Natholeon
eldannardo
Hot off the painting table, here is my completed army for DBA I/29b Philistine 1099-600BC:
And here are a couple of close-ups:
So now that they are complete, onto the next project – a 50 point force for Warmachine v.2. I’ve already painted some more Hammerfall handgunners, and Alexia and 6 Risen are due for the paintbrush this week. If I can keep up a steady pace, I should have them all completed by the end of May.
There are other projects beckoning though: Two 6mm armies for DBN – French and Russian; and 15mm Marlburian Allied and French armies for Beneath the Lily Banners. I’m looking at getting these from Lancashire Games. This will be followed up by a couple of Napoleonic ships for the Warhammer Trafalgar rules and a 6mm Anglo-Portuguese army for DBN. That should be the last of the ‘big’ projects for this year.
The decision to go with 15mm Marlburian is threefold. The first is economic. I can completely buy two armies for the same price as half of one 28mm army. The second is speed. I can paint 15mm three to four times faster than 28mm, which means I can be gaming within a reasonable space of time. Third is that I found that really enjoyed painting the 15mm Philistines, and found previous 15mm armies to be a similar experience. 28s can be enjoyable if there is no pressure to paint up a lot of them, and Marlburian would require this. I’ve purchased and painted a Williamite Anglo-Dutch army from Lancashire (long since sold), and really like there figures, so no worries there, then. I’m looking forward to them.
I’m just sorting out some Napoleonic Austrian and French 6mm figures that fellow Rotorua Irregular John purchased. They’ll be based up for DBN as well. DBN will be my army level game for Naps, whilst the 28mm have been sorted out this weekend for Sharp Practice. Now I just have to paint some of this stuff!
Nate
Filed under: DBA and variants
Well this is my first post ever on this blog so i thought i’d start off small. These are the first four elements of my Later Hebrew DBA army that will be completed over the next two weeks (hopefully; i’m a slow painter with a short attention span).
Dan.
The first three spear elements for my 15mm DBA Philistine army. The figures are Essex.
From the front, and
From the rear.
One great thing about digital photography – you notice all the imperfections! I’ll go back and tidy up the chap with the white goatee whose shield rubbed off on him. Biting it too much?
Dan is preparing his Later Hebrews at the moment, so the next lot of Philistine Spear is undercoated and ready to go as I type!
Nate
The Persian DBA army was finished off last night. They are all painted in Black Line technique. After observing a professional Black Line paint job, I decided that my biggest problem with the style was that I wasn’t leaving enough Black showing through. I believe that these Persians are an improvement on the Macedonians for that reason, although I’m still not happy with the horses.
Without further ado, here is the Persian DBA army:
My variant has 1x 3Cv (Gen), 2 x 3 v, 2 x 2LH, 4 x 4Sp, 3 x 2Ps
Close ups:
General, 3Cv, 2LH, 2Ps
4 x 4 Sp, 2 are Greek Hoplites, 2 are Persian.
And finally a scene of Persians vs. Macedonians. Viewed side on (above) and from behind the Persian lines (below).
Next I plan to get into a couple of Napoleonic units again. At the moment though I have a Warhammer character under the brush – Wulfrik the Wanderer. Hopefully I’ll get him finishedand post a picture soon. Next DBA army will be Philistines to fight Dan’s Hebrews.
Nate
Technically I’ve already painted 5 DBA armies, including an Alexandrian Macedonian. But I’ve sold 4 of them, and Dan and I aren’t gaming in the Marian Roman period, so in a sense, this is the first of a new DBA era.
You might have gleaned that Dan and I have become very fond of this little game. In fact, aside from a Flames of War game, the last time he was here that was all that we played!
Here is the Macedonian army in all of it’s glory. The figures are largely Essex ones that I bought second hand. They were basically painted in thick Humbrol paint and needed stripping. The repaint is better, the first time I’ve used black line technique for my figures, although it won’t be winning any awards! The General is a Museum Miniatures figure, and towers over the Essex to a degree, but he does stand out as a heroic general should. The pikes on the Essex figures were warped when I got them, and they are now as straight as they will ever be. There is something to be said for empty hands and brass rod!
