First up we have a 6mm Field of Glory game, Later Hungarians vs Ottoman Turks.
The FOG Trophy, what they are all fighting for.Battle lines are drawnCavalry closeup
Alan ran a 28mm Vietnam game using FNG rules. It wasn’t a good day for the Americans! (Ed: I only managed to take one useable phot0, however Alan sent us some of his to add to the post.)
US Patrol advancesA quiet(ish) villageView from the the side of the villageUS scout across a stream
Peter ran a 15mm(ish) Hammer’s Slammers game, using a collection of 1:87 Roco Minitanks, mixing and matching turrets and chassis from WW2 and modern vehicles.
Peter’s winter wonderlandTwo out of three downArmour advancesBrew up!
Finally we have a four player Dragon Rampant game, Skeletons and Goblins against Dwarves and The Forces of Nature (Tree and Rock men), including Jeremey’s massive Tree Giant.
Andy’s Dwarf Scouts start the advance, the rest of the force stay put!Stephen’s undead Giant would dwarf almost anything, except Jeremey’s bark leviathan.Tony’s Warg riders start to outflank Andy’s DwarvesStephen’s skeleton archers take the high ground as his cavalry charge Jeremey’s rockmenDwarves finally advanceStephen’s skeleton cavalry losing to Jeremey’s rockmen
Andy does a quick photo roundup of last weekend’s meeting.
First off a game of Mortem et Gloriam, 6mm Pontic vs Early Imperial Romans.
Pontic Commander’s viewPontic and Roman forces closeLight Cavalry clash
Andy and Stephen had another attempt at SAGA – Age of Crusades, 28mm figures, Crusaders vs Mutatawwi’a
Some of Andy’s crusadersMore of Andy’s Crusaders, red tokens indicate fatigueStephen’s Mutatawwi’aStephen’s Assassins, with priest and Warlord in supportMore of Stephen’s Mutatawwi’aTroops deployed for the second game, 8 points a-side, from the Crusader point of view.
Alan ran a big Chain of Command game, 28mm figures, with a combined British and Norwegian force trying to hold off a German advance.
All is quiet on the northern frontGermans advanceMore GermansBritish defendersNorwegiansLight German ArmourGerman Heavyweight?German troops hold the wall.
And finally, corporate clashes in deep space, Tony, Chris and Eric try out A Billion Suns. Not a straight up space battle, but operations spread across multiple tables with each player having different contracts to fulfil.
A pair of freighters
Approaching a jump gateTwo British Heavy Cruisers exit a jump gateRescuing some lifepodsBritish Destroyer Squadron
Last year, as a bit of a lock-down#2 project, I decided to make a small desert village for 6mm sci-fi games. All of the components come from Brigade Models (quick disclaimer here – I’m one of the owners of said company) but the techniques would work with any other manufacturer’s buildings. The wall pieces were taken from the Town Walls range, while the buildings are mostly from the Desert Outlands set. The photos in this post are all thumbnails – click on them for larger versions.
The first decision to make was how large it was going to be; I decided that it would have to fit in a 4l Really Useful Box, which gave me a maximum of a 348x220mm footprint and a height limit of 68mm. I based it on a sheet of Foamex, which is great for terrain projects as it doesn’t warp like MDF or hardboard when you apply paint. This came in 300x200mm sheets, so one of those did the job nicely.
I spent a while laying out wall pieces until I had a configuration that I liked – I wanted to avoid a simple rectangular wall. I positioned a gateway and sanded down the base at that point so it sloped away, and added a pair of watchtower pieces to the walls. Once I was happy with this I glued them down with a clear glue (Uhu). I smeared some wall filler around the joins to fill in the odd gap, this has a similar texture to the wall pieces so blends in better. I then laid out the buildings – I wanted enough space around them to be able to position figures and vehicles, so didn’t cram them in too tightly. In the end there were nine altogether. Again I fixed them in place with clear glue.
Now that the main components were in place, I was able to texture the ground. Inside the walls I simply glued a layer of sand using PVA, with the odd small stone around the edges. Outside the walls I mixed up a batch of emulsion paint, sand and PVA and applied this with an old paintbrush. I mixed in some larger grades of sand and small stones (sold in homeware shops for basing candles) so that I achieved a much rougher texture than the inner area.
