Just replayed that Roman Rd scenario as the defender against Carl's late Romans and got a right royal hammering... As I already knew, combrogi bounce off pedes with full kit who are armed with heavy throwing spears!!!
Luckily, my Teulu stepped in and salvaged 924 very welcome victory points, otherwise it would have been very embarassing!!! I still can't believe how good those guys are!!!!!
Am not at all sure how I'll play that scenario at Hot Lead if I get to do it as the defender, as it is a real pig...but still great fun.
On another note, am now painting extra cavalry ready for the Struggle for the North campaign run by Morris & Jones...have decided that if one is to play at Rheged or Gododdin, one might as well follow the heroic poetry and go with lots of chaps on horses...have no idea how it'll go as I've still not managed to get a practice game in and the event is only 3 weeks away. And my entirely light infantry and cavalry force is likely to face nasty Heptarchy Saxons in bloomin' shieldwall with nasty thrusting spears....and Picts armed equally unpleasantly...Oh well, I may have to just go with the flow and hope that 'captain cock-up' decides not to come out to play that day!!!!!!!
I'll let you know how it goes!
PS have painted the first of the (converted) West Wind Romano-British cavalry that will eventually be my Rheged Teulu (although probably not in time for the above event.) It looks great...will post a pic at the weekend....
Tuesday, 5 June 2007
Tuesday, 29 May 2007
And now for something completely different....
One of my other 'little jobs' from the past few weeks has been doing some work for a mate who has just become a daddy... He and his wife asked me to paint a mural on their nursery wall. They opted for woodland animals... A bit of a different scale to 28mm wargame figures, I think you'll agree!!! Paints used were those little Homebase DIY tester pots of wall emulsion with colours liberally mixed to get the shades I wanted... Different, but great fun to do and, at three months old, little baby Isabelle has already begun to notice that this particular wall looks different to other three in the room... (aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh).....
Sunday, 27 May 2007
1500pts British Kingdoms Army
As promised, here they are: 1500pts of Age of Arthur British Kingdoms. All shields and standards handpainted...fool that I am!!!!
The Whole army. Three views.... Bit of work with Adobe Photoshop on the first one to get some sky in there...
First, the Rex (obviously Latin for 'king,' Rex is a title that any very powerful British Warlord could give himself if he felt like it and had the force to back up that claim...) with his Teulu (pronounced 'Taily' - these are his bodyguard, comitatus, etc.) I have fielded them as heavy cavalry because I can and because somehow, an Arthurian army without them just feels plain wrong, even though there is diddly-squat evidence that 'Arthur' (or any of his more 'historical' contemporaries) ever really fought with such cavalry..let's face it, the Teulu could fight on horse or foot as they needed to. In WAB, you can't be dismounting and remounting warriors so I've bitten the bullet and gone with cavalry...
The Rex is accompanied by his battle-standard bearer, an 'Uchelwyr' or minor nobleman, carrying the dragon banner.
Next, the spearmen or 'Combrogi'. The chap in the green cloak in the first pic is a 'Tiern' (high ranking nobleman.) He's there to boost the fighting power of this unit and he certainly did that in the game on Tuesday!!
These are a handful of pagenses (skirmishers) with javelins...
The Cavalry. These are mounted Combrogi, light cavalry with throwing spears, shields and javelins. I like these guys...very handy!!!
Lastly, a bard. He doesn't fit in points-wise, but he will be part of my 700pt character retinue for campaigns, so I've stuck him in these pics.
I hope you like them! I'm very pleased with the overall effect. They seem to 'hang together' pretty well, largely due to the unified unit standards (themes and colours) and the choice of red, black and white as shield colours. I'm looking forward to playing a few more games with them. So far, they've played two: One close- run victory and one bloody stand-off...
Next in line for the paintbrush, three javelin-armed mounted combrogi and four javelin-armed Teulu models for my late 6th/7th century Northern British variant...
The Whole army. Three views.... Bit of work with Adobe Photoshop on the first one to get some sky in there...
