TTS AAR: Classical Indians versus Siamese (Thai)

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Plenty of time left for a second battle before vanishing off the the Vanquish show. Rob would use his Siamese/Thai again, but I switched to a Classical Indian army, but a Republican version with few elephants, only two-horse chariots, and loads of raw troops.

I lost the deployment but as Rob chose to concentrate his troops on the right side of the battlefield, I could still look to outflank his line on the left with my chariots, the elephants lumbering slowly after them.

I was a bit worried about the block of cavalry and elephants heading down towards the right hand end of my line: it was very much going to be a case of holding them off until the chariots could pounce!

Unlike the last game, my outflanking manouevre arrived in position with almost perfect timing: the chariots could attack the flank of his infantry on the hill while my longbow and javelin men kept the enemy pinned in place from the front.

Unfortunately, Rob’s troops proved quite manouevrable themselves, so I had to abandon the idea of outflanking the troops on the hill, just pinning them in place with javelin-throwing chariots, and concentrate on the other enemy infantry at the bottom of the hill. Here I got into exactly the position I wanted and prepared to wreak havoc!

Meanwhile, however, Rob’s big block of cavalry and elephants had been sweeping forward towards my right flank: defended only by a couple of useful units of javelinmen (in blue), a single unit of chariots, and a couple of units of raw horsemen (in yellow).

Worse, Rob’s other infantry brigade had managed to get away from the centre and had joined his “big push” to the right.

Fortunately for me, Rob’s initial cavalry attack on the far right hand side got bottlenecked by the trees and the edge of the table so that he couldn’t apply his numbers and, even better, one unit of my raw cavalry got the bit between their teeth (see what I did there!) and actually managed to win a combat against their Thai opponents.

An incredibly hard-fought melee broke out all along the line in this sector of the battlefield, with my troops, despite being outclassed, holding their own until the Thai elephants came lumbering out of the forest and smashed them from the field!

But, you ask, what about your outflanking force: surely your troops have by now run over the Thai infantry near the hill and are heading back towards the action to save the day?

Er, no.

An unfortunate double Ace countered my initial advantage, and another hard-fought melee broke out around the hill.

Meanwhile, becasue the combat in the bottom right hand corner was going well for Rob, he was able to divert some of his infantry near their to turn and attack the flank of my line of raw longbowmen (in green) who were still trying to get forward to support the flanking attack.

This looked bad but, with a bit of luck with the cards, the raw longbowmen held firm even if they were all disordered.

I was now starting to win the combat around the hill, largely due to outnumbering the Thai 5:2 in terms of units and had the occasional flank attack advantage, but it was all happening very slowly and, as we have seen, the rest of the Thai were winning in the bottom right hand corner…

Let’s go back to the right where I was now down to only two victory coins remaining…so it was all over if one set of Thai elephants got into my camp, or the other defeated my raw cavalry. This was all very much too close to call!

Luckily, the Thai elephants had obviously exhausted themselves traipsing across the battlefield and slaughtering my troops, so neither managed their allocated tasks.

Two match points saved!

Which, as Rob was also down to his last victory coin, gave me the opportunity to block some enemy Lights from evading and then run over them with my own elephants charging in from the flank.

If you click on the left hand picture below, you can see that the elephants are in position to charge the flank of the Lights in front of them, but the Lights could evade through their infantry on the hill into the empty square on the other side. In the right hand picture, however, you can see that I have moved my javelinmen first (in blue, with the 9 next to them) to block that square. Now when the Nellies charge forward, the Lights have nowhere to evade to and get squashed!

The squishing of the Lights by the Nellies gave me Rob’s last victory coin and a win, but only by the merest scrape of the skin of my teeth!

It had been a magnificent game where my outflanking manouevre had been countered by Rob’s mass assault on my right, where the Thai elephants had wreaked havoc once they had cleared the forest.

A close run and most enjoyable game!

IABSM AAR: Defend the White House

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My afternoon session at this year’s Operation Market Larden event was a game of I Ain’t Been Shot Mum run by Phil and Jenny, using Jenny’s marvelous terrain.

The setting was Arnhem, 1944, and one section of the Oosterbeck perimeter where the British paratroopers tried to hold off part of an SS Division. I would play the Germans, with Vlad as my opponent.

My objective was to take (and hold until the next Tea Break card) a house at the far end of the table: see picture, left, below. At my disposal, I had four platoons of infantry and four armoured vehicles: a Tiger, a StuG, a Panzer III and a SdKfz 251 flak. Against me were four understrength Para platoons with a plethora of both automatic weapons and PIATS.

I believe the key to winning a game of IABSM is to mirror good, historical tactics. Here, the situation demanded a rapid, aggressive advance focused into a schwerpunkt that would allow overwhelming force to be applied every time the enemy was encountered.

I therefore decided to advance my whole force up the Stationsweg road (the one on the left hand side that runs the length of the table) and then cut right at the end to hone in on the objective. I was hoping that by doing this I could initially apply my whole force to only part of his because, as Vlad pointed out, he had the whole table to cover whereas I could choose where to appear.

The opening moves therefore saw me send the first two platoons of infantry (Zugs 1 and 2), accompanied by the StuG, up the sides of the road. The Tiger and Zug 3 would rapidly follow.

The action began very early on, with two squads from Zug 2 rushing the house with the dormer window by the greenhouse on the far left in the picture above. This proved to have a very surprised section of Paras inside on the ground floor, and a sudden melee broke out, easily won by Zug 2 as they had double the numbers.

There was a PIAT team upstairs who managed to fire a round into the Tiger as it took up a position by the house, but luckily all it did was chip the paintwork and rattle the tankers inside! Meanwhile Zug 2 continued its rapid advance: disposing of another section of Paras who were in the next house along. So far, so good!

Meanwhile, two squads from Zug 1 had taken possession of the house on the other side of the road, the other squad rushing forward into the small wood past the two greenhouses.

