Best not look forward....

 Guess what, i met a time traveler, he told me he had been to the future and seen what goes on an' that (i did, stop laughing at the back). I thought it was best to record his words here for later generations to see and heed his words (and i would do some gaming based on it to ensure it lives on in a visual type of way):

 'In the year 2087 mankind will finally settle on another planet, actually a belt of 4 planets not dissimilar to our own, the one on the far right smells a little of petrol and the middle one (left middle) wont ever produce a decent crop of chickpeas but otherwise pretty darn close. It will all begin with the discovery of said planets by a tired and slightly depressed astrology student forced to stay late completing an overdue paper in the observatory at the university of Swindon. Upon the news braking the human governments of the world will as one jump into action to grab themselves some prime space real estate before 'those other bastards' grab it for themselves. This will lead to the near collapse of the global economy as nations switch massive chunks of their budgets to do so. National debts are called in, lending is suspended, taxation goes through the roof so some rocks in deep space can get a flag stuck in them. With the global markets in free fall the 'exploration' projects will be thrown out to the highest bidder and be promptly grabbed by some major corporate bodies who are now the only organisations left on earth capable of funding such an undertaking. Thus many joint probes of just a few hundred thousand hastily designed and assembled fully laden inter-stellar war ships will set out on their missions to bring peace to this new unspoiled corner of space. After many a (pretty cool and quite cinematic) space battle the victors (or if you like the survivors) will settle on these new utopias, claiming them in the name of their parent company. While this is going on earth will have gone into proper full scale meltdown, the economy buggered, people fighting over puddles in the street, gangs of odd looking folk driving modified muscle cars in desert wastelands, the whole nine yards. The collapse of order on earth will prevent the carbon offsetting the population have been doing so well with up to this point leading to almost one hundred years of climate based armageddon and the slow death of all living things on the planet. This will cause a mass panic led migration of those still just about rich enough to afford it to the newly settled worlds. Now alone, the populations of the four 'new Earths' will stand alone in the cosmos, the final bastions of humanity. After about thirty years of sorting themselves out and organizing their new homes the ruling corporations of the New Earths will do what all corporate leaders tend to do and look to move into new markets, probably aggressively. As lines begin to be crossed there will come a visitation, a fleet of strange and alien craft will touch down on each of the planets to spread a message of peace. The envoys of the Greater Galactic Assembly of peaceful and progressive beings (made up of the whole rest of the living beings in the galaxy....except humanity) shall deliver the decree that reads thus:

'We have watched you from afar, gathered an expansive body of data and evidence of your good and peaceful civilizations and have come to give this message of love to you. IF YOU BLOODY WAR MONGERING PRIMATES EVER TRY TO LEAVE THESE PLANETS YOU SHALL ALL BE VAPORIZED YOU VIOLENT, STUPID BACKWARDS ARGUMENTATIVE PRIMITIVES!!!'. They will then draw attention to the fact that a 'laser wall' has been thrown up all around the borders of the New Earths that will turn any craft that attempts to travel through it into very thin chips. And so it will be, humanity shall war over their new homes to secure the important human needs of social networking, faster food and more elaborate and expensive ways to market coffee while the rest of the galaxy looks on, tutting.

  This message was delivered to me by the great voyager 'Cosmic' Stu, on a bench in Bute Park Weston Super Mare, lunchtime, Jan 30 2020.

 Question is does this say 6mm mass battle or 15mm Platoon level to you?....



.....'till next time....

Thar be movements ahoy!.

I thought it may be high time to return to my 2mm 'punk n' shot' campaign:

 Having failed to oust a Tuttinghammeshire advanced force from the town of Brickage the forces of Crivenshire have regrouped and decided to take the attack to the enemy....but a surprise awaits!...


...but first...

Rites of Spring, the sound of the revolution summer!.

