Black Tree Designs Celt Slingers

I've decided to impose a moratorium on figure painting in October for myself in order to make progress on a  number of other projects that have been on the back burner.  Racing to hit my deadline, I managed to get some Black Tree Designs "Celt Slingers" painted up before the end of the month though.

Black Tree Designs "Celt Slingers". I've removed their shield studs and shields for the most part.

I didn't think it was possible to wield a shield while using a sling, but a little research on TMP changed my mind. The large oval scutums were probably too unwieldy for skirmishers to carry, and my packs of slingers only came with two small round buckler shields. I shaved off the mounting knobs from most of the slingers, saving the bucklers for the two poses who I thought would look too odd without a shield in their off hand.

Five coats of generic craft flat spray weren't enough to knock off the Army Painter shine

I also gave my Army Painter dip another try, thinning it with mineral spirits and using the very thinnest of coatings to accent the shading I had done and give a final protective coat (since these figures will likely be picked up by the figure rather than the base). The dip still came out thicker than I had hoped, though it wasn't quite the disaster that befell my Cretans. I think I may have just received a bad batch of dip if such a thing is possible, since it isn't behaving the way my previous tin did.

The slingers are decent sculpts, not quite as nice as the BTD Ancient Germans, but serviceable.

Fall In 2012 Plans

The event listing for the various miniature wargames being run at this year's Fall In was posted, and just like with Historicon, there are far too many games I'm interested in playing. At best we'll be going up Friday around midday and catching some afternoon and evening games, with a full day of gaming on Saturday and heading home on Sunday. I'm intrigued by this year's theme, the war of 1812, but I'm concentrating on getting in games for periods I have a real love for: Ancients, Medieval, and World War II, as well as a smattering of sci-fi and fantasy wargames. My top picks for Fall-In 2012 games after the jump.

Fall-In Friday November 2

Man, coming up late in the day is going to be a bummer as I'll be missing some really good looking games: "Steel Curtain", a Fireball Forward WWII game at noon, Miles Reidy's "The Battle of Lundy's Lane" at 1:00 on a table full of Architects of War terrain, the dungeon crawler "Dungeon Hack!" and the Black Powder game "Sanderhausen" at 2:00. The earliest game I think we can make would be at 3PM.

21st Century Russian Civil War, 3:00
With a short running time (only 2 hours), and in a scale and period I haven't tried, I'd love to take a swing at this modern clash between U.S., Russian and terrorist forces. Sounds neat!

Barbarossa Kamfgruppe, 4:00
There are a ton of WWII wargames being run with Barbarossa, a rules set I'm not familiar with. With a 1 hour play time, encouragement for wargamers of all experience levels, and the temptation of prizes, I am sure we'll get at least one game in of Barbarossa.

Super Sized Space Hulk, 4:00
Warhammer 40K was my first exposure to the concept of wargaming, and though I'm well versed on the lore and background of the game, I've never had a chance to play the universally acclaimed Space Hulk. While it's unlikely I'll be returning to 40K I'd love to get in a game of Space Hulk to see what all the fuss is about.

Roman Civil War, 6:00
Hey an ancients game! Despite using a rules set that isn't Hail Caesar, I'd love to take a shot at running the big man himself.

Twice Reborn, 6:00
A hypothetical battle (can fantasy games be hypothetical? Aren't they all?) between a reborn Sauron, his balrogs and nazgul and an alliance of dwarves and elves. An epic battle and only 2 hours long!

Castle Siege, 7:00
I am a sucker for beautiful terrain, and I can't believe a wargame designed around an assault on a castle during the 100 Year's War won't be impressive.

Alien War, 7:00
I don't know anything about this other than it's a sci-fi bug hunt, but the description made me laugh, " take on hordes of bugs on a distant, fairly awful planet. You won't like it there "

Die Harder, 8:00
A "Die Hard" wargame? I LOVE seeing game masters stretch the bounds of what a wargame can be. Probably my favorite action movie ever, I'd love to get in on this.

Fall-In, Saturday, November 3

This is a family vacation, so I'm pretty sure we won't be able to make it to the 9 AM games, opting instead for a leisurely breakfast with the wives and kids. I'll have to get over my disappointment at missing another Roman Civil war game, "Mehr" a Black Powder game in 15mm, and "Atlantic Wall '44" which uses "conventionized, fast play rules" (which I think is essential to pulling off a successful con game).

