Bolt Action - Allied Training

Club Night - Wednesday 31st August

Last week, Neil and I played a small 'training' game of Bolt Action.  I had the Americans and Neil was the British. We both had 500pts forces, which is about half the normal game size and we reduced the table size from a 6 x 4 foot to a 4 x 4 foot.

 

 

British Force

Supporting Neil's 3 sections were; an AT Gun,  a Vickers MMG and a Forward Observer.

 

American Force

While may 2 squads were supported by; a bazooka team and a Sherman.

 

The Mission

I forgot the name of our first mission, but we both had half our force held in reserve and 1 objective to hold and 1 to capture.
 

My general plan was to use the squad with both BARs along with the Sherman as a base of fire; while the manoeuver group closed with the enemy and finish them off in close quarters fighting!
 

Neil placed his units first and set up his Vickers on his command post in the ruins, his 6 pdr in the woods in the centre and a section in the woods on his left.  All three units were hidden and covering the centre and his left flank.

 

 

The Assessment

Now, this being a training mission I made a lot of schoolboy errors.

First was force selection, should of left the bazooka in the barracks and maybe the Sherman too.  That said, I was limited with the models I had and also only having 5 order dice! Each unit needs a order dice, so I could only have 5 units. Next mistake was setup!  I Shouldn't have setup my fire base squad in the woods with my command post, this spot had limited line of sight and being woods reduced my movement which hindered my ability to relocate. My other big mistake was forgeting about Neil's reserves and running my manoeuver group around the flank and getting jumped by one of Neil's sections coming on from reserve.

 

That said, even considering all of the above; I pulled of a shock win!!!! Despite my manoeuver group getting caught in the open by the Vickers MMG, a full British section and even some friendly fire from my Sherman. I got very lucky, as Neil lost a section to a artillery miscalculation!; Then he rolled poorly when what was left of my manoeuver group assaulted his full section and wiped them out!!!
 

We didn't finish the next game which was a attacker / defender game, again with reserves. I was the attacker. It didn't start well, as again I forgot about reverse and once again marched my manoeuver group into a British section deploying from off table. This time Neil took no chances and deployed a second section to wipe them out.

With time running out, Neil had one last shot at my Sherman with his AT Gun................ BOING failed to penetrate again. Over the two games Neil failed to damage the Sherman in about 6 attempts!!!

Cheers

Kev

Preview - UK Games Expo 2016

UK Games Expo

"The UK Games Expo, (UKGE), is the UK's largest hobby games convention which takes place over three days during the Summer Half term. It is open to all members of the public to come and ,try,play and buy hobby games from around the world. It is suitable for all ages with a large Family Zone that caters especially for our younger audience. With special celebrity guests, demonstartions, competitions, tournamnets and even an huge board games library you can borrow from, you won't have time to do everything." 

(www.ukgamesexpo.co.uk/visitor.php)

The UKGE is on Friday 3rd until Sunday 5th June, at the NEC in Birmingham.

Scimitar Games Group at UK Games

(https://sites.google.com/site/scimitarcovclub/home)

For the last few years John has ran a huge Memoir 44 D-Day Landings game as a participation event at the UKGE. The game will be in NEC Hall One at location E46.  We are bottom right on the plan at the link below - opposite the UKGE Press Facility

http://www.ukgamesexpo.co.uk/downloads/UKGEHallOneWeb.pdf

A few weeks ago John tested part of the game at the club.

Really looking forward to the UKGE, as I will be helping out the Sunday.

Hammin' Iron Battle Report

Wednesday 11th May Club Night - Scimitar Games Group (Coventry) https://sites.google.com/site/scimitarcovclub/home

Battle Report

Neil and I played Hammerin' Irons, an American Civil War Naval Wargame from Peter Pig

http://www.peterpig.co.uk/acwnaval.html

All the Hammerin' Irons models are Neil's.

Neil was the Confederates

Neil had the CSS Tennasse, CSS Lady Davis plus a huge fort and the chance of 3 late arrivals.

and I played the Union fleet.

The Union fleet had USS New Ironsides,  USS Signal and USS Teaser to start and 3 late arrivals including my favourite ship USS Commodore Morris.

Following a semi random setup Neil was defending; the 2 objectives of 4 buildings and 4 cargo ships (which ended up in the same spot).

