If......

 I wonder as I drive along on a fifty mile journey having dragged myself from my bed and looking at the heavy dark clouds reminiscent of Mordor in the distance, why, why at almost seventy years of age do I do this to enjoy a few hours of moving wee sojers around a table and surrendering myself to the Fates in the shape of the ever fickle dice. I am not sure of the answer but I love it.

Anyway, I got to Penrith while it was still dry and marched to the Dungeon for a game with Matt Crump, he had laid out a scenario set in Norway in 1940, a German platoon with supports had to capture two bridges and a small village crossroads, the Norwegians of course had to stop them. The Norwegians (Matt) were all in ambush and their troops would not be put on the table until the Germans managed to get within 12" of their die, or Matt could decided to open fire before this happened. The Germans had armour and one truck while the Norwegians had one A/T gun and the chance that their platoons had made up a few Molotov Cocktails (a die roll on entry to the table), and just in case they had a British anti-tank rifle team.

The table was a lovely set up as usual, Matt really goes out of his way to make things look as good as possible and today was no exception. The rules were Bolt Action 1 with a few tweaks, also if anything comes up Matt always errs on the side of commonsense, which I am happy to go along with.

The bridges

The crossroads

My forces

I sent my infantry straight up the centre while the left hand bridge was seized by my truck infantry, 222 armoured car and bringing up the rear a PzII, the right hand bridge was left to the PzI and a squad of infantry. The Norski anti-tank gun, it could have been British, could not contain itself and a shot immobilised the 222, which for the rest of the game became a pillbox, the MMG on the left was quickly left with only one man as crew, not a great start. No matter I kept going forward and started dropping mortar fire on the gun to no avail, but slowly my one man MMG and the 222 began to build pins on the enemy A/T gun and nearby MMG which had an adverse effect on those weapons. Soon I had reached half way to the village and more and more enemy troops were turning up, a sniper quickly took out a squad LMG but did nothing else during the game but attract a lot of lead.

I take the first bridge

I take the second bridge

Norwegian ski troops

Just as I had taken both bridges and got my main force over the stream one of my squads opened up on friends nearby (double six) and killed half the squad. I then took a chance and climbed a hill on the right to force Matt to show what was on the other side and he managed to strike down seven of the squad in one volley, oops. No matter I was still edging closer to the village and the PzI was causing a lot of pain to the enemy to its front, I threw the survivors of the unlucky squad who suffered from friendly fire at a machine gun behind a wall and they clubbed the surviving crew member to death, but then suffered another accurate volley and disappeared. Both sides were now running out of troops and the crossroads could not be taken by vehicles. A last titanic effort brought my surviving squad within six inches of grabbing the crossroads. The game ended after turn 10.

Tank of the match, PzI

So close yet so far

Superstitious, Moi?

A close run thing and a draw as I had held on to both bridges, I have put this aside to play again, possibly at the club with a bit of tweaking for Normandy or the Eastern Front. Matt had a couple of excellent firing turns but also a lot of morale fails, I had some good hits but could not convert them to kills, although I did manage to dish out a lot of pins due to always getting at least one hit if not a kill. The friendly fire was a real kick in the teeth just as I was about to run forward, also my mortar got two hits out of the ten turns, a bit pathetic. Nonetheless a great little game, Matt has expressed interest in trying a Chain of Command campaign next, I shall look forward to that.

I had another Bolt Action game this week on Tuesday at the club against Jimi, a game which has been postponed for several weeks due to circumstances beyond our control. It was just a throw down game somewhere in Normandy. I took three Heer squads along with a Waffen SS squad with two LMG's, an infantry gun, a sniper and a 251/22 which is a halftrack with a big anti-tank gun on it, it is cheap. Jimi had three squads I think one of which was veteran Paras, a 6lb anti-tank gun, sniper and that damn AVRE with the big squad killing mortar, which I hoped my big anti-tank gun would sort out or perhaps the infantry gun would load it up with pins.

