DBMM - 15mm Clash between Early Persians (c.540BC) and Neo-Sargonids Late Assyrians (c. 670BC)

 On the weekend got the chance to have a 15mm 450 point game with Paul Graham. His Early Persians took on my Late Assyrians for all the Mesopotamian marbles. 

Summer, I invaded on a battlefield with four gentle hills, two small patches of rocky scrub and a non-important provincial road.

Paul's army had three Persian commands and a Skythian ally while the Assyrians had four regular commands - two comprising four chariots backed by levy, a mounted command of cavalry, light horse, mounted infantry and some levy and an infantry centre.

The Persian deployment. The Skythian ally is on the flank, two mixed commands in the centre and (out of shot) the Immortals, Bow and some Light Horse.

Looking down the table you can see the Persian bow on the hill, with the Immortals tucked in between the hill and road.

The Assyrian mounted are near camera, one block of chariots next, the infantry centre and the other chariot block at the top.

Across come the Skythians to threaten the levy (Hd(O)). The Assyrian SG leaves them to their fate as the main battleline obliques.

The Persian centre pushes into the Assyrian Spear. The Cv(O) will hold up very well over the battle facing a mix of Sp(O)/(S).

The Chariots and Cav(S) eye up the Immortals and the EAP Cv(O). They will initially come off second best - losing one chariot to shooting and another to a Cv(O) 😖

The Assyrian left readjusts, pulling the Chariots back....slowly....lowest PIPs. The Levy is about to be mauled.

Eventually the Assyrians commit all their Generals. At the top the Assyrian CnC chariot is now interspersed with his spears and is driving the Persian cavalry back.

In the centre, the two remaining chariots have seen off the cavalry supporting the Immortals while the remnants of the Assyrian cavalry are just surviving the Immortals. In the bottom right, the remaining Light Horse from the clash of Assyrian LH(F) and Persian LH(O) has got in the rear of the bow. This breaks the Persian left at the same time as the Persian centre breaks. In the same bound the Skythians and the Assyrian right (Mounted) are disheartened.

The Persian SG arrives too late to support the centre.

Overall, Paul was winning this battle until the Assyrian generals committed themselves to melee. I was far too cautious with my chariots after being well out-deployed. Paul generally was able to achieve better matchups and it wasn't until the chariots had multiple attempts at charging Cv(O) and Skythian horse that I was able to make my better quality troops perform.

In the centre I got lucky with my 4 Bw(O) elements removing both Bw(X) and Cv(O) elements early giving me a gap to bring my CnC in.

Overall, a very fun game that could have gone either way.

I like the command structure of my Assyrians but feel that I need to practice my deployment and perhaps review my PIP allocation.

DBMM - Norse Viking Baggage

 The lack of appropriate baggage has stopped me using my Norse Viking DBMM army so far. I've had the army for about 15-20 years and I think it has made the table once.

Inspired by the final season of "Vikings", I thought it was about time I rectified that.

I managed to pick up a plastic Longship at a now-defunct Wellington model shop. I then cut it in half to give me the pieces for two beached longships on the Northumberland coast. 

The barrels, sacks and crates are from a MicroArts studio "Ware Pile" kit I picked up from Scott at Kapiti Hobbies.

The ground is all done from a mix of AK Interactive ground textures suitably washed. I've then used some left over figures - all Wargames Foundry - to give the scene some character.

I also replaced the plastic shields that came with the ship with metal Foundry ones. These have more heft....and Vikings appreciate their heft.

Finally, there is a smattering of static grass with some obligatory scattered tufts.

Quite happy with how it finished up and am looking to running the Vikings on the table.

It is quite a mono-dimensional army - 20 Huscarls [Bd(O)], a single Berzerker [Wb(S)], 2 Mounted Scouts [Cv(I)] and 40 Undisciplined Raiders [Bd(F)]. It also has its own fleet of six Longships [Bts(S)]. And of course, all Irregular........"Here for a good time, not a long time!!!!"

