Tiny Tolkien

On New Year’s Eve Gus Woodward ran his long-awaited 6mm scale Battle of the Five Armies (or Battle of the Six Armies as there were enough Orcs for two Orc commands under Hordes of the Things).

The forces of Evil were commanded by Andy Sangar (the Wargs), Ron Pearce (Orcs) and Nathan Halliwell (more Orcs).  The Goodly Men of the West were Robin Woodward (The Dwarves), Richard Sangar (The Elves of Mirkwood) and Jamie Crawley (The Men of Esgaroth).  I made tea and coffee, took photographs, and gave rules advice.

The battlefield featured the ruins of Dale (foreground), the gates of the city under the mountain (middle distance, right), and the mostly dammed River Running (middle distance).

Gus’s armies are based on 15mm style bases (40mm frontage) with large number of figures on each base - about 30 in each Horde element.

The massed Wargs were led by a nameless Goblin Hero.

In the centre, the Orcs discovered why it’s best not to send Warband into a stand-up, good-going fight with Elven Knights.

On the Orcish right the mysterious Beorn (a God under HOTT rules in this game) appeared...  

... and then he rolled a 1 and left, presumably remembering that he had some honey to eat back at home.  Still, Jamie still had another God (the Eagles) to call upon.  They surely would be more effective.

On the Orcish left a massively bloody fight developed between Dwarves and Wargs.  The Goblin Hero leading the Wargs killed Thorin Oakenshield and then fought Dain of the Iron Hills (the Dwarven Hero General).  The result was a tie on an odd number leading to both Heroes dying in the combat!  

The loss of Dain pushed the Dwarves over 50% casualties leaving them as a Demoralised Command.  The loss of their own General could have demoralised the Wargs but Andy threw a six on their next PIP roll so the wolves fought on.

The battle then hung on whether the forces of Evil cold seize the treasure locked up under the Lonely Mountain.  Andy managed to get a lone unit of Wargs into contact with the goodly stronghold but they lost the contact and were then killed by Elven Knights.  Nathan nearly got there with two units of Goblin wolf-riders.  One unit was destroyed by Gandalf’s magic (a timely 6:1) and the other was unsuccessful in its single attack on the walls.  


Oh, and the Eagles:  they arrived and then Jamie immediately rolled a one and they decided they weren't needed.  So quickly were they gone in fact that I didn't get a photograph.

Finally, Grogg, the Orcish commander-in-chief, was fought off and killed by Gandalf working in tandem with some Elvish blades.  His death signalled the end of the Battle of the Five or Six Armies.

Return to Laritsa

Stately Counterpane Manor saw its first game of Blitzkrieg Commander yesterday.  We returned to a scenario called Many Rivers to Cross that I originally ran using Tac:WW2 rules on New Year's Eve 2004.

The scenario's title comes from the period following the victory at Stalingrad when the Stavka, realising that having to await permission to advance beyond each river line was slowing down the front-line troops, made commanders aware that medals would be awarded for each river crossing seized.  The Mariupa River at Laritsa was (in our fictional case) deemed worthy of award of the Order of Kutuzov, Second Class.

Our Soviet Commanders were Jamie Crawley (Major Korolski) and Andy Sangar (Colonel Sangarov).  Here we see Korolski and Sanagarov contemplating the task ahead.

Stuck on the wrong side of the river and hoping to escape when their engineers had repaired the bridge were Colonel Sangrescu of the Romanian 17th Infantry Regiment (Richard Sangar, left) and General Grau, commander of 59th Infantry Division (Phil Gray, right).

The table had the Mariupa River at the western end.  It was crossable only at the bridge but this had been destroyed by a previous Soviet air raid.  Engineers struggled to bridge the shattered spans while the Romanians prepared to sell themselves dearly.

157th Tank Brigade (forming the Forward Detachment of 51st Tank Army) began the battle split into two columns.  Korolski, with a weak battalion of tanks, half a battalion of motorised infantry and a below-strength regiment of Cossack cavalry, advanced on the right towards the ridge held by Romanian infantry and German Marders.  Sangarov, with the rest of the tanks and infantry advanced on the left.

Almost immediately, the Soviets got lucky.  A flight of patrolling Il-2s bombed the position on the ridge, causing damage and casualties among the Marders and the infantry.  The resulting suppressions would prove crucial for what was to follow.