  So, as i was waffling, i decided to dive into turn two of my Pike and steampunk bobbins, first the positions at the end of the last turn:

  The situation as the turn begins, Tuttinghammeshire forces are established over the Crivenshire border (circled). I decided to change things around a bit and make all moves at the same time to prevent the attack/ reaction cycle of last turn. To that end both Tuttinghamme and Crivenshire make their moves together:

To which end both forces pushed on in the east, actually moving past each other!. Crivenshire decided to contain the invading forces where they were and go on the attack at the border to try to catch them off guard. For their part Tuttinghammeshire also pushed on over the eastern border only further east, attacking the town of Whiffy in order to split the Crivenshire defensive forces. Why they chose to do this can be explained by what happened next:

Berkshire rises and declares support for Tuttinghammeshire!!

  Thats right the third shire to come to arms are Berkshire, adding to the forces of the north!, things look bleak for Crivenshire!. Berkshire waste no time in joining in the attack on Whiffy, meaning the next battle will be a two on one affair!.

 While i was up and at it i decided to draw some F.F.S cards for the upcoming battle, getting the following:

Crivenshire scouting seems to be going well for once, they get choice of deployment area, while a lucky trooper in the Tutinghammeshire force has found a spell scroll ready to use in the battle. For their part Berkshire scouts are very familiar with the battlefield, meaning they get to rejig it a bit before setting up!.

 The battle should be done soon, but you know me and my glacial pace when it comes to hobby stuff. I have decided this year i am going to go with the flow a little more, playing games and painting stuff as the mood takes, so this campaign will probably ebb and flow throughout the year. It will be nice to have something bubbling away that i can dip into when i want. It also means i can flit between projects without getting frustrated when i move away from things to something else, nothing is ever unfinished, just set aside ready to come back to later. Which is handy because i got a copy of this in the post yesterday:

Which has got me thinking about some 6mm Sci-fi stuff i could do......

......'till next time....

3 day army.

Hi all, having just had some minor surgery (nothing major, just a procedure i had put off for too long) i found myself under the 'for the sake of all things holy, don't do ANYTHING!!!!!' type of recovery period. Now if you are anything like me sitting still for days on end is a struggle and a half, so after half a day (it may have been half an hour to be fair) i was bored...so i set myself a challenge.......

.....but before that:

never too early for some early rage i find!.

  So as i was waffling, i decided i would do something that required the stillest of sitting....painting!, and better yet, i had received a couple of armies worth of minis from the splendid kallistra i had ordered to boost the forces of 

and i had three whole days worth of stillishness to look forward too so i elected to set myself the task of painting a whole army in that time. Guess what?, from prepping to basing i just about managed it!. This post is the proof!:

    THE MIGHTY HORDE OF AAGARAXX THE REALLY VERY NAUGHTY, MASTER OF PRICKISHNESS AND DEEDS OF AN EVIL AND FRANKLY COCKISH NATURE

Wrong 'uns,  the whole lot of 'em

 The Forces commanders. Front right is Aagraxx himself, rightful prince of Generica and aspiring usurper of King Pharrus with his personal banner bearer Kevin the skeleton (known as 'bony Kev'). To his left is his apprentice and moody spotty teenage nephew Cwispin, who styles himself as 'the Dark Fury', much to his masters amusement. Behind them is Aagaraxx's best general and long suffering right hand man Susan.

 A selection of the Evil ones foot troops, mostly Darklands contractors looking for steady employment in the wrongdoing sector. At the front are a unit of Aagraxx's highly trained personal bodyguard known only as 'the black shields'. Being a stylish type Aagraxx has introduced a retro 'dark age chic' themed uniform for his troops, Norman is very 'in' this season.

 The forces fast attack section, made up of some horsemen and a couple of packs of the dangerous and rightly feared Githounds.

 Missile support is provided by some armoured and some rabble archers as well as Aggarax's own  skirmishers, the shifty black clad 'shadow Bastards'

Being an all round nasty evil type Aagraxx would never be seen without some undead types shuffling along with him, to this end he has summoned some Skeletons and some brown stride inducing specters!.