The squads in the house then watched as a couple of Para blinds advanced towards them, and then used their upstairs vantage point to spot both a 6lb-er anti-tank gun unlimbering in the garden of the house to their front and another platoon of Paras making their way through the copse of trees right underneath the windows. My plan to force the Paras to reveal their positions by needing to move towards my very narrow axis of advance was working!

The anti-tank gun got off a shot at the Tiger, but the round either missed or bounced off its armour, but then Zug 1 let rip and shot half of them down. HE from the Tiger then finished the crew off. Zug 1 then prepared to deal with the Para platoon advancing towards them through the copse.

Back on the road, my SdKfz flak had appeared, and promptly started pumping 20mm cannon shells into a house slightly further into the center of the table (the one with the dead marker on top of it in the picture below). Another Para platoon had been spotted in the house but, for the rest of the game, either the flak or the Panzer III would keep the enemy pinned down with cannon and/or HE fire, effectively taking them out of the action and unable to do anything.

So that was three of the four Para platoons spotted: with one eliminated, one about to be fired on at close range, and one pinned down by cannon/HE fire. One of the two enemy anti-tank guns had also been taken out, and all for the loss of only a handful of infantry.

The remaining Paras then had a bit of a resurgence, with the other anti-tank gun decloaking right at the end of the road perpendicular to the Stationsweg (I think that’s the Graaf van Rechterenweg road: the superb terrain was a more or less exact representation of the actual battlefield, with Phil and Jenny having walked the route and specially commissioned 3D printed buildings to get it just right. Huge kudos to them!).

This managed to get a couple of shots off at the StuG before getting enough HE in return to take it out of the action. All the Paras now had to deal with my armour were PIATS and sticky bombs.

One of the PIATS now made a difference, a the officer in charge of the Para platoon under fire from Zug 1 grabbed said PIAT off one of his squaddies and used a Have A Go Hero card to fire into the SdKfz flak. Incredibly, this survived one round with only a little bit of engine damage, but then the officer moved closer, fired again, and blew it to bits! His success was, however, short-lived, as elements of Zug 4 then rushed forward and captured him.

Meanwhile his platoon had been effectively neutralised by Zug 1 firing from the upstairs windows of the house overlooking the Paras’ position, and the Tiger and Zug 2 had moved further down the Stationsweg road.

Time was now ticking on, so leaving just enough assets to deal with the remaining Paras that I’d spotted, I sent everyone else forward and now curling around to the right in a final advance towards the house that was our objective.

As it advanced forward, the Tiger did have its second brush with death. If you look closely at the picture top right in the gallery above, you’ll see another British officer standing just outside the house in the centre of the photo. He also had a PIAT, and managed to get a couple of shots off at the armoured beast. Luckily for me, they both bounced off the tank’s front armour, and then a barrage of HE fire from the Tiger’s 88mm gun vapourised the poor Para before he could fire again.

Back to the narrative, and the fourth and final Para platoon was spotted lurking behind the objective house. They didn’t want to go into it, as they knew the Tiger would then quickly reduce the house to rubble. They did have another PIAT team, which they sent forward to the hedgeline to engage the big cat. I had now, however, managed to get most of three platoons of infantry forward in preparation for a final push, and fire from one of them shot down the PIAT team before it could fire.

The climax of the game was now upon us, but actually things ended witha bit of a damp squib. I sent a squad of infantry across the road to “occupy” the target house, with a good roll on the dice getting me just inside.

I was hoping this would force the Paras outside to come inside to displace my infantry from their game-winning position, at which point the Tiger would bring the house down on the lot of them (well, I was commanding SS troops) with the rest of my infantry then re-occupying the rubble to take victory, but in fact the Tea Break card arrived almost immediately and that was that!

A great game of IABSM played across a wonderful table set up. My thanks to Phil, Jenny and Vlad for a fantastic afternoon’s gaming.

TTS AAR: Timurids versus Siamese (Thai)

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Time for my Timurids to take the field again, bolstered by my latest spot of painting: some “flaming oxen” courtesy of Ten Kingdoms prints from Micks Bits via Etsy. Their opponents would be the Siamese (Thai) army of good friend Rob.

Unsurprisingly, the Timurids won the scouting, and I used the opportunity to stack most of my cavalry on the left flank, looking to advance quickly, turn and then roll up the enemy line. My main worries were the Thai elephants lurking opposite my cavalry on the right flank - I’d have to keep well away from them - and the massed infantry facing my largely empty centre: if my flank attacks didn’t go in as planned, I could see my camps overrun for a hefty loss of coin.

Once the game began, I advanced quickly across my entire front, and was happy to see at least some of my left-hand flanking force get into position before an unfortunate Ace stopped the rest from following.

On the other flank, I send my Turkoman light cavalry in to harrass the advancing Thai horse, but no arrows found their mark. No worries: all I wanted to do here was to pin the enemy in place whilst my flank attack went in.

But where was the flank attack?

Yes, I now had four units of cavalry behind the right flank of the advancing Thais, but they seemed to have disappeared from view: the rapid Thai advance leaving my outflanking horsemen too far from the action to immediately intervene.

And that rapid Thai advance was now causing me some problems: more elephants pushed some of my lancers backwards; the “flaming cattle” were sent flying from the field without achieving a thing as his infantry pushed forward; and even my right flank was now fully engaged and foundering!

Finally my flanking force appeared but, again, the rapid advance of the Thais meant that had, so far, little effect.

The main melee across the centre of the field continued with the Timurds, despite being somewhat on the back foot, proving that they still had teeth…particularly on my right, where the enemy elephants had been shot down and more lancers had won a duel with their Thai equivalents and returned to smash into the enemy flank.

My flanking force still hadn’t intervened, but my third cavalry command (the one that had started just to the right of the flanking force) finally dealt with the threat of the Thai cavalry and elephants in front of them, turned, and managed to crash into the flank of the still-advancing Thai infantry.