A close up of the Macedonian Phalanx
The subtle complexity of DBA belies its apparent simplicity. As Dan and I get a handle on the basics of the game we have started to think beyond getting a single long line to outflank your opponent (although it doesn’t hurt). We now give greater thought to our opponents strengths when we deploy and look at support. We’ve also learnt to use terrain a little more strategically. In one game last week I took Italian allies to fight his Carthaginians. I broke up the board with rough going to give my Auxilia a nice advantage. This was screwed up by my Built Up Area being in his deployment zone. Dan used three spear elements and threw himself against the walls. The first two became spear shaped smears, but the third was successful in the 3rd bound (the luck of threes I guess). Losing a BUA and the Spear element garrisoning it meant an immediate loss of three elements. Despite manoeuvring well and making his army break up into about 7 groups (difficult for command and control), I lost 1 more element and the game. Never mind. In another game I chomped his general and won fairly quickly, so it all goes in swings and roundabouts. The beauty is that you can get so many games into a day that eventually you have to win one!
The Macedonian Army with the backdrop - it is starting to look a little too pointillist. I might paint a new one on card instead of polystyrene!
I’m currently painting a Persian army to fight the Macedonians, and I’ve finished 4 elements already. I think that I’ve really got the hang of this black figure technique as you’ll see when I post pictures of it, hopefully this weekend. It isn’t fantastic and I’d never use it on 28mm figures, but it is extremely effective for these little fellows. After the Persians it will be back into the Napoleonics- 1 British and 1 French unit. Then another DBA army. Should keep me sane…
Nate
I never say ‘no excuses’, there are always excuses! In this case it has been that school has been busy and painting has taken a back seat as a result. I’ve finished off the first battalion of French with a nice flag around the Eagle, and have painted another half battalion in greatcoats. I’ll post them as soon as they are finished. Aside from that, I’ve finished 3 elements of GHQ 1:285 Modern Germans:
Mounted for Modern Spearhead, these are just samplers. Very easy to paint, but I need a pile more to build a decent army out of them. Dan’s got Israelis. We didn’t get matched pairs because we just wanted armies we thought were cool. I don’t know why Germans and Israelis would be going head to head in the modern era, and frankly it’s a minefield that I don’t want to even tiptoe over!
We spent a decent amount of time last weekend painting and finishing off trenches and craters for our battlefields. We also put together the last of the Space Marines (still need a librarian, but otherwise finished!).
We played several games of DBA, including one of Big Battle DBA for the Punic Wars. That was resolved fairly quickly when my CinC was outflanked and killed. I believe that it was the only element I lost. On my right flank I was carving through one of his commands… Note to self – keep your CinC out of potential danger!
We also played DBA Biblicals with Philistine and Later Hebrew Armies, which was a bit of a laugh as my Built Up Area ended up in Dan’s deployment zone. I placed an element of spear in it as defence and watched as his Auxilia repeatedly assaulted the walls. Three elements left themselves smeared all over the defences. Very amusing.
Two DBA Wars of the Roses games were also played. These were quite evenly matched. I can’t remember whether the results were even in this contest as well. I have the feeling that I may have lost the first and won the second. I do remember that we enjoyed them quite a bit.
DBA has been a real revelation. We’re thoroughly enjoying our games, and now it is time to paint some armies! Technically it shouldn’t be too much effort to paint 12 elements, but it actually is! Mostly because we have other projects on the go – Dan has his Space Wolves and I have my Napoleonics. I’ ve no doubt we will get there though.
Hopefully I’ll get to do a bit more painting over the holidays.
Nate
Filed under: DBA and variants, Seven Years War, Wargaming, Wargaming works in progress
Just a quick post of a couple of projects – firstly an element of Seven Years War French.
Well, they are almost finished. I still need to paint the cuff buttons onto the figure in the front left.
And as Dan and I are quite excited about DBA, I finished a built-up area base to put my houses on:
The next post will have my first finished element of plastic Perry French, including the updated piping on my first figure that was missing.
Nate
Filed under: DBA and variants, Legends of the High Seas and the Old West, Wargaming, World War One
It was just Labour weekend here, and Dan came down to stay. It was a busy threee and a half days with a decent amount of gaming and some model making.
