Saxons finished

Completed in between various interesting bits of bug investigation for work.

Hair by Citadel Contrast (mostly Skeleton Horde), shield backs with Contrast Cygor Brown, fronts with various AP colours, weapons with AP metallics.

Basing: WarWorld Scenics basing grit, Vallejo Sepia Tone, my standard grass basing mix.

New warriors at the back. Need to tart up the movement bases a bit :D

Panting some more Saxons

My Saxon warriors for Dux are.... scratty, as my wife would say - shields falling off, paint chipping etc. So I've assembled some more out of the GB Dark Ages warriors box and started on them with the Contrast paints...

Leatherwork in Snakebite Leather, faces in Fireslayer Flesh, clothing in assorted Nazdreg Yellow, Agaros Dunes, Millitarum Green, Arkhelian Green and Flesh Tearer Red. Saving Skeleton Horde, Gore Grunta Fur and a couple of other shades for hair.

Should get these finished and maybe even based tomorrow.

Saxon Miniatures vs GB Late Roman size comparison

Per request from Richard Crawley, herewith a size comparison photo: apologies for the quality but the only working camera without a flat battery here tonight is my iPad mini :D

Saxon Miniatures on the left, GB Late Roman on the right. 

The Battle Of Maldon... in Lego

I don't often use this blog to share links for their own sake...

...but this (via @ospreybooks on Twitter) is absolutely brilliant.

Enjoy!

Painting Challenge - Saxons

I finished up a bunch of Musketeer Miniatures Saxon archers, plus a stray Duguth I somehow managed to miss earlier in the year and an extra figure, just before Christmas for the Analogue Hobbies painting challenge.

These are to replace my missile troops in Dux Britanniarum (the current ones being Wargames Factory plastics). The extra figure is, as far as I can recall, a 1980's Citadel female ranger, which I unearthed in a massive tin of assorted painted and unpainted Citadel and Ral Partha figures - and there are no prizes for guessing who she's meant to be. The original paint job wasn't wonderful, even by my standards (if you look closely in last week's Dux Brit AAR, you can see she's wearing blue gloves!), so I re-undercoated her and started again.

The science bit? Army Painter matt black undercoat, Army Painter Warpaints and a couple of Vallejo colours, then a light wash of Army Painter strong tone ink, and some light highlights on the faces and hair after the wash. Varnish is the usual Army Painter, bases are Tamiya dark earth diorama paint and Javis static grass.

Battle Report - 25-Nov-2012 - Bretwalda - WAB Age of Arthur day

Sunday saw our club put on a WAB Age of Arthur day at our venue. In the end, we had 14 players turn up, a mix of our members and folks from further afield - the venue could, with a bit of a squeeze, hold 24, so there was a reasonable amount of room.

The players were split into two factions, the British (with mercenary allies) under Vortigen, and the Saxon invaders under Hengest: we diced for leaders, and issued them with crowns. Format was three rounds, the first being three sets of doubles plus the leaders (Scrivs as Vortigern and Phil from the Halifax club (the Pennine Raiders) admirably cast as Hengest) in single battle. I paired up with Stephen (also from the Pennine Raiders) to take on the worst Britian could throw at us (which turned out to be Reuben and AndyB from our club!).

It all went OK (ish) for the first three turns, but turn four saw an awful lot of damage done to the combined might of the Saxons and a lot of failed tests, despite our best efforts, and we wound up on the receiving end of a Mighty Victory to Britain. Which rather set the pattern for my day, sadly.

After a quick dash home for the scenery I'd forgotten, we set up the tables for two rounds of singles for the afternoon. The plan here was that each leader was given the scenario sheets for the seven different tables, and had to allocate a player to each table for the second round, and then a different one for the third round. Most of the scenarios were out of the Age of Arthur rulebook, but we added a couple of Andy Hawes and my devising (The Old Roman Signal Station and Our Lady of Wansford) and James Morris' Battle of Chester scenario.