So much for the big gun

Another victim

And yes, a third disappointment

I suffered the misfortune of all my deployment dice coming out of the bag against only two of Jimi's, I had hoped to build up a field of fire with the infantry gun and the Waffen SS squad but it was not to be. I did manage to get off the first shot with my 251/22 but it bounced off the British monster, the British anti-tank gun was a bit of a surprise to me and I had not hid the haltrack very well and it became a smoking wreck. Not to worry, I could still hurt the enemy with what I had left, or so I thought. An artillery barrage hit my boys and was only causing a few pins until it hit my infantry gun and wiped out the crew. I bravely struggled on but an aggressive move by Jimi cut down another of my squads and with four command dice gone to two British dice I shook hands and called it a day. Although the halftrack was cheap what is the point of buying a model of one if you do not use it, I have more of the same waiting their turn.

Light mortar

Tough fighters

Jimi's boys flush with victory

If only I had not thrown that Fubar, if only I had not lost that infantry gun.........

I am taking the Italian Wars next week and the week after to introduce Simon and Stewart to Furioso and to scratch an itch after all this painting. Julian will be bringing his troops for a mid-week game on the 30th, so a busy time for the new army. I have managed yet another arquebus unit, Landsknechts this time and have another 16 French gunners that should be finished by club night. I have even more crossbows and arquebusiers to add before putting the French to bed, for now. I also got another French gendarme unit with supporting heavy cavalry, you can never have enough cavalry for the Italian Wars, especially in a French army. Before I start the imperials next year I might side step and build a camp and some fieldworks.

To Bradford!

 Casa Anderson is plague free and I am well, apart from all the other ailments I have collected in my mature years, I was lucky in that the unpleasantness only lasted one day and then I was on the mend.

I got back to the club on Tuesday night and managed to join an ECW game hosted by Stewart with his beautiful figures, the scenario had a Royalist force trying to hold back a Parliamentarian force on its way to Bradford, I believe it was historically based and from the Pike and Shotte rulebook. Stewart had tweaked the evade rule which nearly ended my wargaming career the last time we played and besides, I needed a fix after missing the previous two weeks.

There were three of us at the table, Stuart commanded the Royalists while Stewart and I split the Parliamentarian force between us, I held the left and he took the right. There was no real finesse to the game, we just had to advance and overwhelm the enemy and sweep into Bradford where we joked we had a table booked at a local eatery. 

Royalist Cavalry

Me.

My boys edge slowly forward

Stewart's less than enthusiastic right wing

And so the Gods played their own little game. Stewart's men moved once in seven turns, after that I think they made one decent advance in almost three hours of playing, both my own men and the defenders also suffered from a lack of commitment. Nevertheless I did manage to eventually advance to the defended hedge line and take out the enemy artillery. Previously the Royalist cavalry had clashed with my mounted troops who were very reluctant to move but nevertheless saw off the enemy, these now retreated or tried to as they failed time and again to move behind the nearby hedges, I was happy to leave them to it.

The Royalist position

I at last reach the hedge line

At 'em boys

As my infantry had broken the Cavalier's line Stuart countered by sending a cavalry unit to take them in the rear, instread they soon found themselves surrounded on all sides by artillery, cavalry and Stewart's now advancing infantry. Numbers were beginning to tell and we called a halt to the affray and handed the victory to Parliament, we would not lose our deposit on the curry house albeit we would be arriving a tad late.

I had to cancel a couple of games due to the damn plague, my game with Julian will now take place on the 30th and my game at the Dungeon with Matt will be the 24th, I don't know when I will manage to get the third installment of my Late Roman 'campaign' done as Aetius marches on Edicus 'Proceritas' in Northern Gaul. This Tuesday coming Jimi and I will at last get around to our Bolt Action game which has been postponed about three times now.

I continue adding to the Italian Wars French, this time it was mounted crossbows from Steel Fist, these are quite large figures on big horses, not suitable for mixing in with TAG, you might get away with Foundry, but I will keep them separate in their own unit. They are also very well armoured for skirmishing troops. I have another eight arquebusiers 90% finished and another eight cleaned and primed ready to go, these are TAG Landsknechts and are lovely figures, more anatomically correct than the other manufacturers but full of character. I think I will need to get more French Gendarmes before I move on to the Imperials, I had not intended to get these until much later but at least one unit is required, maybe two.