We started Saturday morning with a game of Legends of the Old West. We hacven’t played this in a year or so, and I was very surprised how easily the rules came to us. When I say that, it was in light of the fact that Dan had left the rulebook in Auckland, so we were playing with memory and my old roster sheet. We only had to look up one thing, which I did in the Legends of the High Seas book. Because the systems are so similar, it transferred perfectly. So anothe shootout in Armpit with 2 identical gang rosters. The result was bloody, and by turn three things were looking bad for my gang. but the comeback was on, and with no campaign nobody voluntarily retired. It came down to 2 deputies facing off. They survived their showdown and both headed for the hills on the last turn. A fun game.
The set-up for the game in the town of Armpit, Arizona.
A struggle around the Corral.
Bloodbath at the crossroads.
The next game was Warhammer Historical’s The Great War. We wanted to get our freshly painted British and German armies on the table. We decided on a blitz scenario with the Brits having 1500 points versus German 750. I kind of expected that as the German player I would be sitting back and shooting. What I didn’t expect was that my forces would take a hammering in the preliminary bombardment, that they would frequently find themselves unable to shoot due to pinning and that my turn would take five minutes while the British took about 40 minutes. All up, not a particularly enjoyable game to play. Probably quite accurate in a historical sense but that would be for solo games I’m sure. When two people want an enjoyable game it doesn’t really cut it. We also found the Great War rulebook quite frustrating to navigate at times. We relied on our familiarity with Warhammer 40,000 to get us through the basics, and this similarity was one of the main reasons we had looked forward to this ruleset. We’ll give it another go with 1000 point forces on each side, and hopefully they will give a more enjoyable game. The other option is looking into Iron Ivan Games’ Price of Glory, which I’ve got and looks very good.
The British Army.
On Sunday we played a game of DBA to warm up. And we enjoyed it, so we played another. And another. And another. We played DBA until 1.00 in the morning. We both hadn’t realised just how entertaining and addictive this little game is! We ordered another couple of armies (Ancient Spanish and another Polybian Roman) with an eye to playing Big Battle DBA for the Punic Wars. Now we just have to paint the figures – that’s why there are no photos of these games.
On Monday we built some terrain and got stuck into some Warhammer 40,000 figures. I converted a Chaos rhino into a Space Marine Razorback and built a Veteran Vanguard Assault squad to travel in it. Dan played around with the Chaos Dreadnought and gave it a pretty daemonic arm. Pics will follow. My Space Marines are to be known as the Solar Companions, but their nickname will be the Smiley faces of the Emperor. More on that in the future.
Today 3 boxes of plastic Perry Napoleonic goodness showed up, so more on that in the next blog.
Nate
Filed under: DBA and variants, DBD, Wargaming, Wargaming works in progress
Just a quick update. Finished another three elements for my DBD French army – the General with the Maison du Roi; the Gardes Francaises; and a unit of Horse:
I also thought that I’d take a look at putting together a colour scheme for a Space Marine chapter. This chapter will be called the Companions, and modelled on the Macedonian Army of Alexander the Great. I chose purple initially as it reminded me of Barney the Dinosaur, and I thought this would be a fun theme, but purple and green was simply too garish!
Perdiccas here is hopefully the start of a small Space marine force.
Nate
Filed under: Battle reports, DBA and variants, DBD, Wargaming, Wargaming works in progress
I’ve just finished a playtest of my rules mechanics for solo wargaming in the age of Louis XIV. It was a chance to try out my DBD modifications and see if I could play an’impartial’ game. The scenario and battle report are below…
The Battle of Kleine Muffinstadt
In this scenario one side is marching onto the battlefield having undertaken a surprise march. The defender is camped betwen the Flusswasser and the village of Muffinstadt. 2d6 are rolled to determine how many elements the defender has ready, and how many elements the attacker has on the board. Another die roll determines the direction the attacker will enter from, and for subsequent elements the roll is made again. A list of elements is made, each given a number, and 2d6 used to determine which elements are present or not. The General’s element is always present. Throughout the game, any elements that didn’t arrive initially are rerolled for. I made an error here, and made the artillery a 12. As this is a rare element, you are better off having it as a 7 – more chance of getting it. This is because there are 5 entries each for Horse and Foot, so quite a good chance of rolling for them. At any rate, the upshot was that the French never got their artillery out of the camp.
