Wars of the Roses with Midgard - Mortimer's Cross

 Colin and I played our second Wars of the Roses game with Midgard Heroic battles, using the Mortimer's Cross list that the author (James Morris) had published online. I have a sizable 10mm WotR collection, so was providing both armies.

Our first game, using the smaller 300 point army lists, had been an outstanding victory for Edward IV (technically still Duke of York at this point). It had also been a very bloody game for the various commanders, of the 7 involved, 3 had died and 2 had been wounded!

For this game we were using the expanded 400 point lists, with gave Colin 11 units for the Lancastrians and me 10 units for the Yorkists.

The two forces deployed fairly conventionally, both putting their single mounted unit of knights out on the same flank, which made sense as there was a wood on the other flank! I put Edward of York in the centre of the army, where he could influence most units around him. Colin however, put his commander, Jasper Tudor, out with his mounted knights. His plan was to use his generals combat bonuses to quickly dispose of my mounted unit and allow him to get around my flanks.

In Turn One the two armies trundled towards each other, exchanging long range archery with little effect.

In Turn Two I took a chance and launched a charge on the Lancastrian cavalry, thinking I might as well get the charging bonus in before I was crushed. In a hard-fought melee the two forced battered each other to almost the point of mutual destruction!

Most of the rest of both armies repeated Turn One, moved closed and using long range archery. Except the Lancastrians pulled one unit of bowmen back to allow their Flemish mercenary pikemen to come forward.

On the far flank, Colin threw his Irish Bonnachts into a unit of my archers rather than wait and be riddled with arrows.

Turn three saw the last of my mounted knights falling to the Lancastrian onslaught, but that had effectively taken out their opponents as a effective fighting force. To avoid allowing my flank to be threatened I charged my dismounted men-at-arms into Colin's unit opposite, forcing them back.

In the meantime I turned my supporting unit of billmen to face Colin's surviving cavalry. After a nasty experience in the previous game, he was very wary of engaging the billmen head on!

On the other flank my archers held the charging Irish, in fact pushed them back. Following up in Turn Four they destroyed them, but were reduced to half strength themselves.

Colin's cavalry decided to move well away from my billmen, effectively taking them out of the game. Jasper Tudor in the meantime moved across to join the Flemish pikemen.

Which was needed, because the pikes charge into the billmen facing them was no going as planned! The bills not only help them, but pushed them back.

 

Turn Five and I went for an all out assault with the Yorkists, launching three new charges. In the centre Edward led his household men-at-arms into the unfortunate bow unit in front of him, who had failed their test to swap positions with the billmen behind them!

Elsewhere the other men-at-arms units kept battering each other into the ground, but unlucky dice meant that the Lancastrian unit routed when they were pushed back.

In an final attempt Colin threw his fresh Irish into the fray, combining with a flank attack by his kerns out of the wood. It pushed the billmen back, but at a heavy cost to the lighter armoured Irishmen.

In the final phase of Turn Five high scoring archery cut down the last of the Yorkist men-at-arms, costing me 43Reputation points.

But it was too little, too late. At the end of Turn Five the Yorkists had 4 Reputation left to the Lancastrian -2. Another historical result with a Yorkist victory! Easier on the generals this time, only one killed and two wounded.

Another fun game, played in just over two hours. We are really enjoying these rules and they are working well for different eras. Unfortunately, sorting the two armies out has made me realise that my ratio of longbowmen to billmen and men-at-arms is out. Either I have too many melee units, or not enough longbow units.

Of course, I'm a wargamer, so I have ordered more bowmen!!!

Painting in October

 I didn't get a lot done this month, but as I had a trip to Alsace and a family visit, I guess that was to be expected.

These are all from the Myths of Albion range by Conquest Games. 

First up, a Marsh Troll, the big brother of the Marsh Spirits I painted last month.

Then a mounted Tree Man Hero.

And some real muscle to finish off the warband, an Ent/Wood Troll.

Again I am really tempted to expand on these wonderful miniatures to make a 300 point Midgard army, but I will try to resist, at least for now. I still have a lot of re-basing to get on with and various bits of terrain i need to finish first.

War of the Worlds Survivors 8

Earlier in the week we played through the next game in our VSF post-Martian Invasion campaign using Fear and Faith/Mutants and Death Ray Guns. This was another scavenger hunt in a deserted? urban setting. I put three sewer covers on the table, these were intended to be surprise spawning points for the Shades, but that didn't turn out as expected.

A view of the table set up.

From another angle.

And from Google Street View 😁

The opening moves. In his usual 'restrained' manner, Mark's party rushed forward towards the closest loot markers. His rifleman paused to take aim and fired at a Shade, dropping the creature with a shot to the head.

Slightly more cautiously, Colin's group moved down the street, towards the nearest loot marker.

Mark reached two loot markers, but without time to search them as he drew all the Shades in the area down on his head. A careful pistol shot dropped the closest Shade as they closed in.

Next to appear, a Martian Scuttler. As luck would have it the only PCs in sight were Mark's party! It moved forward and fired, but just made Mark's leader duck into cover.

On the other side of the table Henry had been quite successful at shooting the odd Shade in his way, but found himself in a race with one of Colin's gang to get to the next loot marker.

At this point a second Scuttler appeared.

Despite this, Mark's party pushed forward, firing at the fighting machines. One of the group rushed into the church to check out another loot marker....

...only for three Shades to emerge from the shadows.

Mark's hail of lead had some effect, damaging one of the Scuttlers' legs, causing it to topple over.

Then a blast from his leader's shotgun stopped the other Scuttler in it's tracks. A few moments later flames could be seen emerging from the machine's engine.