The next stage was to add lots of small details to the buildings. I used a few parts from the Brigade 2mm scenery range, there are bits of girder bridges, barns, support frames from an airship hangar, a Roman lighthouse (makes a good chimney) and an obelisk in the main square. There’s the odd roof-mounted water tank and aerial from the 15mm range. There’s also a radio antenna which is the broken off top of a much larger 3D (mis)printed mast. This part proved to be a nightmare as I kept knocking it off – in hindsight it would have been better to paint it separately and attached when everything else was finished, but I kept supergluing it back on.
I also fitted some supports for fabric canopies made from paperclips and wire staples – I drilled into the buildings, walls and base with a 1mm bit and superglued them in. I didn’t add the canopies themselves yet to make it easier to paint around them.
Everything was then sprayed in Halfords white primer, followed by a coat of Army Painter Skeleton Bone. The walls and buildings were them washed with GW Agrax Earthshade, while the ground was washed with Seraphim Sepia. This gave the buildings a distinctly different shade from the ground, even though they were painted with the same base colour. Walls, buildings are ground were all heavily drybrushed with bone or stone paints from the Citadel Dry range.
Other details were painted in – doors and windows, various roof accessories and so on, mostly using Citadel contrast paints which worked well over the pale bone base colour. With this done I was now able to make the canopies from small pieces of paper towel – the type of nasty, non-absorbent cheap towels that we used to get in school toilets! I soaked the pieces in dilute PVA and draped them across the supports, making sure that they drooped as naturally as possible in between. Once the glue dried they were pretty solid. I painted them in either dark red or dark brown using GW contrast paints.
The finished conurbation was christened Mos Arun; ‘Mos’ from the Star Wars Tatooine naming convention, and ‘Arun’ taken from the road name where I live. I’m planning a series of other small building bases to accompany it in the near future, which will also appear on this blog in due course. All being well, they should appear at the club’s Open Day later in the year.
Shortly before Christmas Stephen issued a challenge, throughout the rest of December post pictures on our members groups.io page of famous scenes from military history, or myth, or fiction. Fantasy or sci fi, film or whatever, but using models from our collections.
Moving from myth to history, Andy contributed Gaius Julius Caesar leading Legio XIII Gemina across the river Rubicon in January 49BC precipitating (another) Roman Civil War.
Alea iacta est
And going back to fiction, Andy staged the battle between Gandalf and the Balrog in the Mines of Moria:
Gandalf and the Balrog at the Bridge of Khazad-dûm.
“Your dead sleep quietly, at least, Captain, out of reach of sharks” “Yes, sir, of sharks and men.” ― Jules Verne, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
Stephen had a play with his camera to create a sepia print of Pickett’s Charge.
Picket’s Charge
Mark delved into comic-lore to give us a scene from the comic 2000AD, Judge Death vs Judge Dredd.
Judge Death Lives! 2000ad progs 224-228, “you cannot kill what doesss not live”.
Marcus offers a scene from an Iron Hand mission in Vietnam.
Two MiG 21 Én Bạcs pursue a pair of F105 Thunderchiefs on an Iron Hand mission. A SAM-6 site is the F105’s target.
Our last meeting of the year saw three “periods” in progress:
First up, our FOG contingent (John, Paul and Mark) ran a couple of games of Early Carthaginians vs Dominate Romans.
6mm Cavalry and Light HorseThe infantry get closeA bird’s eye view of the combatRoman LegionariesAfricans and Romans standoff.Carthaginian cavalry charge the Romans
Next up Alan ran a game of Fief, France 1429, a game of dynastic ambition. You can probably guess where and when it is set. Boardgames are not unknown at the Society, but they are not that commonly played either. Alan, Marcus, Dave, Chris, Peter and Mike were the contenders for the control of France.