My good friend Charles Singleton at Helion with whom I work closely on many of his titles, sent me a copy of the new Italian Wars Volume 4 Ceresole book, I have just started reading the book and I can recommend it, of course I can. The battle was fought in 1544 and my own armies are based around the battle of Pavia 1525 however when I come to building a Spanish force I shall lean heavily on the information contained in this book.

 The TV Guide. I have watched Code 404 the daft police comedy where one half of the buddy team is a man brought back from the dead and made into a $6,000,000 man, no, more like a £6 Gameboy, I loved the first season, gave up with the second, and have actually enjoyed the third. Apart from that I am revisiting 24, the full run which is a sad reflection on the state of entertainment or just me.

 

The West Fights Back

 After the shock defeat in Northern Gaul by the British usurper to the Imperial Purple, Edicus "Proceritas" (the tall), Aetius the Magister Militum of the West has marshaled all the forces he can from Italy and has marched to confront the Rebels. On the way he was met by a Visigothic army determined to take advantage of the situation. The armies met as Aetius crossed into Gaul.

As I am still showing positive for Covid and rules author Rob Broom is recuperating at home we decided to fight the next battle remotely. Since I last did this Zoom has limited all sessions to forty minutes so I set up my iPad on Facetime and the iPhone on Messenger and we duly made contact this morning at 0930. I had brought an army with a strong Roman infantry force supported by Goth Foederati, Huns and archers, Aetius had a personal bodyguard (Bucellarii) of Steppe Noble cavalry. Rob had warbands of warriors, some cavalry and swarms of skirmishers.

 I set up with my cavalry on my left and infantry prolonging the line with the Goths on the right, opposite the Visigoths had cavalry on their left, the infantry then a horde of skirmish troops on the right. My plan was to destroy the enemy right and wheel in as my infantry began to advance, I would be cautious on my right and see what the enemy cavalry intended to do. Rob advanced his flanks and ran into an arrow storm from the Roman lines and men fell, the Visigoth riposte managed to scare away the Huns for a turn but they came back and slowly but surely the enemy skirmish lines were destroyed. I held my infantry back in shieldwall while their cavalry crashed into my right flank archers, these stalwart men stopped the horsemen and then routed them and caused them to flee the field, sadly in their enthusiasm they ran into the Mounted Comitatus and were in turn dispersed, but it was a good trade off.

Romans

Visigoths

My Goths had now managed to get close to the Comitatus and charged them putting them at a disadvantage, although the cavalry made a brave effort the numbers were in favour of the Germans and another enemy cavalry unit fled the field. Despite their flanks floundering the enemy infantry were still cautious about taking on the main Roman line, however one Fideles unit struck the elite Celtae Seniores and although at first doing well the Romans recovered and yet another Visigoth battle formation ran. The Roman cavalry were now manouvering and threatening the Goths right flank, throwing caution to the wind as the action seemed to be going against them they at last hit the Roman line. The shieldwalls held and the green Quinta Macedonica managed to throw back the enemy Dux and his bodyguard, they rallied shortly after but the writing was on the wall as the Visigothic battle line faltered and the Romans prepared to roll up the enemy flanks.

Visigoth right collapses

Romans hold the centre

Visigoth left folds

We called a halt, the game had gone very well for me and I cannot complain about die rolling, Rob can as several times he hit rock bottom at the wrong time. If his skirmishers had been half as good as mine he might have stopped the Roman cavalry but he failed, he was left having to rely on his warbands and they just could not move my infantry. Aetius will now march north and attempt to defeat Edicus who remains near the coast attempting to persuade the local warlords to join his campaign.

As I said above I still tested positive for the annoying plague on Monday despite feeling absolutely fine, I shall test again this weekend and am hoping to get back to the club on Tuesday. I have managed to complete a unit of Albanian Stradiots (there's a joke waiting there) along with a French general. On the tray are a second unit of mounted Crossbows from Steel Fist, a tad on the large side but they will not look out of place on the tabletop. I had some senior moments ordering up a number of arquebusiers from TAG but managed on my third attempt, so they will finish my French army when they turn up.

I have bought a superglue accelerator for the first time, I know baking soda does the same job but too much and you get a grainy join, I am fed up holding metal for minutes and merely gluing the arm, weapon or whatever to my fingers. 

