The Looting of Oldsholme

Here's the first game in the Battle of the Black Crown mini campaign we played, for details of the campaign see here.

The battlefield was set up in advance, the tiny village of Oldsholme was in the centre of the field, slightly towards the Undead lines.  The various stacks of crates and barrels were merely for colour, they had no game effect, and were removed when they got in the way.

The orc skulks snuck forwards to lurk close to the windmill, but the rest of the orc force remained behind (Vanguard move).

The Undead took advantage of the Orcs’ hesitation, advancing into the remains of Oldsholme.  The werewolves managed to snatch one loot counter, and a troop of ghouls also bagged the middle objective.

In response, the gore riders charged the werewolves while the rest of the orcs advanced, the two heroes heading off towards the windmill to try and keep it’s loot from more packs of ghouls.  The skulks loosed a volley at the ghouls holding the loot.  Amazingly they did sufficient damage to wipe out the flesh-eaters, leaving the objective available once more.  The charging gore riders wiped out the werewolves, taking the loot for themselves.

The gore riders did very well against the werewolves...

Ignoring the dropped loot in the centre of the village, a troop of ghouls charged the skulks, perhaps to revenge their comrades.  The skulks didn’t last against the ghouls.

Another ghoul pack rushed up to take the loot near the windmill.  On the far flank, the ghouls that had followed the werewolves tuned away, desperate to avoid their fate on the blades of the gore riders. 

The gore riders could see the rear of the fleeing ghouls, so took full advantage, smashing them to a pulp before turning to face the undead flank.  In the village centre, the orc axes charged into the ghouls, still feasting off the remains of the skulks and were similarly brutal.  The krusher tried to stop the ghouls near the windmill from fleeing with their objective, but couldn't quite reach them.

...and just as well against the ghouls.

With the undead forces considerably thinned it was time for the zombies to shuffle in.  Ignoring the dropped loot, they charged the orc axes, but they did little damage and backed off.  The remaining ghouls moved closer to safely carrying their loot.

 

The krusher was ineffective against the fleeing ghouls so backed off and and called to his flagger to help.  The axes charged in and chopped down some of the zombies, but not quite enough to break the living dead (missed Nerve by 1). The gore riders, slowed by their loot, marched towards the undead flank.

The ghouls turned to face their home and started to run, whilst the zombies shuffled to the side to claim the remaining loot.

The krusher caught the ghouls, but was unable to hurt them and retreated while his flagger tried to catch up.  In the village, the orc axes and gore riders caught the zombies between them and destroyed them.

Realising that they were all that was left of the undead force, the ghouls desperately ran for safety, but ended up just short of the line.

Fortunately for them, the krusher and flagger were both just too far away to stop them slinking off in the following turn.

With nothing left to kill, the orcs examined their loot.  Curses!  The lone troop of ghouls had managed to escape with the Black Crown.  The krusher called on an orc krudger to lead a force into the undead lands to try and steal it back.

This was a great fun start to the campaign.  Although the orcs won by gaining two loot tokens and virtually wiping out the undead force, they let the Black Iron Crown slip away.

The War of the Crown

Yesterday T'Other One and I played a three battle mini campaign for Kings of War.  It was a gloriously fun day, played in a great spirit of friendly competition and good sportsmanship (plus its always a pleasure to play on his great looking terrain).

We came up with a brief storyline to thread through the three battles.  I'm sure we could  have included more conditions to reflect victory or defeat in prior battles, such as veteran rerolls (are they still a thing?) or deployment advantages.  I'm equally sure that wouldn't have made the day any more fun.

As there was quite a lot to say about the campaign, I'll split it into different AARs. To begin with, here's the background and campaign framework.

THE WAR OF THE CROWN

A KoW mini campaign in three parts.

Whispers across the land say that the fabled Black Iron Crown is part of a small horde of treasure recently unearthed by a simple farmer, breaking new land to try and scratch a living. Warlords of Mantica descend on the simple village of Oldsholme, eager to seize the Crown, increase the power of their magicks and further their quest for power…

Scenario 1 LOOT

500 points 4x4 foot table 3 loot counters

Scouting forces descend on Oldsholme. Hearing the groaning of the undead and smelling them long before setting eyes on their putrescent horror; the villagers of Oldshome have fled, leaving the opposing forces to battle and ransack the village, grabbing what treasure they can in the hope that the Black Iron Crown is amongst their loot.

Each loot counter is numbered. At end of battle a D3 is rolled and the number rolled is the loot counter that is the Black Iron Crown (CoK 2018 page 61), which can be used by its new owner in the next battle.

