Keeping busy

I'm back at work, but confess that working from home offers many distractions. Most notably the accessibility of my garage, where a bunch of toys in painted and unpainted states constantly call to me. I have avoided being sucked in to the vortex entirely, but yesterday could not prevent myself from playing another fantasy game, just to try out the rules and refine them a bit. And there is definitely some refining needed. Orcs for instance, were ripped apart by the Dwarf army before getting into contact. This tended to happen in Dragon Rampant too, so maybe my Orcs just need to be sneakier, but I suspect what I really need are some faster units, like Boar boyz. Add that to the shopping list.

Aerial view of the Battle of the Two Fords

 I didn't do a full battle report for this game, just taking a few photos of the set up, as I new time was precious, but the idea was that the Orcs were advancing from one direction, and Chaos from another. Opposing them were an Imperial-Dwarf alliance, defending the two fords that cross the river.

The Imperial set-up. No knights, just foot troops.

Opposing them a matching force in terms of points, but light in numbers.

The Orc force, ready to strike

And the brave Dwarven defenders

In the centre sat a woods which was unpassable.

In the first clashes the Orc Warlord was seen off by a combination of the handgunners and the gyrocopter. After that, things just got worse for the Orcs. Only at the end did the Shaman use his magic to literally squish the Dwarf King.

 Overall the Dwarfs were too strong, but I put this down to the activation system. The Orcs' lower Discipline rating meant that they failed their command tests often, and this allowed the Dwarfs to activate their units. As such, the cannon and handgunners were shooting just about every turn. So I think that I might abandon that mechanism, and just try the rules with IGo-UGo.

AT the end the Chaos knights are sweeping through the Imperial flank, while the Giant turns around and walks away - he did this for most of the game.

In the evenings I've continued to paint, mostly Star Wars Legion.

The dark lord of the Sith

I tried very hard to follow the guide by Sorastro

But gave up in the end and used gloss varnish

My third squad of stormtroopers

And two units of speeder bikes

The second squad of Stormtroopers, and the last dozen 54mm Great War figures

The Chaos Sorcerer can summon a demon, so this Reaper miniature that I bought years ago has been painted and drafted into use.

Currently painting Macedonian pikemen for Craig.

Nate

Battle of Azgaar's tomb

Havin thrown together the outline of the fantasy rules in a word document and created some stats, I fought a trial battle today between the Dwarf and Chaos armies. The scenario called for the capture of Azgaar's tomb, a source of strong Chaos magic, which the Dwarfs are defending.

The Chaos battleline deployed

The Dwarven battle line, minus the miners who are digging under the earth somewhere.

Chaos had the first turn, and the first activation failure saw the Dwarf cannon react with a miss. 

The cannon was upgraded to a Runic Cannon, enabling it to reroll scatter dice. It didn't help this turn.

The Chaos hordes surge towards the Dwarfs.

The Runesmith casts Rune of Fire on the Giant.

 For the majority of the game I was playing the magic rules wrong. I wrote them last night when I was feeling extremely tired and was wondering why the casting was so hit and miss. Then I remembered how it was supposed to work and the game was much better.

The cannon misses again!

That's OK! Runic reroll!

Ooof! The Beastmen are battered.

The Miners appear and charge the Chaos Sorcerer!

The Wizard takes most of the hits, but it is the Dwarfs who fall back due to failing to batter the Sorcerer.

The Gyrocopter had attacked the Giant with its steam gun, but was then charged by the lumbering beast. Here it is fleeing from that encounter!

After suffering the fire of the Dwarf cannon, the Chaos Lord charges the Dwarf King and his bodyguard.

But is wiped out.

At this stage the Handgunners have seen off a unit of Beastmen, the Giant has attacked the Warrior shieldwall and been repulsed, and the Dwarf King has eliminated another unit of Beastmen.

A blast of magic from the Runesmith and the Giant is out of here!

The Gyrocopter rallies and returns, but the Chaos Warriors are closing.

Chaos flank attack! The Dwarf King was wiped out here. I think that flank attacks in the future will reduce resilience by 1 as opposed to reducing it to 1. Either way, this unit still would have been destroyed.

On the flank the Chaos Warriors run down the Dwarfs as they fall back from combat.

The Chaos Warriors surround the remaining Dwarfs.

Beastmen and Giant continue to rout, but the Sorcerer destroys the Miners.

As the sun pours onto the table the Dwarf defeat becomes apparent.

