Magnificent (?) Seven

This is how the newly rebased reptiles are likely to appear on the table, next time my Blood Gorged Lizardmen God of Battles army takes to the field.

It may happen as soon as tomorrow, if I decide to let my dead warriors rest, and instead field the cold-blooded hordes.

GoB: Lizardmen Temple Guards / Blood Gorged Brute Watchers Rebased

Finally got the rebasing job finished on these. As you can see, being part of a second hand lot has not been kind to the paint - but they still look well enough om the table to be fielded (and with the new washer bases, I do not need to wrap them in soft tissue for storage, anymore).

As with the Skink Shaman, I am not going to decorate the bases further - finished to this stage, bases look absolutely fine on the table, and if I should decide to strip and repaint any or all of these, the bases will have to be redone, anyway.

I need to finish painting the new base on a Mummy, then I can go back to Santa's assistant and slap some more paint on her, just in time for Christmas!

GoB: Skink Shaman Rebased

Finished rebasing this guy earlier today (flock glue had to dry before taking pictures).

Before somebody starts moaning about the paintjob quality (or lack thereoff), let me say that this was part of one of the second-hand lots I bought this late summer/autumn.

I am not going to spend any tufts or other 'advanced' base decoration on it, as I may someday want to strip and repaint it (but this is not that day!), which is likely to ruin the base, so it just got he quick 'army unit' basejob.

GoB: Re-basing Some Temple Guards.

Ever since I purchased the two big lots of painted Lizardmen, I have been wanting to rebase all the metal minis, as otherwise I have to keep rolling them in soft paper tissue when stowing them away, as metal minis on plastic slotta-bases topple over far too easily, and even though the paintjobs are not great, and the minis do have some wear and tear, I do not plan to strip and re-paint tham within any overseeable future.

Thus, I have started the re-basing process with the first unit of Temple Guards/Brute Watchers.

I am going to play a 36 points battle with my Lords of Undeath against Kevin's Orcs this upcoming Saturday, and I have another appointment with him on December 19th where I expect to play with my Blood Gorged/Lizardmen, so I have to get these ready!

More Ancient Temple Guards

I just recently came across this batch, complete with shields and spear-arms. Nice catch, but a job-lot, as, obviously, I am going to have to clean and paint them from scratch.

Attic Attack IV: Day 2, God of Battles

Ulrik and Kevin had a go at God of Battles, Ulrik commanding his LotR Dwarves, Kevin taking control over my slightly re-configured Lizardmen army-

The Reptiles advanced in force on the central rock pass.

The Skink Archer company was annihilated by the Dwarven elites...

...but then the saurus Ravagers got stuck in - and made minced meat of the Dwarves!

It was getting late, and Kevin had to leave soon, and with his main unit (and Priest) gone, Ulrik was not very keen on fighting on, so we left it at that.

The beads were marking Miracles on the units, by the way, in case you wonder.

Currently, I am spending all my spare time in the garden, as the weather suddenly turned almost summer-like thi week, so I do not know if I shall have any gaming related news for a while, but if we get some rainy days, I should be able to continue work on my Company of Heroes for Blood Eagle (LotR Fellowship characters), so stay tuned!

Attic Attack IV: Day 2, Dragon Rampant

This is likely to be the last Dragon Rampant AAR from my hand you will ever see, but I shall return to that subject further down the page.

Ulrik and Tobias played a game with my two 35 points warbands (I wanted a slightly bigger game than the one at Åcon).

The Elves advanced rather timidly, while the reptiles hurried forward.

At this point, Prince Arodon began a long series of Wild Charges which lasted for the most of the reminder of the battle.

The Lizardmen struggled to get through a lot of rough terrain on their right flank.

The current state of affairs is not really reflecting the flow of the game.
At this point, Ulrik (Lizardmen) had missed his first activation roll 4 or 5 times, and the only reason why the Elves did not control more of the battlefield was the very cautios advance made by Tobias.

A lot of Wild Charging and fighting on the Elves' left flank.

The Swordmasters cut through, first the Temple Guards, then the Saurus warriors, leaving only a few weak units for the Lizardmen to retreat.

Ulrik had the same kind of bad experience with this his first game with the 'Rampant' rules as I had with Lion Rampant, failing a lot of Activation Rolls, and seeing his battered units just withering away without any chance of rallying, and I have decided that Lion Rampant is going on the 'tried and rejected' shelf for now. It had its chance, but failed.

We are going to revive SAGA, and try out A Fantastic SAGA (fan-made fantasy rules add-on), and the High Elves at least (but probably the Lizardmen as well, as I have droves of unused models) will be re-configured to fit that system (I may have to find a few more painted models, or, alternatively, paint up some myself *shudder*).

