Painting Update - Squadhammer, Badgers & Burrows

 It's almost the end of the year, so here's one last look at what I've painted in the closing weeks of 2021.

I wanted to finished at least a small force of Astral Claws for my Squadhammer project. I added a Razorback to the mix to complement all of the infantry units I had done so far.

I also completed a Captain to lead the force. Combined with the rest (Tactical Marines, Dreadnought, Assault Marines), that should give me enough elements to play a decent game of Squadhammer and I can add more later on. 

My end-of-the-year meanderings also led me to finally pull out my small collection of Badgers & Burrows and get a starter warband painted. 

These are delightful miniatures to paint, full of character. I feel like I need to get more colors so I have more options for the rest of them!

Miniature Musings - Painting 2mm Miniatures

After posting about my positive reception of Strength & Honour on Twitter, I had Korhyl Miniatures (the maker of the resin armies I purchased at the convention) reach out to me and ask if I could come up with a post about how I ended up painting their 2mm minis. 

So here's the step-by-step process I took to paint a Roman Legion base. 

I started with the base which went into a quick soapy water bath before being air dried. 

Then a black primer, which I tried to make as thin as possible while still getting a good coat. 

As you can see, the individual blocks are still visible. 

Since this was my first attempt at anything this small, I decided to start with the base instead of the troops blocks. 

I used Vallejo's Flat Earth as a base color, and then dry brushed Tan Earth overtop to lighten it a little. 

Normally I'd apply a brown wass to Flat Earth to give it some depth, but with such a tiny scale, that'd probably be too dark. 

After the game of Strength & Honour, I was advised by Maurice to use extra fine point (that's 0.7mm!) acrylic markers, and he was right! The tips were just small enough to make the dots that give the impression of faces, shields, swords, etc.

Having a good set of pens with a range of colors is nice, especially when it includes pastels that can pass for various colors of skin and horse hair. 

The longest part of the process was dotting the blocks. 

Some advice: Do the shield dots first, then the face dots. I tried doing the faces first, only for the color to be covered over in places by the shields. You need the "faces" to give the blocks a sense of direction. 

I placed "shields" on the front and left sides of the blocks, and used silver dots to show swords and armor on the rear and right sides. 

I predominantly used a single shade of red, with a shade of red and white to break up the color monotony. 

I've heard plenty of hobbyists say that, when you get into the smaller scales, basing makes the unit really 'pop', so I tried that out here. I used two different flocks for grass, as well as tiny clumps of foliage in a couple colors to represent bushes or low trees. 

And with a quick varnish, that's a unit done. Accomplishable in a day, or less with some dedication, you could easily finish an entire army in a week or less and be able to play massive battles. 

I'd really like some thoughts and feedback. Anything you'd do differently? My only thought, at the moment, would be to make the entire top layer of the Legion base metallic, to show Roman armor, then adding the colored tops. Maybe I'll try that with a second base. 

Dice and Stones - Strength & Honour AAR

My last game of the convention was another demo of a set of rules that had piqued my interest. 

"Strength & Honour" is an upcoming set of rules by Mark Backhouse and published by Reisswitz Press and Too Fat Lardies. What sets it apart from other ancients wargames is the intended scale. While it can be played in any scale, it's designed for use with 2mm miniatures!

Seeing those tiny, rice-grain sized units on various social media platforms, I couldn't believe how a relatively simple paintjob could give the impression of thousands of warriors gathered on a battlefield in formations that larger scales could only dream of. For example, the Romans could actually form up in their cohorts on a single base, while wild warbands of Gallic or German warriors looked more like flowing masses of bodies. 

When I saw that there would be demo games at Historicon, I jumped on the chance to play.

The game was based on the Battle of Vosges in 58 BC, between the German forces of Ariovistus and the Roman forces of Julius Caesar. I ended up controlling the German center as Ariovistus. 

The Romans had a mix of veteran, trained, and raw legions, with some cavalry and skirmishers on the flanks. The Germans consisted mostly of warbands, with some superior warbands scattered about alongside skirmishers and cavalry on the flanks. 

Maurice, who ran the game, walked us through the various aspects of the rules. I'll talk about my impressions through this after-action report. 

Most units in our game were big, lumbering blocks of troops that were best used when just marching forward. Cavalry and Skirmishers had better chances to maneuver, and all movement is randomized. It takes command points from army leaders to move multiple units together in formation.

Movement is done via grids, which is a big plus in my book.

My most stunning takeaway is that this game is firmly rooted in Blood Bowl, of all things. Plenty of actions can result in a "Reversal of Fortune," which stops your turn and lets the opposite side start acting. Poor combat results, a failed maneuver roll, etc. 

The combat is also a lot like Blood Bowl's Block Dice. Units will compare their Battle Strength, which can be modified. If they're equal you roll 1d6 and look at relevant result on the combat chart. If your strength is higher, you roll 2d6 and pick the result. If it's lower, you roll 2d6 and your opponent picks. 

From my observations of the game, it's rare for a base to disappear entirely unless something has gone disastrously wrong. What happens instead is that bases will shove each other back and forth, racking up Misfortune cards (or the much worse Disaster cards) for their side as they lose combat and cohesion. These cards have numbers on them, but they're hidden from both sides.