First, the Rex (obviously Latin for 'king,' Rex is a title that any very powerful British Warlord could give himself if he felt like it and had the force to back up that claim...) with his Teulu (pronounced 'Taily' - these are his bodyguard, comitatus, etc.) I have fielded them as heavy cavalry because I can and because somehow, an Arthurian army without them just feels plain wrong, even though there is diddly-squat evidence that 'Arthur' (or any of his more 'historical' contemporaries) ever really fought with such cavalry..let's face it, the Teulu could fight on horse or foot as they needed to. In WAB, you can't be dismounting and remounting warriors so I've bitten the bullet and gone with cavalry...
The Rex is accompanied by his battle-standard bearer, an 'Uchelwyr' or minor nobleman, carrying the dragon banner.
Next, the spearmen or 'Combrogi'. The chap in the green cloak in the first pic is a 'Tiern' (high ranking nobleman.) He's there to boost the fighting power of this unit and he certainly did that in the game on Tuesday!!
These are a handful of pagenses (skirmishers) with javelins...
The Cavalry. These are mounted Combrogi, light cavalry with throwing spears, shields and javelins. I like these guys...very handy!!!
Lastly, a bard. He doesn't fit in points-wise, but he will be part of my 700pt character retinue for campaigns, so I've stuck him in these pics.
I hope you like them! I'm very pleased with the overall effect. They seem to 'hang together' pretty well, largely due to the unified unit standards (themes and colours) and the choice of red, black and white as shield colours. I'm looking forward to playing a few more games with them. So far, they've played two: One close- run victory and one bloody stand-off...
Next in line for the paintbrush, three javelin-armed mounted combrogi and four javelin-armed Teulu models for my late 6th/7th century Northern British variant...
Friday, 25 May 2007
The Thinking behind My Army
Before I post the first finished army pics, I thought I'd just share the rationale behind what I am doing with this army.
Initially, I was planning on a Romano-British army, simply because that's all I'd seen out there in wargame land and because what I'd read suggested that was the way to go. Also, my reading of Philips and Keatmans fantastic 'King Arthur, The True Story' really inspired that idea. It was only when the Age of Arthur book actually came out and I read the historical background, that I began to rethink. Anyway, I ploughed on, detemined to field an Ambrosian Twilight of Britannia list. I even bought additional Roman models to add to the mass of GB Arthurian/Germanics I'd already got. However, I played a couple of games with that army while painting and found myself oddly dissatisfied. I found myself playing just like I do with FOTW Romans...badly!!! So that prompted a rethink and I tried a British kingdoms list. It felt very different, with rock-hard characters, Teulu and warband infantry and I found myself playing more aggressively, and just plain..better! So I bought the West Wind models and 'British-ised' them with round shields (see earlier post) and that's the army I've completed...I simply removed the very overtly Roman troops and popped them away in the storage cabinet until I could think of what to do with them.
Then came the news that Morris and Jones were planning a 7th Century campaign day based in Northern Britain. I was really keen to get involved, but would have to field a later army.... and it was then that it struck me... I could actually do three armies in one here. So this is how...
The current British kingdoms force has 3 infantry blocks containing about 70% round shield models with the rest oval shield Arthurian range, some armoured. I figured that would be entirely appropriate for a Brtish kingdom that had started out as a warlord in charge of an old Romano-British frontier garrison who declared himself Rex. As time went on, the Roman equipment would begin to wear out, although the descendents of the original military garrison and their armourers, smiths, etc still retained their knowledge of Roman arms techniques, so some Roman armour , helmets and shields still remain in use, although only in a minorty among the combrogi. Gradually, the equipment and tactics would evolve to that seen in later kingdoms, very 'skirmishy' - lots of javelins, etc and obviously all round shields, armour very much limited to Teulu and leaders...
So, by replacing some of the round-shield foot models with the Roman chaps I've relegated to the storage cabinet and by re-arranging unit numbers, I can field the army of the Roman Military Civitas that preceded the Warlord's take-over-much more of a late, late Roman looking force.
By painting a few more round-shield unarmoured types, I can replace the oval shield types competely to field a much later force - 6th-7th century...Even better if I replace some of the current Teulu with West Wind's javelin-throwing ones.
Genius! with one an a half armies' worth of figures, I can field 3 different variant armies!
So, here's the scenario:
Romano-British civitates force: Represents the garrison of Hadrian's Wall near Carlisle-the Western end of the wall, the Civitas of the Carvetii.