You can see them in the bottom half of the picture below…and, yes, that’s the flanking force above them, still desperately trying to get into position to have some effect on the battle!

Their intervention meant the end of the left-hand Thai infantry command, and my flanking force finally got into contact, hitting the rear of the other Thai infantry command and causing one measely disorder!

The writing was now on the wall for the Thai, but their guard infantry still managed to dispose of the last of the Kharash (driven slaves) and then crash into one of the Timurid camps.

This was, however, too little too late: the lead unit from the outflanking force finally got its act together and crashed into the back of some unfortunate Thai archers sending them, and Rob’s last three coins, reeling from the field.

So, a commanding 14–3 victory for the Timurids in the end, despite how long it took for the flanking attack to make any meaningful impact on the battle. Credit also to Rob: the scoreline hardly reflects just how close he came to turning defeat into victory. His decision to drive his battle line forward so aggressively very nearly neutralised my flank attack altogether, and the single camp he captured could easily have become three — especially if the Kharash hadn’t held out for as long as they did.

Death at the Donga using What a Cowboy!

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My morning session at this year’s Operation Market Larden event was a game of What a Cowboy! translated to the 1879 Zulu War and the death of Louis-Napoléon, the Prince Imperial of France, and only son of Emperor Napoleon III.

Here’s the historical background:

With the outbreak of the Zulu War in 1879, the prince, with the rank of lieutenant, forced the hand of the British military to allow him to take part in the conflict, despite the objections of Rouher and other Bonapartists. He was only allowed to go to Africa by the special pleading of his mother, Empress Eugénie, and by the intervention of Queen Victoria herself. He left England on 27 February 1879 with letters of introduction from the Duke of Cambridge, the British commander-in-chief, in the hope he might be allowed to follow the movements of the troops.

Once he arrived at Durban, he joined the General's Head-Quarters and met Frederic Thesiger, 2nd Baron Chelmsford, the commander in South Africa, on 9 April and was nominally placed on his staff. The prince accompanied Chelmsford on his march into Zululand. Keen to see action and full of enthusiasm, he was warned by Lieutenant Arthur Brigge, a close friend, "not to do anything rash and to avoid running unnecessary risks. I reminded him of the Empress at home and his party in France."

Chelmsford, mindful of his duty, attached the prince to the staff of Colonel Richard Harrison of the Royal Engineers, where it was felt he could be active but safe. Harrison was responsible for the column's transport and for reconnaissance of the forward route on the way to Ulundi, the Zulu capital. While he welcomed the presence of the prince, he was told by Chelmsford that the prince must be accompanied at all times by a strong escort. Lieutenant Jahleel Brenton Carey, a French speaker and British subject from Guernsey, was given particular charge of him. The prince took part in several reconnaissance missions. However, his eagerness for action almost led him into an early ambush when he exceeded orders in a party led by Colonel Redvers Buller.

Despite this, on the evening of 31 May 1879, Harrison agreed to allow the prince to scout in a forward party scheduled to leave in the morning, mistakenly believing that the path ahead was free of Zulu skirmishers.On the morning of 1 June 1879, the troop set out, earlier than intended and without the whole escort, largely owing to the prince's impatience. Led by Carey, the scouts rode deeper into Zululand. Without Harrison or Buller present to restrain him, the prince took command from Carey, even though the latter had seniority. At noon, the prince halted the troop at a temporarily deserted kraal. The prince and Carey made some sketches of the terrain and used part of the thatch to make a fire. No lookout was posted. As they were preparing to leave, about 40 Zulus fired upon them and rushed towards them, screaming. The prince ran to mount his horse and was able to grab onto the holster on the saddle of his horse. The prince's horse then dashed off before he could mount. After about 90 metres (100 yards), the strap the prince was clinging to broke and the horse kicked the prince in the belly, winding him. The prince fell beneath his horse, and his right arm was trampled. He leapt up, drawing his revolver with his left hand, and started to run, but the Zulus outpaced him.

The prince fired three shots from his revolver at his assailants, but he missed each shot. The prince then fired two more shots, albeit slower, in order to better aim. However, these, too, missed. One of the prince's assailants, a Zulu named Langalibalele, threw his spear at the prince, but missed. Another spear, thrown by a Zulu named Zabanga, struck the prince's left shoulder. The prince tried to fight on, wielding the spear thrown by Langalibalele in his right hand and his revolver in his left. However, weakened by his wounds, the prince sank to the ground and was overwhelmed. Zabanga stabbed the prince again with an assegai, followed by Gwabakana; and then the prince suffered a final blow from Klabawathunga – who stabbed the prince in the right eye – penetrating the prince's brain and killing him.

Two troopers of the Natal Native Horse, Abel and Rogers, as well the Zulu guide accompanying them, died with the prince during the Zulu ambush. Carey and the four surviving men came together about 50 yards (50 m) from where the prince made his final stand but did not fire at the Zulus. Carey led his men back to camp. The prince's body was recovered the next day. After a court of inquiry, a court-martial, and intervention by Empress Eugénie and Queen Victoria, Carey returned to his regiment. Carey died in Bombay on 22 February 1883.

The game would begin at the moment the Zulus are first spotted, and I would play Lieutenant Carey and Trooper George Rogers. As you can see in the picture on the left, below, both my characters began the game stuck in the goats’ corral!

Subsequent discussions with other people who have played the game have led me to understand that the way to win is to all work together to hold off the Zulus as a single body, but when the chits for my characters eventually appeared, last out of the bag, I discovered that everyone else in the party had just run for their lives, every man for themselves!

Trooper Rogers ran out of the corral towards his horse, Lieutenant Carey climbed over the corral’s wall. The pics below show how far we all had to go (the other side of the donga to the left) and the position as the first of the Zulus arrived.

