Feeding the ravens: Saga mass battle

I've been playing a lot of Saga lately, more so than anything else I've gamed since September. I gave Saga a miss in its 1.0 incarnation. Now that Saga 2 has been released, I've jumped into the deep end. I have two warbands painted and am completing another two with more ideas for other warbands to come. There's something satisfying about the game that makes it always a delight to play.

Everything in Saga is about trade-offs. There are no über-warbands or über-troops. Where a unit is strong, it has corresponding costs or weaknesses:

• Javelin-armed troops are powerful (as I've learned to my joy playing Welsh), but have lower armor in melee, making them easier to kill.
• Mounted troop types (I have mounted hearthguard and mounted warriors with my Spanish warband) move fast, but are more vulnerable to missile shooting—unless they're cataphracts (in the works for my Byzantines), in which case they're expensive.
• Building larger units gives you advantages in combat, both in how many dice the units throw and in how well they survive taking losses. However, larger units will mean that you have fewer Saga dice for activations.

The three basic troop types (apart from hero/warlord) provide a good set of options for building a warband:

• Hearthguard have the best combat punch per figure, provide a Saga die even if only a single figure survives in the unit, and have the best armor. But they cost 1 point per four figures and despite their better armor, they die pretty quickly. I've experienced melees where two 4-figure hearthguard units took each other out like the Kilkenny cats—only without even the tails being left. You need to use them judiciously. 
• Warriors still have decent armor (typically 4) and also have numbers on their side. 1 point buys eight figures. A unit of 8 warriors throws as many combat dice in melee as a unit of 4 hearthguard. Hearthguard may be harder to hit because of their better armor, but Saga abilities and using fatigue against them can change the balance of armor. Even if the losses are even, a 4-figure hearthguard unit suffers more from three lost figures than an 8-figure warrior unit does. Eventually, losses will cause a warrior unit to stop generating a Saga die, but the unit will still remain in being and can melee or shoot with half its figures rounded up.
• Levy missile troops are the bomb. At least that's what I think. They're not going to do well in a fight (though they can sometimes drive off their attackers), but they don't need to fight. They can torment their enemies from a distance. You may get only a couple turns of shooting, but that can whittle down an opponent. When they are hit, it's highly unlikely they'll be destroyed in one go. 12 figures (you should *always* have 12-figure levy units) are hard to kill. Even after getting thwacked a few times, there always seems to be a few still hanging on. They may not be worth using at that point—especially since they won't be generating a Saga die after getting chewed down to fewer than six figures. Nevertheless, a timely missile shot—even if it's just 2 dice—can turn out to be a game-changer.

The game

The players were Mike Lombardy, running his Irish, and me, running my Welsh on one side. Dean Clarke and Bill Stewart, on the other side, both ran Late Roman warbands from the Aetius and Arthur book (a.k.a. Age of Invasions).

This was the third time I'd played my Welsh, so I was feeling good about my options on the battle board. I've found that the Welsh suit my style of play very well. They've got some defensive reaction abilities, but they also have a very strong offensive or counter-offensive punch. They do well in rough terrain because they have a Saga ability that lets them move through uneven and dangerous terrain with no movement loss.

The Roman players were both using their armies for the first time. The Impetus rule for that faction is a little like trying to rub your tummy and pat your head. You have to activate Saga abilities that increase your impetus so you can activate abilities that use up impetus. You have to keep priming the pump or you're stuck doing just basic stuff, which can get you from here to there, but it lacks sparks.

We wound up with a lot of terrain in the center board, which benefitted us skulking Celtic types, but didn't do much for the Romans. It gave us stuff to hid in and behind, but which we could also burst through at full move if we played the right Saga ability. I got to use my Fogou Games ruins for the first time.

The men of the Tiber won the coin toss and deployed in an impressively tight, straight linear formation. We just kind of formed up in clumps higgledy-piggledy. Bill was opposite me and Mike and Dean faced each other.

My Welsh formed up against Bill's Romans

Bill had two 6-figure mounted hearthguard units, two 8-figure warrior units, and one 8-figure warrior bowmen unit, plus his warlord. I had two 4-figure hearthguard units (with javelins), three 8-figure warrior units (with javelins), one 12-figure levy bowmen unit, and my warlord (with javelins). I certainly had the missile advantage.