For the second round I got assigned Cat Coit Celedon against Vortigern himself, Scrivs. This basically requires the attacker to punch a hole or two in the defender's formation and make it off the table. I almost managed it: my cavalry vapourised in the face of some remarkably unpleasant double-shotted sling fire, but I did get two units of Duguth headed in the right direction. Except that, due to a complete bit of tactical idiocy on my part, I'd got my hearthguard rather firmly stuck behind some fleeing Geoguth, and in no position to charge. So when Scrivs charged them and they broke, fled and died, my army proceeded to fail its tests, and ... yup, another Mighty Victory to the British.

Last up I got Grahame from our club's Franks in the Mount Badon scenario, which I picked largely because it was the only one of the seven I'd never played. Looking at his forces, and really not wanting to attack uphill against thrusting-spear armed Franks, I decided I'd defend the hill: at this point (in order to make the 2000pts vs 1500 pts the scenario calls for) my cavalry defected to Grahame.

It so nearly worked. I spent four turns resisting the temptation to leave the hill. My reinforcements obligingly turned up on turn four, and proceeded to charge what used to be my cavalry... which actually worked out quite well, as they fled, causing a bit of a logjam for Grahame. By turn 5 I'd lost a unit of Duguth and both my skirmishers, and was poised to charge my Gedriht off the hill and hopefully turn a close-fought victory... except that Grahame unloaded on my Gedriht with every missle troop he had, and did 6 out of 24 casualties. A panic test. They failed. And fled. 11", which was about 3/4" too far for them to stay on the table... You can guess the rest :D

All in all, though? It was a brilliant day - I had a blast, and it certainly seems that everyone else did. The British won the most territory, despite some sterling efforts in the final round after a pep talk from Hengest, and there was a three way tie for the mightiest warrior, resolved in favour of Andy Beer who actually managed three Mighty Victories. Thanks to everyone who came, to Andy Hawes for being organiser in chief and MC ("Yet more interesting NEWS, gentlemen, from the Land of Britannia!"), and to everyone else who helped.

I'm also very pleased to report that the dice-off for various goodies, including a bottle of mead and some of the very nice new Musketeer character figures, raised £65 for the Battlegames Combat Stress Appeal.

Oh, and, P.S.: Scrivs? I win :D

Anglo-Saxon portraits, a BBC series

Courtesy of my ex-employers Aunty Beeb :D

iPlayer link here - also available on iTunes under 'The Radio 3 Documentary' for non-UK listeners (thanks Stefano!)

"Portraits of thirty ground-breaking Anglo-Saxon men and women.
The Anglo-Saxons are somewhat out of fashion, yet the half millennium between the creation of the English nation in around 550 and the Norman Conquest in 1066 was a formative one. 

This major new series for BBC Radio 3 rediscovers the Anglo-Saxons through vivid portraits of thirty individuals.

Contributors include Nobel prize-winner Seamus Heaney on the Beowulf bard; departing Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams on the first Archbishop of Canterbury, St Augustine; writer David Almond on the oldest surviving English poet, Caedmon; Michael Wood on King Alfred; Martin Carver on Raedwald; Richard Gameson on Eadfrith the Scribe; Helena Hamerow on the peasant-farmer; Geoffrey Robertson QC on the law-makers."

First up? Vortigern. Enjoy!

Battle Report - 8-Oct-2012 - Dux Britanniarum

The initial setup - Saxons entering
from the left, Britons centre bottom.

Monday night saw the next round in Andy and my Dux Britanniarum campaign down at the club. Another Saxon raid, and this time we rolled up a raid on a church. I started out only rolling one turn of advance movement for the Saxons, and as I was moving through a wood, it took a little longer than I really wanted to get to the church, by which time the British Tribune and several warbands were facing off against Aelfric and his hearthguard.

Aelfric and Godric at the head of
the Saxon Gedriht.

About there is where it all started going downhill. Not fancying being charged by Andy's commanipulares in shieldwall, I backed off, hoping to draw them away from where Leofric and the warriors were raiding the church. It worked, up to a point.

Chaaaaaaarge!