The Taking of Villers-Bocage, Normandy France, 10:00
A massive Fireball Forward game. We became a big fan of the rules after being introduced to them at Historicon. I'm hoping to get in a game or two with our Soviets and Germans before Fall-In, but I'd love to get in a big game at Fall-In.

Bloody April, Skies Over Arras, 11:00
We own Wings of Glory, and the only reason it doesn't hit the table more often is that we only have the card planes rather than real models. I'm sure this is going to be a good time.

Medieval Jousting Tournament, 12:00
I've thought about using the large scale Papo figures for man to man combat. Running only 2 hours, I'd like to see if they add anything to the experience. Plus, this totally seems like something my son could grasp.

The Yoke of Rome, 1:00
Another ancients game pitting the barbarian chief Albatross against his Roman nemesis Gingivitus!

Assault on a Klingon Mine and Strategic Materials Depot, 1:00
Not the most evocative game title I've seen, but there were a number of sci fi games that caught my eye at Historicon and I'd love to get a chance to run a Klingon ship this time.

Guadalcanal, 1942, 2:00
Another Fireball Forward game, but this time with a shorter running time (3 hours), the author himself Mark Fastoso, and in a theater I've never had a chance to try.

BOLT ACTION Demonstration Presented by WWPD, 3:00
I started listening to the WWPD podcast a few months ago, and despite not knowing a lick about Flames of War, found the group a lot of fun to listen to. Hoping to stop by and see the guys putting on their demo game.

The First Tank Battle: The Battle of Gabr el Ahmar, 4:00
I love tanks and I love trying to do something with crummy forces. I must be the only one looking forward to running hapless Italians blundering across the desert.

Sky Galleons of Mars, 5:00
After a long day of intense historical action, I'm hoping a fun game of "colorful ships and buckets of dice" will be a nice palette cleanser.

CY6!-Operation Bodenplatte, 6:00
There are a number of games of Check Your Six! being run at Fall-In. I've heard good things about it, and the games I've seen at other cons looked like fun. Would really like a chance to try it out.

There Will Be Blood, 7:00
Another sci fi game, this time using Silent Fury home rules. I'm a rules nerd so I like seeing how other folks write and adapt rules to fit their situation.



That is a ton of games, and the conflicting start times and lengths means I'll only get to play a few of them. Besides the games I'm hoping to see the WWPD live show and hit the dealer hall of course. Fall-In runs from November 2 - 4. Can't wait!

The Best of the Hail Caesar Yahoo Group. September 2012

Lots of good discussion this month as folks return from vacation and get back to waging war with tiny armies. It was hard to pick the best post of the month, so here are a few of my favorite highlights.

Rules Clarifications

• A testudo hit in the flank adopts battle line formation, but does not turn 90 degrees to face its attacker. The attack is still to the flank.

• Skirmishers in open order can not adopt a close order formation as a charge response to stop a heavier unit. Skirmishers in open formation can pretty much be ignored by heavier units in regards to the proximity rule.

• Two cohorts side by side with a third of same width covering exactly half of each of the two front cohorts. Would this mean the rear cohort could support either of the front cohorts or neither?
  
  It could support one of them, you choose which, but it can't support both. Of course, if they are fighting two separate enemy units, you will fight the combat with the support first, to increase your chances of victory. Then, all being well, the winning cohort will be able to sweeping charge into the flank of the remaining enemy, support following, to totally decimate that unit who will be facing two cohorts, one of which is supported. All gravy!

 Modeling Pyrrhus' Cavalry

I particuarly liked shaoloongyin's thoughts on modeling the unique nature of Pyrrhus' cavalry. The encouragement of the designers for players to hack the rules to best fit their vision of history or playability is one of the things that I really like about Hail Caesar and the HC community. I'll quote shaoloongyin's thoughts in total, because he's got some neat ideas:

I'd appreciate feedback on the following two approaches that attempt to reconcile historical troop characteristics within the HC ruleset.

Pyrrhus' mobile heavy cavalry reserve - Marauder rule

At the battle of Asculum, and perhaps elsewhere, Pyrrhus established a reserve line of elephants + skirmishers on the left and right wings and commanded his heavy guard cavalry in the centre. Apparently, he and his cavalry force would dash to wherever the lines appeared weak to either apply command or armed force.

Given this mobile role, it seems awkward to place such a cavalry squad under the distance restrictions of the usual divisional command rules. So, I've decided to use the Marauder rule in such cases, as well as the optional commander-in-chief rule for Pyrrhus.

