Grotfang, a Warboss for Orctober (4)

A bit more work on Orc Warboss Grotfang.
Added his right arm and banner pole, attached him to a base and given his boar some horns.
Undercoat ahoy!

Peninsular Real Estate

Inspired by the recent Song of Drums and Shakos game I thought I'd do some work on some scenery for future games.
I bought these Warbases buildings a couple of years ago with the intention of using them for some Italian based games of Bolt Action (and with half a mind on multiple use for Napoleoinic and even El Cid games). They were dirt cheap and they're functional. There are two buildings here, each made from two Warbases kits.

To my mind you have to do a fair bit of work to MDF buildings to stop them looking like, well simple boxes of MDF with pretty drawings on. So rather than go for the complex and expensive pre-printed offerings from the likes of 4 Ground  I'd rather go with simple clean box shapes that I can add texture and detail to. So these have been assembled (they go together very easily) then the doors and windows stuck on before being "rendered" with a mix of PVA, filler and fine sand.

A coat of spray undercoat, then the walls were painted with a Wilkinsons taster pot colour before a wash of Griffon Sepia and then some drybrushing.
Roofs next.

Grotfang, a Warboss for Orctober (3)

Bit of greenstuffing.
Whilst doing this I came to the realisation that my dreams of becoming the third Perry Twin were unlikely ever to be fulfilled.

Still, a bit closer to a lick of paint now.

Find the Letters - a Song of Drums and Shakos Battle Report

The morning mist began to clear as the small British patrol advanced toward the tumbledown Spanish farm buildings.
"Right men, our contact has hidden the letters somewhere near that farm. Sergeant Bartholomew, take Lawrence, Morris and Shemp and search the nearest building. The rest of you stick with me. And keep your eyes peeled for Frenchies"

And so to our first ever game of Song of Drums and Shakos. Using the scenario I posted yesterday, our small (400 point) patrols would clash whilst searching for some incriminating letters.
I split the British into three groups, with Sergeant Bartholomew and the three veteran troopers sent out on my right to search the farm building, whilst the Captain, drummer and two riflemen were centre left, and a further four riflemen held the centre.
Captain l'Aurel meanwhile deployed in a much more constricted formation in the centre of the board, with fusiliers next to him and Marceau the drummer boy and the conscripts to his right with Sergeant Ardie.

The peaceful Spanish farm (gems to show possible letter stash)

Bartholomew commands the Veterans.

The British centre

Sergeant Ardie and the green recruits

Privates Lawrence, Morris and Shemp make ready

The first few moves saw cautious advances from both sides. I soon realised the error I'd made by having Bartholomew and the veterans too far from Captain Wiseman and unable to be issued with group orders, which meant my advance on the right became fragmented.

Captain l'Aurel however had wisely remained in command of his troops, although a few of the newer recruits dawdled at the rear.

Prepare to give fire!

"Aux armes citoyens!"

Captain l'Aurel bravely urges the men on (from the rear).

Eventually we made our way into musket range. The Voltiguers began to unleash volleys and two redcoats met grizzly ends! Return fire from the fractured British was less effective, but the proud French captain was forced to take cover from one close shot

Mon Dieu!

Steady, lads

Bartholomew and the veterans had made their way to the corner of the farm building, but digging in the dirt revealed only turnips, not French letters.

A spectacular shot from Private Widdle, brought brave Sergeant Ardie crashing to the ground and a wave of panic spread through the French recruits, but the cries of Captain l'Aurel and the drumming of Marceau ensured none fled the field.

"Damnation, no bonus rum for us tonight lads"

Private Miller frantically rifled through some broken earth at the edge of the woodland, but again could not unearth the letters, meaning they were concealed in the outbuilding close to the French lines. Another shot put Captain l'Aurel to the ground and, realising his peril, he called to his men to rally around.

"Right boys, let's finish this with cold steel"

The veteran British, realising their foe were likely to escape with the correspondence gathered themselves for a bayonet charge.