The plan was to charge them on my terms, so when the Saxon Lord card came up, I declared a charge, planning on using a Carpe Diem, a couple of Boar cards and an Aggressive Charge. Andy promptly trumped it with a Step Forth card, which allowed him to take his turn immediately. Fortunately, he did this before I'd played any cards on my activation, so I plonked down the card I wasn't planning on using, an Evade, and rocked back out of range. Of course, then it was my turn, so I got to charge after all. So far, so good.

The notorious Maximus Minimus
and the British levy.

However... let's just say that my dice rolling in the combats that followed will probably be the subject of a Probability For Wargamers article. In a nutshell, it stank. I lost count of the number of times I rolled way below the expected number of hits, and I think I only managed above average once.

After two turns, both units of hearthguard were headed for the baseboard edge, having lost their amphora, and all that was left holding the British at bay, and more importantly, distracting them from Leofric's dirty work, was Ecgwine and a single unit of warriors.

The Gedriht in full rout. Ecgwine and
his warband (on the right) attempt
to hold the line.

My dice for that fight wasn't any better, and in fact all that saved him from going back to the fair Lavinia on a bier was the fact that I rolled just as few 5s and 6s for wounds as I did for my attacks!

At this point, I was on force morale 1, and very close to losing the raid. Except that Leofric had just found the Holy Knucklebone of St. Cadwyr and the church plate, and out of the church he and two warbands came, smack into Maximus Minumus and the British levy, and me with a fat hand of Fate cards.

Trust Leofric to find the wine.

That result, at least, went the way probability said it would.

If ever a victory could be said to be Pyrrhic, this was. As I remarked to Andy, on the subject of the abysmal performance of the Saxon hearthguard: "Aelfric is going to be very very unhappy."

"To Britain's Shores": Chapter 2 - "The Church"

I don't think I've ever seen Aelfric this angry before.

He came back from across the river with news of a village with a church to the Britons' Christ-god, ripe for the taking, and a new wolf-skin cloak. Some of Wulfhere's men who went with him have started calling him the Young Wolf, and, truth to tell, it fits.

We came on the village just as a bunch of the Britons - I swear, the same ones we fought before: I'd recognise that short warrior of theirs in the red cloak anywhere - were moving to head us off from the west. Aelfric, me and his dozen Gedriht, the hearthguard who are his sworn bodyguard, moved to head them off, backed up by Ecgwine, Theobald and his band, while Leofric took another dozen warriors and headed for the church.

"We should have taken them." Aelfric has waited till everyone's wounds are cleaned up and bound, Lavinia and a couple of the Saxon women working their way among the tattered survivors of our band. She moves to sit by Ecgwine now she's done, rests dark hair on his shoulder. If she's upset at the desecration of her god's church by Leofric, she's smart enough to keep it to herself. Bright girl. 

His voice is deathly quiet."We should have taken them," he repeats, ice-blue eyes sweeping along the men facing him. There's a chorus of sullen assent, none of them really wanting to meet his gaze. They messed up. We messed up. I count myself as one of them, Thane's champion or not, and I'm very glad Aelfric has me stood by him right now, so I don't have to meet that look. "All you had to do... All you had to do was stand firm for long enough for Leofric to do his job. Are you not my hearthguard?"  A snort. "Are you not warriors?" Louder. "Or are you women and cowards?" 

The last time anyone used that last word in Wulfhere's hall, it was Ecgwine. Even he winces, this time, and Lavinia murmurs something to him which earns her a sharp shake of the head. Good. He's learning. 

Aelfric stalks the width of the dais. "The Atheling... the princeling..." He means Ecgwine. "...is more warrior than you are." Fair play to the lad - his warriors did stand firm against twice their number, including that Tribune with the very quick blade, for long enough to delay the Britons from getting to Leofric. He bristles a little, does the princeling, at the implied slur, though, but Lavinia stretches up, hair brushing his cheek, and whispers something in his ear that earns her a surprised look, then a nod, and he's paying a lot of attention to Aelfric now. I make a mental note to have a word with the lass sometime.

Leofric gestures with a horn brimming with wine. "But we did... heh... loot the church. Can't... argue w' the plan." 

"Barely, Leofric." The blue-eyed glare won't work on the Drunkard, and Aelfric is smart enough to realise, turns that ice-cold regard back on his Gedriht. "Barely," he repeats. Words cutting like the keen edge of a blade. "You shame me. You dishonour me, and everyone else here." 