The main purpose of the cards is a way to check army morale through a fun rule named "Haemonculus Est" (roughly "Little Man" in Latin). When a side calls it, the other sides' cards are counted. They're tallied together and compared to the army's morale value. If it's equal or higher, the game ends. If it's over half, then the game continues, but the side becomes tired and gets movement and morale penalties. And if it doesn't reach have, the side whose cards are being counted gets to remove one of cards from the pile (likely the highest value). 

The two sides had their own strengths in the game. The Romans were better on the defensive and, when supporting each other, could easily rebuff individual German warbands. 

In comparison, the Germans warbands gained strength bonuses when charging or when supported by other warbands. If a Roman legion was cut off from its fellows (like one ended up ended up on our right flank) it resulted in some pretty nasty combat outcomes. 

This game ended with another historical results. For the first half it seemed like the Romans had the better of the Germans, dishing out card after card and throwing the German left flank and center back. The Germans did manage to rally later on, smashing the Roman's own left flank with some deft cavalry maneuvers. 

It was the Romans, however, who called "Haemonculus Est" first, and despite the German's attempts to delay the inevitable, there were just too many cards to hope that our army morale wouldn't be reached. It was a small consolation that the Romans were fairly bloodied as well, and had the Germans called "Haemonculus Est" first, we may have reversed history.  

Maurice had brought along six armies from Korhyl Miniatures, whose products are featured in the above pictures. I bought a Roman army and a Pontic army, and I'm looking forward to getting a copy of Strength & Honour when it's released. I'll probably pick up a second Roman army from Korhyl so I can play out the Roman Civil War, as the rules will apparently allow players to run campaigns and watch their units evolve over time. 

A Hill to Die On - Live Free or Die AAR

With Thursday and Friday done, I arrived once again at the Valley Forge Casino for a day's worth of gaming.

The morning game was a refight of the Battle of Brandywine, ran by the Little Wars TV crew. I'm a huge fan of their on-going, fantastically produced battle reports on Youtube, and I jumped at the opportunity to get into one of their games as soon as the convention registration opened. 

I was especially excited because it was an opportunity to play their new set of rules for the American War of Independence, Live Free or Die. 

Before the game began, the British Commanders (myself and Walt) were presented with a couple choices. We had the chance to rest our troops before engaging, which would cost us a couple turns but give us the ability to remove morale hits (DMZs) at the end of a turn. We could also send a flanking force to try and cut the Americans off on another table which was centered on the small town of Dilworth.

We decided to rest our troops (which gave us 10 turns to complete the objective) and send a small brigade of two Guards regiments to outflank the American position. 

Walt controlled the majority of the troops with Cornwallis' and Medow's Brigades, while I had Agnew's and von Donop's brigades. 

The American players (Zach and Ray) had loaded most of their troops on their right to block the road under Zach, while Ray's troops were positioned to block my own. 

The British advanced towards the Americans who, apart from some slight shuffling, held their ground. 

With the Americans angled on the hill, it took several turns of marching before my troops could get into firing range. 

Zach and Walt, on the other hand, clashed immediately, with Walt's troops fixing bayonets and charging up the hill. 

Ray's position on the hill meant that my regiments had to cross multiple obstacles to reach him. Doing so gave my units a DMZ per obstacle crossed. 

I planned to give Ray's troops a round of firing before charging in. 

Live Free or Die is also a shoot-then-move ruleset, and units that don't plan to move can "volley fire," doubling the amount of shots they get. 

The British got the worse of the exchange of volleys, with multiple stands lost and units forced back down the hill (which meant I would have to cross the obstacles once again!).

Meanwhile, the Americans must have gotten word that some force of British was moving on a flank march, because their entire right flank suddenly about-faced and started marching back towards Dilworth.

With his flank in the air, Ray decided against retreating his own troops and instead planted his flag and stood his ground. 

Walt, on the other hand, was chasing after the treating Americans. 

The fighting was fierce between the remaining British, Hessian, and American troops, and ownership of the hill was fluid. Both sides were gathering DMZs like they were on sale.

Walt's path was open, so he split his advancing troops into two forces; one was sent after the retreating Americans, while the other was gathering to push into Ray's flanks. 

Despite being outnumbered, Ray's soldiers stood firm in the face of the Hessian Grenadiers, and sent the whole brigade fleeing backwards when I failed multiple morale checks. 

Despite multiple pushes, I couldn't seem to get my regiments to form a cohesive attack on Ray's position. 

By this time in the game, most of the left side of the table had been completely emptied. 

And the Americans were gathering at Dilworth. 

Now flanked by Walt's troops, Ray wasn't going to do down without a fight, using his skirmishers and last, tattered regiments in a curved line.

However, a combined charge by British regiments saw the last American troops on the hill routed. 

The game ended with Walt's flanking troops advancing on the Dilworth table, but too far away to keep the Americans from consolidating their position. 