Scenario 2 INVADE

1000 points 4 x 4 foot table

Furious that their forces have failed to secure the Crown, a larger army is sent to invade enemy territory and take back the Crown. The holders of the Crown need to break through the enemy lines to regroup with their main force…

A straight up Invade scenario as per CoK 2018 page 69. If the army possessing the Crown wins, they get to keep it for use in the final battle. If the opposing force wins, they steal the Crown for their own masters.

The winner of this battle can use the Crown in the final battle.

Scenario 3: KILL

1500 points 6 x 4 ft table.

The opposing armies clash in one final bout of slaughter to determine who will finally wear the Crown…

A straight up Kill scenario, as per page 85 of the hardback KoW rule book.

Campaign Victory Points

3 points for scenario victory (6 points for winning scenario 3)

2 Points for scenario draw

1 Points for a scenario defeat

To whet your appetite for the first AAR (found here), this is the battlefield set up for the Loot game.

All Change August

Long time readers will know that I bemoan my lack of actual tabletop gaming.  I even set myself the challenge of playing an average of one game a month this year.  Well this August I should manage to make good headway.

Not only do I have one of my semi-regular games against Merlin coming up soon, a chance to blood my Scythians, but we are changing the Monday games schedule for August.

My Monday night group is dedicated to D&D, specifically a 4th edition campaign that started when that edition was released and is now approaching its end.  As the holiday season is upon us, we have put D&D on hold and are playing a different game (almost) each monday for the next five weeks.
This should give me the prod I need to get some projects finished.

Coming up are the following; a return to an old Savage Worlds Quickstart we began one Halloween, Cthulhu Wars boardgame, a couple of games of Frostgrave, and another game, probably Kings of War.

Plenty to go at there.

I also have a day's gaming of Kings of War against T'other One soon, we have put together a three battle campaign, more details, and photos, after the event.

Greek Houses

Just finished a couple of Greek houses to help create the right atmosphere for our up coming battles. These are a part of the Westwind, Forged in Battle scenery range, lovely buildings to paint.

Terrain Crate Arrives

Terrain Crate finally arrived at the back end of last week.  I have heard quite a few complaints about this kickstarter, both because it has been delayed, and because of the alleged poor quality of the pieces.

Rather than show every piece I got I will show the contents of one of the bags that I have got painted, I'll comment on how good (or not) I think the end product is, and the pictures should allow you to decide for yourself if its for you or not.
I got a couple of the Dungeon crates, one of the Town crate and the Dark Lord's Tower.  Well, the tower and one dungeon crate was for my lad, but those are the crates I have seen.  I can't comment on the Battlefield set.
The pictures show the Tables and Chairs set from the Town Crate.  There are two identical bags of these, so double the number of pieces you see here.

Unpainted, the plastic is already coloured brown, so the pieces could be used as is.

As you can see, the torches are a bit wonky.  The plastic seems about the same as that used in the Dungeon Saga furniture pieces.  I had expected this, and was happy with the result.  Those torches got the hot water treatment, as did the tables, as there were some slightly bent legs, though nothing too serious.

And painted up.  

As you can see, the torches have straightened considerably, there is a slight bend in the banded table, though it sits flat, so I'm fine with that.

I washed all the pieces first, then did the hot water trick on the bits that needed a bit of straightening.  The wooden pieces got a coat of VMC Burnt Umber, then a heavy dry brush of VGC Heavy Golden Brown and a light drybrush of VGC Khaki.  Metal bits, principally the torches, got a base coat of VMC Oily Steel thinned with VGC Black Wash.  Once dry, The wooden pieces got a wash of VGC Sepia Wash, and the metal pieces got Black.  Then it was just a case of finishing touches; VGC Off White for the foam on the pint, Silver for the utensils on the plate, and a gradation of red through orange to yellow in the centre of the torches.  The coals were then drybrushed black.

I missed out the flames for the torches, I might include them on the second set, but I do think they might easily get knocked off and lost.

I think they have painted up well.  It's not an award winning job by any means, but they are only props for the main action, and they shouldn't detract from the heroes and monster minis.

My verdict?  I like them.  They are not the quality of some of the resin pieces you can buy, but they are a lot cheaper as well.  They paint up really easily, I will be getting some more done soon (I needed these for the Thursday night D&D group, so they got priority).  There are some pieces that require some work straightening out thinner parts, (the astrolabe in the Wizard's Study is badly bent, I hope it comes out OK as that is a really nice piece).  Given the nature of the plastic, and the cost, that's not surprising, and seems easy to fix.  The pieces have a few mold lines, but not bad ones, except, annoyingly, across the plates in the Treasure set.  In fact I found several of the tables and chairs needed no clean-up at all.