  The force is speed painted to my not so high standards as per the rest of my 12mm stuff but for a quick job i reckon they will do. As far as using them i have a crazy and highly involved plan that may require some volunteers, more of which in a future post.

Aagraxx personally leads an attack on a northern stronghold.

....'till next time....

Blood at the Sentinals pt2

As usual i have taken a flippin' age to post the 2nd part of this game report. I'm not angry with myself....just disappointed......

Good 'ol pixies!!!!

    Right, on with the report, you can read the first part  Here:

BLOOD AT THE SENTINALS PT2:

  Mallagor could move when he needed to, despite his great age he ran faster than the rest of the line of troops muttering 'ohshitohshitohshit' repeatedly under his breath as he did so, but when a wizards library of ancient arcane texts and spell books are in danger it turns out he will move heaven and earth to protect it. He reached the shadow of the first ruined watchtower before even the scouts could get there, the tower (one of a pair known locally as the Sentinals, once joined by a fortified wall several miles long in ages past) loomed large and mercenary free before him. he stopped and pressed his back against the cold stone, trying to catch his breath. Sargent Caprill rode up to him moments later. ''Well you can shift my lord' he giggled 'i never saw a man out run a cavalry squadron before'. 'Well...good..sir..' Panted the mage '....at least...we...got here...first..' he tried to continue. 'What?, before them?' asked Caprill pointing to the far tower. Mallagor peered around the wall only to be met with the sight of a black and white clad horde of mean looking soldiers advancing in the distance....then he threw up.

To battle!. For this game i used my modified version of 'One Hour Wargames' by Neil Thomas with a few extra ideas i wanted to try out as well:

  The turn sequence was changed to a combined activation phase where each player takes turns to move or shoot with a unit, innitutive was rolled each turn. If a unit with a commander is activating any friendly unit within 6'' can also activate.  

  Combat was rolled for by both sides in the combat phase, my morale rules were used meaning the lowest scoring side in a combat was required to test at the end of the phase.

Magic can only be used by wizards who roll 1d3+1 spells before battle.

The forces:

Mallagors 'oi you, put that scroll back'.....errr.....force

It consisted of:

Mallagor, a wizard,

Sargent Caprill and his herald Sir Barry,

1 Unit of Knights, 1 Unit of Foot Knights, 2 Units of Leve, 1 Unit of Men at Arms, 2 Units of Cavalry, 1 Unit of Archers and 1 Unit of Skirmishers.

The Black Rats Magic book liberation squad:

They had:

C.C. Bathion, leader of the Black rats,

Gavin the Grey, wizard of incredible dullness,

2x Units of Men at Arms, 2x Units of Archers, 1 Unit of Knights, 1 Unit of Cavalry,  1 Unit of Skirmishers and Clive the Ogre.

The Battlefield, the towers are the titular Sentinals, ruined watchtowers under which lies Mallagors no longer hidden magical library!. They are the objective of the game, both sides need to control the towers to win.

Both sides had control of one of the towers at the start of the battle.

 The Black Rats set up with their horse ready to attack the oppositions tower, crossbows in support.

 Their center consisted of the Sentinal protected on both sides by Men at Arms and Clive.

This force was supported by Archers and Skirmishers.

 Mallagor ordered his Knights and Cavalry to the left with Skirmishers to their flank.

 The center was held by Mallagor and the Leve with crossbow support.

The right was held by The foot knights (the purple palace guard no less!) supported by Men at arms and more Cavalry.

 The battle began with the Black Rats advancing, only the crossbows on the hill held position.

 Mallagor held back the Leve but had the Right advance towards the far tower.

The following turn started with a bang as the Horse of the Black Rats slammed into the Opposing horse, supported by Clive who was transported by a 'Swarthy Stevens Spell of unusually swift swiftness!'