British Kingdoms force: Represents the early stages of the kingdom of Rheged that emerged from that civitas, aiming for the time period of late 5th early/6th century-ideal as an 'Arthurian' force as well:
Northern Welsh force represents the kingdom of Rheged from the time of Urien onwards (mid 6th century until the kingdom's absorbtion by Northumbria.)
So that's where I am now. The British kindoms are what you'll see in the pics in my next post. The next job will be to get some troops done for the later period, along with a foot Teulu, before finishing off another dozen or so Roman foot models and a couple of oval shield cavalry to complete the earlier army...
Initially, I was planning on a Romano-British army, simply because that's all I'd seen out there in wargame land and because what I'd read suggested that was the way to go. Also, my reading of Philips and Keatmans fantastic 'King Arthur, The True Story' really inspired that idea. It was only when the Age of Arthur book actually came out and I read the historical background, that I began to rethink. Anyway, I ploughed on, detemined to field an Ambrosian Twilight of Britannia list. I even bought additional Roman models to add to the mass of GB Arthurian/Germanics I'd already got. However, I played a couple of games with that army while painting and found myself oddly dissatisfied. I found myself playing just like I do with FOTW Romans...badly!!! So that prompted a rethink and I tried a British kingdoms list. It felt very different, with rock-hard characters, Teulu and warband infantry and I found myself playing more aggressively, and just plain..better! So I bought the West Wind models and 'British-ised' them with round shields (see earlier post) and that's the army I've completed...I simply removed the very overtly Roman troops and popped them away in the storage cabinet until I could think of what to do with them.
Then came the news that Morris and Jones were planning a 7th Century campaign day based in Northern Britain. I was really keen to get involved, but would have to field a later army.... and it was then that it struck me... I could actually do three armies in one here. So this is how...
The current British kingdoms force has 3 infantry blocks containing about 70% round shield models with the rest oval shield Arthurian range, some armoured. I figured that would be entirely appropriate for a Brtish kingdom that had started out as a warlord in charge of an old Romano-British frontier garrison who declared himself Rex. As time went on, the Roman equipment would begin to wear out, although the descendents of the original military garrison and their armourers, smiths, etc still retained their knowledge of Roman arms techniques, so some Roman armour , helmets and shields still remain in use, although only in a minorty among the combrogi. Gradually, the equipment and tactics would evolve to that seen in later kingdoms, very 'skirmishy' - lots of javelins, etc and obviously all round shields, armour very much limited to Teulu and leaders...
So, by replacing some of the round-shield foot models with the Roman chaps I've relegated to the storage cabinet and by re-arranging unit numbers, I can field the army of the Roman Military Civitas that preceded the Warlord's take-over-much more of a late, late Roman looking force.
By painting a few more round-shield unarmoured types, I can replace the oval shield types competely to field a much later force - 6th-7th century...Even better if I replace some of the current Teulu with West Wind's javelin-throwing ones.
Genius! with one an a half armies' worth of figures, I can field 3 different variant armies!
So, here's the scenario:
Romano-British civitates force: Represents the garrison of Hadrian's Wall near Carlisle-the Western end of the wall, the Civitas of the Carvetii.
British Kingdoms force: Represents the early stages of the kingdom of Rheged that emerged from that civitas, aiming for the time period of late 5th early/6th century-ideal as an 'Arthurian' force as well:
Northern Welsh force represents the kingdom of Rheged from the time of Urien onwards (mid 6th century until the kingdom's absorbtion by Northumbria.)
So that's where I am now. The British kindoms are what you'll see in the pics in my next post. The next job will be to get some troops done for the later period, along with a foot Teulu, before finishing off another dozen or so Roman foot models and a couple of oval shield cavalry to complete the earlier army...
Wednesday, 23 May 2007
A First Victory!!!
It's amazing what a lick of paint can do for one's generalship!!! Yup, second outing for the British Kingdoms boys (first outing fully painted) and we managed a (very rare, but bloomin' welcome) 656pt 'close-run victory.'
