Blood on the Frontier - Song of Drums and Tomahawks AAR

I've had the chance to play a variety of skirmish games recently, the latest being Ganesha Games' Song of Drums & Tomahawks, a French & Indian War themed update of their Blades & Heroes rules. I've been meaning to paint up my Muskets & Tomahawks miniatures at some point, and Drums & Tomahawks provides the perfects means to get them done in chunks. 

Carl also has a vast collection of 20mm and 28mm miniatures for the period, as well as some terrain. So we built a couple of 350 point forces (standard size for the game), and as Gary was interested, he and Carl split an Indian warband to counter my Colonial scouting party. 

Indian Warband: 

Elite Indian Brave x4

Indian Warrior x4

Indian Youth x3

Colonial Scouting Party:

Ranger Officer

Ranger x3

Frontiersman

Settler

Indian Brave

Indian Warrior

The scene was a frontier settlement somewhere in the Ohio valley in late autumn.

The scouting party, consisting of four rangers (one being an officer), two colonial tag-alongs (a Settler and a Frontiersman) and two Iroquois scouts (a Warrior and a Brave) arrived to find the settlement eerily quiet. The two colonials called out before being quieted by the ranger Officer - his two Indian guides had already begun to slink towards the woods, a bad sign.

The Rangers moved through the settlement, while the two colonists lagged behind. One of the Indian spots movement deeper in the woods.

It was a group of Algonquin warriors! The senior Indian Brave took aim with his musket, but the shot missed, slamming into a tree trunk and alerting the Algonquins.

Indian War cries began to fill the air. The Rangers formed a line, waiting for the enemy to get into range of their muskets.

Return fire from the Algonquins killed the Indian Brave. The Warrior waits, watching as the Algonquin that killed his mentor rushes forward, hoping to talk the Iroquois' scalp.

The Iroquois Warrior fired early, however - knocking over an enemy, but not fatally wounding him.

Musket fire erupted from both sides. The Algonquin killer reached his prize, but was engaged by the Iroquois Warrior.

The Rangers stayed in line, even as hot lead filled the air around them. Their fire managed to knock over several Indian attackers, but nothing seemed to kill them. The Iroquois scout found himself suddenly outnumbered.

In a flurry of tomahawks and knives, the Iroquois scout was cut down, his body falling beside his mentor's corpse. The two fallen Indians were quickly scalped, grisly trophies taken by the enemy.

One of the Rangers went down, a bullet tearing through his chest.

The Indian that killed the ranger quickly ran into the colonist's midst, scalping the fallen Ranger.

The Settler ran out of frame for the moment, but he managed to kill a lone Indian prowling over on the left edge of the firefight. The Rangers showed their mettle in this turn, felling three Indians - two with muskets and one with a thrown tomahawks.

However, the Algonquins still had the advantage in numbers, and decided to charge the colonials. The Frontiersman and another Ranger were brought down. The rest of the scouting party, demoralized from the sudden loss, started to retreat from the settlement.

Two Algonquins rushed the Ranger Officer, and the leader's green uniform was stained red as he falls.

At this point, the scouting party broke, with the Settler and the remaining Ranger fleeing back to friendly territory, the only survivors left to tell the story of the slaughter. The remaining Algonquins torched the settlement, wholly satisfied. Carl and Gary claimed victory.

What a game! While it took us a few turns to understand the activation and turn sequence, the game moved at a pretty good clip once we did. The activation of models depends on rolling dice (1-3 d6s) to see how many actions a model can take. Since all of our models were Quality 4, they needed a 4+ to activate.

Failing on 2 or more dice, however, ends the current turn, and passes it over to the enemy. So there were plenty of turns were Gary, Carl or I tried to roll two dice for activation and failed both. This can get frustrating when it occurs multiple turns in a row, leaving your force stuck in position and unable to do anything. I have been contemplating trying a different method of play, with alternating activation and two actions per model, but we should probably play with the rules for a little while longer before making any changes.

However, we did have fun, and I believe we'll keep playing with these rules as we work towards assembling larger forces for use with Muskets & Tomahawks for larger battles.

Skirmish at Dusk - Ronin AAR

With Osprey Game pumping out one blue book after another, Carl and I decided to revisit Ronin. Luckily, Carl has plenty of terrain and Sengoku-era Japanese miniatures, so all I had to do was show up with some dice and the proper fighting spirit. 

We decided for a quick, introductory game, so we set the points at 100. 

Carl's buntai:

Samurai (Powerful)

Ashigaru-Gashira

Ashigaru (Yumi)

Ashigaru (Yari) x2

My buntai:

Samurai (Fast)

Ashigaru-Gashira

Ashigaru (Yumi) x2

Ashigaru (Yari)

The setting was some nondescript village somewhere within the Kanto region.

Peasants returned to their homes as the sun began to dip below the horizon. A pair of consorts looked on, watching the sunset.