I may also make a Blood Eagle warband out of some of the models, to have more variety at my disposal.

2016-08-07 God of Battles 40 Points Half Game, Part 2

As promised, the rest of the AAR from Sunday's half-game.

The Dwarf Priest got to work.

One of my center units moved forward...

...was shot at, managed to roll 1 save (on 10 dice), lost 3 and recoiled. This was the point when I started to lose heart.

My right flank advanced.

Some of the Dwarves started to move around the ruined watchtower.

Although I had covered the most ground by now, my battle-line began to look a little jagged.

A  view from my far left flank.

Some Dwarves moved up to counter my flank attack...

...and my Skinks poured a volley of arrows into them, killing... one.

Ulrik then used his Stratagem to re-activate them, attacking the Saurus Warriors. As the reptiles had the Berserk Blessing, they got the chance to strike twice, before the melee ended. They killed a whuppin'... one(!) Dwarf.

The Dwarven archers then opened up on my Saurus Ravagers, inflicting 3 hits. My former experience with Defense rolls led me to use my Standard for an extra 2+ chance for a save, rolling 11 dice. I just barely managed to save the 3 hits on the normal Defense dice - and, of course, the Standard die rolled a 1, losing me the Standard Bearer never the less. Makes sense only if you are me..

The next Turn opened with nother fight on the extreme right, causing another whuppin' ONE Dwarf casualty. Yay! I think I even used my Stratagem to but I am not suer. I had used it before Ulrik used his, which proved fatal for one of my units.

I now did what would probably have proven a big mistake, should we have played the battle to the very end: I started abandoning my initial plan to surge forward and engage the enemy as soon as possible, and instead I drew units away from the centre and started 'tunnelling' them over the flanks to avoid the arrows from the centrally placed archer unit.

The reason for my decision was probably that I was a little shaken by my bad luck, and the bowfire causing casualties every time. Normally, I would have stuck to my plan and pushed on, but the bad dice-rolls made me lose confidence, and I wavered.

The Ravagers waded through the reeds and started moving towards the left flank.

Ulrik used his Stratagem to put an activation counter on the Saurus Warriors (Brutes) in front of his crack unit, then moved the unit up close to them. As I had used my Stratagem, I could not remove the Activation Counter, and as Ulrik had one unit less than me, he was certain to be able to charge with his hard-hitters next turn.

The battlefield at the conclusion of this turn.

Then came the charge, which cost me half the Saurus Warrior unit. This was the  point where I gave up. One too many bad rolls for one afternoon/evening. Besides that, I was getting tired, with a beginning headache, and I did not fell like gaming on.

Next time I play the Blood Gorged list, I shall stick to the plan of surging forward and get stuck in, maybe screen the main battle line with one or two expendable Skink/Youngling units to soak up incoming missile fire, and see if I can disrupt the enemy formation and get able to get a couple of units into the rear of it.

I guess, the Blood Gorged are much alike to a barbarian/celtic army, needing to get stuck in, and, hopefully, build up some impetus through their Blood Gorged rule (get a Trophy Token each time they inflict casualties in melee, Tokens can be exchanged for extra Attack Dice in subsequent fights).

Well, lesson learned, and hopefully I have used up my share of bad dice rolls for a while...

2016-08-07 God of Battles 40 Points Half Game, Part 1

As it says in the header, we did not finish the game yesterday. I do not remember how many turns we played, but it will be revealed when I run out of pictures of the action.

My Blood Gorged Lizardmen rolled highest aggressionm so Ulrik had to deploy half of his force (including Camp and Baggage), first.

I then deployed my entire army, using the Temple Guards (Bodyguard), and the Slann Priest in his Chariot (palanquin) to guard my Camp on the extreme left. I know I cannot defend both camp and Baggage against the Dwarf Miners without dedication too big a portion of my army to rear guard duty, so the Baggage was to be left open for their attack.

A view from the left flank.

The rest of the Dwarves deployed

And a full view of the battlefield.

As the attacker, I opened the ball, moving my rightmost Saurus Warrior (Brutes) unit forward.

In my next activation, my Slann Mage Priest cast Burak's Rage (Berserk) on them.

The Dwarf Miners moved forward.

Both armies advanced steadily, some more steadily than others.

Ulrik used his Stratagem to re-activate the Miners.

And I did the same with my flankers.

The Dwarven right tried to keep up an acceptable pace.

I started to maneuver the chariot in response to the potential Miner threat.

I think that was about the end of Turn 1.

Turn 2 will be described in a later post - right now I have some rules to brush up on for the weekend!