Playing piecesView from the North WestPlayer’s resource cardsFief Playing pieces and cards
Alan and Peter formed an alliance and had a narrow lead at the end of the game, so they are claiming victory. Mike, Marcus, Dave & Chris wouldn’t necessarily agree with that assessment though
Finally, Tony & Phil combined their efforts to put on a 15mm Star Wars game, using slightly adapted Stargrave rules. Jeremey and Phil each took a squad of Stormtroopers, while Stephen and Andy had a squad of Rebels. Both sides were searching the village for a pair of droids who had concealed plans to a top secret Imperial Weapon System (the Death Star). Tony ran the unaligned Jawas and was in charge of resolving the players searches and random events.
The village, the lull before the stormThe Rebels disembark from their U-Wing assault shipThe Jawas minding their own business.Jeremey’s Storm Trooper squad and their shuttle.Andy’s Rebels find what cover they canRebels search a buildingStephen’s Rebels take up positions to fend off the ImperialsPhil’s Stormtroopers take cover behind a water extractorRebels have found the droids and try to get them back to the shuttle, The Jawas are not happy!The droids and their surviving escort almost at the shuttle (and that’s as far as they got).The remnants of Stephen’s squad form a last line of defence.Jawas and Stormtroopers pursuing the Droids and RebelsAndy’s Rebel squad (now deceased)
Club member Jeremey takes us through building and painting his modern take on the classic earth Elemental.
While I certainly wouldn’t consider myself to be a professional sculptor, I have made a number of miniatures over the years. This miniature, the Concremental came out of an idea to create a modern version of the very familiar Earth Elemental. I was lucky enough for this miniature to be cast and so here is my attempt to paint it.
The miniature is currently being sold by Fenris Games and comes in several parts as shown. Therefore the first thing to do was to glue the parts together. The miniature is made of resin but I found superglue worked very well in sticking it together.
The miniature fit quite well on a 50mm round base and I stuck the spare bits of concrete that came with the miniature to the base.
I then added some milliput to the base to provide a texture to match the miniature.
Once the milliput was dry I sprayed the whole thing with Halfords grey primer. It was at this point that I first thought how on earth I was going to paint it. After all, concrete is grey so do I just put a black wash over the miniature and leave it at that or do something else.
I decided to try something different and painted the various concrete blocks in different shades of grey. I then dry brushed the miniature with lighter shades, before finally adding a very watered down black wash.
I then painted the traffic light pole silver and the steel reinforced bars as rusted metal. The traffic lights I did in yellow, I didn’t actually sculpt the traffic lights and they are clearly in the American style that I’ve seen in yellow.
Once all that was done I felt the miniature needed something else, so thinking the miniature would be made of modern street materials I painted road markings on the flat parts of the miniature.
The miniature started to look much better with the markings but they were too clean and bright, to remedy this I actually took a file to the whole miniature to distress the markings. This worked really well and gave the whole model a nice worn look.
Now all I need to do is find a game to put the Concremental in.
The Society has been busy this weekend jut passed, a small contingent ventured to ExCeL for the delayed Salute 2020 (or 2021?) whilst others attended the normal society meeting. First up, Salute. Andy’s thoughts with pictures by John, Mark and Andy.
Five of the membership, John, Brian, Mark, Marcus and Andy, attended Salute putting on Marcus’ Pulp participation game “Biggles and the Island at the Top of the World“.
The theme for the show was the Battle of Britain. The 2020 show was intended to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the battle. Centrally displayed in the hall were a replica Spitfire and Hurricane, with some RAF reenactors making an appearance after the photo was taken.
They say ExCeL looks like a hanger…
I got the impression that Salute hired more of ExCeL than usual, to space us out more, although I also understand there were fewer games and traders scheduled to attend than in “normal” years; and there were a few “no shows” in both categories.
Salute General view. More spaced out than usual, and perhaps fewer attendees?
In Marcus’ game Biggles is searching a lost Artic island for a missing Professor and the strange artefacts he was studying.
Biggle’s party deplane from their Walrus
His party discover a secret labyrinth, with ever changing chambers and passages.
The labyrinth awaits the explorers
However he was not alone, a party of Nazis with unworldly weapons were also trying to recover the Professor.
The German’s advanced submarine
The Russians had also sent an NKVD team to prevent the Nazis securing their objective.