Whilst his T-34s finished off the Marders, Korolski launched his cossacks in a sweeping manoeuvre to slaughter the cowering Romanians.

At this point, the German 88mm FlaK36 east of Laritsa started to cause heavy casualties among the T-34s.  However, if Sangarov could advance and draw fire onto his battalion, Korolski would be able to swing around the open northern flank and cut off the defenders.  Unfortunately, Andy chose this moment to embark on a run of failed command rolls and his tanks stood still while Sangrescu's Renault R-35s caused heavy casualties among the, still celebrating, Cossacks and the 88 severely weakened Korolski's tank force.   With time running out it looked like the Soviets would be unable to reach the river in sufficient force.

However, even now the Red Air force could yet tip things in their side's favour.  A flight of Pe-2 dive bombers suddenly appeared over Laritsa.  With long lines of trucks and horse-drawn wagons drawn up in the streets of the town waiting to cross the river, slaughter looked inevitable.

Every sidearm available joined the Moebelwagens by the river bank in putting up a storm of fire.  Phil rolled his five dice and...

 
... the Pe-2s went down in flames.

At the start of their game turn five the German engineers completed the repairs on the bridge.  Colonel Sangarov tried one last throw of the dice (literally) revealing that he had a company of partizans in the large wood west of the river.  Sadly he was unable to make contact with them and order them to attack the bridge.  The rear area elements of 51st Infantry Divisions HQ began withdrawing.


By now we were short on time and the Soviets were within one loss of their break point.  We called the game a narrow Axis victory but noted that Korolski was at least likely to reach, if not cross, the river.

Friday's Random Picture

Latvian Army soldier guarding the Freedom Monument in downtown Riga, August 2006.

I have turned from the Dark Side

Fast painting ain't too fast when it comes to 20mm Napoleonics.  Sitting at my painting desk last night, part way though another batch of French infantry I remembered why I stopped considering massed battle games in 20mm in the first place.  Too much like hard work!

  
Needing some guidance I took out my box of individually based Napoleonics.  I then went and looked at the Too Fat Lardies' demo videos of Sharp Practice on YouTube.  I then went and bought Sharp Practice and decided that my new Napoleonics are going to be skirmish based.  Black Powder?  Maybe it'll be the way to use my 6mm Great Northern War collection if I can't get my head around Polemos?

 

Orta Be Useful

Just painted and about to have their bases "glooped" is this unit of Ottoman Janissaries in 6mm scale.

As usual they are Irregular Miniatures.  The flag bears the symbol of the 59th Orta.

Having looked at these (hugely magnified) photos, I think I might have a go at painting in the sword scabbards on a few of these guys.

As requested...

A couple of shots of those speed-painted French Napoleonics after a little highlighting:

I've added highlights to face and hands with Games Workshop Elf Flesh and repainted the cross-belts and rucksack straps with pure white.  I think this looks OK.  I shall probably do another dozen or so and see what they look like en masse.

The Ottoman light horse are halfway through the basing process.  They had their bases glooped with tile group and then painted in patches of two shades of brown.  They've then had dry-brushings with GW Graveyard Earth and Vallejo Camouflage Orange Ochre.  Next will come Khaki, Iraqi Sand and then finally a mix of Iraqi Sand and White.

Finally, also underway is what will be my sixth base of Janissaries.  More Irregular Miniatures, they're at the gloop-on-the-base-paint-colours-you-can-pick-out-the-detail-later stage.

On the Workbench - December 2011

The big forthcoming event at the moment is the big Cold War Commander game in April so I should be preparing for that.  Of course, I'm not.  As soon as such a project comes along my brain decides to go of in several other directions...

First up it's 20mm Napoleonics.  These guys are a first attempt at doing a dip type of approach.  I've added some chocolate brown paint to a jar of Humbrol acrylic matt varnish and applied with a brush over figures that were roughly block painted (OK I couldn't resist a bit of highlighting on the coat sleeves).

I'm not sure about the effect.  Do I need to add more brown paint?  Will I like the impression more when I have a mass of figures?

And, yes, that's an old Humbrol Authenticard in the background.

Next up are a group of Arab light horse for my 6mm scale Ottoman Turks.  Irregular miniatures.  They're halfway through having their bases painted.

Finally we have some 6mm scale Cossacks for my Great Northern War collection.  These guys are from Baccus 6mm and just need static grass and other vegetation adding to the bases.