Meanwhile Captain l'Aurel ordered Marceau to snatch up the letters and make off. 

Uttering the immortal words, "as long as I don't get two ones, and that'll never happen" he cast the dice.

Seizing on the French confusion, Bartholomew led the men forward into a hail of shot.

Meanwhile the greenhorns held steady

Flee, Marceau, flee for your life!

Finally the young French drummer snatched up the letters and, once he had kissed his commanding officer on both cheeks, fled the field.

A final frantic charge from Bartholomew, Lawrence and Morris, saw captain l'Aurel, hold them off and wound Lawrence slightly, before the French force vanished into the morning mists.

We had lots of fun playing this.All the feedback from here and TMP about the benefits of group moves and fire and the importance of scenarios meant we had a good tense game. The command mechanic works really well and the fact that everyone is relatively low at combat bonuses but the weapons add modifiers to firepower give the game a very different flavour to SBH.
My opponent made better use of the group move and firing roles than I did and my attempts to use independent troops fell a bit flat - arguably pretty historical. Next time I'll take more care to keep my en close enough to the Captain to benefit.
We finished the evening hatching plans for the further adventures of rival Captains l'Aurel and Wiseman (and looking at models of Spanish guerrillas on the Perry website).

"Such poetry in motion" murmured Captain l'Aurel to himself as he watched the drummer boy disappear toward friendly lines. 
Suddenly fearsome yelling tore tore his attention back to the battlefield, three redcoats were bearing down on him. Drawing his weapon forth he parried the first two blows and sank his blade into the leg of one of the privates. Spinning away from the fight he shook his fist toward the distant figure of the British commander.
"Au revoir, Captain Ouiseman. Until ze next time our, ow you say, paths cross!" and with that he fled toward safety.

Find the Letters - a Song of Drums scenario

Spain, 1812

The mysterious double agent known only as El Jengibre has intercepted some sensitive private correspondence between General Hulot and his mistress, the fabled courtesan Mademoiselle Valerie de Pamplemousse (known to the grognards as Sale Val). In return for a large payment he has arranged a drop in the no-man's-land between the French and British lines. 
Unfortunately one of El Jengibre's men is in the pay of the French and as the British send out a small party commanded by the earnest Captain Wiseman, ably assisted by Sergeant Bartholomew, the experienced French Captain l'Aurel and his loyal Sergeant Ardie are rapidly advancing on the same spot, determined to protect l'honeur of their commanding officer. 
However the wily Spanish spy has not been entirely clear about the exact location of the letters, so the two patrols will need to search for them whilst fending off the attention of their rivals...

One player sets up the table and places three small tokens (each in a terrain feature). Tokens may not be closer than long distance to each other or any table edge.
The other player then picks which side of the board to enter from, with his opponent entering opposite. Dice to see who deploys first, alternating models until both forces are set up. Models must deploy within short range of their table edge.
Then dice to see who takes the first turn.
Whenever a model moves into contact with one of the counters roll a D6. On a 5+ the letters are discovered and all the tokens are removed. When a model contacts the second token, the letters are discovered on a 4+. If the first two are not the cache, then the final token is automatically the letters.
It takes two actions to pick up the letters.
As there is a reward on offer, soldiers will not voluntarily hand the letters over to anyone else until they're safely back in camp.
If the letter bearer is killed the letters are dropped.
If the bearer fails a morale check he drops them at the start of his flee move, hurling them aside in his panic (or in an attempt to distract pursuers).

Victory points.
1 point for each 25 points of opponent dead or fled.
5 points for getting the letters off the "home" base edge.

This is a scenario for my first game of Song of Drums and Shakos tomorrow night.
It's adapted from one in the SBH rulebook.
Some of the feedback on TMP was that scenarios add to the flavour of Ganesha games, so I've taken that on board.
Quite excited to see how it plays out.