 Breaking the Knights!!.

 In reply the royal troops attacked the Black Rats at the tower.

 The Black Rats Crossbows engaged the Skirmishers in the woods in an archery duel, causing the skirmishers to bolt!.

 Having chased off the Knights Clive and his horse riding mates turned their attentions on Mallagor and the Leve.

 With predictable results.

 At the other tower the Royal forces made a breakthrough

But so did the Rats!.

 Causing a scrum between the remaining troops....

 Which the archers lost....spectacularly!!!!.

 C.C Bathions Knights finally saw off the royal horse.

 The situation at the end of the battle.

 One tower remained in the balance.....

....while the other was firmly under the Black Rats control.

  So a marginal win for the worlds most vile and twattish mercenaries, looks like Mallagor will need to buy his library back!. All the minis are from kallistra, i like them a lot.......

......'till next time......

Hey G.W. are you feeling alright??.

Good old Games workshop, peddlers of fine 32mm (snigger) miniatures at hugely inflated prices who at one point we're a hub of great original ideas and fun games. I think someone at g.w. hq needs to hand round the smelling salts because they have done the impossible, they have released something that could be considered to be...wait for it....a bargain!!!!!.

For the princely sum of £2.99 you get the above bits as an intro to the Age of Smeg...err Sigmar setting. Now I'm no huge fan of the setting, it's high fantasy styling goes a bit too far for my taste, I like my fantasy with a cheek stuffed full of tongue (you may have noticed) for me Age of Doodah goes through parody and into bloated chin stroking bollocks that seems to actually take itself seriously but that's just my personal opinion you understand. So why is this loss leading little bundle of interest on this wee bloggington?. Well the magazine and poster can be filed in the bin, the ruler is surplus to requirements, the dice could be handy I 'spose but it's the minis that caught my limited attention span. I know, I know, above rantings may make this sound a bit odd but £3 for 13 32mm (I don't care what they say they sell 32mm!!) Minis is pretty good and the ghost type bobbins (of which you get 10) are bloody nice and could be quite useful to a fantasy gamer, working in several scales. Expect to see them on these pages soon. Even the Smeg marines could be used for something (status or huge titanic types in 2-10mm?).  You can pick a copy up in newsagents and supermarkets in the uk (god I've been reduced to shilling G.W!) But be quick, they did the same with a 40k set last year leading to the fanboy crowd hoovering them up for cheep space marines (and so did the online traders meaning eBay was rammed full of the same sprue no one wanted!).

Anyway enough of this G.W stuff, normal service will be resumed shortly.......



.....'till next time.....

Blood at the sentinals pt 1

I decided to kick off the new year with a battle report. I still have my 2mm campaign going on (more of this soon) but decided on a change of pace this time out. I have recently been fleshing out my 12mm medieval fantasy forces so decided to give them a run out for a change. It also let me change the setting for a mo, i decided it was time to visit

 As i made this header about a year ago and have done nothing with it since!. Its also a good excuse to try out some of my mods for One Hour Wargames. As far as the setting goes i have no fixed plans as yet but think it would work for the 12mm stuff and also let me draw some of my previous narratives and ideas into one place (sort of consolidating my many fantasy bits into one easy to manage setting).....but first......

Kind of like the MC5 fronted by a really angry Tina Turner!.

