad I did because I think it looks good.
Supply Cache and Comms Station, painted
The models were decorated with some spare decals and the computer screens were found on the internet, printed off, and glued in place (I’m sure you can identify the X Wing targeting computer).
So that’s it – some objectives for scenario games.
Stephen gives an unredacted report on a Black Ops mission…
Thought I would have a game of Black Ops.
It’s been a while since I played it and having enjoyed it before I decided to have another go.
I decided not to use the stealth rules and have a simple encounter game – just to refresh myself with the rules and because I just wanted a simple face-to-face scrap.
Each side had 75 points. On one side was a group of droids and on the other a section of special forces troops. The game was simple enough – seven turns to see who can cause the most amount of damage. Both sides comprised a leader, a heavy weapon, and 5 troopers.
I used my smaller (3’x2’) board and set it up as a huge junkyard/recycling plant with loads of cover. The humans deployed in 3 groups (two lots of 2, and one lot of 3) and the droids deployed in 2 groups (one lot of 3 and one lot of 4).
Into The Parking Lot
Due to the amount of terrain both sides managed a couple of activations before shots were fired. The humans, deployed on a wider front, managed to get some troops around the flanks, forcing the smaller droid unit with the Leader into the middle. However, the large droid unit had deployed on a different flank and their numbers looked strong against the 2 man human team facing them.
The Droid Leader Commands
The humans came up through the parking lot and took fire from the droids. No casualties this time – the blasts struck the assorted junk and barricades. Locking and loading, they took up their positions and returned the gesture – one of the droids went down so it was first blood (Ed: oil?) to the humans.
Ctrl-Alt-Del
The droid leader had found himself in a difficult position. With two of the droid troopers (one of which went down under fire) he was taking crossfire as one human team took up position behind a large piece of junk and another team edged around behind some trashed vehicles. Then, bang! Down went the droid leader.
Droid Down!
And then in the following round, down went a couple more of the droids. I wasn’t convinced this was going to last 7 rounds. That said, the droids had managed to squeeze themselves into a good position and it was hard to see how the humans could advance on them without taking casualties. So a firefight ensured with both sides digging in.
The Droids Dig In
This firefight didn’t last long though. One the human teams took a casualty, and then so did another.
Man Down!
With the human position suddenly weakened the droids were able to move up and advance on the humans, despite having taken more casualties and losing their leader.
Working Around The Flanks
The game was starting to change. The droids managed to hit another human and down he went as well. On one of the flanks the humans had made good headway, but they now needed to fall back and consolidate or they would be picked off. The human leader ordered his men to take cover behind some barrels and crates. The droids moved on them, and a lucky shot took out the human leader! Just two troopers left.
Droids Bypass the Bodies
Then crafty shot from one of the human troopers dropped a droid and he rushed round, to outflank the final droid. As he did, his colleague put in a fresh clip and with gun at his hip, let rip and down went the last droid.
Game Over
Victory went to the humans. Just.
Black Ops is a great game. Once the shooting starts it can be quite deadly. A modelling project for early 2021 is to make some sci fi themed objective markers.
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