30th November - Finished New Saga Vikings

I've managed to fit it around an hour and a half to two hours a day thanks to The Wife being on day shifts and her inability to get out of bed without waking me up (It's amazing how much painting you can fit between 5:30 and 7:30 when you've got to get ready yourself). Actually had these finished off yesterday but I didn't have time to get the photos done and the post up.

Thrall Archers

Newly Recruited Hirdmen

Another Mass of Bondi

All the New Recruits

The Current Whole Force (Seven Points Now)

Obligatory Warlord Focused Shot

I'm thinking it'll be the Nomads from my Operation Icestorm box set next as it's getting closer to the time I get my pre-ordered 3rd edition rule book and to be honest it's jarring looking at one fully painted faction and one undercoated one.

There was to be a game in today but The Brother and his Wife had some issues with their baby son last night so we've postponed to another day to be discussed later today after they've squeezed in some sleep on there end. To be honest I'm a little short of sleep myself with the combo of The Wife's previously mentioned day shifts combined with my holiday covering roster this week, So I'm off to sit and watch the Beasts of War weekender and have a cuppa.

20th November - Painted AtDE Adam's Family Gang & Based Trees

Had a roster change for the next couple of weeks, so after going back for a day yesterday back on days off for the next two. After spending a few hours getting the chores The Wife set me before she left for work I sat down and got stuck into the real goal of the day.... finishing off Adam's Family and some other bits and pieces.

First off the painting

The finished Adam's family along with the mercenary Crimson

Top to Bottom and Left to Right we have Drexyl, Ezra, Adam, Skylar, Crimson and Reggie,

 I also finished off my first batch of homemade trees. I used some marine epoxy for the trunks. It gave me a bit of time to work with it and add some detail without needing too much time before I could set it aside and leave it to set. I was tossing up highlighting some of the detail on the trunks, but I think the slightly thinned out Army Painter Oak Brown has giving a nice effect overall. I've based the size on a wood terrain choice for Saga, this one being roughly 12" long and 7"ish wide at the widest point but I working on the card base giving a distinct boundary for both movement penalty or LoS rules for which every system I'm currently playing.

Speaking of Saga, I've also base coated my new unit options to bring my Viking's up to a full six points and offering myself a bit of flexibility when it comes to what I'm fielding depending on opponent and scenario. So depending on the quantity of chores tomorrow I'm hoping to make a good amount of progress on these

19th Novemeber - 18th Nov Saga Vs The Wife

Well what a weekend it was, three days (my new standard) and three games! Not bad stats at all. We had a builder out, so we'd spent the day at home and I'd managed to get in a lot of painting and expanded my Across the Dead Earth QRS to include a few more bits to save on rulebook flicking and corrected a couple of errors I'd noticed. But the highlight was The Wife deciding that we'd have another game of Saga after the girls were in bed, this time just a battle between the two of us. We decided we'd play the Sacred Ground scenario which is won by having troops in any of the three terrain features on the table.

At the moment we're still playing with the four point starter boxes, although I have purchased myself another three blisters, one point each of hearthguard, warriors and levies (I wanted a ranged option for my Viking force). The Viking and Anglo-Danish starters are basically the same consisting of a warlord each, two hearthguard options (one Hirdmen and one Berserker choice for the Vikings, two Huscarls for the Anglo-Danish one of which comes armed with the double handed Dane axes) and two warrior options (Bondi for the Vikings and Ceorls for the Anglo-Danish).

We setup the board with the central hill feature and two forest on the sides, one closer to my deployment and one closer to hers. The Wife had won the deployment which gave me the opening turn.



The Viking force surged forwards from the opening part of the battle streaming toward the objectives reaching them on the first turn though it was quite a distance and they arrived accompanied by a few fatigue tokens scattered among them. The Anglo-Danish moved up slower positioning themselves in readiness to drive their foes out of the sacred sites. I had begun to score points from this turn




The Vikings spent the next turn consolidating their positions and readying shield walls. While the Anglo-Danish moved up ready to smash into the Viking lines on the next turn.



The Vikings see their foes coming closer and a unit of Bondi surge forward to hold the forest they're currently occupying driving the Ceorls before back licking their wounds like the curs they are. The Berserkers charge forward into a unit of Huscarls with cry's to Frigg and Ullr (Referring to battle board abilities) but their foes prove to be Hard as Iron and one Huscarl is left standing leaning on his sword breathing heavily as the groans on the dying sound around him. The double handed axe wielding Huscarls head up the hill to pressure the Hirdman holding the top and the Anglo Warlord then rushes over to re-enforce his loan warrior on the flank.