I am at it again, I settled down with my drink and sweeties to watch the highly praised "All Quiet On The Western Front", now if the movie had been called something completely different I could have sat through it and maybe, just maybe, enjoyed it. But I was expecting AQOWF and this film is not that, so much so it is a completely different story. It starts with the date '7 November 1918', four days until the end of the war, alarms were ringing and I can still hear them.

 My mum used to keep a set of boxes for her money, food, electricity, gas, insurance etc. I have the same, Illegals, Albania, Rwanda, France, Ukraine, Slavery Reparations, Industrial Revolution Guilt, Green tax and now, just as I thought I was managing, it would seem I now need a box for the effects of weather on the third world courtesy of Sharm-el-Shiekdown, for which I am again guilty it would seem.

Covid and ramblings

 After nearly three years I caught the dreaded Covid yesterday, I had a cough, tested on Sunday and was clear, but yesterday around 1300 hours I began to shake uncontrollably and felt like I was freezing despite my jumper and fleece, so off to bed. I actually felt much better that evening and sat through two episodes of SAS Rogue Heroes. This morning I feel like I am just getting over a not too serious cold, runny nose and slight fuzzy head, anyway, that's the club and two possible weekly games hit on the head for now.

After eight years of blogging I have hit 100 subscribers, it gave me a little lift when I noticed, I write the blog mainly for my own amusement but am happy when people let me know they enjoy reading it, like that gent at Partizan last month.

I also notice that my piece on The West has Fallen has far out stripped all my other posts with 242 hits, there are more but I have not a clue how the system works or why some are registered while others are not. Anyway I am sure many surfing for an educated article on the demise of the modern West will have been disappointed that mine refers to a wargame set around 500AD.

We were at my son's in Darlington for the weekend and FIASCO at Leeds was taking place, now I swore after the last visit I would never go near it again, almost an hour to leave the car park, however The Assault Group would be there and Yarkshire Gamer Ken Reilly was putting on an Italian Wars extravaganza. The missus gave me the green light so I ordered figures from TAG to pick up and was looking forward to seeing Ken's table, the missus would content herself in a local cafe.

It was a lot busier than the last time I was there, quite a few traders, a lot of traders actually, the games were all participation that I could see. On entering I made for the Italian Wars set up and was not disappointed, a magnificent example of the period, I managed to get a chat with Ken before heading into the main hall. Sadly there had been a mix up at TAG and Pete had not brought the figures I needed, he apologized and put them in the mail the next day, I should receive them this afternoon, again we had a chat. I also bumped into the guys at Helion, Andy at The Last Valley who had just made my poplar trees and club member and mate Rob Martin who was running a game which was proving popular. There were a few of us there but it is amazing that you can wander around a hall for hours without bumping into anyone.

Chinese v Burmese beautiful figures

More of the same

Italian Wars, well worth the visit

Inspiring

Pirates

Rob with his Mummy

Modern

I have another Italian Wars game next week but won't be able to bring a lot of new troops to the table, I should have my Stradiots ready but I really need a lot more shooters, these are the troops which should arrive today.

I shall sign off now with an amusing story, you had to be there. Seemingly when the missus and I signed our treaty 47 years ago hidden in the small print was the fact that it was my job to put the bins out. Last week I was lazy and decided to put them out in the morning, I was in the shower when an irate Memsahib informed me the bin men were outside. Not wanting to suffer her ire for the rest of the week I leapt out of the shower, struggled to put my jeans on, leapt downstairs, got out the back door into the rain, bare chested, bare feet and soaked. I confronted a startled bin man and pleaded with him to take the bin and empty it. Man or mouse, you decide.

Hopefully back to normal next week.

Oh wait. SAS Rogue Heroes, am I just a miserable joyless old so and so. It is a BBC production so that was a big warning sign for me, then up pops the West Indian pilot in an ill fitting uniform, which bore no resemblance to any RAF uniform I have ever seen, the modern heavy metal tracks grate on the nerves and the graphic novel sequences take away the gravitas of the unit. I am also not convinced by the lovely Algerian/French spy lady who is walking about Cairo like a Vogue model, which seems like a side story unrelated to the deeds of the SAS but it gets a female involved. Now I might be wrong but as I have McIntyre's book ready to go I shall find out very quickly what liberties have been taken.