There was then a mad scramble for the horses, with about half the characters, including Trooper Rogers, managing to get on board and kick for the donga. Lieutenant Carey was last out of the bag again, and was almost overwhelmed by Zulus immediately. He was badly wounded by a thrown spear, but managed to shoot one of the Zulu indunas (chiefs) dead with his trusty army service revolver. Carey then managed to get onto a horse but, perhaps crucially, hadn’t managed to check or tighten the girth!

Carey was almost caught immediately, but managed to shoot another Zulu dead and urge his mount into a canter. Unfortunately, all this delay had given the Zulus time to close in, and Carey was wounded again and fell from his horse. The fall stunned him, and before he could rise, the enemy was upon him and he was killed!

But what of Trooper Rogers? Well he had managed to outpace the Zulus and had reached the donga safely. In front of him was the Prince Imperial, who was now on foot having lost his seat whilst trying to jump his mount down into the rought ground of the dry river bed.

Rogers dismounted and began to lead his horse through the donga. Unfortunately, the horse shied at a patch of water and bolted almost straight into the Prince Imperial, who promptly mounted Rogers’ horse and rode off!

Typical royalty!

The game ended with Rogers jogging after the Prince Imperial, hoping that the Zulus were too busy ritually disembowelling his erstwhile comrades to give chase!

A terrific game: full of action and excitement. The players managed to extricate five of our eight characters, including the Prince Imperial, which surely counts as a victory of some sort!

I was sorely disappointed that Carey hadn’t survived: I thought it was all over almost as soon as the game began, but had begun to hope he might live after he had shot down the Zulu induna…but it was not to be. As for the Prince Imperial stealing Trooper Rogers’ horse…words fail me!

My thanks to Simon, the gamesmaster, and the other players: Chris, Dave and Ty. A great morning’s gaming.

Operation Market Larden

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A few weeks ago I drove to Evesham for the twelth Operation Market Larden Lardy games day.

As always, the tables looked excellent with a great mix of custom terrain and miniatures. I played in two quality games—one in the morning and one in the afternoon, AAR to follow - and it was great to catch up with everyone, even if I couldn’t stay on for the traditional curry in the evening.

Here’s a round-up of most, if not all, the games on show:

As always, huge thanks to Ade for organising the event, and to all the gamesmasters and players, especially those unlucky enough to be saddled with me!

I’m already looking forward to OML13!

Ewelme '26 Game Four: Galatians versus (a different lot of) Palmyrans

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With one loss and two wins already under my belt, it was on to the final game at this year’s Ewelme tournament. I’d be fighting Palmyrans again, but this time under Dillon’s able generalship.

As I’d beaten them in the last game by putting all my cavalry on one flank and refusing the other, I decided that that’s what I’d try again. I mean, it had worked last time, so what could possibly go wrong?

As the game began, my horsemen shot forward and immediately engaged the enemy. This worked well, as I routed one unit of Palmyran cataphracts and my cavalry penetrated deep up the right flank, preparing to turn and roll up the enemy line.

Things were not, however, going so well on the left and in the centre. In the last game, the Palmyrans had initially held back a bit, giving me a chance to develop my outflanking manoeuvre on the right. Not so in this game: the enemy shot foward and my warbands were soon under some pressure, particularly on the far left.

No matter: the plan was still viable, and I could now turn my cavalry and drive into the Palmyran left flank.

Well that’s what should have happened, but Lady Luck intervened and decided that my troops deserved a hefty kick in the fork!

Now I know that some people think that I blame the cards for every one of my defeats, but I would maintain that my luck in TTS competitions is, at best, erratic. It’s not always bad (those of you who have been paying attention will remember that in the last game I drew a 4/5/6/7 for consecutive activations giving me three flank attacks against an unwitting enemy unit) but on this occasion it was not just bad…it was the pits, man!

Ready to turn my cavalry and send them into the Palmyran flank, I drew seven cards in a row with none higher than a 2. Let me say that again: seven cards in a row, none higher than a two.

Don’t believe me? Here’s the evidence:

A quick reminder of the stats. That’s a probability of:

P = 16/80 ​× 15/79 ​×14/78 ​× 13/77 x 12/76 ​× 11/75 ​× 10/74​

Which works out to approximately: 0.00000536

So the odds are about:

  • 0.000536%

  • or roughly 1 in 186,000

This pause in the action gave the Palmyrans time to recover from my right flank assault, consolidate, then capitalise on their success against my left and centre, and before long one of my cmaps was taken and I suffered a 69-165 defeat!

So kudos to Dillon for riding out my initial assualt and focusing on what was important: knocking my three-coin warbands and/or camps off the table. A well-taken victory for him.

Disappointing, but my two big victories in games two and three still meant that I finished in fourth place overall in the tournament. Here are the full results:

 

One consolation, though: my army did win the prize for the Best Presented Army, even if I did have to vote for them myself!

Thanks to Peter for organising (and congrats on another big win) and to all my opponents throughout the event. I highly recommend the TTS tournament circuit to everyone: lots of fun games in a competitive but very friendly environment. Here are the rest of the year’s fixtures:

  • To The Smallest (15mm): July, Cardiff

  • British Open at Britcon: August, Leicester

  • TTS at Colours: September, Newbury

  • TTS Open at Warfare: November, Farnborough

  • Two the Strongest (Doubles): December, London (TBC)

Ewelme '26 Game Three: Galatians versus Palmyrans

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My third game at this year’s Ewelme To The Strongest tournament was against Adrian’s Palmyrans: legionaries and cataphracts, gulp!

Learning from my previous games and a discussion on tactics from Mr Butler, I massed my cavalry on one wing, intending to blast through any enemy there whilst my warbands held up any advance against my centre and left.

As I’d lost the scouting, the game began with the Palmyrans advancing aggressively. As planned, I sent my horsemen forward on the right flank, and they soon secured an excellent position from which to roll up the enemy’s main battleline.

Adrian had, meanwhile, been a bit unlucky with his activations on the other side of the table: his nasty superheavy cavalry and mincing-machine legionaries not yet in a position to cause me any trouble on the left.