40k - Fields of Blood Warhammer 40k NZ Rankings

 After creating and then maintaining the Fields of Blood NZ Rankings since the start of 2008, I've decided to shelve the project going forward.

The rankings were created in conjunction with the FOB NZ Masters and were designed to encourage the 40k tournament scene in New Zealand.

They started with Excel spreadsheets, moved to a JV with Rankings HQ and finally arrived as an interactive part of my Fields of Blood blogsite.

Much thanks must go to Jack Dunn who created the backend for the website and acted as technical support for whenever I had a problem. He was the star of the operation and was always able to find time even when domiciled in Boston, studying for his Ph.D and then running his company.

Thanks also to the TOs who supported the Rankings by submitting the results of their events.

At various times Warhammer Fantasy Battles, Kings of War and Flames of War were supported by FOB rankings - as were KoW rankings for Australia and the UK. All were fun ventures and introduced me to some unique and interesting personalities 😅 

For me the Rankings were a fun exercise and no doubt helped to drive tournament attendance locally.

In the past few years there has been the development of other ranking sites internationally, so TOs will still have the opportunity to have their events "ranked" going forward.

40k - The Pain of the Torturers - Dark Eldar in White Dwarf

 About 15 years ago I bought a 3rd Edition Dark Eldar army built and painted by Troy Forster. This army had appeared in White Dwarf (January 2001) - so over 20 years ago!!!!!

Over the years I have added some figures to it - bulking out units etc. Trying to match Troy's painting style is daunting to say the least.

Anyway I managed to track down the article on the army and thought I'd post it here.

I met Troy at the 2nd Liber Animus in 2005 where he was using a beautifully painted Ultramarines army that just pipped my Death Guard army for 1st Place. 

And strangely enough, ended up with a WHFB Empire army he built for a White Dwarf "Tale of Four Gamers" series - and he had passed on to Golden Daemon winner Gav Clarke. It is another beautifully painted army.

KoW - A Blast From the Past

Cleaning up some books yesterday, I came across the 3rd Edition Kings of War rules and also the Uncharted Empires army lists....it got me thinking.

Kings of War (2nd Ed) was probably my favourite ever rules set. I really enjoyed it as a tight rank and flank game that eschewed "combohammer" and focused on maneuver. With the demise of WHFB, it filled the role as a tournament based Fantasy game but never really blossomed, largely because it wasn't "Games Workshop".

I've not tried the 3rd Edition which has been out a couple of years but finding the rules I am keen to try it out. 

Hobby - What's Next?

 Having finished the Planetary Empires paintjob over the weekend, I'm looking at what projects I have coming up next.

1. Dark Eldar Re-basing

During 8th Edition I used a mix of Jack's 5th Ed DE and my 3rd Ed models. Jack had used some resin bases from a pre-cursor of Secret Weapon Miniatures and so I based the 3e models I required on the same. For 9th Ed I'm restricting my army to the 3 Ed models and so they need to go back to sand and flock (who uses flock!$#?). 

This should take me a couple of days.

2. Hellions & Wyches

The old metal Hellions and a unit of Wyches could do with a tidy up. Their current paintjob is a bit jarring. Think with a few evenings work that they can be made to look a lot better.

3. Viking Baggage

I need to make some baggage for my DBMM Viking army. I recently bought some Micro Arts Studio crates and sacks and have an old Longboat, so I think there is something I can do with that. Again I think there is probably 4-5 hours work.

Check back over the next week to see how much I get done 😃

40K - Painting Up Planetary Empires

 Friday night after work I pulled out my set of Planetary Empires ready to paint it up.

After clipping the hexes off the sprue, I gave them a spray with Army Painter Black Primer and then an overspray with some of their Brown.

From there I went through and blocked out all the buildings and fortifications on the sprue using ProAcrylic Dark Grey. The edges of the hexes were then repainted with Vallejo Black Primer.