Discipline reasserts it's self in the Viking camp as the warriors once again lock shields and brace for the coming onslaught. The Huscarls stream towards the Hirdman and they ready their shields and raise their voice to Ullr, holding their ground. Two men fall from both camps and the Anglo-Danes withdraw to ready themselves for another charge. The Ceorls seeing the now half strength Hirdman move to flank the hill readying themselves for a charge of their own.

 The Viking Warlord decides that in this case offense is the best defense and cry's for the remaining Hirdmen to charge the Ceorls with him. The hearthguard feel the touch of Frigg upon them but luck runs with the Ceorls and they push back the Warlord and leave both Hirdmen on the ground bleeding their last at the cost of just one of their own. The Warlord decides to quit the hill vowing to keep them from the forests for the day pushing himself to the limit to make the distance.

The next turns sees a lull in both forces movements as they rest and hold their positions daring the other to attack.

All the signs point to Raganarok. The Bondi overjoyed at the prospect of this launch at the Anglo-Danish Warlord with unbridled fury. He manages to pull down three of the warriors before they butcher him before the eyes of his helpless Huscarl. The tattered unit on the other flank draws courage from the proximity of their Warlord and push the Ceorls before them from the forest.

Their is a momentary flicker and the battlefield dims as the shadowy figure of Loki seems to move across the field as it goes so to do the final two Ceorls near the forest seemingly taken by the trickster. The tattered Viking force hold's it ground sensing an end to the days struggle as do the Anglo-Danish on the hill. But the loan Huscarl overcome with grief rushes the warriors to avenge his fallen commander and perhaps manage to drive the filthy Vikings from the forest but they run him through and secure the woods for their leader.

Final Score was 72 point to me and 32 to The Wife. She realizes giving me two turns of uncontested holding of terrain is what cost her the game and is keen to go again when we can fit another one in.

17th November - AtDE Game vs The Uncle vs The Brother

Two days, two games not bad stats if you ask me. Caught up with both The Brother and The Uncle at The Uncles house today and ended up playing another game of Across the Dead Earth. The Uncle and I played the pre-made gangs again, but we quickly rolled up a third gang for The Brother. The gang creation rules were quite simple really and we had this done in no time at all.

The table was still set up from our last game so all we did was add an additional three tiles making it four by three. We decided that a loot counter based game would ensure that we all got involved and make it harder for two gangs to team up against the other. The loot tokens were blind drawn and the winner would be declared by the total points held at the end of the game. Loot could be taken off the board through your deployment zone but you could not look at the value until the game had ended. The Uncle had also dug up some more scatter terrain so we had a nicely crowded table to play on.

The family gang came in from the north (The Uncle), where as the two savage gangs came from the south (The Brother) and the west (myself).

 The savages met by Ronnie quickly took to the flank of their muscle bound opponents. The first turn was spent getting into position, though the leader of my rival savage gang managed to loot the rear vehicle. Skylar entered one of the ramshackle buildings and prepared to loot the premise.

Now I got a little distracted by the game at this stage, although my brother also runs a blog and I'll put a link up to his post once he gets his post up as there was a fair amount of action between his gang and The Uncles, as I was rather cautious of Drexyl on watch and wait covering the loot across the road and took a few turns to re-organise myself. Ronnie did manage to take down a rival savage through a window though.

Topper then pop'd round a corner and showed just why an assault gang member with a scattergun can be so devastating and I attempted to cover the window with Pyro to free up Ronnie for a bit more flexibility but The Brother's scout ended that idea by then coming up to the window and dropping a grenade through it, which would end up taking Pyro out for a good four turns and also as it happens Shay-man as I refused to leave him down while I had a medic handy.

Topper proceeded to get some revenge of the scout taking him down. He tried to put him out of action but failed to manage it.
I thought this was the beginning of a comeback on my part with me being the only player who hadn't managed to retrieve a loot counter at this stage of the game.




Unfortunately the next turn removed any ideas of a spectacular come back on my part. Shrimp got into a melee with Skylar as she had in the last game, unfortunately unlike the last game she dropped her axe (That's not a knife event card) and was knocked down and then taken out by the hidden assassins blade in her opponent's umbrella handle. Ronnie decided to risk popping his head out in an attempt to take out Drexyl and clear the path for his gang mates to loot the convoy but the sharpshooter got him with a Head shot and suddenly my gang was two members short with two more tied up in a medical situation.

The next few turns saw The Uncle capitalize on the now clear roadway loot and begin ferrying it to his deployment zone. The Brother attempted to get his second count off the board but Topper saved the day knocking down his remaining three gang members, including one Quick draw (Event card) which while both men managed to get their guns up Topper and his magical scattergun won the day to the suspenseful musical accompaniment provided by The Uncle during the rolling proceedings

In the course of the next few turns Topper managed to not only take out the rival savage's gang leader, but also survived a blast from the medic's flamethrower and then put him down in his following activation. After which he picked up the loot and made his way back to the board. (In theory, we called the game once The Brother's last gang member was knocked down, although not one had been put out of action).