Even better, my warbands in the centre had taken full advantage of the need for the Palmyrans to deal with my cavalry coming in from the right, with one (led by their general) bursting through the main enemy line.

Adrian diverted some of his heavy infantry to deal with this warband, but an amazing run of cards meant that the usually cumbersome deep unit pivoted neatly in place and charged the flank of some Palmyran heavies not once, not twice but three times in the same turn!

More decent cards also saw my cavalry properly curling in from the right to achieve total domination of that sector of the tabletop.

This was too much for the Palmyrans to take: the loss of the heavy infantry being the final nail in their coffin with my Galatians winning a massive 186-21 victory!

So a cracking win due, in part, to the cards…but I’ll take that as I’ve so often been on the other end of Lady Luck’s tender ministrations!

Painting Challenge: End June Update

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Lots of entries submitted, so time for another update.

First up, we have Bill with some more cracking buildings for the Caribbean plus the troops to go with them. Plenty more in his gallery, so make sure you check it out via the NavBar, above.

Next is Mr Helliwell, also with a combination of figures and terrain. Here I’ve just shown his two terrain collections: you can see the individual pieces in his gallery, along with the troops he sent in as well.

Stumpy has been re-basing orcs:

Whilst Carole has been painting more spearmen for Midgard.

Next up is Dex, with some troops for Burma:

Mervyn reports that he’s very hot (in the temperature sense!) but has still managed to send in some Genoese mercenary types:

And finally Mr Burt has sent in some Brits for his FSJs to fight:

Keep them coming!

More Celts and the first Chinese

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I needed a few bits and pieces to finish off my Celts.

First up were the casualty figures: unfortunately important the way I play! These are 3D prints from 3D Breed’s March or Die range printed by Bunker Miniatures.

These are great figures. I especially like the chaps with the spear sticking up out of them, and the mailed warrior with a sword but without his head! I even managed to use up the last few cloaks I had lying around and, yes, the figure underneath is fully painted.

Next up are some light infantry with slings: a troop type I will need when I field the Celts as Ancient British. I very much like the way the 3D Breed designs have translated into 28mm: very chunky figures, almost cubist in nature. They paint up very easily and are nicely posed. One slight issue: I always thought of the Celtic slingers as Iouantoues (youths) and these are definitely not that…I mean, check out the balding figure in the red and white stripes!

These size reasonably well with the Victrix figures that make up most of my army: only very slightly shorter even if they are quite a bit chunkier.

Finally we have one of the 3D Breed’s specials: one of the two druids that they offer. The other is more of a generic holy man with knife figure, so I’ve saved him for another use. The chap below is another antler-wearing ‘Herne the Hatstand’ so fits well with the general theme of my Celts. Lovely figure: paints up easily.

All the above are painted with Contrast paints on a Grey Seer undercoat, with any highlights etc done using standard acrylics. The cloaks are highly recommended and are from Weave of War.

Finally in today’s bulletin, we have the first bits of a 15mm Han Chinese army: three units of Billmen armed with the dagger-axe, and four units of Spearmen armed with, er, spears. These are Lurkio figures from the range now being made available again from Gripping Beast, with the command and standard anachronistically coming from Ten Kingdom’s Song Chinese range via Micks Bits on Etsy.

It was a bit odd painting relatively old school 15mm metal figures again after spending so much time on plastic and 3D printed 28mm figures, but I think they have turned out okay.

I will say that this project very much demonstrated the difference between metal casts and 3D prints: the 3D prints have much more animation in them, looking better overall even if the extra detail sometimes makes them more difficult to paint. I would have gone 3D printed Song all the way, but wanted an earlier Chinese army that can pass for Spring, Warring States, Han, Three Kingdoms etc. Once the Han are finished, I’ll probably eventually end up doing enough Song units to convert the army into a later Chinese army anyway!

Note that these are based ten to a 75mm frontage base (FK&P2 from Big Red Bat), which means I can now field three units of Billmen/Spearmen on a 15cms grid (two bases together) or six units of Billmen/Spearmen on a 10cm grid (one base). The standards are coloured in pairs (green, yellow, blue, red) to make pairing them easy.

Next up are three units of Crossbowmen, so another 60 figures in total. I think I might need some more red paint!

Ewelme '26 Game Two: Galatians versus Principate Romans

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Still reeling after my devastating loss to the Tuaregs in game one, my fourth loss in a row with the Galatians, my lads now faced a powerful Principate (Early Imperial) Roman army. I was not looking forward to this: the Roman mincing machine was built to defeat Celts!

The only area where I did enjoy superiority was in terms of cavalry, so I opted to deploy all my horsemen on one wing, hoping to overwhelm their Roman equivalents as fast as possible then turn into the centre.

The battle began with the Roman army moving forward like space invaders.

In reply, to conform to my plan, I hung back on the left, but advanced forward on the right, my cavalry in particular shooting forward in a card-induced raggedy fashion, eager to bring their opponents to battle!

The two cavalry forces met in a thunderous clash. Despite their ragged advance, my men held firm against the initial charge before steadily driving the outnumbered Romans backwards. Yet this was no easy victory; the Roman veterans fought with grim determination and proved exceptionally difficult to break.

Meanwhile, back in the centre, a bit of luck with the cards (well, a bit of unluck for Dave) had seen the Roman line effectively break into two parts, each of which I could hopefully destroy before closing in on the rest.

On the left, where my objective was really only to pin the enemy in place, a brutal grinding melee erupted. Much to my surprise, my warriors initially gained the upper hand, driving back a Roman Cohort and wiping out a unit of Auxilia.

The Romans fought back hard, however, and honours were very much even by the time things were decided elsewhere on the field, although some Sagittarii were now threatening the Lights guarding the camp.

On the right, my superior numbers did indeed start to come into play, with the victorious cavalry then joining the infantry to drive back a mix of Roman Legionaries and Lights.