The Soviet NKVD disembark from their Aerosan
And finally, a lost tribe of Vikings were hellbent on preventing anyone from leaving the island with the Ragnarok Stones, the phenomena the Professor had been studying.
The Vikings patrol the labyrinth
We ran several games throughout the day, with up to four members of the public taking control of one of the four parties.
A selection of photos from the games:
Vikings find the secret chamberBiggles faces down the NKVDThe Germans find themselves boxed in
We are pleased to announce that the game won the Jim Clarke Memorial Award for the Best Science Fiction / Fantasy game at Salute.
The Jim Clark Memorial Award for the Best Science Fiction / Fantasy Game
Meanwhile, back at the regular Society meeting, other members were running a series of games. Photos courtesy of Mark J and Stephen.
First off Mark J and Pete ran a game of Fields of Glory, pitching Mark’s Hundred Years War English against Pete’s Hungarians.
FOG Ancients – HYW English vs HungariansFOG Ancients – HYW English vs HungariansFOG Ancients – HYW English vs HungariansFOG Ancients – HYW English vs HungariansFOG Ancients – HYW English vs HungariansFOG Ancients – HYW English vs HungariansFOG Ancients – HYW English vs Hungarians
The first battle was won by the English, the Hungarian Knights couldn’t cope with longbows and stakes. The Hungarians won the second battle by focusing on the men at arms and drawing the longbow fire away from the knights. So, honours even.
Alan ran a Star Wars X-Wing game.
Star Wars X-WingStar Wars X-WingStar Wars X-Wing
And finally Stephen ran a Stargrave game – A Hive of Scum and Villainy:
‘A Hive of Scum and Villainy’ – a Stargrave adventure‘A Hive of Scum and Villainy’ – a Stargrave adventure‘A Hive of Scum and Villainy’ – a Stargrave adventure
Stephen reports on a recent Sci Fi solo game using Black Ops
Since it was a wet weekend I thought I just fancied a game of something. Since I hadn’t played Black Ops for a while I thought that’s what I’d do.
I went with a simple meeting engagement. Each side had 100 points each. The human squad had two fireteams of five men – in the first was the leader, heavy weapons support, a technical expert, and two troopers. In the second was another heavy weapons support, a sniper, and three troopers. The droids had three fireteams of five, each consisting of a heavy weapon support and four troopers.
Droids occupy the relay station
The idea behind the scenario is that the droid army has captured a human communications station and the human squad has to go in, recapture it, and get it online. They have seven turns to do that and get to safety.
Moving through the cargo crates
Turn One
Black Ops is a card activation system. Each troop type has two cards in the deck and when they are drawn a model can take one action (e.g. the human Specialist card is drawn – the technical expert and sniper can each take an action). In addition, the leader gets a bonus third card which can be used to activate a third time or he can order a model within 6” to take a third action. Simple enough.
Get some! Get some!
On the first turn it seemed like there were only droid cards in the deck, all the droids had taken one action, and the droid troopers had taken their second, before one of the human cards came up. This allowed the droids to make a quick advance and move up to halfway across the board (I was using my smaller 2’x3’ board). This put the humans on a back foot, particularly the sniper (private Urek Ricci) who I had wanted to move up to an advantageous position but this was now denied because the droids, ZX81 and CPC464, had moved so far forward.
Sniper Ricci takes aim
Turn Two
The human leader, Sergeant Waylan Gomez, led his team up through some cargo containers. Urek Ricci advanced on another position and took a quick snapshot with his rifle at ZX81 – he missed. I’d made the terrain nice and close, to eliminate too many long-range avenues of fire that could dominate, so models had to move carefully to ensure they couldn’t be seen. The droids well and truly moved into the comms relay station area and crossed it safely to cover the approach of the humans.
Droids advance in strength
Turn Three
The humans had to get a move on. Private Yan Obrand, with his M77 plasma gun, saw the droids Dragon 32 and HP85 moving around the back of the comms relay. He let rip, but missed. He then took a second burst and this time both droids went down! First kill to the humans. Urek also had a go with his sniper rifle at the droids in the station compound, this time with a steady hand and good rest for his weapon. But he missed again! Close to Urek was private Cove Longstern and he moved up to put some suppressive fire down. The droids responded by moving an entire squad against Ricci and Longstern. They opened up but failed to hit anything. Sergeant Gomez with specialist Sorel Marsden and private Dorian Zenward continued to sidle through the containers trying to find a way to the relay station.