The Welsh teulu ready to rock 'n' roll

The Romans moved first, but with only four Saga dice on turn one. Bill didn't rush in and take the ruins. It would have required two moves for one unit. Instead, he used his four Saga dice and warlord's abilities to get the whole straight line moved up one M move.

On my turn I played my Children of the Land ability to move without penalty through the uneven terrain. I rushed a warrior unit into the ruins with the intention of making them sacrificial lambs to inflict as much pain and misery as I could on the Romans before they overwhelmed me. I got off my free javelin shot and took out one of Bill's warriors. I also moved up my bowmen out from the woods they were skulking in and took a shot at Bill's other warrior unit, which effected one more loss for him. The rest of my move was just shifting things in my backfield to support my forlorn hope in the ruins.

Sticking my chin out

Bill pitched in right away. He shot a volley of arrows at my warrior unit, but I escaped from injury. He followed that up with a charge by one of his warrior units. To my surprise, I won with no loss to my unit. Bill took four casualties and went reeling back.

Holding fast—like their descendents will do at Rourke's Drift

Bill's next attempt was to turn my left flank using one of his fearsome 6-figure mounted hearthguard units. I think he decided that doing a von Paulus and sending his units into a meatgrinder was a bad idea. 

Looking for the soft underbelly

I decided that I had to get ballsy at this point. The Welsh don't defend well—despite my warrior unit's survival in the ruins. At his first opportunity, Bill would charge my hearthguard behind the ruins to my ruination. Fortunately, I rolled a dragon on the Welsh Saga dice. That meant I could use the very nice Wild Charge ability. I supplemented that with the Deception ability. The upshot is that I added four dice to my attack for wild charge (in addition to getting +1 on my dice for charging with javelins). Deception let me discard two attack dice to gain four additional defence dice. There were no other Saga abilities used by Bill or me. No one had any fatigue to use. I was rolling 10 dice looking for 4s, bill rolled 12 dice looking for 4s. (Had Bill been attacking me, I would have 8 dice looking for 5s against his 12 dice looking for 4s—and no additional defence dice.) I came out just ahead. Bill lost three figures, I lost two. 

Knowing Bill's hearthguard weren't defeated and seeing Dean's hearthguard looming just beyond, I decided to withdraw my surviving two hearthguard to prevent them getting slaughtered.

A rare moment of caution

The turn also saw the demise of Bill's other warrior unit. I shot my bowmen twice, both times scoring 5 hits, not enough of which Bill managed to save. It was a pretty hot dice turn for me.

On turn 3, Bill attempted a main strike against my bowmen: revenge for his warriors. I had a Saga die on the Evade ability of my battle board. I placed it there on turn 1 figuring that I would get to a point where buggering off rapidly was my best move and I wanted to have it available. However, I really had no place to bugger off to. Bill's warband came in and smacked me. When the dust settled I was seven figures fewer and hunkering down.

Bill then sent his warlord in to fight mine. At this point I wanted to invoke the run away rule, but I found out that not only was that cowardly, but the rules don't let warlords evade from warlords. Bill had one fatigue from moving + charging; I was fresh as fruit. We also both had hearthguard within S distance so they could die for us. I used his fatigue to up my armor to 5 and we rolled off even odds: 8 dice looking for 5s. I suffered one casualty, which I took from my hearthguard. Bill suffered three, which he took as fatigue and two dead hearthguard. And he scurried back.

One the other end of the table, Dean and Mike had been fighting their own little war. Mike was getting the best of it, having taken out two of Dean's mounted hearthguard. At this point it looked like certain loss for the Romans. We were already very much ahead in points. We decided to play out our half of turn 3 and see where we were.