This way, if he leaves the cavalry unit to lend command to any of his remote wings his guard cavalry will not suddenly be operating as if lobotomised. Though, per the rules, Pyrrhus' guard cavalry would be activated under the command of their original sub-commander in the centre rather than Pyrrhus himself (unless he joins the unit), no? This seems a little strange.

Perhaps it might be better to make them an exceptional division of 1?

Tarentine cavalry with 'Parthian' shot

Light, javelin-armed Tarentine cavalry apparently favoured riding up towards an enemy, casting their javelins, before riding away in a hit-and-run manner. There is doubt about whether their tactics favoured melee engagement.

Rather than used the 'feigned flight' rule, I've opted to allow Parthian Shot to be used with the Short Range value. The Tarentine javelin tactic appears analogous to the Parthian bow technique, though perhaps without the backwards-firing flourish.

Despite their initially exceptional use of shields, I've also opted to maintain Tarentine cavalry at a 6+ morale save and standard light cavalry, unless someone can offer a more elegant way to simulate this equipment. A 5+ morale save seems too strong.

Republican Romans

On a related note, with regards to Pyrrhus' enemy, the Republican Romans, I've toyed with the idea of allowing a manipular swap whereby a supporting second line principes or triarii unit can replace the unit in front provided the frontal unit gives ground in good order. There is thus still some chance for front line units to have their tactics disrupted if their break test puts them in disorder or destroys them outright.

Glad to see the chatter on the Hail Caesar Yahoo Group picking up. With my life being so full of non-game related activities in the moment, it's nice to be able to check in on Hail Caesar even if I can' seem to get any lead on the table.

Rome Total War II, First Look

The last few weeks have been quite challenging for me. Despite not making a ton of progress on wargamey stuff, I did catch a peek at some ancient warfare, albeit in digital form.

A few years ago when progress on my 20mm Punic armies slowed to a crawl, I picked up Rome Total Warfare and played quite a bit of it in hopes of jump starting my drive to finish that project off. I was years late to the party, but I really enjoyed it. Deploying my armies and fighting battles scratched the wargame itch, but I missed the tactile quality of moving figures and the creative aspects of building and painting terrain and minis.

Rome II on the Horizon

Creative Assembly has produced a number of domain management / battlefield simulations in the intervening years from Napoleonics to Samurai, and I just learned that they are returning to ancient warfare again with Rome II. Even with the inclusion of Hollywood style flaming catapult attacks and Omaha beach landing craft, I can't deny that the game looks gorgeous even at this early stage.

They've just released a teaser trailer as well. I'm definitely going to keep my eye on this one, even if I only end up dabbling with the final product before getting back to lead and paint.

Song of Blades & Heroes

With the impending Reaper Madness coming in March, I've been looking for a set of skirmish rules to run some games. After downloading the Song of Blades & Heroes rules I used my son to test out some of the mechanics with his choice of dinosaurs (and various zoo animals). He was thrilled. The boy just loves rollin' dice. Sadly, I think this means he'll be a rabid Yahtzee player.

Stegosaurus under attack

A little reskinning to make playing with the boy easier.

Mordheim Chaos Warband

I've been going through my older figures and terrain to cull anything that needs to be junked or sold.  I tried Mordheim, Game Workshop's fantasy skirmish game 5 or 6 years ago but haven't played since then. I'm considering selling off my Chaos warband and Mordheim terrain but thought I should probably take a few pics before I sent them on their way. Please excuse the few bases that didn't get finished off. The whole wicked warband after the jump.

Two Brethren holding the upper story of a ruined rowhouse

A pair of Possessed

"Jeff G.", Fly Mutant

Magister and mutant

"The Little Guy", chaos mutant

"We're here to eat babies and kick ass. And we're all out of babies."

Black Tree Designs Cretan Archers

Black Tree Designs Cretan Archers

I painted up a unit of Cretan Archers by Black Tree Designs. The sculpts weren't bad and they painted up quickly, but Army Painter quick shade finally let me down. After block painting the archers I brushed on the Army Painter quick shade. It looked a little dark, so I wicked away quite a bit of it and had faith that it would lighten as it dried. Unfortunately when I checked them the following morning, the dreaded goop had remained fairly dark and they needed quite a bit of repainting and highlighting to get them back up to table top standard.

I was concerned that the BTD Cretan Archers were sculpted larger than 28mm standard, but comparing them to a Warlord Games Celt (on the left) and a Wargames Factory Viking (center right) my fears were unfounded.

BTD comparison

So while I'd happily pick up more BTD Cretan Archers, I'm afraid the honeymoon is over with Army Painter. I'll still be doing some experiments with thinning it and using it sparingly, but for me, I don't think I can rely on it completely to handle the shading of my figures.