Unfortunately, the tranquility is about to be shattered. Carl's band of warriors arrived, hoping to stay the night in the town's inn.

From the opposite trail came my group, who serve under a lord hostile to that of Carl's group.

The two groups spotted each other and charged forward. The peasants, surprised by the sudden, fearsome noise, began to scatter.

The two groups continued to move forward. Some bow shots were exchanged, but no arrows managed to find their mark, either missing or being turned aside by armor.

The combatants met in the middle of the town square. Swords clashed as the last of the peasants ducked inside their homes.

My yari-wielding ashigaru managed to give Carl's ashigaru-gashira a blow to the head, before being chopped down. Combat proved inconclusive elsewhere.

Carl's bow ashigaru managed to stun my own bow ashigaru. The ashigaru-gashira and his underling dealt a grievous blow to their enemy, who retreated. My own samurai, in a valiant demonstration of his martial skill, kept Carl's samurai, ashigaru-gashira, and ashigaru preoccupied.

Carl's ashigaru went down, but his bow ashigaru wounded one of my own. I tried getting another ashigaru into combat, but Carl's ashigaru-gashira turned and dealt the interloper a grievous wound. 

It was starting to look dire for my buntai. Another of my ashigaru went down. My ashigaru-gashira tried to help his samurai commander, but the three attackers wouldn't let up.

Like a typhoon, Carl's buntai cut through my warriors, with only my ashigaru-gashira remaining. Realizing his lord and subordinates were all dead, the ashigaru-gashira decided to flee (likely being cut down or catching an arrow in the back for his cowardice). It was a solid victory for Carl.

I enjoyed the game, although the combat system seemed a little arcane at first, with its combination of dice and counters. Another concern we had was just how hard it was to kill people without a lucky break in dice - my samurai was able to hold off three attackers for half the game. We also thought that there wasn't much movement in the game, although that might have been because we played a low point game with only a few models on each side.

It may be that a group of samurai and ashigaru may be passing through the painting queue in the near future.

Stalling Out - Horizon Wars AAR

Having gotten the hang of how to set up one of the scenarios in the Horizon Wars rulebook, Kevyn and I decided to retry the first scenario we played, Deliberate Attack, and bumped the points up to 20.

Kevyn's mech-led force would be the attackers:
P3 Mech Gold Prophet (CHQ)
P1 Mech x2
Armored Artillery
Heavy Cavalry x2
Mobile Infantry x2
Heavy Infantry

In order to win, Kevyn would need to beat down my force until only two units remained on the table at the end of a turn.

While I decided to defend with a conventional only force:
Heavy Cavalry (CHQ)
Heavy Cavalry x2
Light Cavalry x2

Heavy Infantry x2

Recon

Armored Artillery

To win, I would need to end the game with at least four units on the table, and have double the original amount of Presence.

Kevyn deployed his advanced force, while my units (the two Heavy Infantry and the Recon) were set up in hidden deployment.

In the first turn, I kept the two Heavy Infantry units hidden, but chose to reveal the Recon unit, which used its Guide Fire ability to reign down Armored Artillery fire from reserves. This was even more deadly thanks to a CR upgrade that pushed the Armored Artillery's firepower stat up to 8!

Kevyn decided to focus on the Recon unit, laying fire into their position, but poor dice and a combination of high armor and elevated cover meant few hits were scored.

Kevyn kept his units' fire concentrated on the Recon unit, not wanting to get closer to that dangerous artillery barrage, but the small infantry unit kept their heads down, receiving little damage. 

I brought on the first of my reserves - a Heavy Cavalry unit - which Kevyn then tried to destroy with a charge from his Mobile Infantry. Unfortunately, the P3 vehicle out-rolled the P1 infantry, winning the close-quarters battle and causing a huge amount of damage.

It was at the beginning of Turn Three that Kevyn realized his mistake. Allowing the Recon unit to hold up a large chunk of his force meant that I had enough time to bring on the high-presence units I needed to win the game. And as the previous two turns had shown, it was unlikely that he could do enough damage to take the slightly-damaged Recon unit to stop me from winning.

Kevyn's attempt to shoot down the Recon unit allowed the infantry to react and move out of line of sight to most of his units. A desperate gamble from a long-range move from his Mobile Infantry didn't allow for a charge, and another shoot action failed to provide the necessary crits to wipe the enemy from the table.

A crit from the Armored Artillery's indirect fire did, however, take out Kevyn's other Mobile Infantry unit, and my Heavy Cavalry (along with the CHQ unit I had brought in from reserve) started to rumble forward toward's Kevyn's lines. 

However, the game ended at that point - I had five units on the table (none hidden) and had doubled the original presence of the advance force. 

