English Long Bowmen

 

Over the last 6 weeks, I have been painting figures for SAGA Age of Chivalry. It has really caught on at our historical wargaming club in Montreal. At our monthly SAGA nights we usually having 10-12 players.

After some research, I decided to go with Perry Plastics for my figures. This ended up being a good choice as they are a good price, easy to assemble and a lot of fun to paint. I am also starting to appreciate that they are quite light weight in comparison to metal figures. I have designed and printed round 25mm bases and oval 25x50mm bases for my SAGA armies. These are all magnetised with a 1x10mm magnets, the fact that they are plastic helps with this and they certainly seem to be easily transported with metal boxes.

I know a lot of players finding the exact armour and accruements for the time period, and I do appreciate the medieval age was a period of rapid change of armour and weapons. I elected to do my best to be accurate but especially in respect to head wear I might be a little off for specific countries.

I decided to build armies for the English, Swiss and Yorkists first as they are quite different in organisation. Of course a lot of these figures can be used for other countries but I felt it important to put a couple of forces the table as quickly as possible. I think I have painted 12 units so far but I will start with my English Long Bowmen.

The Long Bow was integral to the English army during this period. They are also relatively unique in SAGA organisation to the English. They can also be hired as mercenaries by some other specific factions. I did do quite a bit of research on how to paint them and generally what I found it could be quite varied but I decided to go with basic colours of the time but adding several figures in the livery of the Yorkist faction of Edward IV. I also decided to do one specific faction in the livery of Sir Richard Ratcliffe. 

Three units of Long Bow Armed Warriors

In the Red and Blue livery of the Yorkist faction.

The Black and White livery of Richard Ratcliffe

Non specific but uniform clothing but with a touch of red and blue to keep them English. I will use this unit as my mercenary bowmen for other countries.

The figures are from the English Agincourt box in the first 2 groups and the last unit is from the War of the Roses box. I have to say that the War of the Roses figures are quite nice and I prefer their styling.

Midgard- Britons vs Romans

 

This past Saturday myself and PY got together for a game of Midgard, our second. In this game PY played the Britons while I played the Romans. We used the 300 point lists from the Midgard website.

We again played scenario 1 from the rulebook, I ended up being the attacker. I have to say the game did not go well for me. It is clear that I have a lot tp learn about tactics with this ruleset, the only excuse I have is that I am still learning the rules. 

I started an aggressive attack which caused me to lose 2 of my units almost immediately, I did push on but by the third turn my reputation had dropped to zero....game over!

I do enjoy playing though and I am sure I will get better with more experience. Some photos to follow.

Many Rivers to Cross-Turn 2-The Village

Forces

Guards Platoon 1, FM 8 (missing 2 soldiers)

FR 0, 5CD, Regulars

Supports (10)

Barbed Wire 2

Extra Infantry Section

MMG Team

Schützen Platoon 2 FM 8 (fresh)

FR +1, 5CD, Regulars

Supports (15)

Pioneer Wire Cutting Team

Adjutant

Shabby Nazi Trick (fifth columnist)

Red Dice

MG34 Tripod Mount

Pregame Bombardment

Extra Schützen Squad

Patrol Phase

Patrol Markers

British JOPs

Well spread German JOPs

Fixed Defences

Bunker status

Allied left protected

Allied right protected

Allied centre protected

Game

This was my second shot in trying to take this village. In the first game I concentrated most of my resources on my right flank, this time as you can see from the Allied fixed defences, the only real choice I had was to attack equally on both flanks. Again, I only had light weapons so the key to my advance was probably the Pregame Bombardment as well as a Fifth Columnist. My JOP's were in much better position now with choices of deployment on the extremes of each of my flanks as well as in the centre. The Allied JOP's were heavily concentrated on their left with a single JOP on their right, but positioned thus so they were unable to deploy forward into the fenced area in front of the barn. I rapidly deployed all my forces in the first 2 phases. with 2 squads to the left with the MMG team, the mortar team and a SL all within command range. I was also able to deploy 1 squad half way up the field on my right in a tactical position that they were already half way across the table. They were covered by another squad behind the hedge.

