Tis The Season

 The season of the witch, that is. I'm on another tangent right now and have dipped my toe back in the 1/72 pool. The models are from Red Box's Dark Alliance range and what better place to start - Witches!

There are eleven variants in the box and four sprues. I can't imagine a need for forty-four 1/72 scale witches, but you never know. I picked out eight for my purposes and whipped them up over a few painting sessions. Very enjoyable as always.

So is there a purpose to this madness? My only 1/72nds are WW2 eastern front things. Yes, I plan to incorporate the spellcasters into WW2 leveraging BelloLudi WW2 and BellowLudi Spellbound which is compatible with all their rules. The idea is interesting and pretty "out there." We were impressed enough with BelloLudi Crossbow the other day to want to continue with the rules. That reminds me, I probably should post that Bat Rep. It was a banger for sure!

A Few Models More

 I've been busy knocking out some more models and minis recently. I completed four more Saxon fighters to help protect the village, some 28mm fantasy orcs and a couple of 3d printed 1/72 scale Soviet AFVs.

Tooting their own horns... 40mm Sash and Saber sculpts.

Fifteen Oathmark orcs in heavy armor with two-handed weapons. These were fun builds and equally fun to paint up. I do have a banner I need to get on to that standard bearer. His goblin compatriots are also lacking banners and I've got a some for those fellas as well.

And finally a couple reinforcements for the Soviets. These were Etsy pickups. 1/72 scale single-piece models, perfect for the gaming table. easy to prep and paint up. 

AAR: Eastern Front Action with Rate of Fire

 Mark and I got together on Saturday afternoon to let the 1/72 toys out for a spin. I set up a very simple "capture the crossroads" scenario and put together two force lists from my Soviet and German collections using the excellent Rate of Fire rules from Crusader Publishing. The Soviets started a bit closer to the crossroad so they felt a bit more like defenders, fitting given the 1942 date I assumed when I put it all together. 

Pregame... the junction sort of in the center is what we're both attempting to control at the end of 10 turns.

The blown out building near the crossroad became a target for me. It was bloody tough to shift those reds once they'd taken up a position in there!

Oh God... the KV moves to threaten my Panzer II!

I had my little tank pull back, but both the KV and BT-7 could both still see it! The BT's shot missed but the big 76mm shell from the KV got the tank's attention! The shot went wide and the German crew all thanked their lucky stars. The Panzer peppered the infantry in the central ruin, it's little guns unable to do much at that range against the green tanks.

Finally, some German reinforcements arrive, in the shape of a Panzer III. Still basically ineffective against the KV, but it could at least challenge the BT. Mark must've though it was more of a threat because the KV pulled back instead of forcing the issue.

I moved the Panzer II out again, trying to keep fire on the infantry in the middle, Mark's big tank peek around the building at it. Not this again! This time the tank found its mark but it was a glancing hit that only caused a morale test which I of course failed. Panzer II, suppressed. Not terrible though, it just is unable to advance towards visible anti-tank threats.

Now that's an anti-tank threat! Some REAL reinforcements arrive. I need to get this thing set up and hope it doesn't get wrecked while vulnerable.

The Panzer II continues harassing infantry, this time some SMG troops in the woods. At this point, Mark was violently cursing and spewing hate at the little tank that could. 

Time to put up or shut up! The halftrack drops the Flak36 and the crew start prepping it right away. The KV watches. It takes a shot.... weeeoooooooowwww.... boom. The shot sails over the 88, it was a bit high. Won't get that lucky next time!

The BT advances to trade more shots with my Panzer III using the woods for some protection. Our shots missed each other.

The BT bursts out of the woods, screaming towards the 88! My Panzer II took its opportunity fire shot and A HIT! Not a great hit, but it caused crew survival checks for the Russian crew... survey says, dead driver! Fantastic for me, the fast Russian tank was immobilized. Sucks for me that :

1) it has a fully functional gun 

2) it is perhaps seven meters in front of my tank

3) the rest of the crew is screaming for vengeance

The 88 and KV trade shots, both missing. Hmm. At least my 251 filled with infantry survived the quick dart across the gap! 

Yeah, there you go. Mark rolled a 12 to hit. That gun against that "armor" and Ze Schnellhund was done. At least the BT was now just a turret. Unfortunately it was in a really good spot to cover the middle of the table.

The dudes from the halftrack and the squad that had been in the woods to the right side of this picture crept towards the ruined building of death and destruction. The Panzergrenadiers had gotten pasted by mortar and small arms fire, thus the few troops you see here. 

My final spite attack. The Panzer III get in position to take a pot-shot at the KV. The 88 had just hit it and killed the commander. The Soviet mortar rained death on the 88 and killed four crew! My Panzer takes the shot which I really really really needed to hit the tracks. I forgot to aim the shot, but it's a good thing I didn't because I got the hit and hit the tracks anyway! If I had aimed, I'd have missed altogether. Just a "track damaged" result reducing the tank to Slow speed and forcing a morale test. It failed. Heh. Scram, Commie! That was 10 turns and we had ourselves a draw. We'd both been mauled, I think I took more of a beating, but that'll happen to an attacking force in this sort of engagement. Either way, it was a darn entertaining few hours of dice and toy soldiers. Thanks Mark!