Yan Obrand lays down covering fire
Turn Four
Again, Urek Ricci took a shot and again he missed! Some sniper he was turning out to be. That would be his last shot though, because ZX81 returned fire and he went down. Two of the droids moved up to occupy his position where they would be able to make a flanking attack on the rest of the human squad. Private Longstern gave fire and a droid went down. But then C64 took a shot and it was bad news for Cove Longstern – it was the end of his game.
The firefight hots up
Turn Five
The droids sought to consolidate their position and see if they could exploit the flank they’d opened up. More droids moved up. Another pair of droids, one armed with a heavy kinetic lance, tried to counter the advance of Yan, Sorel Marsden, and Dorian Zenward. These three had advanced to the side of the comms station, but were waiting for the right moment to break cover and make a dash for the doors. Sergeant Gomez took private Uriah West to shore up the weakened flank left vulnerable after Ricci and Longstern had been taken down.
You go that way and we’ll give you cover
Turn Six
With not much time left it was obvious the humans had to get a move on. It was already looking extremely unlikely they would have time to re-enable the relay station and get off board so if they were to they would have to get moving. With that in mind, Yan, Sorel, and Dorian moved up to the station. Immediately the droids opened up and took Dorian Zenward out. But on their second activation Yan put down some suppressive fire and Marsden managed to unlock the station and get it back online. First part of the mission complete!
Behind the back of the bike sheds
Turn Seven
Last turn syndrome – go for it! So the station was working but could they get away? It pretty much happened how you think it would – the humans made a dash for the table edge and the droids opened up where they could.
In the end none of the humans escaped. The station had been reactivated but they hadn’t quite got away. Human loses were four models, and droid loses were six – so a pretty even ratio. The humans could claim a partial success.
A short pictorial round up of the games at the latest meeting.
First up a couple of FOG Ancients games.
6mm FOG Roman Civil War6mm FOG Ancient British Chariots6mm FOG Ancient British Warband
Next, on a planet far, far away, Alan ran a couple of games using Fistful of Lead Galactic Heroes rules.
Star Wars ImperialsStar Wars BattlefieldStar Wars Imperial All Terrain Scout TransportStar Wars Rebels annoy the native fauna
Lastly Several SAGA Games. Stephen and Andy in the Age of Crusades, Templars vs Saracens.
SAGA Age of Crusades deploymentSAGA Age of Crusades. Salim al-Katid’s Warband on parade
There will be a full write up of this game in a couple of week’s time.
Jeremey and Tony were playing SAGA Age of Vikings, Norse-Gaels vs Anglo Saxons.
SAGA Age of Vikings, Jeremey’s Anglo Saxon WarbandSAGA Age of Vikings, Tony’s Norse-GaelsSAGA Age of Vikings Warbands Clash
Later in the afternoon Tony (Norse-Gaels) and Jeremey and Andy (both Vikings) had a couple of three handed games fighting to control a Bard, after all, he who controls the bard writes the saga.
SAGA Age of Vikings, Three way fight for the Bard. Tony’s Norse Gaels top left, Jeremey’s Vikings top right and Andy’s Vikings at the bottomSAGA Age of Vikings, second battle for the Bard. Andy’s warband eliminated, the Bard in Jeremey’s protective custody while Tony’s Norse-Gaels look on.
Andy tells the story of the Fenris mission from a different perspective.
Following the limited success of the first mission to Denides, Captain Ash de Vere set about recruiting replacements for the losses incurred, Eric Olsen, the First Mate and Sam Fleet, a pathfinder had both died during the mission.
The first order of business was to recruit a new First Mate, by a stroke of fate the best candidate Ash could find was also called Eric, Eric Bamburgh. After some reflection Ash decided the crew really ought to have the services of a medic, and fortunately the new first mate knew of a good man called Dan McIntyre who was looking for a new berth.