I also like how they are keeping to a 'look'.  The shield on the weapon rack is a Basilean shield, and some of the barricades and rubble piles contain bits easily recognisable as tables or doors from Terrain Crate (or Dungeon Saga) sets.  I was particularly impressed by the coins in the treasure piles; they have an image on them rather than being plain discs.

If you like them, they are now available on the Mantic website here, though the retail packs are different to the kickstarter packs, the tables and chairs are currently only available in the Dungeon Depths mega set.

The photos seem to have worked out better.  It was a simple matter of using my phone rather than my camera.  How technology has come on.

5e Compliant Kobolds

As part of my (very) long term project to paint up minis for D&D, I have just finished a group of kobolds.  Like the Reaper goblins I did a while back, I wanted to accurately represent the equipment that 5E kobolds use.

Left to right; kobold with sling, kobold with 'sword'(back), kobold guard, Scale Sorcerer, kobold with 'sword' (back), Dragonscale, kobold with sling.

Here's the Dragonscale with his fancy shield

In the Monster Manual there are only two types of kobold; ordinary kobolds, armed with slings and daggers (or kobold sized short swords), and urds, basically rock dropping winged versions of the same.  Volo's Guide to Monsters gives three more kinds; the Scale Sorcerer, the Inventor, and the Dragonscale.

The new Reaper Bones kobolds are available in six different variants.  The wizardly type will do nicely as the Scale Sorcerer and the axe throwing kobold can easily be converted to a slinger by removing the held axes and using some greenstuff to make a sling.  I left the axes thrust through his belt, but that's a small detail.  The sword and (literal) board kobold was easiest, I simply carefully removed the wooden shield with a sharp hobby knife and cleaned up the arm a bit.

That left two kobolds in studded armour, both with 'swords' and shields and a spear armed kobold with shield.  The one with sword and shield held in hand became a Dragonscale.  I used greenstuff to give the shield a covering of scales, then carefully cut off the sword, drilled the right hand and then gave him a spear made from copper wire.  (In retrospect, doing the shield last would have been better, as handling the model meant that the scale detail got damaged and had to be resculpted).

I decided to create a new type of kobold.  I wanted a CR 1/2 kobold to balance encounters, and liked the idea of one that used a shield, possibly with the ability to interpose it when its allies are attacked (there is a similar ability for fighters).  It would still use a dagger (or kobold sized sword) and wear no armour.  The spear wielding kobold was good for this, I simply removed the spear and replaced it with the Dragonscale's sword.

Thus out of the six kobolds available I have found a use for five of them, and I think I might try converting the last one into an Inventor.  With the studs shaved off the armour, and some sort of crate or bag covering the shield slung on the back, it should look the part, especially if I can craft some sort of exotic weapon for it to wield, like the scorpion on a stick.  I can't see myself wanting many of these though, so I might end up with a surplus.

The paint jobs were pretty simple, base colours with a highlight followed by a wash of Army Painter Strongtone ink.

I aim to do five lots of the kobolds eventually, the basic troops and the new guard type will have generic paint jobs.  I will paint a Dragonscale and a Scale Sorcerer to represent each colour of chromatic dragon to emphasise their heritage.  That should give me plenty of options for encounters.

As I said before when discussing the gobins, it doesn't really matter how they are equipped.  However, I want the players to learn from their encounters.  Kobolds, like goblins, are low strength and high dexterity, therefore they use weapons that suit those abilities.  It is also a visual clue; using DEX based weapons means they will have good DEX saves, so smart magic using heroes can choose their attacks accordingly.

These kobolds have helped me get out of a bit of a rut.  I have found it difficult to finish minis recently; I seem to want to get more and more complicated with highlights, details, blended shading etc, and when I look at something that has already taken ages, and looks nowhere near finished, I have been putting that project aside.  I was determined to do a very quick paint job on these and get them table ready asap.  I think it worked, and they don't look too bad.

Also, I'm still struggling with photography.  I've tried so many different set ups with lights etc, that I am forced to think it may be the camera (and my lack of understanding of it), not helped by the tumble it and I had on the steps of Bebbanbergh Castle last year.
In essence I can't get a close enough image with enough light to show clear, close detail.  I might be forced to experiment with my phone camera, I understand they are very good now a days.