Completed Plastic Soldier Company Soviet Infantry

Plastic Soldier Company "Soviets in Summer Uniform"

My soviets are done, but I can't say I'm entirely pleased with how they turned out. I botched the primer and found the mix of colors in the Battlefront Soviet Paint set a little too similar in shade to create the contrast necessary to make these figures. Still it was good to get some 15mm figures under my belt, and these should be fine for learning Fireball Forward and Flames of War.  I may slowly replace these plastics with Battlefront or Peter Pig figures over time.

These guys should provide good support for some T-34's and KV-1s

Homemade Dungeons & Dragons Miniatures

When I was digging up the control figure for my Reaper Bones experiment I came across a set of fantasy monsters I sculpted myself for the dungeon crawling game my group played about 10 years ago. This was before the advent of WotC's prepainted figures so finding a miniature for the more exotic monsters meant doing it myself.  Of course, my players always told me to "just use bottlecaps", but whata they know...

Earth Elemental

Water Elemental

Gibbering Mouthers

Brain Golem

Beholder, Old School Style

Dark Ages Color Palettes

I've been noodling the idea of starting the Dark Ages / Norman Conquest / Normans in Italy / 1st Crusade period, but since it's on the back burner I'm taking my time and planning out how I want to tackle Yet Another Period. I read some really good posts on Model Dad's blog about dark ages dying techniques and color schemes. Using that as a base, I've decided to work out the color schemes for the various armies I might be painting up for my 10th - 12th century Normans, Anglo-Saxons and Vikings. This is a pretty massive post where I go into historic dyes, hobby paint equivelants, color schemes, and samples. All this and more after the jump.

Fabric Colors of the Anglo Saxon World

I've just started researching Dark Ages color schemes, but I've found Jenny Dean's website a great resource (thanks to Model Dad for pointing me there). Jenny has a number of posts dedicated to Anglo Saxon dying techniques. Along with descriptions of her dying methods and examples of her experimental results, she also drops cool tidbits like this:

"The analysis of dyes in textiles of the early Anglo-Saxon period seems to indicate that reds, like purples, were mainly used for narrow woven bands, headdresses, embroideries and accessories, such  bags, rather than for larger fabrics. Where dyes were used in larger fabrics (and dyes were detected in only one-third of the larger fabrics analysed) these were mainly dyes that give shades of yellow, blue and brown, plus green from blue and yellow dyes used in combination. It is also possible that, at least in the early Anglo-Saxon period, reds and purples were colours reserved for people of high status."

Ms. Dean seems pretty reliable regarding natural dying techniques of early Britain, so I'm going to assume her description of colors and their frequency in the archeological record is accurate. This gives me a good place to start for planning out color schemes (dyed textile images from Jenny Dean's site).

Common Colors(60% of cloth) Undyed Fabric in Off-white, Gray, Tan, and Brown

Uncommon Colors (30% of cloth) Yellow, Blue, Brown, and Green

Rare Colors (10% of cloth) Red, Purple

I had read a bit of wargamer wisdom that said the color green was not available as a dye color during the dark ages, but based on the examples above I feel confident that nearly every color of the rainbow could be produced during the 11th and 12th centuries, and only the saturation and frequency of various shades need to be adjusted on our figures to recreate accurate clothing.

Historically Accurate Hobby Paints

With these Anglo Saxon color samples as my guide, I've tried to find suitable color matches in the Vallejo and Games Workshops line of paints. I'm working from images from the web, and comparing them to the paint samples from the two manufacturers, so I can't promise an exact correlation, but hopefully it's good enough for the tabletop. The Games Workshop colors appear to be more vibrant on the whole, so many of these GW colors would probably need to be desaturated by adding some white or brown to the shade.

Sample	Vallejo	Games Workshop
Common Colors
	883 Silver Gray	Rakarth Flesh
	918 Ivory	Ushabti Bone
	837 Sand Light	Karak Stone
	916 Sand Yellow	Zamezi Desert
	877 Goldbrown	Balor Brown
	876 Brown Sand	Mournfang Brown
Uncommon Colors
	953 Flat Yellow	Tau Light Ochre
	915 Deep Yellow	Yriel Yellow
	961 Olive Green	Loren Forest
	833 German Camouflage	Caliban Greent
	907 Pale Greyblue	Celestra Gray
	963 Medium Blue	Kantor Blue
Rare Colors
	959 Purple	Xereus Purple
	817 Scarlet	Wazdaka Red
	911 Light Orange	Jokaero Orange

Creating Color Palettes for Dark Ages Armies

Now that I've narrowed down the colors I'll be using for my dark ages figures, I've combined them into a few color palettes.  Although information about warfare during this time is limited, it's unlikely vikings, normans and anglo saxons adhered to any sort of uniform, each man providing his own gear, painted and dyed to his own taste.