On the other flank Shay-man finally managed to stabilize the grenade shocked Pyro, who proceeded to run over to attempt to prevent Ezra the family medic from grabbing the final unclaimed loot counter. Of course he managed to trip (Event card Tripwire) and while he survived the grenade Skylar attempted to lob at him (which actually rebounded back beyond her, but she survived the blast) Ezra decided that seeing as Topper's scattergun had been so effective he'd have to have a go with his and the clown like ganger bit the dust again.

The final ranking was The Uncle on top with myself next and despite an incredible effort The Brother coming in last. If it wasn't for The Uncle putting Drexyl on watch and wait effectively keeping me from the roadway the game may not have gone the way it as I wasn't game to push towards the loot.

The rules handled the third player without any real hitches, the only change we made was a slight alteration to work out initiative, rather than adding enemy knocked down/out of action miniatures to our rolls we subtracted friendly knocked down/out of action ones and it worked well in the three player setting putting the emphasis more on your own gang rather than allowing you to take advantage of someone elses agression.

As soon as his post is up I'll link The Brothers blog here for anyone that's interested. Link now up Stand and Deliver Wargaming - Across Dead Earth Post-apoc Skirmish

16th November - Family Saga Game

Viking & Norse Gael View

Anglo-Danish & Irish View

Decided to get a game of Saga with the whole family. The Eldest and The Wife had yet to have a game, so to even things up a bit we decided to put myself and The Youngest on opposite sides. The Eldest and The Wife decided to head out and do the shopping and they'd leave us to carry everything downstairs and set up (It hit about 45 Celsius today so outside in the covered area with a couple of fans running was a necessity). The forces were a coalition of Anglo-Danish (The Wife) and Irish (The Youngest) vs the combined might of some Norse Gael (The Eldest) and Vikings (Myself).

Viking Ford

We decided to play the battle at the fords scenario with the turn sequence suggested in the multiple player scenario (one combined orders phase and rolling off each turn for first active round with play going clockwise after that). The Wife and The Youngest won the roll off for deployment and I'll admit I was worried once they'd finished (they got to deploy half of their troops before us then the remaining in response to our full setup). The Eldest and myself held one ford each where our opponents blended their forces. My ford seemed to have some pretty heavy opposition at the beginning.

Norse Gael Flank

The game went the full seven turns and we ended with a win to the Viking & Norse Gael with nine points to none. The Youngest went for a last minute point grab but unfortunately for her The Eldest had the last turn and killed her last wolfhound and handler.

 The Anglo-Danish hearthguard push the ford to some Norse Gaelic resistance but the hearty warriors with their Dane axes are decimated and thrown back.

The Vikings push over the river with a unit of warriors, they fell two hearthguard but are pushed back by the Irish Curadhs (Champions) in a rather tattered state. Unfortunately they leave an opening behind them for the second warrior unit to push up through.

 This unit smashed through with devastating effect all but destroying a Anglo-Danish hearthguard thanks to one of the men hearing Valhalla calling (Viking ability sacrificing up to three models for extra combat dice) and leaving an Irish Curadh dead before the last standing man holds himself upright on the rivers edge daring the remaining two Irish hearthguard to come in and finish the job. Final tally seven dead Viking warriors in exchange for three Anglo-Danes Hearthguard, one Irish Curadh and two Irish Hearthguard.

 The other ford had bogged down massively with neither side gaining any ground by pushing the ford so they had lined up on either bank and proceeded to weaken each other with their javelins.





Meanwhile the Viking hearthguard rushed through the gap created by their fierce brethren taking down the remaining Irish Curadh.

On the other side the pelt clad beserkers streamed across the ford tearing down the last of the Irish in front of them in an attempt to reinforce their solitary brother upon the bank.

Moments later the Anglo-Danish chief managed to pull down the lone almost super human warrior (he almost survived four hits missing just one save). The beserkers quickly avenged their fallen comrade, with the Viking warlord and hearthguard killing off the Anglo-danish warriors on the other side.

The Youngest made one more attempt to gain a few points for their total.....

But The Eldest didn't like that idea finishing them off and moving across the river for another few points for us

The final view of the Norse Gael flank, four points over the river (warlord and two warriors)

The Eldest and I took the day nine points to none, though there were several times were the game could have gone either way. Tactically the girls are both really improving. The main game changing moments came down to the battle board rolls in the orders phase and the luck of the dice during combat in most instances.

Viking flank, five points for us (Warlord, one beserker, one hearthguard)