Sounds good so far, but the Allies actually then got 4 double phases in a row and were rapidly able to accumulate CoC pips. It took them awhile to deploy but they got a lot of chances to do so. I probably should have advanced early then I did but I was able to get to a rifle team off the table on the right by splitting them off from the LMG team under command of their JL. I was able to put covering fire down on the side window of the building on the far left Allied flanks as well as put a smoke grenade down to protect the LMG team in the field. The rifle team was able to rapidly advance once out of the field to the edge enemy edge. The 2 men left got within 3" and were about to be shot when I was able to interrupt and get them off the table. First victory condition met!

While all this was happening, I was firing with 3 squads on the building on the Allied left but to absolutely no effect due to the hard cover provided. It is difficult without heavy weapons. My focus here was due to the fact that I could win the game if I could clear the right and left Allied flanks (2 foot squares) I would meet the 2nd victory condition and win. Graham had yet to place anyone on his right flank so that square was already open, all I had to do was knock that one section out of the left Allied flank. But by now my FM was falling due to the attrition I was receiving on 3 of my deployed squads. A SL got killed, my FM was down to 5 and by now my fire power was much reduced and Graham deployed his last section on his right. I had no chance to win so I withdrew.

As you can see below this battle cost me dearly in men and in Mens Opinion, my leadership has categorised as Dangerous. I am now a murdering officer!

Game Photos

My right flank taking a pounding again

I should have been more aggressive with my left flank

I was able to drive this section out of the destroyed house on the Allied right

The Allies liked being in the houses

Summing Up

German Platoon #2 

Platoon Leader Outlook: Sad

Platoon HQ Leutnant dead, HQ now consists of 2 Feldebel (SL’s) 

Men’s opinion: -4 (-1 on FM roll)

CO’s opinion: -2 

8 Dead, 4 missing next game

German 1st Platoon has lost 5 dead 

British Platoon #1 

Platoon Leader Outlook: Affable (+1 on FM roll)

Men’s opinion: +3 (+1 on FM roll)

CO’s opinion: +2  

1 dead

Graham played well in these first 2 games, he has decided to hold the village in the next turn. It is going to be tough with the limitations as noted above.

Dracula's America-Dagon Rising!

 

Myself and Luis had the seventh and final game in our Forbidden Powers campaign set in the Swamplands of the Deep South. We played this as a one-off campaign not in association with the campaigns in Shadows in the West or the Hunting Grounds sourcebooks. I will calculate Destiny Points for this campaign in case we do move on in the future with another Dracula's America campaign. Although it was not really stated at the beginning of the campaign, I would think that Luis's Cultist Posse represents the Alliance of Chaos while my Nephilim represent the Alliance of Order.

To date Luis had won 4 of the previous games and I had won 2, the Infamy accumulated were quite close with Luis have a 2 point margin. Really though the Cultists were trouncing my Nephilim in most of the games. I believe I really only had one significant victory. The Cultists have much more seasoned veterans who are better equipped.

This scenario was set in a dry area in the middle of a swamp, with Dagon's Pool in the middle with monoliths placed around it. Each posse can claim a monolith with a character using an action utilising one of their grit dice. With a successful throw they can claim it, if the Alliance of Chaos claims 3 of the monoliths then a Minor Servitor of Dagon appears. If at the end of turn 8, if the Servitor is on the table then the Chaos Alliance wins the game. The Servitor can appear anytime after turn 3. Simple enough!

Game Summary

In my recent Saga game, I mentioned that I had incredible dice while my opponent was absolutely abandoned by the dice gods. In our last Dracula Americas game the reverse happened to me to a point where even Luis felt sorry for me. Unfortunately, it was very similar in this game, just terrible dice and yet again my Seraphim once on the table is knocked down by some random event and never gets to engage the enemy. But time to stop whining!