I was playing against my mate Carl who was once again using my Late Romans (we were practising for The Beast's Hot Lead event in July) and we played the 'Roman Road' scenario from the Age of Arthur book. Basically, I had to start in column of march with 1500 pts while Carl's 1000 ambushed me and tried to prevent me exiting his table edge (short table edge...). See the book for more details. Anyway, it was a tremendous battle... In the end my Teulu, complete with General and army standard exited safely (gaining me STACKS of victory points) while my brave foot troops slaughtered Roman cavalry and cataphracts and one unit was slaughtered by Roman pedes. I was denied a Mighty Victory due to my mounted combrogi failing a crucial panic test and getting stuck on the table, being beaten in a fight by bloody Roman archers (ok, with a bit of help from their general and ASB...) Great fun, but a bit of a sod of a scenario for the defender if his 1000pt army is small in numbers, (as the Romans were really, with expensive troops, equipment and all...) as there was just too big a gap for me to pile through. Also, my cavalry gained me an advantage (which I partly blew by getting the mtd combrogi in trouble, but hey ho...lessons learned!!) that infantry armies wouldn't have...
Anyway, as I say, a rare victory for me which could have been better if I'd not made a couple of stupid errors, but Carl acknowledged that he'd made some mistakes too. If he hadn't made those, it might well have been much closer.
First game on the new gaming boards as well. I have to say, both of my armies on such nice new boards did look rather cool!! Sorry there are no pics, but we didn't have time or enough light.
Full British Kingdoms army pics at the weekend, I PROMISE....
Oh, and the bloody heating/hot water still isn't fixed and is going to cost me a smal bloody fortune when they come back to complete the job...GREAT!!!
I was playing against my mate Carl who was once again using my Late Romans (we were practising for The Beast's Hot Lead event in July) and we played the 'Roman Road' scenario from the Age of Arthur book. Basically, I had to start in column of march with 1500 pts while Carl's 1000 ambushed me and tried to prevent me exiting his table edge (short table edge...). See the book for more details. Anyway, it was a tremendous battle... In the end my Teulu, complete with General and army standard exited safely (gaining me STACKS of victory points) while my brave foot troops slaughtered Roman cavalry and cataphracts and one unit was slaughtered by Roman pedes. I was denied a Mighty Victory due to my mounted combrogi failing a crucial panic test and getting stuck on the table, being beaten in a fight by bloody Roman archers (ok, with a bit of help from their general and ASB...) Great fun, but a bit of a sod of a scenario for the defender if his 1000pt army is small in numbers, (as the Romans were really, with expensive troops, equipment and all...) as there was just too big a gap for me to pile through. Also, my cavalry gained me an advantage (which I partly blew by getting the mtd combrogi in trouble, but hey ho...lessons learned!!) that infantry armies wouldn't have...
Anyway, as I say, a rare victory for me which could have been better if I'd not made a couple of stupid errors, but Carl acknowledged that he'd made some mistakes too. If he hadn't made those, it might well have been much closer.
First game on the new gaming boards as well. I have to say, both of my armies on such nice new boards did look rather cool!! Sorry there are no pics, but we didn't have time or enough light.
Full British Kingdoms army pics at the weekend, I PROMISE....
Oh, and the bloody heating/hot water still isn't fixed and is going to cost me a smal bloody fortune when they come back to complete the job...GREAT!!!
Tuesday, 22 May 2007
TRA-LA-LAAAAAAA.......!!!!!!!!!!
Sorry...please excuse the over-enthusiastic fanfare leading this message...but I've only gone and completed the painting of 1500 points of British Kingdoms..... I know.... Unbe-flamin'-lieveable innit?!! (In the immortal words of Age of Arthur co-author Steve Jones, "About bloody time!" and I can't argue with him really!)
Anyway, I finally applied the last blob of static grass at 10.30pm on Monday evening after a frenzied weekend of paint-slapping....well, I have a game this evening and wanted to play with all painted toys...although, note to self, be careful...not varnished yet!!!!!
I shall be taking some full army and finished unit pics over the next few days and will post highlights both here and on the WAB forum.
To be honest though, it's not QUITE as much of a celebration as it could be, as I don't think that my list is a great gaming list...I could use a second unit of skirmishers, so I'll be doing those over the next week or so, but even so...after almost 16 months of painting it is GREAT to have at least something resembling an army painted!
Anyway, must get on...bloody hot water/heating system failed over the weekend and this morning is to be spent working from home so I can phone innumerable heating engineers to get a repair quote...sigh......!!!!!
