SAGA Night: Seljuks vs Welsh

SAGA Montréal

I had an opportunity to join in at the most recent SAGA night at the Abyss hosted by SAGA Montréal. There were 10 players so 5 games were put on. I am not 100% sure, but I believe there were 2 warbands of Welsh, Normans and Jomsvikings; Norse-Gaels, Normans, Skraelings, Vikings and Anglo-Danes were also there. My Seljuks made their first appearance. 

Unfortunately, it seems the action was so intense that very few photos were taken, including from my own game against Benoit's Welsh. Here are couple of photos from our game, I used the same composition as I had used couple of nights before in my game against Graham's Anglo-Saxons. Our game was toughly fought out and I believe Benoit edged me by 1 point, so a draw in SAGA terms.

Here are some photos from some of the other games pinched from our clubs Discord server.

Skraelings vs Jomsvikings

Normans vs Vikings

Hopefully I will get a few more photos when we have our next outing on October 24.

I should note this is all in practice for the SAGA Montréal Grand Melée, all the details are provided in the banner.

TFL on Soirée Peinture

What a Cowboy Campaign: Showdown in Los Nachos

Last Wednesday, we saw the start of our much anticipated What a Cowboy campaign written by Eero, my friend in Finland. We are the first group to playtest. Eero's club in Finland is going to start sometime in early October. 

The campaign can be found here, the background story has been very well fleshed out and I cannot do a better job than Eero so download the campaign pamphlet and have a look at the intro. Suffice to say though that the campaign documents a generational  feud between two families, the Makinens and the Taverniers. The Taverniers are rich and the Makinens are poor, their father Jake Makinen has been murdered and all the property has been stolen. The sons were driven into exile in Mexico and now have returned to the New Mexican territory to seek the return of what is theirs and to find out who killed the patriarch of the family.

We advertised on the Montreal Historical Wargaming Club Discord and found 5 players. Most games will be hosted at PY's place, and hopefully we will get to play once or twice a month. To set up each game and to track progress we use the Club's Voice Discord Channel. This seems to be working well.

We got together a couple of weeks ago to generate our characters and also to see who has the initiative. Each posse has a set of player characters as well as non player characters generated by the campaign. The NPC's will vary according to the scenario played. I should note that there are 10 tables to the campaign and after some dice rolling and discussion, the Makinens got the initiative in the first turn. They decided to  try to take over the Tainted Desert, the Taverniers decided to challenge them and won a dice roll to accomplish this.

The Players

Makinens

Matt Makinen-Gunslinger

Justin Makinen-Greenhorn

Bubba Carlsberg-Shootist

Hector el Borracho-Greenhorn

Tuco-Shootist

Taverniers

Max Briggins-Shootist

George Marrison-Shootist

Justin MaBoots-Shootist

Billy Bob Jackson-Gunslinger

Elmo Röid-Shootist

Game Photos

The Tainted Dessert, the Makinen's started in the foreground.

The Players ( I will get a photo of PY aka Elmo Röid in our next game): The Makinen Gang Gabriel aka Hector El Borracho, John aka Tuco; The Tavernier Gang Dan aka Billy Bob Jackson and Graham aka Justin MaBoots.

The Summing Up

Well the first game was awarded to the Makinens who out-gunned and captured two of the Tavernier gang; Max Briggins and Elmo Röid. They have thus taken over the Tainted Desert, increasing the income from their 2 sheep farms as well as their derelict ranch. They questioned their prisoners but it quickly became clear the Taverniers were not involved in the murder of Jake Makinen. The Makinens who were poorly armed will now be able to arm up for their next encounter in this fascinating and really cool campaign. 

Serafimovich-Game 4

Last week myself and Dan got together for turn 4 in our CoC Serafimovich campaign.  This was the second attack of the Italians on the Bobrosky. Historically it took several goes for the Axis to take this position, so history was mirroring itself on the wargaming table.

As described earlier this was the Attack and Defend scenario from the rulebook. as you can see the table was basically the same as the previous with some new building, but terrain rules.

Table Overview, the Italians are attacking from the right.

Some new industrial/farm buildings, these are actually from the Napoleonic 3D Print Terrain set and printed at 18mm scale, once printed it was clear that they had too big a footprint our Quatre Bras game. They will do well for WWII wargaming as I had a shortage of these type buildings.

A new Russian farm complex from 3D Print Terrain

The Italian approach.

PMs and subsequent JOPs position, I believe the Patrol Phase was a draw.

Forces

Italian (13 Supports)

Platoon 2 (missing troops)

L3/35 Laflamme

47/32 Semovente

Brixante 45mm Mortar Team

Soviets (6 Supports)

Platoon 3 (fresh)

M1927 IG

Wrath of the gods

The Game

To be honest, I did not think that Dan was not going to take any armour, so I picked a gun with the best HE component. Boy, was I wrong! I was horrified to see that he took 2 tanks, the only saving grace was that Italian armour of this period is quite weak and I was hoping that 4 AP would do it. Additionally he had a flamethrower and I knew that once it got close, my troops would be done.

Of course, I never too any action photos until the game was half over. I had placed 2 sections on the near edge of the table to protect my right flank but as you can see they were quite battered by long range fire from the 2 tanks and by the time the Laflamme was up the table, I had already taken a battering. I had placed my IG in the farm complex with another section. Dan however was able to move his AFV's up under cover I was able to get only one shot off which missed from the M1927 at the Laflamme. I felt I was in deep trouble. I had however been able to reduce the Italian FM because of some lucky shots at 2 Squadras that Dan had placed in the middle of the table behind the hedge. I believe I wiped out a couple of teams as well as a JL.