On the wargame table though, I find treating each figure as an individual turns the board into a visual mess. My goal was to create a color palette for each army that would visually tie them together, without implying that they were wearing uniforms or livery. I wanted these color palettes to be fairly generic so I could assign them to armies at a later date, so I've gone with four simple color themes based on the seasons of the year.

The common colors will appear most prevalently within each army. One or two uncommon colors may appear as well, with the rare complimentary colors reserved for decorative items and borders on elite figures.

Winter

883 Silver Gray	918 Ivory	907 Pale Greyblue	963 Medium Blue	916 Sand Yellow
Rakarth Flesh	Ushabti Bone	Celestra Gray	Kantor Blue	Zamezi Desert

Spring

918 Ivory	837 Sand Light	915 Deep Yellow	961 Olive Green	959 Purple
Ushabti Bone	Karak Stone	Yriel Yellow	Loren Forest	Xereus Purple

Summer

916 Sand Yellow	918 Ivory	961 Olive Green	833 German Camouflage	817 Scarlet
Zamezi Desert	Ushabti Bone	Loren Forest	Caliban Greent	Wazdaka Red

Autumn

877 Goldbrown	918 Ivory	876 Brown Sand	953 Flat Yellow	911 Light Orange	817 Scarlet
Balor Brown	Ushabti Bone	Mournfang Brown	Tau Light Ochre	Jokaero Orange	Wazdaka Red

Painted Examples of Viking Bondi

I'm hoping to start playing SAGA this winter starting with viking and norman warbands. I painted up a few 28mm bondi from Wargames Factory's "Vikings" as samples to see if this technique would work.  When I think of vikings one of the first images that comes to mind is the viking longship with its striking red and white striped sail. 

I decided to assign my autumn color scheme to any vikings I paint up, with particular emphasis on ivory and a rusty red color. The bondi were viking farmers, and unlike the more heavily armored huscarls, the bondi are wearing simple tunics and breeches providing a good range of fabrics to paint up. As lower class warriors, they shouldn't have a large amount of the rare red fabric, but I made sure to include at least one bit of red on each. A red cap on one, but only a simple belt or pouch on the others with some red being incorporated into the simple geometric designs of their shields. I also included a bit of ivory in various tunic borders as well, using the two "team colors" to tie the whole army together.

Viking bondi from Wargames Factory

I still need to paint up more vikings and some opposing normans in a different color scheme, but already I'm happy with the result. By forcing myself to limit the color palette and pay attention to how I could incorporate the ivory and rust red colors I think the end result should appear suitably archaic but with enough pops of color to add visual interest to the game.

Buying Dark Age Vallejo Paints Online 

The paints above are available from your FLGS, but my FLGS is pretty lackluster and constantly seem to be out of stock. I tend to order more frequently from Amazon and The War Store and a number of the paints mentioned above are available there:

918 Ivory	Vallejo Model Colors: Ivory #5
883 Silver Gray	Silver Grey
916 Sand Yellow	Sand Yellow
877 Goldbrown	Vallejo Model Colors: GoldBrown #126
876 Brown Sand	Brown Sand
963 Medium Blue	Vallejo Model Colors: Medium Blue #57
953 Flat Yellow	Flat Yellow
961 Olive Green	Vallejo Model Colors: Olive Green #82
817 Scarlet	Scarlet
959 Purple	Purple
911 Light Orange	Vallejo Model Colors: Light Orange #22

There are also a few paint sets that offer a good place to start if you need to pick up more than a few bottles of paint to add to your collection.

Panzer Aces Wood & Leather
The Vallejo Wood and Leather set contains a variety of earth tones, a great place to start for the common colors that appear in dark age armies.

The Vallejo Earth Tones set  looks like it provides a good initial set of muted natural colors too.

Amazon's Vallejo Game Colors Paint Set: Undead
The War Store's Vallejo Game Colors Paint Set: Undead
The undead set comes with a metallic silver and bronze, white and black as well as a shade of red, parchment, purple and violet. Along with a few individual bottles of earth tones, this seems like a good basis for a generic dark ages color palette.