BLOOD AT THE SENTINALS, PT 1

   'What in the name of the gods can he want now?' thought Mallagor as he approached the gigantic, highly polished gold doors that lead to the Kings throne room. The guards nodded to him as he passed, giving the signal for the doors to be opened. With a dramatic THUNK the locking mechanism was disengaged and the doors swung open in an improbably smooth motion. As Mallagor entered the room, beginning the long walk along the opulent purple carpet that marked the path to the base of the dias upon which stood the massive and frankly over the bloody top golden jewel encrusted throne. As he passed many footmen, courtiers, knights and purple clad guards the page of clear announcements (actual job title) read aloud the prepared list of accomplishments attributed to Mallagor as an introduction to the court. 'HERE WALKS MALLAGOR THE WISE, KEEPER OF THE KINGS MAGICS, COMPILER OF OCCULT ITEMS, PROTECTOR OF THE REALM, CURATOR OF THE LIBRARY OF THE UNKNOWN WRITINGS, LORD OF THE WESTERNMARK, ADVISER TO THE CROWN, HEAD OF THE ORDER OF ROYAL MAGICS, FAILED MAMMOTH HUNTER AND ALL ROUND BEARDED TIT....' The last bits caused a titter of laughter around the room from the more prominent nobles, Mallagor cursed himself as he reddened as he always did at this point, he sped up to try to get to the throne. 'Mallagor, finally pulled yourself away from your potions to grace us with your presence i see!' Boomed king Pharrus from his royal seat as the wizard bowed before him. Mallagor rose and looked up at the king who he noted was still as large as ever, as red faced as ever, as stupidly overdressed as ever and...well thats new, the King had a visible smirk playing across his not so tiny cheeks. 'We are being probed Mallagor' boomed king Pharrus, 'Probed sire?' replied the wizard. 'Invaded' offered the King by way of explanation, the smirk still playing across his face. 'Invaded my liege?, but who would dare?' answered Mallagor. 'Its those vile currs the  Black Rats, they are as we speak making headway into the west, they burned several of our boarder villages on the way in and are' the king was almost holding back a chuckle 'we think headed towards the Sentinals as we speak'. As he finished the King put his hand over his mouth to stifle a laugh. Mallagor stood confused for a moment. He answered 'But do we know why sire?, the black rats are mercenaries, who could be behind this attack?, who would dare invade in such a brazen fashion?'. 'We..' the King tried not to laugh 'we....don't..(another stifle)...we don't......know Mallagor'. The Wizard became aware that there were audible snorts and small chortles among the courtiers as the King spoke, as he looked back at the King he could see him shaking, like a child trying to hold back a fit of the giggles. 'Could it be Aagraxx up to his tricks again your highness?, maybe its Lord Yanic and those troublesome northmen, perhaps it may be...' Malagors musings were interrupted by a huge snort from the king who finally could hold back no longer and collapsed into a fit of  laughter. 'NO MALLAGOR' the king exclaimed between laughs 'IT WAS ME! I HIRED THEM!'. The rest of the court exploded into laughter as Mallagors head swam. 'What?, he said trying to make himself heard, 'why would you do that, the Black Rats are mean, dangerous and all together....well....complete bastards sire!, why would you hire them...and to attack....to attack..did you say the west?' Mallagors face fell '...i'm Lord of the West...what the hell is going on?'. The king tried to pull himself together, he sort of almost succeeded 'You know how you said you were worried in case we were invaded, you know, you thought the troops were getting lazy, not battle ready and all that what with it being so quiet?'. 'Yes' replied Mallagor, dreading where this was going. 'Well we dec..(the giggles returned to the King)...'we decided to help out and stage kind of...what would you call it...a kind of training exercise if you like.(snort..) I...(chortle)..I hired the Rats anonymously you see...(giggle)..told them your library could be reached through (chuckle) a secret door under one of the Sentinals...thought it would (snort, chuckle...giggle..)...would give you a chance to get your troops up to speed in case anything should actually happen...you know...for real'. Concern overcame Mallagor. 'But sire, my Library CAN be reached through a secret door under one of the Sentinals, i told you that not two weeks ago!. 'Ah, thats where that came from, knew it rang a bell' laughed the king and the rest of the court, who were now in hysterics. 'You better run along and see nothing happens then Mallagor...off you pop, take some Palace guard with you if you like' said the king to the back of the wizard who was already half way out the door. The king rose to address the court who were now in uproar 'Well he could have said thank you at least.......you just cant please some people........'

 Report to follow.......'till next time......