Grotfang, a Warboss for Orctober (2)

A bit of progress on Grotfang.
I had a dilemma about how actually to model him. My original plan was to cut off the metal legs and glue the torso to the legs that are moulded onto the plastic boar. However, looking at the drawing, the metal model doesn’t much resemble the picture. Only the choppa bears much similarity. So I debated building the plastic orc and using the metal right arm (or part of it) to create Grotfang.
In the end I went with my original plan. Mainly because the metal is some classic Brian Nelson Orc goodness and will look great on a beefed up (ho-ho) boar.

 Big gap at the bottom of the boar's kneck

 Leg still not matching up

Speaking of the boar, the model really is a “pig” to put together. The two sides just don’t fit at all well. Having assembled one of these before I knew that was the case, but even so I was surprised at how poorly it fits, with big gaps appearing despite quite a bit of work with file and knife.

Anyway, he’s part way there. The pig needs some greenstuffing to hide the joins, and Grotfang needs a chainmail skirt creating from greenstuff to hide the join a bit. I’d like to get the modelling finished before the weekend, but I fear a couple of days working in Belfast will interfere with that.

A game of Song of Blades and Heroes

Saturday, and with the current Mrs TTS on shore leave for the weekend, I was entertaining the two offspring. So we decided to get the soldiers out. I’ve been looking at the Ganesha Games stable with a view to using Song of Drums and Shakos for some Napoleonics and thought I’d combine entertaining the boys with getting the hang of the Song of … engine by digging out my old PDF of Song of Blades and Heroes.
Smallest boy wanted to be Chaos Warriors and eldest chose Dwarfs – I had intended to referee, but both insisted I play, so out came the Orcs.
We had just over two hundred points each or around five or six models. The Chaos warriors were given the human profile (which wasn’t hard enough but I couldn’t see a substitute) and we each had a leader and some troops. The Dwarfs also included a crossbow armed fellow. We started equally spaced out on a 4x4 table and went at it. This naturally resulted in a scrum in the centre of the board with not much subtlety involved.

 Clan Groznog enter the field

 Mutants from the Chaos Wastes

 Waaagh Gruzzkup's ladz

 'Ere we go, 'ere we go...

 After some C&C issues the forces finally close

 Ooof!

 The Groznog boys start handing it out

 Now the Chaos lads get in on the action

 Orcs down all over the shop

 Fights in all directions

 The Dwarf commander shows who is the hardest

After several bloody rounds of combat the Dwarfs were left in control of the field and the bad guys slunk off to lick their wounds.

 

Thoughts

I like the activation system, giving a lack of definite control, something I always enjoy in a war game.
The rules are simple and straightforward, we all picked them up pretty quickly.
The combat system seems a bit too simplistic, and means it’s hard for a lesser warrior to ever beat a better one. Maybe we need some more practice to get the hang of ganging up and picking fights.
Quality 3, and Fighting 4 made a huge difference and the dwarfs just seemed altogether much harder. We just seemed to bounce off them quite a lot.
There’s a Cat Warrior profile in the book, which is a bit tougher and probably about right for the Chaos Warriors next time.
Shooting seems unlikely (excepting very poor dice rolls by the defender) to kill anyone. The odd push back, or maybe knock down, but full on kill will be very rare.
Morale is odd. I failed some tests and as a result stood up without having to pass a test to do so, so ended up better off. Also after fleeing for a turn you can just turn around and get stuck back in? Seems a bit odd.
We didn’t use any of the group moving or shooting rules. I imagine they’ll be more useful in the Napoleonic version
It lacks a bit of depth, really. I suppose the rich background of WFB (however derivative it may be) has spoiled me, but it felt a bit generic and bland. I suppose investment in the system and running the campaign may add something to this.
So overall I was a bit disappointed. Be interesting to see what Drums and Shakos has to offer over and above this.
The boys however, both said they enjoyed it and want to play again