Two of the group advanced on the last Scuttler, whilst a third gave covering fire. But suddenly the firer heard the dreaded "Click" of the revolver's hammer landing on an empty chamber, Out of Ammo!!

Whilst the Scuttler was distracted, Mark's swordsmen rushed into the church to help his comrade. As they cut the Shades down, two more groups emerged from behind the altar! At this point I rolled a double fail on my first activation, so the creatures just wandered about, growling at the humans. Knowing when to quit, they grabbed the last loot marker and fled, with a horde of Shades lumbering after them.

Elsewhere, Colin and Henry had an easier time of it, despatching the few Shades close to them and grabbing some loot each.

Now a Martian Hybrid fighting machine appeared, armed with a heavy heat ray and the dreaded black smoke discharger, right on top of Mark's party. Once again I snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, failing my first activation and allowing the humans time to ran off the table before I could even fire once!

Another fun game! Once again Mark's aggressive play drew most of the attention onto his party, but again my rubbish dice prevented me from exploiting it. 

Three groups of Shades deploying in the church over 4 turns could have been decisive, if I could have activated them. This was unexpected, the Shades were expected to mainly deploy from the sewer covers, only appearing inside the church on a roll of 6.  But they players managed to roll a 6 each time the Shades deployed.

For the next game they venture down into the sewers, who knows what may be lurking down there!!!

A Step Towards The Dark Side (or is it Away)

Our niece came to visit for the weekend with her young man, Jack. We had met him a few times before, but always in family situations, Christmas etc, so we didn't feel we had had the opportunity to talk properly. This was a chance to get to know him better, as well as spending some time with Lizzie. Jack is an avid GW gamer/painter (mostly AoS) who admitted he has had no real exposure to other rulesets, so I wanted to take this opportunity to introduce him to some alternative gaming systems. I decided to go for Ganesha Games systems as they had simple mechanics and would be quick to pick up.

All the girlies went out for a walk into town on Saturday afternoon, so we managed to get three games in, two using Fear and Faith and the third using Mutants and Death Ray Guns.

For the Fear and Faith scenario, the leader need to perform a ritual to extract mystical power from a sacred pool. To successfully conduct the ritual they needed to spend three uninterrupted activations in the same turn, on the steps of the pool.

My warband, a vampire and his cossack thralls. The scenario was set around dawn, so the first few turns of darkness would give the vampire a big advantage. After sunrise he would be far more vulnerable and also at risk of crumbling into dust if he rolled too many 1s for his activations.

Jack's warband, a warlock, aided by a Hungarian vampire hunter and a bunch of angry villagers.

The opening moves, as the two warbands close in on each other.

A cossack with a musket took position behind a wall and fired on one of the villagers, missing him. In response the villager rushed forward with his axe and struck at the cossack.

Unfortunately, the cossack dodged the blow and crushed the villager's skull with his musket butt.

On the far side of the table, a cossack and a villager dodged around the standing stones, trying to get a clear line of sight on the other. The villager fired first and the cossack hit the ground.

Shielded by his thralls, the vampire moved towards the pool.

While the warlock hung back, encouraging the vampire hunter forward.

The vampire transformed into bat form, which would allow him to cross the obstacles more easily.

A couple more turns saw the rest of the cossacks being cut down by some incredibly lucky dice rolls, leaving the vampire alone, just as the sun rose.

The vampire made a last ditch attempt to conduct the ritual but was forced back by the vampire hunter. The vampire turned into gaseous form to escape.

Now the warlock stepped up to conduct the ritual...

...but the vampire reformed and seized his foe.

Somehow the warlock fought him off as his followers rushed to his aid. The hunstman took careful aim with his crossbow...

...and put a wooden bolt through the vampire's heart, killing him!

First win to Jack!

We played again, using the same scenario but I swapped warbands. Jack stayed with the warlock as he had gotten a handle on how they operated.

My new warband, a witch with her animated scarecrows. These operated like zombies, they were had to activate, but if close together could activate together as a mob. I would need to keep the witch close to use her leadership to stand much chance of keeping them moving.

In the first turn they barely moved which allowed Jack to get close to the pool unopposed.

However, he got overconfident and rushed the vampire hunted forward, then rolled two failed activations, which ended the rest of his go.

This left the vampire hunter rather exposed!

In the next turn I rolled good activations and swarmed him with my scarecrows.

He was a powerful fighter and held them off at first, pushing one back and knocking another down.

But sheer numbers told and he died bravely.

Now the scarecrows turned their attention to the villagers.

The fighting was intense, with melees breaking out all over the place.

By keeping the witch up close to the scarecrows I was able to keep them activated.

One by one the villagers fell.

The huntsman shot, but his wooden bolts were not a effective as they had been to the vampire!

Slowly, but steadily, the scarecrows cut the warlock's warband down.

The musketeer fired again, killing a scarecrow, but it was too late.

The warlock and the last villager were killed, leaving the witch able to conduct the ritual at her leisure.

One all!

To ring the changes, we now played a game of Mutants and Death Ray Guns. This uses the same mechanisms, but different traits and weapons makes it feel quite a different game. Jack's shooting was deadly and he swiftly score his second win of the day. 

Being absorbed in playing we had sort of lost track of time, and now wondered why we had been allowed to play on for so long? We soon found out, the girls had gone to our favourite Italian deli, where Mick had an open bottle of prosecco from lunchtime. So they had spent their time drinking fizz and eating marinaded Italian olives!

Jack seemed to enjoy trying something new and went off thinking of what AoS models he could use to create a warband for our next game!