I got two dragons on my Saga dice roll. I was reduced now to generating just six Saga dice, but I had dice still on my board, so still eight dice in play. I set up what I hoped to be a chain of events against Bill's hearthguard and warlord:

1. I removed my warlords fatigue.
2. I moved up a full unit of warriors and took a javelin shot at Bill's hearthguard (to no effect).
3. I charged in with my hearthguard against his three surviving figures.
4. I used Wild Charge (+4 attack dice), Combat Bonus with a dragon die (+2 attack dice), Deception (-2 attack dice, +4 defence dice).

When the fighting was done, I'd lost two figures, but eliminated Bill's hearthguard unit. Then I charged his warlord with mine. Bill already had two fatigue from earlier in the turn. I got +1 to my dice for attacking with javelins, so we were 8 dice each looking for 4s. I took one hit, Bill took two, which ended him.

The end

That same turn, Dean lost his warlord to Mike. The Romans decided Wales wasn't worth the effort.

Afterthoughts

It was a fun game—for Mike and I. I'm really liking the Welsh. They're kinda brittle because the javelins reduce their armor in melee. I've found that they die quickly if I'm not careful. The key is to maximize the effect of their javelins and to not get caught standing by a charge. The one-two punch of Wild Charge and Deception is a nice combo for a crucial attack. Adding Combat Bonus dice to that is just gravy. If you can use your opponents fatigue to increase your armor, all the better. It's a good riposte style warband.

Bill got to use his beautiful newly painted Late Romans for the first time. Every army needs to get bloodied; they just more so this game. The local ravens had Italian for dinner.

Bill's lovely Romans

I got to use my Fougou ruins. I bought them online from Fogou Models in November. They came quickly and are very, very nice resin castings. They're a lot of bits and pieces that can be arranged in multiple ways. For this game I used the Osric's Outhouse set. I'll use the Farmhouse later.

Ja, it's gut to be der König

John Palmquist ran his long anticipated playtest of Dan Mersey's The Men Who Would Be Kings on Saturday. I played a modified version of these rules when Kevin Smyth ran his America Rampant variant game at one of our local game events.

John is putting together a game for our Enfilade! convention in May. This was this first chance he's had to actually play the rules. Ralph Holloway and I got to the Panzer Depot in Kirkland just after John Kennedy opened at 11:00 a.m. John P. got there much later.  The game didn't start until 2:30 p.m. by which time Wes Rogers had wandered in and joined the game just as we were setting up.

The scenario was a force of German colonial troops rescuing Mighty Joe the prize gorilla from a casbah in some unnamed East African country. No explanation was given for how Mighty Joe wound up in the casbah. No one asked. We weren't sure we wanted to know. In the upcoming convention game, the German force will be rescuing kidnapped missionary children, but those minis are still ohne Farbe.

Mighty Joe and his captors in the casbah

Wes and I were the Germans; Ralph and John P. were the natives. John K. kibitzed.

I had a unit of German marines (Seebattaillon) and a unit of sailors. Both were highly rated regular units. Wes had one unit of regulars and a unit of askaris, who were rated irregulars, but with good stats.

The native forces were all irregulars (no tribal units) with modern rifles, except for a unit of Ruga-Ruga, who had obsolete rifles—but top-notch leadership.

Troublesome Zanzibaris

There were four German units against five native. The natives were both outclassed (regular v. irregular) and only slightly superior in number, so the Germans had a big advantage.

At start, there was one native unit of Zanzibaris in the casbah with Mighty Joe. All other native units came on board if they rolled any doubles for activation. The Germans started on board: Wes was near the casbah and I was farther down the board edge.

Deployment—Alles in Ordnung ist!

My plan was to sweep around engaging the native units coming on board while Wes attacked the casbah and rescued Mighty Joe.

The native units all entered soon after the start of the game. One unit dashed towards the casbah to retrieve Mighty Joe in order to take him off the board. Wes was engaged with shooting at the Zanzibaris in the casbah.

Wes rocking the casbah

I was carrying out my sweep, but wound up splitting my force with the sailors going in through a small cluster of buildings (calling it a town would dignify it too much) and the Seebataillon going off to the left and trading shots with a native unit coming on board. These were Custer's tactics at The Little Bighorn, so I had military precedent to go on.