Anyway, I finally applied the last blob of static grass at 10.30pm on Monday evening after a frenzied weekend of paint-slapping....well, I have a game this evening and wanted to play with all painted toys...although, note to self, be careful...not varnished yet!!!!!
I shall be taking some full army and finished unit pics over the next few days and will post highlights both here and on the WAB forum.
To be honest though, it's not QUITE as much of a celebration as it could be, as I don't think that my list is a great gaming list...I could use a second unit of skirmishers, so I'll be doing those over the next week or so, but even so...after almost 16 months of painting it is GREAT to have at least something resembling an army painted!
Anyway, must get on...bloody hot water/heating system failed over the weekend and this morning is to be spent working from home so I can phone innumerable heating engineers to get a repair quote...sigh......!!!!!
Friday, 18 May 2007
Not Long Now...
Yup, unbelievable though it may be, after nearly 15 months of painting, I am within a gnat's bollock of completing the core 1500pts for my Arthurian army! I reckon I've got about an hour's work on the last 5 Pagenses, then about 3 more evenings on the last 8 foot Combrogi and then I'll have 1500 lovely points of British Kingdoms. Bloody fantastic!!!
The plan then is to paint a couple more unarmoured cavalry (I've had to temporarily sub a couple of painted Teulu types to get my mounted Combrogi to painted gaming strength-and I painted too many Teulu anyway...) then I will have a less Roman looking light cavalry unit.
Next, it's a foot Teulu, which will be fun...having to paint replica banners...bugger....
I then need to paint about a dozen more Roman types (you know, big oval shields and stuff) and a couple more armoured cavalry and I can field a pretty good looking Twilight of Britannia Romano-British force (I'll just swap some non-Roman looking types for the Roman looking ones to do that...)
At the same time, I want to paint some very British looking fellas on foot and a few javelin-throwing West Wind Teulu cavalry so that I can create a 7th Century Northern British army.
The basic idea is that there are about 75-80 models that can fit into all 3 armies, with the remaining 30 or so filled by the very specific variants to personalise it all. It's a bloomin' great plan, but will probably take me another 6-8 months to do... Then of course, there are the Saxon allies.....
Anyway, I'm off out to a charity pub quiz now, organised by a mate from work. My team are calling ourselves the Magnificent Seven...there are indeed seven of us, but I am not sure how magnificent we'll be as my day at work has resulted in my brain turning to soup! Great! The upside is the very nice fish n chip supper that precedes it!!!!!
Hopefully, if I can summon up the energy tomorrow, I'll post a bit about why I've chosen the armies that I have and how I see the history of the three linking together. It sounds bloody clever, doesn't it? Well, don't hold your breath, but I hope it'll interest someone out there somewhere....
The plan then is to paint a couple more unarmoured cavalry (I've had to temporarily sub a couple of painted Teulu types to get my mounted Combrogi to painted gaming strength-and I painted too many Teulu anyway...) then I will have a less Roman looking light cavalry unit.
Next, it's a foot Teulu, which will be fun...having to paint replica banners...bugger....
I then need to paint about a dozen more Roman types (you know, big oval shields and stuff) and a couple more armoured cavalry and I can field a pretty good looking Twilight of Britannia Romano-British force (I'll just swap some non-Roman looking types for the Roman looking ones to do that...)
At the same time, I want to paint some very British looking fellas on foot and a few javelin-throwing West Wind Teulu cavalry so that I can create a 7th Century Northern British army.
The basic idea is that there are about 75-80 models that can fit into all 3 armies, with the remaining 30 or so filled by the very specific variants to personalise it all. It's a bloomin' great plan, but will probably take me another 6-8 months to do... Then of course, there are the Saxon allies.....
Anyway, I'm off out to a charity pub quiz now, organised by a mate from work. My team are calling ourselves the Magnificent Seven...there are indeed seven of us, but I am not sure how magnificent we'll be as my day at work has resulted in my brain turning to soup! Great! The upside is the very nice fish n chip supper that precedes it!!!!!
Hopefully, if I can summon up the energy tomorrow, I'll post a bit about why I've chosen the armies that I have and how I see the history of the three linking together. It sounds bloody clever, doesn't it? Well, don't hold your breath, but I hope it'll interest someone out there somewhere....
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