The game ended with a somewhat historical result; the British ended up taking the American positions but were unable to stop the Americans from retreating in relatively good order. It had been a much bloodier refight, though, with both sides taking far more casualties than in the original battle.

Given another chance, I probably wouldn't have bothered with letting the British troops rest for two turns in exchange for access to the "Redress Ranks" phase. The cost of losing the extra game time wasn't worth the benefit of removing DMZs, since you have to be outside of 12" of enemy units to do so. That was on me - I convinced Walt to delay the advance rather that immediately step off. A couple more turns may have made all the difference!

This was a fantastic game and one of the best convention games I've participated in. The miniatures and terrain looked fantastic, and I'm absolutely planning to use Live Free or Die as my go-to AWI rules. It looks like I'll have some orders with Pendraken in the next year.

Historicon 2021: Inner (and Outer) Daemons - Warmaster Revolutions AAR

After my first two games on Thursday, I was ready for a full day of gaming with the Warmaster tournament. My Daemons were fully painted and raring to go.

We had six players; definitely less than previous years, but with no conventions and some attendee issues over mask requirements, I wasn't surprised. 

My first game was against John and his Bretonnians. It was my first time facing the Arthurian/French-inspired, knight heavy faction in Warmaster. Like Nippon (which I have faced before), the Bretonnians have a special army rule that affect their breakpoint. Only their heavy mounted knights actually count. Chaff units like Peasants and Squires don't count against the army's breakpoint; both for and against. 

This meant that John's breakpoint was only 5 compared to my army's 9. But I had to get through his heavily-armored mounted knights to force him to break.

The scenario was Take and Hold. Both sides had two objectives to place at the start of the game. One was closer to their backline, and the other closer to the center of the table. To control an objective, a side needed to been the only one with a unit within 5cm. Units like flyers could contest objectives, but not control them. 

Since this was my first outing with the Daemons, I was far more cautious then I should have been, especially against an army that outmatched with the amount of cavalry it could bring. Even with the restrictions to commands in the Revolution version of Warmaster, cavalry is still arguably the kind of the battlefield. 

John used his Squires to disrupt my Chariot brigade, which left it vulnerable to his own brigade of Knights and Grail Knights. This shattered my right flank. While I was able to wipe out his Peasant brigade, that kept one of my infantry brigades from moving further up. 

Eventually John was able to grind enough of my units beneath the hooves of his cavalry and broke my army in turn 6. Adding up the objectives we controlled (and a bonus to John for breaking my army), it was a 2-5 loss for the Daemons. 

My second game was against Liddick and his new army, Lizardmen. Their main gimmick is that their Slann "general" can't actually command any units. However it can give a bonus to Skink character's Command stat and can relay spells through Slann Shamans with an unlimited range!

I didn't manage to catch the name of the second scenario, but it involved placing two objectives in the centerline of the table. Starting on turn 3 the objectives activated, and when a side controlled both objectives by being on top of them at the start of their turn the game would end and bonus points would be scored.

I tried compensating for my lack of aggression in the previous game by being too aggressive during this match. Both cavalry brigades ended up worse for wear; my Chariots couldn't handle the Cold One Riders and the mixed brigade tried attacking Kroxigors in terrain. Not an ideal matchup!

With my Daemon Chariots and Cavalry spent, Liddick marched his infantry out into the open and onto the objectives, and the Daemons couldn't push them off. It was another loss for the Daemons, 565 victory points to 945 victory points. 

My final matchup was against Kal, who was commanding a ragtag Dogs of War force. Finally, a familiar enemy!

The final scenario was Battle for the Tower, with both sides fighting to control the central (Chessex dice) tower. 

After a couple turns of failed command rolls and a potentially devastating blunder (which put my Chariot brigade in range of Kal's Ogres and Dwarfs), I thought that the game was all but over. 

Things turned around somewhat when the Chariots did better than expected and managed to mangle the Ogres without losing too many stands. My other cavalry brigade ended up mostly pinned up on the massive block of Pikemen, but reduced their numbers greatly. And they even took out a Giant!

What really saved me was finally getting the Daemonic Hordes into Kal's Crossbowmen and Handgunners. The unarmored, ranged troops were easy targets for the hordes of Bloodletters, Plaguebearers, Horrors, and Daemonettes, which pushed Kal over the breaking point. I had also managed to drop a couple units of Hordes to control the Tower. In their last games, the Daemons managed a 5-0 win. 

So, how were the Daemons? They're definitely an aggressive army. I felt the hurt that I had no ranged units or artillery to interfere with approaching enemy brigades. And I'd probably try to drop the Daemon Swarms, since they only got in the way of the Hordes on the attack. But having Command 8 Wizards, and three Wizard characters, is definitely nice.

The toughest part of the army is dealing with the Daemonic Instability rule. It's a 2/3 chance that something bad is going to happen to any Daemon unit that has lost a stand; either charging uncontrollably, becoming confused, or losing another stand (or disappearing entirely!). The only offset is that the "Summon Daemons" spell in a 4+ to cast and the army can take three Wizards. Without those two conditions, the entire faction might be unplayable. 

Still, I was happy to be able to play Warmaster at a convention again. And now I can get working on a new army!