Above you can see my M1927 and a section behind the stone wall of the farm complex, the Italians made effective use of their 3 smoke rounds from their Brixante mortar.

I had placed my last section inside a ruined stone house.

As you can see, both my sections behind the hedge retreated back after heavy casualties from the Laramie. It was really touch and go for the Soviets now, they had a FM of 5. My next CD roll revealed a 5 so I now had a CoC dice. I withdrew my troops out of range of the Laflamme and said my prayers, but I also ended the turn, smoke gone. The next Italian CD roll did not change the situation. The Soviet CD roll was good, they got a 3. The JL commanded the M1927 team to take careful aim. This time they hit the Laflamme, 3 net hits.....the Laflamme blew up dropping the Italian FM to 2. Game over. This was a very well played game by Dan, but her will have to attack Brobosky again in turn 5.

Post Game

The previous method I was using just was not working so I have had to resort to a spread sheet. It is a little confusing. The game 4 column is the actual result from the post game process of turn 4. The greyed column is the effects for the next turn (5). I am hoping this makes it easier to keep track.

SAGA: Seljuks vs Anglo-Saxons

Myself and Graham got together last week and had a game of SAGA at my place. Graham had not played much SAGA and was keen to get back into the game as our Wargaming Club now has a monthly SAGA night which has been very well attended. One of our club members has set up a SAGA Tournament for the end of November so we are all keen to get in some practice.

I recently have been playing the Anglo-Saxons with which I have had some success but I felt it time to rotate out another warband. My Moorish warriors have not seen any action for some time and I saw that the Seljuks were on the AoV/AoI list as allowed in the tournament so I thought I would pull them out and see if I could assemble a warband. I had initially planned to play them as the Umayyads but when I had a look at their BB (Moors) and the figures I decided to play the Seljuks (Saracen BB). I found the BB more attractive and my figure collection better suited Them.

As an aside Graham had thought that the Anglo-Saxons had javelins rather than spears, so when I pointed this out he was quite surprised. We had a quick look through his figure collection and the rulebook and his figures could easily be played as the Welsh but he had prepared himself with the Anglo-Saxon BB. He decided to stick with them for this game.

We used the Chaos method to set up our game, unfortunately I did not record the details so that is lost to time. The warbands are as follows.

Seljuks

Warlord

3 units of Foot Warriors

1 unit of Composite Bow Armed Horse Warriors

1 unit of Spear Armed Horse Warriors

1 unit of Bow Armed Levy

Anglo-Saxons

Warlord

3 units of Foot Hearthguard

2 units of Foot Warriors

1 unit of Bow Armed Levy

I have forgotten most of the details of the game but I did take a number of photos in which I will try to describe the action.

As you can see Grahams had arranged his figures in quite large units as is representative of Anglo-Saxon play. The fatigue you are seeing was due to rapid movement of the Seljuks. I had most of my figures spread out along my edge but Graham had focussed his track on my right so I had to move quickly.

Turn 2, as you can see the action almost immediately went over to my right flank. I had sent my horsemen up the board in an attempt to flank the Anglo-Saxons. I did have quite a few concerns about getting in melee with Hearthguard before they were weakened so planned to use my composite bows to weaken then and the spear armed riders just to harry them.

 

The Seljuk Horsemen.

Grahams beautifully painted Dark Age warriors.

Turn 5: As you can see in the top of the photo my horsemen have done a good job taking out the Anglo-Saxons warriors and hearthguard. But I am having some trouble with the Anglo-Saxon Levy on my direct right flank.

Final position of the troops at game end, the Seljuks scored a fairly decisive victory by points but the Anglo-Saxons had put up a challenging game.

It was a fun game and although not close, I thought Graham played quite well. I suspect though for the next SAGA night these will come on as Welsh. I think I will stick with the Seljuks for a bit! Their BB is interesting but I have a lot to learn in how to utilise it.

Dracula's America-Panic in the Streets

I have a lot of reports to catch upon!

About 10 days ago myself and Luis met up at his place to have the next turn in our Dracula's America campaign.  As you know from previous reports, Luis was up 3 to 1 in games and ahead by 4 infamy points. So I was going into our fifth game facing behind significantly. 

We have been playing the Forbidden Powers campaign, and we now are suffering the effects of the author, P Sheridan Thomas's unlocking the Necronomicon. He starts to read and suddenly a deafening sound is heard and a strange vortex opens and expels Eldritch terrors in the middle of Streetwater! 

The scenario expels a Eldritch monster in the middle of the terrain for each turn. Around this vortex are the citizens of Sweetwater, trying to escape death. Both posses have been tasked with escorting the Streetwaterians to Safety. Points are gained for this as well as for the destruction of the Eldritch Entity and the opposing posse.

As usual I took very few photos as the game was quite intense. 

Another great terrain

A very nasty Eldritch Entity in the Vortex.

We played 7 turns as it initially appeared that the Cult had out-played the Nephilim but subsequently it was discovered that half of the Cultist posse was missing which required a Bottle Check, this was a one dice test as the Leader of the Cult had been taken off the board and they failed handing the game to the Nephilim.

The post-game process was initiated and as usual the dice favoured the Cultists but the Nephilim were finally able to recruit a Veteran to join Astaroth. This will even up thing for our sixth game which hopefully will take place within 2-3 weeks.