As the two new crewmen were settling in Patina dZuk, one of the Runners Ash had engaged for the last mission, popped in and asked Ash if he could stump up 20 credits to get her the kit needed to become a Chisler. As there was just enough credit remaining after hiring Dan, Ash agreed.
So, with the crew back up to full strength Ash set about looking for a new mission to bolster the funds. An information broker Ash knew, Germy, had heard some rumours that Fenris, site of one of the major battles in the Robot Wars, was awash with loot and knew of potential buyers for any physical loot that Ash could find. What Germy didn’t say was how many robots remained active on the surface of Fenris…
Ash and Eric tried to lay some groundwork for the mission, Ash tried his usual sources for some high impact ammunition, but none was to be found. Eric tried greasing some palms to get possible rival crews to look the other way at an opportune moment, but there were no takers.
As Ash set the shuttle down on Fenris he briefed his crew. He would lead one team with Charlie, Jen and Patina. Eric would lead a second team with Skel, Honu and Offler. Bren, who hadn’t fully recovered from the injuries sustained on Denides, and the new medic Dan would be the reserve.
As the teams approached the ruins of a town movement could be seen, several of the Fenris incident robots were moving around the town.
Robots patrolling
In addition, more than one other crew were in the town, no doubt searching for the same loot Ash was after.
Tony’s crew
Ash led his team towards Tony’s crew, an ex-military group judging by their uniforms, activating his Energy Shield as he moved through the ruins.
Ash’s team took up positions behind some rocks while Patina got out her lock picks and set to opening a promising looking crate. Success, unlocked!
As Patina checked the contents of the crate she came under fire from Tony’s crew, presumably trying to take her out so they could steal the loot.
Ash and the rest of the team returned fire at Tony’s crew, giving the wounded Patina the chance to fall back with the loot behind some rocks to take her out of the line of fire. Ash told Patina to get back to the Troubadour with the loot as fast as she could; he and the rest of the team would cover her retreat.
A wounded Patina and her loot.
In the ensuing firefight Jen was knocked down, and as Ash and Charlie were both hit before they pulled back. As did Tony’s crew, perhaps they realised they weren’t going to be able to catch Patina.
Meanwhile, Eric’s team had moved into a different part of the ruins searching for more loot.
Eric’s team
As they advanced a clanking sound was heard behind them, one of the Fenris Robots had appeared from the ruins and opened fire, wounding Skel.
Bren and Dan came to Skel’s aid, Bren taking out the robot, and Dan treating Skel’s injuries.
Dan treats Skel with Bren on guard
Honu took up a position to guard the right flank, hunkering down amid the ruins. Good job too as another Robot moved up, firing on and wounding Honu. In returning fire Honu managed to put the Robot down.
Honu takes cover
While Honu dealt with the robot, Eric and Offler advanced through the ruins, finding another crate.
Offler and Eric find some loot
As they examined the crate they came under fire from Stephen’s crew, who seemed to be concentrating their fire on Offler. She was knocked down, and after returning fire Eric pulled back to some cover, with Bren coming up to support.
For some unknown reason the crew that had shot Offler then fell back, giving Eric the chance to go back and unlock the loot.
With Bren and Honu covering, Eric grabbed the loot and headed back toward the ship, only for yet another robot to appear! Luckily for the crew the combined fire of Bren, Honu and Eric managed to take down the robot, although Bren’s carbine jammed part way through the firefight.
With the robot down Eric’s team made good their escape, with Eric wondering why they had been robot magnets.
Eric’s team fall back with the loot (White skull denotes Bren’s jammed Carbine)
Once the Troubadour had left orbit, Dan took Jen and Offler into the sick bay to treat their wounds. Jen was remarkably uninjured after all, it must have been just a glancing blow, but Offler was in worse condition. Dan managed to patch her up, but she would not be back to full strength for a while.
Back at the Grand Market, Ash decided not to fence the loot through Germy, he hadn’t forgiven Germy for the bad intel on the robots. After some haggling, he found buyers for the Trade Goods and Alien Artefact they had recovered, netting 250 and 400 credits respectively. Ash would have to think on how to spend the hard-earned credits.
The crew gained 135 experience from the mission, enabling Eric to advance a level.
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