Splitting my force against superior numbers—very Custer-like

The sailors got to the edge of the building cluster just as the native unit was dashing in to take Mighty Joe away from the casbah. I wanted to get some shots off and possibly pin them, but I came under fire from some Zanzibaris on my left flank and started taking losses.

Gallant stand of the Deutsche Mariner

The effect reminded me of Kipling's words about the "Kurrum Valley scamp," who

...being blessed with perfect sight,
Picks off our messmates left and right.

The Zanzibaris had the range and the sailors were in a bad spot. I never suffered a lot of losses with any single shot, but I was eventually down to almost half strength. Also, I kept failing my pinning tests. I managed to rally every attempt, but then got shot and pinned again. That meant that they were pretty ineffectual as the natives were attempting to whisk away Mighty Joe from the casbah.

Mighty Joe whisked away

The Seebataillon was slowly shooting to pieces a native unit on the far left, which meant that I was basically out of the action where it mattered.

Feuer!

With the native unit reduced to 3 figures and utterly pinned, I decided it was time to marsch vorwärts! to glory—or more particularly, to go teach the Zanzibaris a hard lesson about pinning down my sailors.

Hup! Hup! Hup!

John managed to get the natives into the casbah and then out again with Mighty Joe in tow. Wes managed to get a couple shots at the group (risking hits on Mighty Joe, but killing the unit's leader), which pinned them in place so he could charge in and take the monkey.

Zanzibaris pinned and at bay

There was a lively skirmish as Wes won the combat and freed Mighty Joe only to have to defend him against an attempted counterattack from the Zanzibaris pouring out from the casbah.

Mighty Joe is rescued!

By this time, the Seebattaillon was shooting chunks out of the Zanzibaris who'd been shooting chunks out of my sailors. This gave the sailors a respite, which enabled them to rally and then start shooting—at close range—at the native units swirling around Mighty Joe, which now included the Ruga-Ruga, whose shorter range (obsolete rifles) put them at a big disadvantage against the sailors and their Mausers.

Wes defeated the counterattack and was able to get clear control of Mighty Joe. The natives swirling around trying to take Joe back disappeared in a few fusillades from the regulars.

My final act was to charge the Seebataillon into the thick of the Zanzibaris, who by now were badly pinned and much diminished. It was short work. Deutschland über Alles and all that.

Angreifen!

Joe was safe and the natives got a lesson in messing with Kaiser Bill's boys. Back to base for sausages and beer!


Postmortem

I liked how TMWWBK plays. The rules are straightforward and the game flows easily. I'd read the rules only once when I first bought them (ever so long ago), but they were easy to pick up again.

The rules are definitely Merseyoid in flavor, though a bit different than the Lion Rampant style of game. Shooting is one D6 per figure and a target at short range in the open suffers one figure lost for each hit, which is typically 5+ on a D6 or 4+ for sharpshooters. Bad shots are 6s. It can mean a lot of losses suddenly. When my long-suffering sailors got a shot at short range against the Ruga-Ruga in the fracas surrounding Mighty Joe, they decimated them, even though they shot with just seven figures.

Because shooting can be so deadly, the game relies a lot more on cover. Shooting at long range reduces the effect to 1 figure lost per two hits. Soft or hard cover further increases the number of hits needed to remove a figure. Crossing the deadly ground is a lot deadlier in TMWWBK.

Regulars, which are basically European units, have advantages over irregulars in leadership and discipline. They can also form close order, which gives them an advantage defending against an attack and also enables them to volley fire.

I've heard from other players that European regulars vs. other European regulars is a very deadly game. A few European regulars vs. hordes of native/tribal units seems to be more the type of scenario the rules were designed to represent. I think this scenario is a good balance, but maybe there needs to be a greater disparity between the number of European and native units.

I think the Germans might have been too well-rated in the game. The rules stipulate that no unit can be modified higher than 9 points. The Seebataillon was regular + elite + sharpshooters + fierce, which would make them 10 points. Of course in a scenario game, you can do anything and it didn't bother me too much to command Teutonische Übermenschen. In the convention game, I expect, too, that there will be many more natives coming on to harsh the Germans' high.