I think every man of us would prefer it if he shouted.

"I picked you, every man of you, because you were the best, the bravest. Today you ran from a fight." There's a moment there when I think he's lost them, before he unsheathes the broadsword at his waist, jams it hard, point down, into the dais at his feet, and leans on it, hands on the hilt. Offers them a  chance at redemption. "Next time, there will be no running. Next time..." Those blue eyes scan the warriors before him, assessing, judging. "Next time there will be no cowardice. Next time there will be no dishonour." He straightens, tugging the blade loose, holds it up in an outstretched arm. "There will be a next time, and as Odin is my witness, we will prevail."

"To Britain's Shores" - Interlude (Godric)

Map cropped from Dux Britanniarum rulebook,
© Too Fat Lardies 2012

There are, it has to be said, worse places to hole up and recuperate than Wulfhere the Red's steading here in what the British call Petvaria. It's a chunk of the north shore of the river Humbre, and we're actually living in a place that used to belong to the Romans.

Been a strange couple of months, mind. Aelfric's sent a boat across the river a couple of times, him and some of Wulfhere's riders who know the lands south of the river, just to scout out the lay of the land and see where we can strike next. The Britons have been quiet - I wonder if they're hoping that we're gone for good. 

No such luck.

Me? I've been swapping stories with some of Wulfhere's men, trying to keep Leofric from getting too drunk, and keeping one eye on Ecgwine when Theobald isn't. Not that the lad seems to need it: he's actually, somehow, managed to keep himself out of trouble, and land himself a girl whose father doesn't want to kill him. I guess this is made kind of easier by the fact that she's a Briton, and a serving lass in Wulfhere's halls. If you like 'em dark-haired and dark-eyed, she's a pleasant enough armful, is Lavinia, and Ecgwine does seem genuinely taken by her. She's smart, quick-witted, and not afraid of us, which I guess is a good thing. Not sure what his father would say, but then, I don't see that his father needs to know right now. 

Wulfhere and his men have plenty of tales to tell. They came over the sea to here, maybe twenty years ago, in the pay of the Britons, supposedly defending the shores from... well, the likes of us. And then the Britons decided they were too dangerous to have around, and stopped paying them, and the rest, as they say, was inevitable. Wulfhere had found himself a woman, and the lads were all happy here, so they basically said 'too bad, we're staying', and variously chased off and killed the British men and captured their women and children. If I were Ecgwine, I might be a little careful that Lavinia doesn't try to slip something between my ribs one night. To be fair to the lass, though, she seems almost as taken with him. Even if she is a follower of this strange Christ-god of theirs.

Aelfric should be back shortly from another scouting trip. Leofric's stopped being a miserable drunk and started being a loud and boisterous one again, which means he's pretty much healed. The rest of  the lads are recovered too, and everyone's starting to get a little restless. A few of Wulfhere's men want to come with us this time, so as soon as the Thane's back with a plan, we'll be off. 

I think I might spend the rest of today getting my gear in order.

"To Britain's Shores" - Godric

And here is our narrator in all his glory. His mail coat's actually a little long for the period, but I'm rather fond of the figure (it's in fact one of the hero figures from GW's Lord of the Rings metals), and he was one of the first figures I painted after I picked up wargaming again.

Usual process - Citadel paints over a black Army Painter undercoat (it predates my conversion to Army Painter paints), Tamiya Dark Earth texture, Javis  Spring Green static grass. I may re-rebase him on a round base to match Leofric, or I may switch to the other near identical figure which is on a GW 25mm round base!

Next up, finding figures for Aelfric and Ecgwine.

As an aside - for those who hadn't noticed, Andy's report for the first game in the campaign is now up.

"To Britain's Shores"; Leofric The Drunkard

As you can tell, I
don't like painting
faces.

After that sterling performance in the Saxon raid on Mill-town on Key-nes, it seemed to me that good old Leofric needed a figure. Finding a Saxon drunk in 28mm is not easy, so after a bit of searching I gave up and headed for the spares box, in this case, lots of Gripping Beast and Wargames Factory Saxons of various types.