It's nice that Kevyn and I are starting to get beyond simply trying to learn the rules, and have instead begun trying to tease the nuances out of Horizon War's ruleset. This could have been a mission in which I tried to rush into Kevyn's forces from the beginning, which probably would have been a mistake. While I had an overall advantage in available Presence, Kevyn's advance force could have been plenty to wipe my units from the table, had he been less cautious. It's definitely a lesson I'll need to keep in mind, if I end being the attacker again in this scenario. 

Tripped Up - Horizon Wars AAR

Kevyn got his own Horizon War miniatures painted, so we decided to get a game in and try out the full rules. 

We decided to try out the Rescue mission at 15 P. I was the attacker and Kevyn the defender. I had to get my units off my side of the table, while Kevyn had to destroy them. Unfortunately, each unit had to take 4 points of damage, first applied to their Movement value, so they started the game limping along at 1" per move. 

We deployed our initial forces, with Kevyn placing his full advance force out. I had two units in hidden deployment. You'll notice the two sets of activation markers denoting where the hidden units are. This was actually a mistake - the tokens should be split up, allowing for a little more ambiguity in the unit's position. 

This misunderstanding meant that both of my units ended up revealed in the second turn, after repositioning their tokens to the other side of the table. Kevyn's P1 mech damaged my P2 mech in close combat, and both then went down due to shooting from both sides.

I brought on another P2 mech from reserve, and Kevyn's forces moved towards the other retreating mech.

With Kevyn leading 1-0, I had to get the other mech of the table. I brought on a Hvy Cav unit and my Lt Cav CHQ. I was able to use the CHQ's Chain of Command ability to move the objective Mech further along towards my table edge. The mech managed to dodge four reactions from Kevyn's forces! It then scooted back a little further

Now things were starting to get desperate. Kevyn had a concentration of forces all around the objective mech, while I was scrambling to get anything over to the fight. Another Lt Cav and a Mob Inf unit arrived from reserve and sped forwards. Meanwhile, my P2 mech was trying to take out the opposing P3 mech, and doing a poor job of it.

Unfortunately, Kevyn's Mob Inf charged in and, after slapping a half-dozen explosive charges on the mech's legs, watched as the explosions toppled the warmachine! Victory went to Kevyn, 2-0.

It was only after the game that I had realized my mistakes. The screw-up with the hidden deployment tokens hadn't helped, and I never thought to try and use the Repair action to try and heal the damage caused at the beginning of the game. I also revealed my units too soon, before I could get a decent build up of units on my side of the table. Kevyn followed the suggested tactics perfectly, forcing my to reveal my units too early, and then harrying them to destruction.

Painting Update - Guild Ball, Arena Rex, Kings of War, Horizon Wars

We're back this week with some single additions and half of a "big" project. 

Gen Con has come and gone, and thanks to some ninja-shopping from Kevyn, I managed to get my hands on some exclusive releases.

Wrecker is the Season 2 mascot for the Masons, and hasn't been released yet. He's an interesting addition (with a somewhat boring model), and I'm curious as to how he works in the team compared to Marbles. The baboon is a damage modifier, while the giant armadillo seems to occupy the footballing space more, with some methods to push models around as he moves.

Lupa is a gladiator for Ludus Magnus, and was originally available only through the Kickstarter. Now she can be bought exclusively at certain conventions. She brings some hitting power to the Magnus ludi, but can be stopped by the opponent by spending Favor dice - which can put the Magnus player at a Favor advantage. She's also a pain to take a picture of thanks to her stance.

Although I lost interest in Kings of War as a fantasy mass-combat ruleset earlier this year, I'm planning on attending a local tournament just to get some games in and support the local scene. The problem is, I no longer have an army for the game, having sold off my League of Rhordia/Kingdoms of Men force not too long ago. Luckily, Kevyn's letting me borrow his Ogres mega-army. As a thank you, I picked up this Reaper Bones giant and will pass it along to Kevyn, after using it in the tournament.

As for the "big" project, I completed half of the forces I'm putting together for Horizon Wars. The above miniatures are all from the Army of the Reach, the military force of Harker's Reach, one of the most powerful manufacturing cities on Kressidia. They're the main opposition to the UMC (United Mercantile Consortium) and their mercenary companies.

This is a big force; an average game of Horizon Wars may range from 15 to 30 points, and what I've painted adds up to 67 points!

The armored elements of the army consist of Mobile Infantry, Light Cavalry, Heavy Cavalry, and Armored Artillery. The vehicles are from Brigade Models, as are the infantry.

There are plenty of foot infantry options; Light Artillery, Recon, Airborne Infantry, Special Forces, Light Infantry and Heavy Infantry. Again, these are all from Brigade Models.

These Heavy Gear mechs have been repurposed as paratrooper variants of medium Gator and light Caiman mechs. I'll be adding more when Dream Pod 9 releases their plastic starter set, which contains 30 mechs!

Now that the Reach forces are done, I'm starting work on the UMC, which is made up of various private military companies. This should break up some of the monotony, as everything in the faction won't need to look alike.