We had 10 characters each, I started in the left lower corner (southwest) while Luis was diagonally across for me. Winning the game was dependent on me not letting the Cult capture 3 on the monoliths. Clearly the one next me should be easy enough to get early in the game, so I sent 3 characters to the east and 3 to the north. I kept Astaroth back with Malpas, who was half dead anyway, as well as the Bokor. I also kept Uzza back but advanced him toward the pool so he could make a run for the SE and NW monolith as need be. I also had to consider trying to win the campaign as the margin was just 2, but knowing that Luis was a much more experienced player, I made this secondary.

Luis advanced his characters to the same monoliths but more to the SE monolith, so I set up the Undead Drifter there on Lookout while 2 veteran hired guns advanced to claim the monolith. By turn 3, Astaroth had captured the SW monolith and in turn 4 or 5 the SE monolith was captured. I was surprised that Luis did not put capturing the NE monolith high on his list. So essentially more than half way through the game I had 2 monoliths and Luis had zero. In turn 6 and 7, Luis started to turn the tables on me and captured 2 monoliths and near the end of the turn 7 was aggressively trying to capture the 3rd. By now I had lost 5 of my characters, although I had killed a minor entity that Luis had spawned as well as banishing a Shogoth that had spawned.  I believe Luis had lost 2 characters including one with an infamy of 4.

I am not sure if Luis had missed it, but he started Turn 8 with only 2 monoliths, so I had won the game as there was no Servitor on the table. A surprising victory as I had not played that well. But the real shocker came in the post game process, Luis's character Mr T with 4 Infamy was deemed killed. He lost these points so the final Infamy total was 39 for the Nephilim and 36 for the Crossroads Cultists. I had won the Forbidden Powers campaign winning 3 out of 7 scenarios. 

I am not sure when we will play more Draculas America as we are moving on to Pulp Alley next. I did go ahead and made a post game Posse sheet for the Nephilim as who knows when they will appear again. Just is case we play another DA campaign I did calculate the Destiny Points. The Alliance of Chaos has 4 for their 4 victories while the Alliance of Order has 5, 3 victories and 2 extra for a campaign win.

I have to thank Luis for setting up this campaign, he really put terrific tables together and he has an amazing collection of figures. It was a lo of fun. In respect to the ruleset, I do find it difficult to play and I continuously made errors and missed things. There is a lot of moving pieces in this ruleset, I think I also found the swamp terrain difficult to navigate as LOS and cover were never very clear to me, but the terrain did look terrific. Playing 7 games over 13 months was really not enough to keep the rules fresh in my mind. Hopefully the next time we play, I will be able to play more frequently. 

Saga Night-English vs Scots

This week's Saga Night featured 5 games. I played against Rob's Scots with my English. This was my first 6 point Age of Chivalry match with my figures so I was looking forward to it.

Warbands

Scots

Warlord

2 units of Warrior Pikes

2 units of Levy Bowmen

1 unit of Mounted Warriors

1 unit of Foot Hearthguard

English

Warlord

2 units of Warrior Bowmen

2 units of Warriors

2 units Foot Hearthguard

We played the Chaos set up as outlined in the Book of Battles. I do not exactly remember the sequence but Rob was the first player so I got to put 4 pieces of terrain on the table, oddly enough my careful thought process here did not work out for me as the deployment ended up being from the short sides rather than the long sides (important to read all five setup conditions). I did get 4 dice on my BB before the start which is always nice. The game was 5 turns with massacre points + some extra points for units on the table. Rob started the game with 7 saga dice while I had 6.

Some Photos

Scottish Levy Bows on their left flank

The English Ability of shooting at 2L was quite effective

The Scots right flank with their Pikemen

Hearthguard in the centre

Hmmm.....what to do next.

I found the Gruelling Advance Ability quite effective

Turn 4 from the English left flank, the Scots have been almost routed

Sir Richard Ratcliffe with his Knights

Warlord's Pride!