As it turned out, what I ended up using was a spare Gripping Beast metal figure - it's in fact the "Penda - last Pagan king" one. He's meant to have an axe in his hand, but this being Leofric, he's got a drinking horn (from a Wargames Factory Saxon Thegns musician) instead.

Painting was the usual approach - Army Painter plate mail spray, Army Painter acrylics and Strong Tone ink wash. Leofric's based on a 2p piece, with Tamiya Dark Earth texture paint, and static grass from Javis Spring Green and Gale Force 9 Arid Grass.

James doing his photography
homework.

The photo was taking using an improvised light box - a Really Useful Box, a piece of white card and some Javis basing material - by my son James. who had 'macrophotography' as his homework from photography club at school this week.

He's hired, I think!

Battle

No, not the book by Kenneth Macksey. Or the one by Charles Grant.

The town.

The Abbey from the front.

After our trip around France (of which more later) we spent a couple of days in Rye, during which time we took a trip to Battle Abbey.

The stone commemorating the location of the
high altar, and thus the place where Harold is
believed to have fallen.

Again, I guess, if you're at all interested in military history, you've probably visited it. This was our first time, mind - despite being English Heritage members for the last two decades. I went wearing my "Guillaume Le Conquerant" t-shirt from Bayeux, which greatly amused the two younger chaps behind the counter, I have to say. I did resist quoting any Stanley Holloway at them - "Tha'd best get tha throne reup'olstered. I'll be wantin' t'use it next week."

There's a nice display including a short film, which does include some sample armour and weapons - dear Lord, but that shield was heavy. The major part of the visit, though, has to be a walk around the battlefield. From which you carry away, or at least I did, one overriding impression, namely, "by gum, I wouldn't fancy that slope in full armour!"

Admittedly, the slope has been landscaped since, and
this isn't the best shot, but you can see, I think, how far
above the camera the abbey now stands.

The Bayeux Tapestry

Just as an aside, these brief holiday postcards, for want of a better phrase, aren't in order of visit - we did Bayeux on the way across from Brittany to the Somme area - but in some vague thematic/related order of history.

So - Bayeux, then. Home of one of the most famous bits of embroidery in the world. Anne and I have been before, but it was mumble decades ago, and I don't remember much - I certainly am pretty sure the building it's stored in has been improved considerably since we saw it.

What can be said about it that hasn't been before? It's a stunning, quite stunning piece of work. The audio tour is new (to us), coming in both adult and kids versions (which James appreciated). Surprisingly, though, it translates very little of the Latin: fortunately my grade A O-level meant I was (still) more than equal to the task of most of it!

Beyond the tapestry there's a museum/display area with some fantastic models, including a cathedral being built which I'm sure was a bit of a reference to Pillars of the Earth. The other thing in there I did grab a picture of, was a text description of the dyes used and a few samples. Again, if you're a Dark Ages/Early Mediaeval gamer, this is useful!

I also left the shop with a 'Guillaume Le Conquerant' t-shirt with a portion of the tapestry art on it... of which more later.

Battle Report - 18 Aug 2012 - Axes 2012 tournament

Had an excellent day on Saturday at the Rushden club at their annual 'Axes' tournament. First time for me, both at the tournament and with the army I took, namely Later Saxons from the Armies of Antiquity 2 book. An interesting list - I think with hindsight I should have skipped the Thegn cavalry, which was for the most part completely useless in all three battles, and spent the resulting 338 points on a unit of Huscarls and beefed up the Thegns.

The Saxons eye up the river crossing.

First up, I drew Richard Holling in the Age of Arthur 'River Crossing' scenario: an interesting choice, made the more so by the fact that the bridges were worth 16 tournament points each (plus the 0-32 for casualties inflicted/incurred).

Much to my surprise, I won this - mostly because all the dice luck went my way, and very little of it Richard's. There is really no way that ten scummy Saxon bowmen with a little help from a dozen equally scummy Saxon javelinmen should be able to wear down a fully tooled up unit of Norman knights, including a Dux and standard bearer, to the point where a unit of underpowered Thegns can put them to flight... But they did. *sheepish grin* Sorry, Richard.