The battlefield looked like this, Kleine Muffinstadt in the top left corner, the camp beside it, the Flusswasser running from top to bottom, two roads and the Muffinberg hill in the centre:
The first die roll confirmed that the Imperialists were attacking the French. But the French obviously had plenty of piquets about, as three quarters of their army was deployed when the Imperialists began to arrive. Initial deployment was as follows:
Turn 1 saw the Imperialists advance down the road towards Kleine Muffinstadt. The general and the Horse regiments were in the van with the foot in the centre and the artillery bringing up the rear. This wasnot preordained by dice, this was my decision, and one that I would alter next time. It would have been better to have a mixed vanguard, as will later be seen. Meanwhile the French advanced, and an element of Horse left the camp.
Next the Imperialists began to deploy their Horse, hoping to charge in before the foot could completely deploy. The last foot element appeared coming down the other road. The French made ready to secure the Muffinberg with a unit of Horse, and swing the battleline so that its flanks rested on Kleine Muffinstadt and the Muffinberg. Another element of horse left the camp and joined its partner in an advance.
The two sides continued to move towards each other. It was about here, as the shooting began, that I forgot a crucial thing for DBx games. You are meant to add the factors for the elements to the die roll! I remembered to do all the grading, but couldn’t work out why things were dying so easily. Then I realised what I’d done wrong! I put everything back 2 turns and started again! This is the situation in the reworked turn three…
Now that I knew what I was doing, it was time for combat. Their was no bias in what I was doing – the PIP dice made sure of that! Both sides were getting ome good rolls, but trying to sort out a battle line for the Imperialists was growing increasingly difficult. The infantry were still forming up as the Horse entered into battle! Meanwhile, the French were creating a sound battleline. The horse and Dragoons met on the slopes of the Muffinberg, and shooting from the French infantry destroyed an element of horse.
The Dragoons died, sending the flanking horse recoiling. The situation at the beginning of Turn 5 looked as follows:
Turn 5 saw the French Horse on the Muffinberg recoiled by an element of shot, but also the loss of the Imperialist general! I didn’t end the game there, though. I decided that it was typical of this time for the battle to continue with troops blissfully unaware of their general’s death (as at Lutzen when Gustavus Adolphus was killed). As I could make up the rules as I went along, I did decide that the their would be a -1 penalty to the Imperialist PIP die roll for the rest of the game.
The Imperialists rolled a 6 – the best possible reult – for their first leaderless PIP roll. It enabled them to form a good line of battle with their infantry, but it was all in vain. A last element of horse succumbed to a deadly crossfire, and the Imperialists were defeated (I play the 4 elements lost army breakpoint rule). The infantry retreated to the south, screened by the last 2 elements of Horse:
What did I learn? Well, first off, the DBD rules modifications work. I was quite happy with the combats. Secondly, keep Horse supported with foot if possible and advance only after you are happy with your batleline. Third, definitely don’t use Dragoons as your head on attacking element against horse – wipe out! Finally, solo wargaming is fun! I really enjoyed the game, and the ability to play through a scenario with rules, but then alter them without having to convince anyone that it is a good idea worked really well! The scenario was designed with the intention that the battlelines would only form slowly, but 2 big dice rolls meant that the Imperialists were at a bit of a disadvantage from the get-go, as the French were pretty much totally deployed from the beginning. But that is how it goes – you can’t guarantee your plan will work. When I start the real campaign with these guys, this type of scenario will be modified quite a bit to take account of scouting points etc.
Time to get the 2 sides all painted now, I guess. It took me one and a half hours to paint my first foot unit – the Orleans regiment, and I’m sure that it would only take 3 hours or so to paint 4 elements. I’m not being pretty with them – at gaming distance there is very little detail to see, so they are getting a basic paint job, and it seems to work. Here is a close up of the Orleans boys:
No wargames fashion police please! I’m quite aware that these guys might not have had red breeches and stockings, but its my army and I’ll paint it for effect, thankyou very much! I’ll keep posting pictures as the rest of the figures get done.
Nate