First Exchange

As I attempted to line up a broadside from USS New Ironsides, the Tennasse rammed the New Ironsides, but failed to sink her and was eventually sunk by the Union Ironclad; but not before sinking the USS Commodore Morris.

With the Tennasse threat removed, I was free to focus on the objective and CSS Lady Davis.

Due to some very canny play from Neil, I was unable to bring my superior numbers to bear; resulting in each ship attacking the sole remaining Confederate ship alone.

The star of the battle was the CSS Lady Davis, with a little help from the fort, she successful defended the 2 objectives from 3 Union ships; only losing 1 building, before pulling out to avoid being sunk.

Result

Neil won the scenario 33 to 30 points! But really deserved a high win margin as he held off my 5 ships with 1 ironclad, a tug plus the fort that couldn't always fire.

Always have a fun game with Hammerin Irons. I am planning to review this great game soon.

BONUS

Plus, bonus pics of another club game, Lion Rampant with Bob's very nice War of the Roses figures.

1st & 2nd Game of Lion Rampant

Lion Rampant

Lion Rampant is the medieval skirmish game, that Dragon Rampant is based on.  As the fantasy version is so much fun we decided to try the original.

Wednesday 27th April Club Night - Scimitar Games Group (Coventry) https://sites.google.com/site/scimitarcovclub/home

Pete D and I tried Lion Rampant, for the first time on Wednesday.  We used Pete's very nice Vikings and Scots.  The Vikings Retinue was a small elite force of 3 units of foot men-at-arms and a unit of archers. Whilst, the Scots had a fast skirmishing force of 2 units of mounted Yeomen with javelins and 5 units of Bidowers.

The first scenario we played was ' The Fugitive',  A Scots noble had escaped from the Vikings and was hiding in some woods, the Scots (Pete) had to find, then escort the noble off the table and the Vikings (Me) had to stop them!  The Scots were lead by a 'Strong' leader who 'Boasted' that "Half of the enemy shall fall to my sword." and the Vikings 'Rash' leader 'Boasted'  "I shall slay your Leader."

The Vikings plan was simple rush to the woods in the middle and then try to hold them (hoping the Scots didn't get lucky and find the Fugitive in the first two woods); whilst the Leader would challenge the Scots Leader to a duel, in order to achieve my "I shall slay your Leader" 'Boast'.

Living up to his name 'Ragnar the Rash', the Viking leader raced ahead to face off against the Scots leader, leaving his Retinue trailing behind; with the challenge issued, 'Duncan the Strong' considered refusing the duel, before boldly accepting and striding out to face the 'Sword Dane!'.  After a brief exchange of blows 'Ragnar the Fool' was on his way to Valhalla!  The Viking's courage was tested with the loss of they leader, but none faltered.

Having failed to kill the Scots leader, the Vikings only chance of stopping the faster and more nimble Scots, was to get to the unsearched woods first. 

Almost there!, as a unit of Viking warriors slowly entered the woods, a unit of Scots Bidowers dashed into the woods and found the hidden 'Fugitive'.  With the Viking warriors crashing through the trees, they charge fell short as the Bidowers peppered them with Javelins as they 'Evaded' with 'The Fugitive'.

Exhausted by the constant shower of javelins and chasing an allusive enemy, the remaining Vikings dragged the body of they fallen leader back to the great hall!

A nice quick eventful game, although I lost by 8 Glory points (5 points for winning the scenario, 2 points for the successful boast for Pete and a total of -1 points for me due to my failed boast!) I think its was a really close game; If Pete had failed his 'Evade' order just after finding 'The Fugitive' I had a good chance of destroying the unit and reclaiming 'The Fugitive'.

After a quick look in the other room; where John was running through the huge D-Day Memoir '44 game, in preparation for running it as a participation game at the UK Games Expo. 

We set up a second game, this time we played 'Meeting the Neighbours' Scenario.  Both forces were returning home after patrolling the borderland and needed to fight through the other force to escape off the far corner.  This time the Scots were lead by 'Malcolm the Braveheart' (me) and 'Sigardson the Strong' (Pete) with the excitement we both forgot to make boasts.

With the objective being to leave the table via the far corner; I decided my best chance was to try the fighting buffalo horn tactic used by the Zulu's. That being, drawing the Vikings into my centre and then slipping around the flanks and attacking from the rear. I was mindful that the 'Evade' order used so well by Pete in the first game would drive me away from the far corner and victory.  Pete's battle plan was to keep his men-at-arms behind the archers, until my force was softened up and then finish me off with the men-at-arms.