"Aelfric? What in Odin's name
are those big grey things?"

So that, rather surprisingly, was a 52-12 win to me (including holding both bridges unopposed), which found me on table 1 against Dave Pearson's rather intersting Hindu India list. It amuses me to wonder what the Saxons would have made of the elephants... It's kind of an odd army, though - it felt like it was all outsides and no middle, if you like - some fairly wimpy cavalry, some fairly wimpy bowmen, some equally wussy infantry, and three elephants.

The weather rolled was heavy rain, which fortunately, or possibly not, lifted after the first turn before it could have much effect. On the good side, I found out what constitutes the 'middle' of Dave's army.

Hands up all of you who read this far and said, "the elephants, you muppet".

And, in a nutshell, I got trounced. I let Dave's cavalry in behind me, and got seriously mullared by the aforementioned elephants, so.. well. 0-32 to Dave, really.

A classic late Saxon battle line

Round three saw me down on table 3 against Wayne Richards, who (like Dave) I ran into but didn't fight at the WAB GT. Thoroughly decent bloke, fielding a classic bunch of Normans, and we basically had a classic Normans v Saxons fight. As Marriot Edgar/Stanley Holloway said of a much more famous battle:

The Saxons had best line of forwards, 

Well armed both with buckler and sword - 

But the Normans had best combination, 

And when half-time came neither had scored.

This was the Apellido scenario from the El Cid book - I got to be the raider and protect the ill-gotten gains (which was probably a good thing, as I don't think I'd have got near the loot if our rôles had been reversed). And it was, all in all, a pretty classic scrap - Wayne's Breton cavalry waltzed up, made "Long Bacon" at the Saxons, and "[...] they ran - and t'Saxons ran after..." Wisely, they didn't run that far after, and reformed the line before anything bad happened. 

My one decent dice roll against
Wayne :D

However, I made three fatal mistakes, in hindsight - I left a gap between my left flank and a steep hill that Wayne's bowmen could sneak through; I left a similar gap between my right flank cavalry (useless lot) and a patch of difficult ground; and I passed up on the chance to swap my hardest group of Thegns to be directly opposite Wayne's tooled-up knights.

Sadly, this combination of minor cock-ups let those damn Bretons through to grab one of the plunder counters. On the good side, I did survive at least one charge from the bunch of knights that got round on the other flank (having gone through my cavalry to get there). By then, though,

...t' fight were all over bar shouting,

And you couldn't see Saxons for dust.

Great game, win to Wayne by... about 7-25 but I'm blanking on the exact numbers. I finished 10th, which is above the halfway point, so I'll call that a win by my standards!

All in all? Fantastic day out: kudos to the Rushden guys for organising it, and congrats to Justin (and son) from Norman Cross Crusaders for a well deserved win!

Battle Report - 05-Mar-2012

The aforementioned freshly painted unit
of Gedriht - largely GB plastic Saxons. By
my standards, one of my better paint jobs.
But I am facing Andy, who's brushwork is
just beyond gorgeous.

Skipping over last week's battle for a while longer (I'll explain later), we move on to this week's...

Namely, an Age of Arthur battle (as practice for a campaign day at Maelstrom in April) with my new early Saxon Kingdoms army... well, to be strictly honest, one freshly painted unit of Gedriht, two gorgeously painted loaner units of Duguth from my opponent, the fabulous Mr. Andy Hawes, and a unit of Geguth and skirmishers made up by temporarily borrowing from other armies of mine (a British warband, and some Roman allied archers). The rest of the army is in various states of assembly/painting/in the post, honest, and I hope to make a sizeable dent in it over the course of this week and weekend (I better, the Analogue Hobbies painting competition finishes in a week and a half!).

We picked the 'Battle on the River Glein' scenario - simple enough: a river across the middle of the table with a ford and a bridge, the objective being to hold the crossings. Andy's Romano-British were the attackers, and he generously let me have first go.

Lesson one in Age of Arthur scenarios - always read the objectives. Why should become rapidly apparent by the end of this battle report!