Again my infantry proved very successful in combat, one warband bursting through the enemy line and heading straight for their camp.

And it was this warband that won the game for the Galatians: taking the enemy camp and the Romans’ last few coins for a 168-79 victory.

So a first victory for the Galatians: a hard-fought affair as you would expect facing such a powerful opponent.

On to game three, where I would need another big win to salvage my hopes of a respectable finish!

Ewelme '26 Game One: Galatians versus Tuareg

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The theme for this year’s Ewelme tournament was Africa and the Middle-East. I could have fielded my usual Venetians Abroad, but as I now had just enough of my new Celts to make up a Galatian army, that was what I decided to field. I even finished them in time to have three practice games prior to the event, but as I lost all three battles (and two of them badly!) I wasn’t feeling too confident of success.

My first game was against Steve’s Tuaregs: an army comprised mostly of lance-armed camelry. I lost the scouting, deployed, and watched as the Arabs came forward.

It’s always bad to surrender the initiative to the enemy, and so it proved here as Steve’s first action of the game was to neatly pick off the Galatian cavalry on the far left of my line with a unit of his camels: their bonus in defence against my horsemen being irrelevant as my chaps were immediately blasted off the table without any chance to fight back.

This set an unfortunate pattern for the game as, certainly for the first few turns, Steve couldn’t miss a hit and I couldn’t save a thing!

The Tuaregs also came forward on my other wing, where my other cavalry there were also soon under huge pressure.

There was a glimmer of hope when my flank march arrived shortly after this, but the Tuareg had so many units that they could spare a couple to bottle up my horsemen, and all that happened was that I eventually lost a few more coins, although we were both quite surprised at how long the Galatian horse ended up lasting!

Steve’s tactics were now obvious: avoid my fanatical warbands and win the game by destroying my vulnerable-to-camels cavalry. This worked very well for the Tuareg, especially given the cards we were pulling, and with both commands of Galatian horse defeated and off the table, I was soon down twelve of my fourteen victory medals.

I did have a little success with my infantry, but nothing to write home about, and it wasn’t long before I was handing over my last two medals for a heavy 31-150 defeat!

Well I have to say that that was a brilliantly executed, textbook victory for Steve, with my only consolation being that I had plenty of time to look at the other games being played!

One game down and three to go, and it looked like being dark clouds over Ewelme for the Galatians!

TTS AAR: Galatians versus the Scandanavian Leidang

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With the Ewelme tournament coming up fast (Ed’s note: by the time this report gets published, it will have been and gone. Doubtless a trophy is now adorning my mantlepiece…) I needed some more practice with the Galatians I was intending to use, especially as their first two outings had resulting in a couple of stuffings of epic proportions! I therefore persuaded friend John to bring his Scandanavian Leidang types over to my place for a game.

Once deployed, the Galatians still looked very impressive, and I was very much hoping that this goregeousness would translate into military success, especially as it looked as if I could overlap the quasi-Vikings on the right. I duly advanced forward strongly…

The Scandies turned some of their troops towards my flanking force, and I was thinking that I could attack their left from two sides but, somehow, my coordinated assault failed to go in at the right time and I ended up losing my flanking cavalry to, of all things, some Viking light infantry archers! I’m still not sure how I let this opportunity slip through my hands!

My cavalry on the other flank weren’t having a very good time either. I think I’m used to having my Venetians Abroad knights on the wings, and thus being able to largely ignore missile fire, so have suffered bady when trying to use mere cavalry in the same way!

Looking back at the photos, I am also struck by how ragged my line looks compared to the solid mass of the enemy. This is obviously something I will have to watch out for in future!

Back to the action.

On the left, I sorted out my battered battle line, and advanced forward to take the wood that looked to be key to the Leidang position. Unfortunately, three Galatian warbands failed to dislodge the one unit of Huscarls occupying said wood, and that was that opportunity gone as the Vikings reinforced and I failed to make any further progress…

…so it was on the right where the battle would be decided.

Both sides had by now taken large amounts of casualties, and we were rapidly approaching a sudden death situation, where the next side to lose a significant unit would lose the battle. I still had a bit of an advantage, and had the potential to take the enemy camp, but somehow I just couldn’t get the cards I needed and the initiative swung to the Vikings.

Now when my deep units had tried to manoeuvre around the battlefield, I hadn’t managed to pull the cards I needed. Not so John, who neatly pivoted a deep unit of Bondi onto the flank of one of my warbands, hitting twice and polishing them, and my last three medals off!

So another loss for the Galatians: making three in a row! Let’s hope it goes better on the day.

(Ed’s note: I won’t bother to clear a space in the trophy cabinet then…)

Well they looked good advancing forward!

FK&P AAR: Scots versus Swedes!

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John and I both fancied a game of For King & Parliament, but couldn’t decide what to play. I definitely wanted to play my Scots Covenantor force, but also wanted to get some of my lesser used units onto the table as well. The solution was to fight a very unhistorical and ungeographical battle between the Scots Covenantors and a Swedish army from about the same period!

View from behind the Swedish Lines

View from behind the Scottish Lines

The battle opened with both sides advancing strongly forward. The Swedes had vastly superior numbers of cavalry concentrated on the wings, and their infantry in two lines in the centre.

The Scots had matched the Swedes in terms of cavalry deployment i.e. some on either wing, but there were far fewer of them and their horses were all poor mounts. They had about as many ‘line’ infantry as the Swedes, but positioned in one long line in the centre. Finally, there was a brigade of Highlanders on the left, and we’d be using the enhanced Highlander rules from the Celtic handbook.

The action began on the left, where one unit of Swedish horse (literally and as a description!) had got overexcited and pulled forward in fron tof its colleagues. This was too good an opportunity for the nearby Scottish lancers to resist, and they hopped the hedge in front of them and engaged.