'Sigardson' successfully blocked my left flank move with careful positioning of two men-at-arms units.  Whilst his archers attacked my right flank, 'Malcolm' had a tough choice! Change the plan and take out the archers or push on and get round the back with the cavalry.  Sticking to the plan the cavalry pushed on past the archers, alas 'Sigardson' had seen the danger and pulled a unit of men-at-arms back to shut the door! 

The deadly game of Cat and mouse, edged closer to the decisive moment.  The Scots were strongest on they right flank, with two units verse 1 and the Vikings had equal numbers, but better quality on they right! The Viking's archers were too far from either flank to help, so the cunning 'Sigardson' committed his weakened men-at-arms unit on his left in the hope of driving a unit of Scots cavalry into range of the archers.  With the Viking warriors charging, the Scots skirmishing cavalry choose to evade and hoped the javelins would weaken the Vikings enough, to force them to flee.  The Vikings shields proved too strong for the javelins and the evade move left the cavalry in effective range of the archers. Who skillfully dispatched the cavalry and effectively won the game.

Really enjoyed both games, the rules offer a good balance between simplicity and historical flavor with enough chaos to keep it interesting.

New style of Blog posts

The futures bright, the futures more words!!

I have not been blogging as much as I would like, so I am going to try a different style of battle report; going for less pictures and a more narrative style. 

Not only does taking good photos slow the games, I have found it both hard and time consuming to edit photos, which has reduced my blogging output.  So hopefully, I will be able to blog more and add just a few photos when I get better!!

I also plan to do more posts about painting, terrain making and army selections.  Like many if not all wargamers I have a project list as long as my arm and I plan to share my projects on this blog and hopefully look back and see which ones saw the gaming table and which one's didn't.

Hope you enjoy the blog and please comment if you like this blog or not and why. 

Cheers Kev

3rd Game of Dragon Rampant

Dragon Rampant big battle

Wednesday 9th March Club Night - Scimitar Games Group (Coventry) https://sites.google.com/site/scimitarcovclub/home

For our third game of Dragon Rampart we tried a big battle, with each side having three Warbands of 30 army points each (24 army points on units and 6 army points on Options and Fantastical rules).

On one side we had an un-easy alliance between 2 Dwarf Warbands and an Elf Warband.  The old enemies made a short peace, in order to deal with the combined threat of, Orcs, Goblins and Beastmen.

The good guys

Garry's Dwarves

Bob's Elves

My Dwarves (finally painted)

Warband Roster: 

Heavy Foot (Leader) single model unit with Wizardlings, blessed weapon and mystical armour

2 Elite foot units

Heavy foot

Heavy missile

The baddies

Garry's Goblins (commands by Pete D)

Tony's Beastmen

Martin's Orcs

The Battle

As with all our multi-player games, each player rolls for initiative (we then use dice to show the turn order), this works well for a free for all multi-player game. But with a 2 sided game multi-player game, they was too much downtime and very little effect, as turn order only really effected the Warbands opposite each other.  If we try a big battle again, I will recommend only 1 initiative roll per side and all that sides Warbands activating.  That said I think I would prefer to play a few smaller games and hopefully get more than one in.

I was facing off against Martin's Orcs, my general plan was to advance my whole force into heavy missile range and wait for the Orc charge!!!  Unfortunately, this group of Orcs choose to hide in the rough going, forcing me to send my elites charging into the Orc horde.  I had some luck in driving off the Orc troll and Bellicose Orcs, but lost both elites and the game ended with my heavy missile and the Orc light missile exchanging shoots.

Some other action photos

Not the most exciting battle.

I think the game was a little dull due to; waiting too long for your or player opposite turn, lack of space to maneuver,  my overly defensive force roster and Martin's un-Orcy sneaky reluctance to charge!!! That all said and done I had a good time and can't wait to play Dragon Rampant again.

Coming up

In my next blog post, I will talk about the different Warband Rosters, I have tried.

Hope you enjoy it. 

