An axe to the kneecaps always levels a fight

Valgen's Lads - my veteran Songs of Blades and Heroes Dwarf warband - enjoyed a good bit of blade work today. They were up against a new Barbarian warband, Wulfs's Warriors, controlled by a member of my local club who wanted a re-introduction to the delights of this most elegant game.

Of course, I was delighted to assist, SoBH being my favourite fantasy skirmish system. As my opponent was looking for a refresher, we played the Standard Rules (400 points) but included the Reaction system from the recently published Advanced SoBH.

A clearing full of barbarians!

It was a welcome return to Songs of Blades and Heroes in the Battleshed this week. 

It's been a few months since I last played my favourite fantasy skirmish system, with the veritable smorgasbord of alternative skirmish systems I'd just had to try in the intervening time. My regular gaming buddy and I, Sam Pate of Wee Blokes, set up a quick 400 point game using the new Advanced rules (ASOBH) from the Fightin' Fungi release.  

As neither of us have a painted our Fungi Fighters yet, it was an excuse for me to deploy my favourite warband instead - Dwarfs led by the old campaign leader, Valgen Maest.

Carronade 2015

Carronade 2015, the annual wargaming show organised by Falkirk & District Wargames club, opened its doors promptly at 10am at the Graeme High school, Falkirk on Saturday. Being relatively local - its only a 30 minutes or so drive - it's become a permanent fixture on my wargaming calendar. Indeed, it was the very first show I ever attended. As always the organisers had done a fantastic job, with no less than 5 halls hosting 43 games and 44 traders.

Ratty rumble - Fightin Fungi rules playest #2

It's been a long few weeks without any gaming due to work commitments, however I finally managed to get my fix with more SoBH rule play-testing with my regular gaming buddy, Arabianknight. Indeed, soon after my return from working away I had the paints back out and quickly resumed with my In Her Majesty's Name production line, with nine miniatures completed already for Lord Curr's Q Division - Extraordinary Affairs. It's all coming along nicely and I hope to get the first pictures up in the new few weeks.

Fightin Fungi - rules playtest #1

"Why was the mushroom happy? Because he was a fun-gi!"

With both Arabianknight and I backing Ganesha Games Kickstarter for the SoBH game, Fightin Fungi, we were keen to play test the new rules available to backers. So down at Arabianknight’s Gaming Emporium we both deployed a quickly assembled 350 point warband for a simple Capture the Shard of Power, (or something like that!), scenario.

As this was a rules play test, our rosters – certainly mine anyway – were created primarily towards testing out some of the expanded array of abilities (traits), the new weapon/armour rules and the Reaction system. We both forewent the long list of new Magic abilities for this time, leaving that for another playtest.

Fightin' Fungi!

As my follower knows, I'm a big fan of Ganesha Game's popular Song of Blades and Heroes, so it was no surprise to see their first Kickstarter, Fightin' Fungi, being quickly backed. 

Not only do we have a very entertaining new range of beguiling characters to play with, we'll be getting the much anticipated new rule expansion for Magic, new attributes tables such as individual weaponry and most intriguingly, a Reaction system! 

The play test rules are available to backers. SoBH just gets better and better!

The First Law's last stand

Galan and his elf retinue, the Woodland Guardians, have been commissioned by a very shady business-man from the Gurkish Empire to acquire potential 'human resources' from an number of small, weakly defended locations - including Ostenlet. Thankfully for the townsfolk, The First Law crew are billeted in the town and are certainly not about to let themselves and the poor wee townsfolk be snatched. However, the frightened peasants will fiercely fight off any attempts to enslave them but unfortunately, due to their panic, might also resist any assistance from their would-be rescuers!

After they failed to rescue Frederik dan Ferengis's caravan from both the Ogre attack and Galan's scheming elves, the First Law warband made a slow and dissonant trek back from The Wilds to Ostenlet, where the crew were planning to disband the expedition and depart on their separate ways. Unfortunately, The Wilds lived up to its name. A poorly concealed hunter's trap whilst they were negotiating a thick patch of wooded undergrowth, seriously wounded an unusually distracted Ferro Maljinn. It was likely to be back to the mud for the ex-slave from the arid Gurkish south. However, Bayaz was curiously instant she recovered and resolved to get her back to Ostenlet.

Caravan of Forlorn Hope

Happy New Year!

It's been a few weeks since my last post, what with all the annual holiday festivity malarkey creating the usual distractions. Now normal service is slowly resuming, with the long, dark wintry Scottish winter well into its stride and limiting me to mostly indoor activities, I can look forward to embarking on my hugely over-ambitious gaming projects for 2015. Some of which will no doubt be encouraged by my first trade convention visit of the year to York (Vapnartak), down in Englandshire, at the end of this month.

The first After Action Report of 2015 is actually from the last tabletop rumble of the old year - battle 10 of our long running Songs of Blades and Heroes campaign between my 'First Law' humans and Arabianknight's Guardian elves. This scenario, The Lost Caravan, was taken from Hour11's excellent scenario conversions  The scoring was 1VP for killing an Ogre and 1 VP for every 20 points of the opposing warband taken out. Most VPs wins...

The Thief was robbed?!

Songs of Blades and Heroes campaign game 9, ‘The Heist’, was a fitting title as Bayaz and his lads "wuz robbed!"