I have, as I mention frequently, altogether too many irons in the fire. That won't stop me from being tempted to paint units for this period. I've never painted colonials before. There's just nothing jumping out at me in terms of minis for this period except maybe the lovely Indian Mutiny figures produced by Iron Duke Miniatures. These figures really are a treat, so we'll have to see where the passion goes. I'm not sure if I can lure anyone else into the Indian Mutiny and I'm not inclined to undertake another project where I'm painting multiple forces for both sides suitable for hosting convention games (like I'm doing now with the Irish Project).


On other fronts

Speaking of the Irish Project, I just today got another package from Timeline/Hoka Hey! in the UK. After painting all the Irish I had, I figured I needed more. What arrived today will be another pike unit, two shot units, and four commanded shot units of kern with calivers—60 figures in all.

Also arrived today was part of the order I made to The War Store for Perry Miniatures AWI, to be used with the upcoming Mersey/Leck Rebels and Patriots rules. I got some Southern militia cavalry, riflemen, and part of the militia troops I ordered. The rest (more militia) is backordered from Perry in the UK and will be sent as soon as they come in to The War Store.

Kevin Smyth turned me on to the four volumes of Nothing but Blood and Slaughter, which are a really informative narration of all the actions big and small (and even the really, really small) that took place during the AWI in the Carolinas (and Georgia, too). There are a lot of OOBs in these accounts, so it will be easy to create historical scenarios. It's ironic that just a few years ago, I sold a lot of unpainted Perry AWI that I thought I'd never have a use for. Let this be a lesson to me in parting with things that I might later want to have kept.

Sometimes a Fantasy

[Yes, more than a month after the event, I'm finally publishing the post about it—replete with misrememberings of plays and sequences only foggily understood when fresh in my mind. If this AAR bears any resemblance to actual events, it's purely by accident.]

On Jan. 13 , we held our Dragon Rampant game day at the Gig Harbor Public Library. There were 12 of us playing on 6 tables. We arrived at 11:30 and most of us stayed until about 5:00, getting in two games.

This was my opportunity to test the centaur warband I've been painting for the last four months. Overall, the ladies (and one man in game 1) acquitted themselves well.

Game 1

I played the first game against Dean Motoyama and his Men of the (Pacific North) West warband. He made up his splendid little army using a lot of classic Games Workshop Warhammer minis.

Dean's griffin-mounted general - nasty business with wings

Dean's army had several shooty elements. There was one unit of heavy missiles, for which Dean used a formidable Games Workshop death ray on a wagon-looking model. He took the unit as having a weighty projectile, which gives it only a 12" range, but let him shave off 1 point from his warband cost. He also had a unit of Elite Foot with missiles, some very natty-looking pistoleros, a unit of Scouts, and a unit of Light Riders with missiles.

Shooty heavy horsemen

I deployed my scouts to my left. Right of them, the Bellicose Foot (feminotaurs). Right of them, my Spellcaster. Right of them, one unit of Light Riders backed up by my Elite Riders (my general's unit). On my far right and across the river, the other unit of Light Riders.

The field of battle

Except for the Spellcaster and Terrifically Shiny Armor for the Bellicose Foot, my units could have passed for stock Lion Rampant units—except for being sythyrs, feminotaurs, and centauresses.

Since I have three different spellcaster figures painted, I had to decide which to use. For game 1, I went with  ...Tim?

What manner of man are you that can summon up fire without flint or tinder?

Early on, Dean's and my Bellicose Foot clashed.

Cow-ladies against wild two-hand swordsmen

The initial combat went in Dean's favor and I retreated back to lick my wounds.

Bloodied, battered, but unbowed: Feminotaurs at bay

I managed to rally on my turn, but Dean came right back at me. This time, however, the worn turned in my favor. As our Bellicose foot smashed away at each other, I started moving the weight of my forces to my left to counter what I feared was Dean's advantage there. I also engaged my Scouts against Dean's fearsome Weighty-Missiled War Machine of Doom to my advantage. I was in the cover of the buildings, which gave me better armor defense against Dean's weighty projectiles.

Feminotaurs reengaged and a shift to my left

My feminotaurs eventually beat Dean's Imperial sword-wielding madmen only to get shot up by his pistoleros and rout away. This brought on my Gorgeous Ladies of Doom (GLoD) to counter the pistolero threat. Already hit by a Befuddle Thee! spell from Tim the Spellcaster and shot up (a bit) from my scounts, the pistoleros were easily routed by the GLoD.

In position, ready to charge

My Spellcaster got late into play. I intended to move him to a forward position in some scrub where he'd benefit from the cover, but Dean pretty much kept his distance from the magic man. I had to move him up a bit more, and out of cover, to get him into the action. Once in, he performed well.

I mostly used his Powerbolt! spell to shoot. It's the same shot as heavy missiles: 7+ to activate, 4+/18" shooting. Although, the best effect came from using the Befuddle Thee! spell as noted above.

Beating the pistoleros brought the GLoD into conflict with Dean's general. It was a tough fight, but Dean prevailed. The GLoD got beat up and failed morale. Soon, however, it was Dean's turn. The fight between our generals was nearly a repeat of the Kilkenny cats:

There once were two cats of Kilkenny
Each thought there was one cat too many
So they fought and they fit
And they scratched and they bit
Till (excepting their nails
And the tips of their tails)
Instead of two cats there weren't any!

Except that Dean's general had just a bit more than his tail left and I had no tail at all (nor the rest of me), but he was hurting bad. The Gorgeous Ladies had done their bit. A little shooting and a spells finally caused Dean's general to fade away after a failed courage test.

Over on my right, my lone unit of centauresses faced Dean's Light Riders and a Scout unit. I ended up getting the better of the shooting exchange and chased Dean's Light Riders away after a few shots.

Forward to the foe

I also brought my other unit of centauresses to counter Dean's Scouts. They took a bit of a beating, but survived the game (and Dean's Scouts didn't).

Worse for wear, but still hanging in

The far right centauresses managed to get all the way back into Dean's flank and put the coup de grâce to Dean's pistoleros, who'd retreated back to the edge of the marsh away from the GLoD.

The bitter end for the pistoleros

This was pretty much the end of the game. Dean's forces were all but non-existent. I was pretty beat up, too, but had much more at hand comparatively.


Game 2

For out second game we played doubles. Ron Beery and I teamed up against Dean and Scott Abbott. Ron and Dean faced off to my left and I faced Scott. Dean's and my warbands remained unchanged, except that Dean switched in a different Warhammer tanky thing for his heavy missiles. The switch did not contribute to its survival.

Dean's tanky-shooty machine version 2.0

I also switched out Tim for Ursula, the Shadowforge tribal shaman figure, who was my original Spellcaster. The WITCH! never got to play. Next game.

Ursula

Scott's warband was only four units: A single model unit for his general, which was Elite Riders with a Wizardling attribute, a single model unit for a Great Warbeast with the Venomous attribute, a unit of Bellicose Foot (also Venomous), and a unit of Scouts with Magical Weapons (which failed to activate for the game).

I decided to use my units with the Ranger special rule (the feminotaurs and syhtyrs) to run up the river (rough terrain, which they ignore) to get to the heart of Scott's position. That sorta-kinda worked. The feminotaurs managed to attack and wipe out Scott's Scouts. However, they then ran afoul of Scott's Venomous Bellicose Foot, who put them out of action.

Ranger types advance up the river

My sythyrs responded by shooting away at Scott's Bellicose Foot, managing at least one evade, and eventually causing them to spectacularly fail morale and go away. They'd already taken some losses while wiping out my feminotaurs and the shooting losses put them over. Bellicose Foot (like all the wild thangs kind of units in the "Rampant" rules) are really a one-shot deal. If you can get more out of them, good for you, but normally they get so beat up they fail morale soon after they start fighting. Like me, Scott took Terrifically Shiny Armor for his Bellicose Foot. That gave them a bit more staying power, but you know they're bound to fail a courage test as losses mount.

Feminotaurs second death in two games

At this point, Scott had only his general and the nasty scorpion Great Warbeast. He'd originally run his Warbeast up into a wood, but pulled it back into some scrub near his baseline. I advanced my sythyrs towards it, but got too close. He charged out, I failed to evade, and got slaughtered. At that point, Scott started to move his Warbeast down the river opposite the direction I had run up with my now eliminated Ranger troops.

Centauresses vs. General Doom

On my left, Ron and Dean were banging away at each other, mostly around the stone walls that enclosed a few fields. Dean was using tried and true WW2 squad tactics to seek defilade and cover from Ron's missile troops.

Skirmish among the ruins

With Scott's Warbeast coming down the river at me (though already with 2 of 6 hit points lost), I interposed my Spellcaster, who managed a Powerbolt! shot before getting smacked into by monstrous, hexapodal, insectoid death with a nasty stinging tail. I didn't win, but I didn't lose too badly. My Spellcaster is heavy foot, so I had a 4+ defensive combat value and 3 armor. The Warbeast hit hard at 3+. I lost three strength points and got pushed back, but passed my courage test. I gave back pretty good and knocked the Warbeast down to half strength.

The warbeast cometh

On my turn, I took another Powerbolt! shot with my Spellcaster and sent in the Gorgeous Ladies of Doom for their first combat of the game. Warbeasts are nasty, but their defensive combat value is unimpressive. I hit on 3+, Scott hit on 6—but because the Warbeast is venomous, every 6 counts double. Nevertheless, I whacked the nasty thing good and suffered no ill effect. Scott failed his courage test and the evil scorpion monster was gone.

This left only Scott's general, who proved hard to kill. Scott's general was an Elite Rider with Wizardling powers. I had my Gorgeous Ladies of Doom, Ursula the Spellcaster, and one unit of centauresses left.

GLoD move up

It came to a battle of Powerbolts! and arrows. Scott focused a lot on the centauresses because, being in 12" range, he got 4+ shooting at them. He kept knocking them down to half strength and I kept propping them back up to four figures using the Heal Thee! spell from Ursula.

Endgame: Closing in on General Doom

While this was going on, Ron was working at finishing off Dean, who was down to one unit. This put us in a strange situation. The scenario rules stipulate that if the unit bearing the Ring of Power is the last defender unit, then it kills everyone and the game is a draw. We weren't sure whether the last unit was Dean's Elite Foot or Scott's general.

I moved the Gorgeous Ladies of Doom into position and charged Scott's general, who countercharged. I failed to break him, but managed to push him back.

Before I could take out Scott's general, Ron killed off Dean's Elite Foot, who had the ring. Game over.


Post mortem

I like Dragon Rampant. It's a very fun, very wild 'n' woolly version of the "Rampant" genre. All the basic mechanics are there plus a few extras—not a lot of extras, but enough to change the flavor of the game. Units can have a lot more bells and whistles, which allows creating a much more idiosyncratic warband. It makes for some nasty surprises, too, but adding those bells and whistles drives up points cost tremendously.

Spellcasters are way cool. I wasn't sure what to expect. I bought the full meal deal version at +4 points. I had pondered buying just a Wizardling at +2 points, which would allow me to pick any three spells, but I opted for the full smorgasbord of spells. Even though I think I used just three in both games (Powerbolt!, Befuddle Thee!, and Heal Thee!). Heal Thee! was a surprisingly good spell. I didn't hit on using it until game 2, but I was able to keep one of my Light Rider units in play for several more turns by bringing lost figures back from the dead. If I'd used the spell in game 1, I might not have lost my feminotaurs.

The drawback to Spellcasters/Wizardlings is that the spells are almost all 7+ or 8+ to cast. It's a bit dicey to have to rely on it as an initial activation, even though setting up disaster for your foe by using a Beffudle Thee! spell and then attacking the befuddled (i.e., battered) unit is a neat trick.

I've really enjoyed this foray into fantasy gaming. Even though the basic mechanics are the same as Lion Rampant, there are enough nuances in Dragon Rampant to give it the feel of a whole new game. I still have some idea of doing a Lion Rampant retinue using the Grenadier minis available from Milrliton. I can order from Noble Knight Games in the US and avoid the nasty, nasty postage charges from Italy. The fantasy range has great figures for Late Medieval, but also a few truly fantasy type things (like dragon-riding knights) that can be mixed in/swapped out to reuse much of the same units for DR and LR.

I'm still a devoted historical miniatures gamer and not likely to go off and start playing D&D. However, Dragon Rampant hits a spot. It's just a fantasy, as Billy Joel sang, but sometimes a fantasy is all you need.

Dixon Grand Alliance!

My Dixon figures has arrove! A few weeks back I sent out a small order for some of the venerable Dixon Grand Alliance range and the ding-dong at my door this afternoon was the mailman dropping them off. I say 'venerable' because the range is more than 35 years old—that's dead in dog years and nearly so in figure range years. But these figures have stood the test of time and are as good or better than many newer figure ranges.

But I wasn't sure what to expect from such a hoary range when I ordered. In too many cases, ordering figures from a range that's a few decades old (or older) can be a disappointment. The molds might not be maintained well and what you get requires a lot of filing and trimming just to distinguish them from fishing weights. (I recall an order to Minifigs USA many years ago that made me think I'd purchased from the Carve-Your-Own-from-a-Block-of-Lead range.)

This is not the case with Dixon! The figures are as clean and well cast as if they were a brand new range. Not only that, but the packaging has all the elegance of old school English figure manufacturers. No bubble-packs or baggies full o' lead. My order contained two small 3" x 3" x 2" white boxes personalized with my initials on the top.

Monogramed box

Inside, the figures were wrapped in royal blue tissue paper as carefully as if they were fine porcelain.

All snug in their box

This is a nice touch.

These figures bring back fond memories. I painted a lot of them in the '80s. When they first came out ca. 1980 they were absolutely the best figures on the market. In a world that was still dominated by Minifigs and Hinchliffe (both cutting edge in their day), their fine detail, animated poses, and head variants put them way ahead of everyone else. They were also in an historical niche that I just loved and no one else was making late 17th c. figures.

I was living in San Jose, CA at the time and several of us got the bug to game the late 17th c. using the old WRG Renaissance rules by George Gush. I painted my minis as Brandenburg-Prussians ca. Nine Years War. I sold them when I went off to seminary in 1986 and briefly resumed painting some about three years later while I was still in Chicago. I never did much with the new batch and sold them in the early 90s after I moved to Seattle. Since then, I've wanted to do another project using these figures. The North Star 1672 range fulfilled some of that desire—Mark Copplestone is the sculptor for both ranges and I'm a big fan of Mark's work.

Among the felicities of The Pikeman's Lament, is that the small scale of a company means that I can do projects for those rules that I would eschew if they required hundreds of figure to complete. So I decided that I could use Dixon Grand Alliance figures to build a company for James II and William III's Irish campaign. I'm already doing late 16th c. Irish Wars using the excellent Timeline Miniatures Border Reivers, so this is a fast-forward by 100 years from that period--no kern or gallowglass.

I'm starting with James' Irish forces first. Years ago, I picked up a nice booklet on the conflict: William III at War: Scotland and Ireland 1689-1691 by Alan Sapherson.

It's chock full of information about Irish, English, Dutch, and Danish units for the campaign in Ireland. I picked it up for $8.95 30 years ago, now it's going for $45.00 on Amazon! I've already got the uniform colors in mind and Flags of War makes the flags for both sides. (Gotta have flags, even in a skirmish game.)

In my Dixon order, I got 12 musketeers for a shot unit, 6 grenadiers (with plug bayonets) for a forlorn hope unit, 2 each of the officers and drummer, and a mounted general.

All unboxed now

This is a good start for now. My plan for the company is to add another unit of shot, a unit of 6 pikes taken as aggressive forlorn hope (no shooting, just piking), a 6-figure unit of dragoons, two 6-figure cavalry units. I'll get the lot in my next order to Dixon.

Musketeers and grenadiers

For now, I have a lot of figures to paint: for other projects ECW, Aztecs, conquistadors, Thirty Years War, Medieval Spanish, Irish 16th c., etc.

Officers mostly

But I'm pretty excited about the Dixon figures, so I'll likely clean and prime these figures soon and get then on deck.