The Dwarfs deployed 33 points, and Chaos 34 points, and the battle was relatively even, so I think the points are about right. However, I also made quite a few changes to the lists as I went, so as a playtest it was a good first run.

I need to write the lists for the Empire and Orcs now, and hopefully have another game soon.

Nate

Dwarves finished and ready for battle

Yes, with the addition of A Runesmith, Gyrocopter and a unit of Tunnellers, the Dwarves are complete. Built for 36 points in Dragon Rampant we'll see how they fare when I start playing with the rules a bit.

The Dwarven army in all of its glory - 7 units

The Runelord with his hand-painted banner

The hardy tunnellers

I love the candles on their helmets.

A crazy Dwarf in his Gyrocopter

Red, blue and yellow - the flying circus is in town!

 I'm going to give the Fantasy painting a rest for a while and head back to Ancients, although I have a dozen 54mm Great War figures that I want to complete first. I did, however, begin to get into another Fantasy army last night.

Nightmare time!

The blue regiment and red regiment - try to guess which is which.

 But I decided that I would come back to the Undead army at a later date. I have four Fantasy armies and my current goal is getting them on the table for a battle, which means time working on the rules..

Finally, because I was painting a banner for the Runesmith I thought I might retro my Ultramarines a bit more. So here's a Primarus Marine with a banner, as nature intended!

Much better with a banner

Nate

Dwarf King

The Dwarven painting mission continues with the completion of the Dwarf King and a cannon.

Surrounded by his guard of Hammerers

He towers over them - on his rock!

A Dwarf master gunner aims his cannon

This one will make a big boom!

The Tunnellers, Runesmith and gyrocopter are well underway, so should appear here soon. School ahs officially started again, and I am teaching on-line from home, which is interesting and just as time consuming as going to work normally. But it does mean I can go to the garage during my lunch break and finish my basing!

Nate

Dwarfs!

Yes, the first Dwarfs are based and ready to fight. They are another example of my Oldhammer leanings, being painted in vibrant tones to contrast with their doughty natures.

Axe wielding regiment in orange

Regiment with shooty sticks in green

Side by side in all their glory

Dwarfs are my favourite fantasy race. Even though I am tall, I still identify with their love of beer and their slow moving, large bellied nature. Also, they have horns on their helmets. Nice.

The rest of the Dwarf army is on my painting tray at the moment. A regiment of tunnellers, the King and his bodyguard, a cannon, a Runelord and a gyrocopter.

As for the Dragon Rampant rules, I am looking at adjusting them in the same way that I did Lion Rampant for the Gallic Wars. For a start, no switching sides when an activation fails. What it will do is trigger a possible reaction from a single unit on the opposite side, before returning to the original side to try and activate again. This system is used in Song of Drums and Shakos Large Battles, and punishes a non-activation without the potentially devastating effects of losing the initiative entirely.
The activation roll will be a generic one for the type of unit, not for specific actions. The number of dice rolled in combat will be equal to the remaining strength points that a unit possesses. I plan on trawling through Warhammer 4th edition and dragging out a whole pile of potential magic and special weapons to adapt the system. In truth it will not be Dragon Rampant anymore. Oldhammer Rampant?

Nate

A lttle bit of painting

After a couple of days of gaming, today I spent a bit of time with the paintbrush again, and tidied up some figures that were all finished but for their bases.

Star Wars Legion Rebel Specialists

 The 2-1B Medical Droid simply had to be painted in that Turquoise colour that I remember from the old Kenner Action Figures.

Craig's second lot of Imperial Snowtroopers

 And, in keeping with the random fantasy drop ins, I repainted this High Elf Chariot for my Elven army.

Pulled by the White Lions of Chrace

Blue and yellow will be the theme throughout the Elven army - when I paint it.

I was going through the old 4th edition Army books, and remembering how much I loved that old school 90s style of painting with bright and vivid colours. Hence the chariot makeover. The banner has been repainted white because eventually I will be painting it with a 90s style banner.

On the painting tray at the moment, having pushed the Macedonians out of the way, is the second part of a Dwarven army, the first two units now being complete as of this morning. I am just waiting for the bases to dry and I'll have pictures tomorrow. I'm on a bit of a fantasy kick at the moment, but the Dwarves are really to enable me to play a mega game with Humans and Dwarves vs Chaos and Orcs. THEN, I'll get back to the ancients.

Nate