The resultant melee took most of the rest of the game to ressolve but, somewhat surprisingly, ended in victory for the Scots lancers and, although their horses were badly blown, the survivors headed (slowly!) into the centre of the field to see what damage they could do there.

On the right wing, the terrain was much heavier: a hedge and nearby grove of trees forming a bit of a bottleneck. The Scots used their Pistoliers and some supporting infantry to hold up the Swedes: a bold advance isolating the Swedish dragoons from their horseholders and causing the Swedish Cuirassiers some trouble.

Although the Scots horsemen would effectively hold up the Cuirassiers for the whole game, the rest of the Swedish horse did eventually manage to break through the Scottish infantry, but with casualties heavy on both sides.

So with the clashes on the left ending in favour of the Scots, and the clashes on the right ending really honours even with the Swedes having a slight positional advantage, the battle would be decided in the centre.

Here the Swedes had again advanced strongly, and soon the first line of Swedish infantry and the Scottish pike and shot units were engaged in a furious melee. The Swedes of their first line were pike-heavy, so favoured charging in against the Scots who were happy to hold back and double-fire as much as possible.

A Scottish battalia to the left broke, but fortunately there were commanded shot and highlanders to plug the gap.

The Scots were now fully committed, at which point the Swedes brought up their second line. Rolling volleys crashed across the infantry, punctuated with fierce charges into melee. The action swayed backwards and forwards as battalia were gradually worn down.

Either side could have won the centre, but it was the Swedes who actually gave way first, especially as their troops could see the remains of the Scottish lancers ambling slowly towards their rear, their tired ponies puffing and blowing as their riders flailed fruitlessly at their flanks.

First one Swedish battalia gave way, then another, until suddenly the centre looked almost empty of fighting men. The day belonged to the Scots!

An epic battle which, right until the very end, could have gone either way. The Swedish cavalry had actually broken through the right hand side of the Scottish line, but had been held up for long enough for their infantry to be beaten in the centre, despite the fact that the pike-heavy “Swedish” infantry (as opposed to the “German” standard infantry) had proved very effective in melee.

Plaudits to the Scottish cavalry on both wings who, despite being mounted on little better than nags, managed to give their opponents a very bloody nose, and to the Scottish infantry, who held on just long enough to win the day.

A great game.

Painting Challenge: mid-June update

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Technically a little early perhaps, but here are the latest entries to this year’s Challenge.

First up we have new participant Bill, whose initial entry includes figures for expanding his 28mm Hundred Years War Midgard armies; two complete 15mm platoons (one British, one American Airborne) for Chain of Command; and a couple of bits of scenery. I especially love the Caribbean distillery:

Keeping on a Midgard theme, Carole has been painting Wargames Atlantic conquistadors for a Fantasy Empire army. Here we have great swordsmen, halbardiers and a couple of units fo sword-and-buckler men.

Time for Mr Helliwell’s usual influx of painted goodness: there’s more medieval types, a handful of Romans, some 15mm Napoleonic cavalry and even a couple of 3D fantasy prints. You can see his gallery (and, indeed, everyone else’s) by using the NavBar, above: there’s plenty more than shown below…

Next up are more WW2 vehicles from Dex: everything he’s painted since his last holiday. There are Kangaroos and a selection of Frenchies: all 3D prints, and all for Chain of Command.

And finally a couple of singleton shots: ACW (or similar) artillery limbers from Stumpy, and German Fallschirmjaeger from Mr Burt:

That’s all for now, but do keep the coming. Believe it or not, we’re almost half way through the year already!

Fanatics ≠ Archers - Again

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With our first game taking not very long at all, Peter and I had plenty of time for a second. I’ll let him tell the story again:

Peter writes…

In our second Galatian vs Western Sudanese battle, Rob deployed his camp slightly off centre to my left and surrounded it with his scary hairy warbands. He then deployed one cavalry command to my left of that and the other way off on my right.

So I again used my camp as a hardpoint on my left flank garrisoned by an entire command of archers to counter any possible attack by his cavalry on that flank.

I then deployed another command of archers centrally to create an interlocking field of fire in the middle. On my right I deployed my only cavalry command supported by a full infantry command to face his single cavalry command.

The Battle Begins

On that right flank I quickly marched forward with my 8 units and 22 arrows facing 2 units and 4 javelins. The numbers quickly showed and Rob’s command was quickly disordered and surrounded.

In the centre I advanced my massed bows to create interlocking fields of fire directly in front of his warbands. This deterred them from advancing.

Just as they were deciding they were fanatical enough to charge forward, Rob attempted to drag his cavalry on my left, that were facing my well garrisoned camp, into the centre enroute to supporting his outnumbered cavalry command on my right.

However this blocked the advance if his warbands and the combination of rough terrain, hesitant unwieldy warbands and intimidating fields of fire quickly turned into a log-jam with the cavalry baulking at entering rough terrain, and his unwieldy warbands both getting in the way and still reluctant to advance into the interlocking fields of fire.

The Battle Continues

On my right, Robs outnumbered, outflanked and unsupported cavalry quickly caved in allowing me to threaten the flanks of his central warbands.

At this stage I advanced my camp garrison out into the main battle area and started to shoot into the flanks of his bogged down cavalry and the still reluctant warbands.

Before long the constant rain of arrows in the middle and the cavalry attacks into his flank was enough to conclude the battle.

Conclusion

Every battle with Rob is always enjoyable and good fun, especially when we are both trying out new armies. In this case Rob’s conclusion was that Galatians don't like being shot at and so my Nigerian army almost exclusively of archers was his worst nightmare.

It does show that sometimes massed archery can work although like me, most TtS players have experienced disappointing and unreliable volleys from massed bowmen. And I know from my personal experience at the World’s that sometimes it's the enemy’s raw LI/javelin that throws its one javelin and kills off both your wounded verteran cataphract and its heroic senior general!

That’s all part of the joy of TtS and means that whatever situation you are ever in, never give up, because your opponent might just fail the save and give you a last minute victory!