Liquid Courage, a Buxom Barmaid, a drink spilled...

Bayaz, First of the Magi, suspecting mutinous thoughts amongst his weary warband, leads them to an infamous drinking establishment hoping to re-tie the bonds that have led them thus far on their adventure. As he enters the forecourt and sights the huge Ogre bouncer brooding next to the entrance, with snatches of laughter, pipe music and a curious mix of odours emanating from inside, he halts the warriors. "The Blue Oyster Bar: You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious."  With that warning, the warriors gleefully head inside...

Mid October round-up: The Rim, The Forlorn Hope and a right Saga!

It's all been a bit quiet on the gaming front over last few weeks due to one thing or another. Too many commitments, too little time. Same old story!

Anyway,  I did manage to join some of my buddies over at Livingston Battleground last weekend for  another game of the excellent Firefly board game. It was great to see the latest expansion in play, Blue Sun.

This includes a map expansion which adds two new tiles to the board. These align with the left edge of the old board, completing the Murphy system and mapping out Rim Space with a new system (Blue Sun) and a new Supply Planet, Meridian. It also includes new supply cards, nav cards and contacts.

I'm still not sure how the goal card we used, however, can quote '2 hours' to play - unless that was the time required to pack up all the cards and tokens afterwards!

I also 'endured' game 7 of our continuing SoBH campaign recently, where my First Law warband, now officially given the title 'Falorn Hope', were at the receiving end of yet another drubbing at the hands of the dastardly elves. Unless the batteworn and reduced human warband can get off the ropes it'll be all over for them by battle 10.  

Unfortunately, I forgot to take my usual camera and was so wrapped up in how Bayaz, First of the Magi, (and possibly the last given this battle!), attempted to extricate his warband from a deadly situation, I neglected to take any BatRep notes. Luckily for me (or not!), my opponent, ArabianKnight has posted up all the gruesome detail over at Wee Blokes.

Finally, I also demonstrated Saga for my brother-in-law, who is no stranger to the Battleshed, usually with a new board game or card deck to try. He's a regular FoW and WHF player too, as I've been at the receiving end of his Vampire Counts and German heavy armour on  numerous occasions! 

I used a similar set-up to the demo with ArabianKnight previously. Basic battle, 6 points, using some of my Empire Warhammer miniatures to act as the Viking warband facing the Scots.I failed to convince John, however, that the mounted Scots Hearthguard weren't some devious plot to include uber-warriors on my side.

In my defence - their only 'advantage' is the long move (and are disadvantaged when being shot at and lose cover bonuses); as Jamie can attest over at Livingston Battleground, having a full group of charging mounted Hearthguard does not mean they still can't be stopped and decimated by a group of indifferent warriors lounging on a hill! :s

So a quiet few weeks, but that's the way it goes sometimes. Over the next few months I plan to revisit Warhammer Fantasy again, as my brother-in-law is ever so keen to let his Vampire army have a go at my semi-retired Empire troops - can't think why ;) Dead Man's Hand and In HerMajesty's Name are also pencilled-in and my next 'big' project will be to build a Carthaginian army for Hail Caesar.

Drunken dwarfs, feisty barbarians and one big chest!

My regular Saga opponent, Ian, has been following my SoBH adventures and was keen to give it a go. So he assembled a 350 point human/barbarian gang and made a visit to the Battltleshed. 

Strangers in the camp

Pictured below are the latest recruits to Magi Bayaz's First Law crew, ready for the resumption of our SoBH campaign. Bayaz's warband coffers are dangerously low at this point with Caul Shivers being gruesomely sent back to the mud by the devious elves and both Nicomo Cosca and Black Dow injured during the last encounter in the mountains. 

Whilst the warband recuperated for a few weeks after the battle, Bayaz gave the young Jezal dan Luthar the chance to use his verbal skills more productively, other than irritating the rest of the warband, and sent him off to negotiate for some half decent fighters at a very decent price. 

Upon his return Jezal was accompanied by two dangerous looking individuals by the names of Red Hat (left) and Curnden Craw (right). Both came with reputation, so how Jezal had managed to recruit such individuals, given his limited coinage, is now common speculation amongst the other fighters...

Meets the Standard

After a long hiatus with regards to my painting schedule, I finally got the brushes out and made a start on the 'Lead Mountain'. I did have an incentive to kick-start the painting though, as I need to paint up two new recruits for my current campaign warband, based on the First Law books by Joe Abercrombie. More of which on a later post.

However, I've had a Dwarf Standard Bearer miniature hanging patiently about my paint table for what seems like ages, so I started with him. I forget where I purchased the miniature, as he's been dwelling in the aforementioned Lead mountain for so long. He came without the actual 'standard', just the pole and cross-support, so I rummaged in my bit box and found a suitable flag from one of the Warhammer Fantasy parts. After a  little slicing and filing I painted the Standard separately, adding some spare transfer designs that I thought looked suitably Dwarfish'.

So finally, Gilic Firmfoot, Standard Bearer, will now join my other battle-hardened Dwarf lads, anticipating his chance to stand short and proud in the next adventure!

The Witch Wood

First scratch-built terrain piece done for 2014; a 'Witch Wood' to join the regular 'woods' for the first SoBH campaign game on Friday.