I must have been quite prescient back in 2009 when I purchased the set as I also bought two packs of the add-on Hive City sprue which was sold separately. I would imagine that these are probably virtually impossible to source now but I can happily bask in the knowledge that I have four Hive Cities 😆

From here it was a case of adding the roads to the hexes and painting up the various structures, craters etc. There are six spaceports and then a multitude of Manufactoriums, Power Plants and Command Bastions to add to tiles. I sprayed these with Grey Primer and then gave them an acrylic wash.

Over the course of the next few evenings I will look to pick out some of the detail on the various structures.

So behold the province of Chadaquy, on the planet Kiltrup in the Tiberius Sector. It is a 52 tile landscape with four Hive Cities - Vulgagrad, St. Palantine, Monza, Boca - six spaceports and numerous Imperial facilities. 

 The two hives of Boca and Vulgagrad with their industrial environs.

Over the next week I am looking to translate the 2009 ruleset into something that works for 9th Edition. Currently have seven players signed up for the campaign with what looks like Ultramarines, Word Bearers, Death Guard, two Necrons, a Tyranid Hivefleet and a Dark Eldar raiding party. 

40K - Planetary Empires Campaign

 I've been watching a few Youtube channels recently regarding narrative campaigns.

Given my disinterest regarding the current GT Chapter Approved Mission Pack, I was keen to still play 40k but perhaps to pursue a more narrative driven game. About 15 years ago GW released Planetary Empires which was their 40k version of Warhammer Mighty Empires. I have run a few ME Campaign Weekends and thought it might be fun to try the 40k version. I have also never painted up the PE box 😃

The rules for Planetary Empires can be found here

I approached the guys that recently played in the narrative game at the Warlords to see if they had any interest and got some positive responses. And also contacted another local who I knew had grown disinterested in the current competitive 40k meta.

So it looks a go. I'll get painting the set this weekend.

40k - NZ Masters Announcement

 Pretty clear that the Government won't be lifting the Level 3 restrictions and returning the northern part of NZ to where there is free movement by 12 November.

On that basis, and as previously stated, the 2021 NZ Masters scheduled for the first weekend in December will be postponed.

To run them on that date, would be patently unfair to those Northerners (over 60% of the field) who not only will struggle to find certainty around travel but have also been in lockdown for most of the last three months.

Not all gloom. Steve Joll and Aaron Wilson are taking over the hall booking that I had at the school and will be running a 24 person event so those that can travel have an opportunity to play some 40k in the leadup to Xmas.

40K - Dark Eldar: First Run & Balance Patch

 Yesterday I had the first run with my 3ed mostly metal Dark Eldar. 

As I was setting out my models in prep for the game, GW dropped its "Matched Play Balance Datasheet" which dramatically changed the points for Dark Eldar. I quickly recalculated my 2000 point army and it was now 2155 points. As a result I dropped a unit of Scourges ("cries"), a Kabalite unit and two Reavers from my Wych Cult Patrol.

In my game against Steve Joll's Space Wolves, he went first and downed two Raiders. However, despite that setback, I was able to start piling up the points and when we stopped at the start of Battle Round 4 I had a handy points lead which would like build substantially over the last two turns.

The underlying lesson I took from the game was just how dominant the DE were in scoring Primary Objective points. Their ObSec is so cheap and with so many other cheap threats for the enemy to deal with is rarely threatened. 

I shudder to think how dominant the army could be in GT 2021 missions before the patch as things still seem too cheap. The speed and carrying capacity of the Raiders (the change from 10 to 11 under 9e is enormous) makes then cheap even at 105 points with Dark Lance (and Black Heart reroll, first turn charge potential).

The other big surprise was just how many CPs a triple Patrol starts with. I was profligate in my use of them yesterday, with practice I will be far more efficient.

So TL/DR from this is that I don't think Dark Eldar players can have too many complaints with the change in points yesterday. The book has fantastic internal balance - everything is good - and I think they got away kindly from the encounter with GW balance bat.