This game was characterised by some of the worst dice luck I have seen on Rob's behalf while I was incredibly lucky with mine. By the end of the first 2 turns I had reduced the Scots to maybe two thirds of the figures without losing any. This continued through turn 3 and 4. By turn 5, I had just lost  5 Hearthguard maintaining 6 Saga dice, while Rob just had 12 figures on the board with 2 Saga Dice. So a very clear victory for me as in the final encounter the Scots lost their Warlord in a Warlord's Pride encounter. 

The game was a bit unsatisfactory because of the Dice God disparity! I did, however, get a lot of experience with the English Battleboard which really is quite effective when you combine its Advanced Abilities. I think I will add another unit of Warrior Bowmen and see how that goes.

Thanks again to Korrigan for setting up these fantastic Saga Nights.

Many Rivers to Cross-Turn 1-The Village

Graham and myself have recently decided to have a go at another Chain of Command campaign. We both like the Early War period of WWII. I had played There are Many Rivers to Cross campaign before as the defender,  with the Chasseurs Ardennais. I have not looked back but I believe I had a marginal victory, this time I will be playing the German attackers. we used the 1940 Blitzkrieg source book for our platoon lists and most of the scenarios.

Click on the link above to get the campaign but essentially we have a 6 map campaign between the Attacking Germans and any Allied force specific to the area where you would like to play the campaign. Graham wanted to play his Early War Brits, he chose a 1940 Regulation Platoon of Guards while I picked a Schützen platoon from 1 Panzer. Our game is set in France. The Germans have no significant support available to them until they place pontoon bridges behind them.

Forces

Guards Platoon 1, FM 9

FR 0, 5CD, Regulars

Supports (6)

Barbed Wire 2

Extra Infantry Section

Schützen Platoon 1 FM 10

FR +1, 5CD, Regulars

Supports (12)

Pioneer Wire Cutting Team

Sniper Team

Red Dice

MG34 Tripod Mount

Stuka Bombardment

The Table

Patrol Phase

Patrol Markers

Stuka Bombardment hit 3 of 7 buildings, oddly enough they all had the same effect with UXB.

German JOPs, not want I really wanted.

British Defensive Barbed Wire

British JOPs

The Game

I was not that happy with my JOPs but they could have been worse, the Stuka Bombardment was somewhat helpful in delaying the British deployment so I got quite aggressive with my attack. I put down all my troops within a few phases, just holding off with my 3rd squad. The Brits made the middle large building in their deployment zone a Bunker which presented quite a challenge. They deployed a section in this building and I had to use one of my squads to place covering fire on it in almost every phase. This was effective, so I started to move my first squad tactically across the field on my right flank to try to get off the board, one of the criteria for my victory. The Brits countered this with placing 2 sections in the house on their left flank. I shifted over covering fire to this building while at the same time using my other squad, MMG team and Mortar team to fire at the building. My sniper took 5 shots before he even scored a hit. Not helpful. 

They made progress but their JL was knocked out half way across the field making their progress more difficult as he could not remove shock.

They pushed on and made it to the road but the Brits moved over to the side windows of the house and pinned them. By now the Brits were unleashing fire from their two other sections one which was behind the fence on their right flank. 

Although the German FM was still high at 8 while the Brits had dropped to 5, the attack was starting to look pretty iffy.

I had now lost 2 JL's and as you can see shock was stacking up on my troops behind the hedge with another squad becoming pinned. I withdrew.......a British victory!

I suppose it could have been worse, my play was a bit rusty and I can see now where I made some mistakes. Hopefully I will play better in the next turn.

Summing Up

German Platoon #1 

Platoon Leader Outlook: Happy. 

Men’s opinion: -3 (-1 FM roll)

Co’s opinion n: -1 

5 Dead, 5 missing next game. 

British Platoon #1 

Platoon Leader Outlook: Affable (+1 FM roll)

Men’s opinion: +2 

Co’s opinion n: +1 

1 Dead, 1 missing next game.

As Graham has the initiative, he has decided to defend The Village again, I will have to come up with a better plan. I have to say it was great to get in a game of Chain of Command. Important to practice up for version 2, which we all hope will be out in 2-3 months.