Christmas Tanks

I didn't get a whole lot of hobby stuff for Christmas but I did get these two nice 1/72 KVs. They're Pegasus models and come two in a box, which includes for KV-1 and KV-2 turrets! Also, Pegasus models tend to be easy builds and look great. Not much else to say, they're seriously strong early war Soviet tanks. 

 The insignia decals were pulled from aircraft red star sheets I have. East builds, easy painting. Looking forward to putting them on the tabletop. 

An Actual Game!

 After what seems like forever, I finally got to push toy soldiers around and throw dice on Saturday night. My nephew is in town so he joined Ziggy and I for a game of Lion Rampant. Jason's in his early 20s and enjoys boardgames. It took no convincing for him to join Ziggy and me. I set up the same scenario I played back in July with Mark and Mike - Scenario 8, Sausages with Mustard, Spain vs Venice. Jason and I shared command of the Spanish attackers while Ziggy's Venetians defended. Forces are 45 points each, there are a total of four commands, two per side. 

Our battlefield. Besides killing Italians, we were tasked with setting the three buildings aflame.

Early turn 1... Ziggy's mercenary Greatswords move out.

The first of many failures of mine. My light cavalry fail to evade Italian heavy cavalry. Los Jinetes are very quicky a memory. Yeah, failing an Evade is painful.

After a few turns, the battle lines form up in the center. Jason immediately gets to work trying to burn the buildings. We're also in the difficult position of pikes vs pikes and similar where it's really hard to get an advantage.

Thanks to a less than fortunate couter-charge, the Greatswords and Jason's heavy cavalry inadvertently meet in the woods and an ugly melee results in both units breaking. I'm not sure a failed counter-charge would have been worse. Is what it is.

Ah, a proper fight. Heavy cav vs. top-shelf halberdiers led by El Capitan con Corazon de Leon. Both units suffered mightily and ran away from each other.

After at least an hour of trying (and I did look at the metadata on the photographs to see how long it look), we finally get the flame to take on the library! 

Into the home stretch... My commander and his halberdiers searching for that lost shaker of salt... Italian cavalry doing the same. 

After more failure, finally the orphanage catches fire and burns on its own!

The game's conclusion... Jason's halberds ran off the greatswords who would never recover. The long-quiet Venetian crossbowmen shot up Jason's pikemen and ran them off. Ultimately, we failed our army morale check and retreated, but not before also forcing Ziggy's Italians to take a morale test as well! We'd managed to inflict some real damage late in the game. Not really sure how we made it a competitive battle because it felt like we just stood there and accepted a complete beatdown by the Italians the whole evening. I'll take it! We all had a good time and as always, looking forward to another game soon,. Be well!

Memorial Day Weekend Activities

 It's been an awesome long Memorial Day weekend and I took an extra day off because of the late night last night. More on that in a moment.

    On Sunday I met Mike and Mark for an afternoon of gaming. I took my Renaissance Spanish and Venetians for a big Lion Rampant game (45 points per side). Each side was split into two commands and each command's initiative order was determined every turn. We played the Sausages with Mustard scenario, with the Venetians defending. Mike and Mark shared leadership duties on the Spanish side while I wrangled the Italians.

An early opening shot. You can see the four buildings in the center which the Spanish were trying to burn down. I deployed a unit of pikemen in the middle as my single forward "speedbump" unit.

The first engagement took place in the hill with the tower. Our heavy cavalry squared off with Mark successfully counter-charging me.

I got the better of the engagement and the Spanish horsemen fell back...

A wide view of the center. I was having a far better time activating units than M&M.

On the right, my crossbowmen had peppered the Spanish light cav who were facing a block of pikemen.

The center had turned into a mess. I had pikemen and greatswords in disarray. The greatswords learned firsthand how nasty arquebusiers are!

In one of my favorite moments of the afternoon was when Mike's initiative rolls had him active twice, back-to-back... fourth in one turn and first in the next. He used the opportunity to charge his heavy cav into my light cavalry. I passed the evade test and fell back into the woods. The Spanish cavalry still completed their charge but in the trees, everyone was hitting on 5+ and only had 2 armor! The equalizer paid off as the Spanish cavalry took it on the chin. 

We played a bit more but at the end of the day, the Spanish torches couldn't get the job done and no buildings burned! In all fairness, my dice were hot and both Mike and Mark rolled hot garbage most of the day. You probably don't need me to tell you how frustrating the Rampant games can be when your activations are failing early and often.

Mark and I then played an introductory game of Quar - Clash of Rhyfles. Interesting item of note... Mark has been bumping his gums for YEARS about his collection of Quar and trying to sell us on the game. He's never once offered to put it on the table and show it off. Mike picks up the new models from Wargames Atlantic and has it on the table in a fortnight. Classic.

We each had 10 troops with a mix of weapons, mostly rifles but also some SAWs and SMGs. The clear glass bauble in the picture above is our objective location we fought over.

My blues turned things into a tragedy for the greens. I was able to get a few very useful fire lanes set up, picking off enemy troops left and right.

I did lose a couple in the process, but in the end was able to take the objective, occupy the enemy backfield and overall, take the win!

Last evening, my wife and I did something quite unusual for us... we went to a WWE RAW pro wrestling event at the new area in Savannah. I got a couple of freebie tickets from work and, well... it was a heck of a lot of fun. 

and of course a cage match!

Even if you aren't a fan, it's truly quite a production spectacle and those athletes are amazing to watch. Awesome stuff.