Cheers Kev

2nd Game of Dragon Rampant

Battle of Five Armies - Lizardmen, Orcs, Goblins, Bug-Goblins and Dwarfs

 

 Wednesday 17th February Club Night - Scimitar Games Group (Coventry) https://sites.google.com/site/scimitarcovclub/home

 

Our second game of Dragon Rampant was a five player game; each player had 30 army points (24 army points on units and 6 army points on Fantastical rules).  We choose to play scenario D: The Crystal Gale, which requires each player to collect crystals from random location on the board; the player with the most crystals wins.

 

The Five Armies

• Bob's Lizardmen

 

• Garry's Goblins (the photos the rest of Garry's Goblin were too blurry - sorry!)

 

• Tony's Bug-Goblins

 

• My Dwarves - No photos as still not finished
• Martin's Orcs

 

 The Game

With my Dwarves squeezed between Tony's Bug-Goblins and Martin's Orcs, I was worried I wouldn't last long!  But I  somehow managed to not just survive, but to take on both the Orcs and Bug-Goblins.

I split my force in two; my leader 'Kevlar Thornbeard' (Elite Foot Single model unit with Blessed weapon and mystical armour), Housecarls (Elite Foot) and Spear Thanes (Heavy Foot) took on the task of swatting the Bug-Goblins. While, holding off the Orcs was a second unit of Housecarls and the Quarrel Thralls (Heavy Missile).

 

I positioned the Spear Thanes in Wall of Spear between the woods and rocky ground, whilst the Housecarls chased the Bug-Goblin scouts and Thornbeard swatted the flying Bug Riders away.

Leaving the Housecarls to dealing with the flying bugs, Thornbeard proceeded to rip through the ranks of the goblin spearman and finally caught up with the goblin elite foot going after the crystals in the woods; causing the Bug-Goblins to break and run.

Meanwhile, the holding force facing the Orcs were getting nervous, with 3 Orc units bearing down on my two.  My Housecarls were pushed back into the woods by the fierce wild charge of the Orcs, offensive heavy Orcs were edging within attack range of my Quarrel Thralls and the Orc Giant was threatening to join the attack.  With the seemingly inevitable Orc charge about to over run my stretched force; I bravely charged my Housecarls back into the fight and refused to pull the Quarrel Thralls back.  The Housecarls smashed into the Orcs so hard that they routed and the Quarrel's finally scored enough hits on the heavy orcs to force them to pull back.

  

Ceasing the moment by Housecarls chased down the Battered Heavy Orcs, only for them to rally just in time and wipe out the Housecarls.

Elsewhere,

Bob's Giant Scorpions  attacked Garry's Giant and lost!!!

 Checking if the Lizardmen Leader is within range to help with a Rally test.

The Goblins recoiling in the face of the Giant Praying Mantis!!!



Superior numbers finally finished off the Praying Mantis.

Well that was our second game of Dragon Rampant; Bob just about won; having collected the same number of gems as Tony, but Tony's force had routed!!

Another Great game and more planned.


 

1st Blog Post

This is my first attempt at a blog post so forgive the newbie mistakes.  Hopefully over time I will get better and one of the aims for this Blog is to help others learn from my mistakes. 

 

On the 10th February 2016, at Scimitar Games Club, we played our first game of Dragon Rampant -

'Dragon Rampant is a standalone wargame that recreates the great battles of Fantasy fiction.

' (https://ospreypublishing.com/dragon-rampant)

 

 

We had a three player game and used the Bloodbath scenario.  We decided to play with 30 army points each; 24 army points on units and 6 army points on Fantastical rules.

 

First up are Garry's Wood Elves.

 

 

Next we have Martin's Goblins

 

And I took no photos of my Dwarfs; as they are not finished and look a bit rubbish.

 

The game played very quickly and with very little use of the rule book.  I had a slow start failing my first three activations.  When I final got a unit to move (my Ice Dragon ) it was soon surrounded by Wood Elves and shoot down.  So in good old Dwarf fashion, I repeated the mistake with my Dwarf Offensives Heavy Foot and again with my Elite Foot 'Lord Kev Thorngudson'; both attacking multiple Wood Elves on they own. DOH!

 

 

The highlight of the games was when Garry's Treemen was attacked by Martins Trolls; real heavy weight dual.

 

 

A close run thing but the Treemen won. 

 

GREAT GAME

 

We had some much fun that we didn't even bother to work out who had won the battle.  I think it was probably Garry, but I am claiming a moral victory as I am writing the history!!

 

Will post more detailed battle reports and fluff soon.

 

Cheers

 

Kev