My Comments

Well that didn’t work out very well, did it!

I still need to find a way to get my fanatics into combat without being shot to pieces by massed archers; and need to remember how difficult it is (on a competition-size table) to switch a command from one side of the field to the other: the table-size is designed to get a result not allow for anything other than micro-tactical manoeuvers.

That’s two games in a row without a win for my Galatians!

Fanatics ≠ Archers

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With enough Celts now painted to have a game, I was keen to get them onto the tabletop. Perhaps unwisely, my first opponent was Peter, winner of almost every To The Strongest competition he enters.

The first incarnation I tried was the Celts as fanatical Galatians: an army comprised of six units of deep fanatics and some cavalry. I’ll let Peter tell you what happened…

Peter writes:

I love experimenting with new armies, new troop type combinations and new tactics and seeing how well they perform, either as an official tournament army or with slight variations to stress test their full potential.

I’ve been inspired by a Nigerian CEO mentoring client who told me about the fascinating medieval history of his nation including Mansa Musa who is, relatively speaking, the richest man who has ever lived, far outpacing the likes of Gates, and Musk through his extraordinary gold mines. Although beware any email from his 20 times great grand son who claims to have found his inheritance down a mine!

Anyway…

So I created a Western Sudanese Nigerian army and fought two battles against my good friend Rob, who wanted to test out his brand new Galatian hordes with gorgeous tartan cloaks.

Essentially an army of archers fighting against hordes of hairies.

In our first battle Rob deployed his hordes in the middle with cavalry protecting each flank. I deployed my archers centrally with my small cavalry command on my left and my camp as a hard point protecting my right flank.

The Plan

My plan had 3 components …

  1. To have a melee free stand off in the middle whilst peppering him with arrows.

  2. To draw Rob’s cavalry command on my right forward into a killing zone surrounded by archers in my camp and nearby woods.

  3. To win the whole battle on my left with a combined arms attack of cavalry and massed archery, around two woods that would constrain and frustrate both his cavalry and his deep warbands.

The Battle Starts

On my left I pushed forward with all my cavalry supported by several bow units. This sucked his cavalry and three warbands forward, with a bloodlust to crush my impertinent bowman.

I then manoeuvred my three mounted units against just one of Robs and moved four archer units just into range to pour arrows into his other cavalry unit and three deep warbands that were struggling to manaouvre around the two woods. The deep hairies were also attempting to swerve right to avoid the interlocking field of fire of yet more of my formed bowmen on top of a central defensive hill. This led them into a very constricted area between the two woods where their lack of manoeuvrability bogged them down into in-action and created a traffic jam. In an attempt unblock this cloggage one unit of fanatics chased some annoying archers into a wood getting delightfully entangled in the vegetation. Not ideal for a deep unit.

Meanwhile in the middle I selectively advanced more bowmen into range to annoy his central wall of warriors who chose to stand and take it, presumably scared that their naked private parts may get skewered by my arrows if they charged me. This stand off suited me as I had 14 points of bowmen holding up 44 points of warbands. Inevitably this meant I had superiority elsewhere on the battlefield.

On my right I advanced and then retreated my apparently helpless archers to tempt Rob’s cavalry forwards into my killing zone. Sure enough one cavalry unit fell for the trap whilst the other, luckily helped by poor cards, decided discretion was the batter part of valor and held back - abandoning their mates to a porcupine death.

The Plan Unfolds

Back on my left I had outflanked one of his cavalry units but despite multiple frontal and flank attacks it survived against the odds. So using the 3rd “P” of my 7 “P” wargaming principles – “Pranking and Surprise”, I unexpectedly pivoted and manoeuvred two of my mounted units to charge Robs exposed and very surprised warband flanks. The bulky naked Galatians stuck between the woods couldn’t react in time and quickly collapsed.

This left the lone warband that had now extracted itself out of the “fire pan” of the wood into the “fire” of being surround by 3 formed bow units, one in front, one on the flank and one behind. With a likely 10 attack cards every turn the outcome was surely inevitable?

Back on my far right, the interlocking fields of fire easily took out the lone cavalry unit that had got too excited and isolated without any cover or support.

The End Is Nigh!

Eventually in the middle the four big Galatian warbands decided at last to risk their surprisingly small private parts by advancing towards my bowmen - who instantly started to edge backwards. But it was too late. On my left the surrounded warband succumbed to repeated double volleys from behind (to get the -1 save), and being charged from the flank. As both Galatian flanks collapsed they gave up enough medals for my plucky (did you see what I did there?) Nigerian archers to win an almost casualty free outright victory in just over 60 minutes.

Lessons Learned

  1. Massed bowmen CAN be deadly even in TtS - provided you keep them out of melee against superior melee troops.

  2. The 3rd “P” - Pranking and Surprising your opponent with unanticipated tactics can be deadly!

  3. Overlapping fields of fire in an Agincourt style killing zone, can be devastating especially when focussed on foolhardy individual targets and can also scare off even superior yet hesitant enemies.

  4. When you have inferiority - slowly back away. When you have superiority use it or lose it!

  5. Experimenting with unusual armies is fun and can unearth some real gold!

  6. The Western Sudanese Nigerian army is the first Sub Saharan army I have ever seen used in TtS and is well worth an experiment or two!

  7. Plans don’t always work, but it’s better to have one than not.

Anyway, that was the first battle of two.

My Comments

Although I might quibble with some of the above, it was indeed a masterful demonstration of how to use mass archers against fanatics. Indeed, I’ve done something similar with crossbows against Ikko-Ikki in the past.

Peter’s mounted units did do a lot of damage but, to be fair and as you’ll see in the pictures below, this was as much to do with the fact that the first two cards my horsemen drew for the first two turns were Aces. My fault for not following Trevor’s Rule - always move the general first!

I certainly found the combination of deep units and an 8+ save a challenge: but one I will work on for the future! Here are my pictures of the game: