January and beyond......

Ah January......I hate January :(

You can't really avoid it though can you? It sort of loiters there....waiting for you....

Anyway. Last night (28th) saw our last January meeting and I have to say it was a very positive one for the club. There were three games being played, the first a large 20mm WW2 using Rapid Fire run by Simon and Phil....

we ran out of club owned game mats and had to improvise...we need more game mats methinks....

...this was also played by a couple of new recruits to the club so steadily our numbers grow. We even had a flying visit by a potential new member, Mat, who popped by to introduce himself...all very positive! This was another of the well loved Germans and Russians bash that always looks good and causes a lot of in game discussion and fun.


Secondly, Drew and Andrew...neither to be confused with Andy...played Mordheim and actually managed several games over the evening, and a lot of fun they seem to have had too! The pyramid thingy was made by Drew who seems to have a thing for terrain making...useful lad. The idea was that the guys would play the game through to get some familiarity with the rules and then look to run an in club campaign. This sounds like a good idea to me, not too many figures involved and the games were quick allowing a lot of campaign moves in a night; they may be onto something here you know.

Thirdly, my Skaven warhammer army got another outing, this time against Steve's Chaos warriors....bulky dudes in very heavy armour...they have a weird array of god thingies that each unit can be associated with each with odd names...Gurgle, Sniffy and Lgbtg...or something like that anyway. A 2000 point bash was organised and I was somewhat concerned by the rather blocky nature of Steve's units...large numbers of very heavy stuff in a few blocks akin to battering rams that towered over my poor little innocent mousies. I needn't have worried overly, ably assisted by Andy the Skaven were victorious under my command!

Just take a look at Steve's 'stiffy' pile after just the first round! Ah, that heady mix of artillery and Jezzails!

That is a lot of points sitting there...providing a nice post battle picnic for my Skaven! The pile steadily grew but I would never be so crass as to add a pic of that here....mainly because that one didn't come out though...if I'm honest. Thanks Andy...you honourary rat boy you!

So whats next for the MHWC? We aim to run  DBA campaign, starting in March I believe, so plenty of time to play a 'refresh our memory' game and get new armies painted before we start....I have an African Vandal army undercoated that has been sitting in a box for two years now...don't tell the wife though! Then of course there is the Mordheim campaign too, which looks very interesting. So, game wise, there is much to look forward to for the members. Then there are several shows coming up, Cavalier, Sidcup...and one we have just heard about in Dartford or possibly Gravesend in a shopping centre...worth looking into that.

And, who could forget, there is Broadside 2014. I am happy to report that a potential disaster has been avoided following the venue not letting us have the small hall anymore. We have consulted with the clubs that take part and they have agreed to take much smaller game tables than we usually offer, 6x5, so we can bring in the clubs and traders that are usually in that hall and place them in the main hall. It has all been a bit stressful and a there has been a lot of work behind the scenes to sort it out but, we are now very confident that things are back on an even keel. We have even managed to add in the wargamers flea market again! A fuller report later this week...I promise!

All for one...and a Turnip for Steve!!

I do so look forward to club nights, the meeting of like-minded people, the air of camaraderie, the chance to get your character figure to violently sexually assault your mates character figure with a choice of root vegetables....war is indeed hell. My good friend Clint made a visit to the club offering to run a game for us....it was all down hill from then on. Take a look at Clints blog for another view of the game.

Building by Ziterdes, other terrain by Frontline and others, figures by Redoubt...hanging chandelier by Mark

The game in question was the highly interactive Three Musketeers game called '...And one for All!', a skirmish level game available as a free download from Eureka Miniatures. The USP of the game is the very open ended game turn for each player, you can get your figure to almost anything in a bound as long as you do not roll a 1 on a D6. After each successful manoeuvre, such as 'I will jump on this table...', you have the option of trying to carry out another manoeuvre. Each new manoeuvre adds a dice to your stack and if any of them come up as a 1 your turn ends. The idea is that by successfully carrying out as many manoeuvres as you can prior to an actual attack with a weapon you can add dice ready for that killer bit of sword play. This means that players will invariably come up with the most outrageous plans to get themselves in a good position to attack and build up power. This could, and often did, involve a players turn going something like this....

1. I will move up to the table and pick up that small keg (roll one D6 and anything other than a 1 your character does the action).

2. I will throw said small keg at Andy's head (roll two D6 and avoid getting a 1...also note that the actions were most definitely directed at the player rather than the character! Such aggressive actions could actually wound and possibly kill!)

3. I will run up to Andy and pull his hat down over his eyes (roll three d6 etc....all very cinematic)

4. I will now fight with Andy in a duel (this is the attack that the previous moves were building up to and gaining dice for) Andy will defend with a number of dice equal to his remaining life/wound tokens, three or less, and I fight with three dice gained from my three successful actions plus the number of dice equal to my remaining life/wound tokens. The numbers of dice are not that important, it all hangs on your highest dice against theirs and the difference.

So that is the basics. Now add some wargamers with the wit and sophistication of a concussed eight year old, desperate to build up to a decent attack whilst trying to out-do each other in the silly stakes, and you have one hell of a boisterous game on your hands! Oh, it all starts of nicely enough, each player appearing to be working out some very logical move with a sensible narrative, but all too soon it begins to get personal and you just know there is going to be tears before bedtime....and it gets oh so personal too.
" I push Steve off the balcony....I jump onto Steve's now prone body....I jump up and down on Steve's head..."...and all this before a sword is even drawn!

Some highlights....

The mass small beer keg throwing episode as each player tried to knock the others out at range (we had a lot of movable terrain pieces such as tables, benches, kegs, boxes, bags etc. to encourage the imaginations)...all very early St Trinnians...

My attempt to build up some attack dice by first ...'poncing about the place a bit'...only to roll a 1 and leave my character poncing about the place a bit on a street corner outside the Inn for an entire turn.

My character 'poncing about the place a bit' outside the Inn....sigh.

All the 'leaping from the balcony onto the chandelier so I can swing around in a large circle and thump into Andy/Mark/Alan/Steve's back'...this went on for some time, there was almost a queue for the stairs to the balcony at one point!

The aforementioned episode of Mark jumping up and down on Steve.

Andy throwing an insult (in French) so heinous at Mark that his character dropped his sword and actually took a wound!

Andy kicking my prone and wounded character in the nuts and killing him.

My character urinating over Steve's.

My character attempting to insert a turnip from the market stalls outside the Inn into Steve.

Everybody picking up a large bench at one time or another and attempting to twat someone but failing every time.

The new rule we added near the end of the game whereby if anyone rolled more than two 1's in an action move that move went disastrously wrong. The defending player could then decide just what had gone wrong and leave the attack in a very compromising position. My character jumped from the balcony for my third action, rolled two 1's and it was decided that his cloak caught on a nail and he was left hanging in mid air!

I managed to kill two characters and only died once!!!!

There was an awful lot of laughter generated by this game and all those involved a very good evening indeed. There was a great deal of talk of how the game mechanics could be used for a variety of other periods and genres.... Despicable Me Minions Vs Clangers for example (this should give you a very good indication about the mental balance of the MHWC membership....)

War on Terror - the boargame!

Say it quietly, but I think things are almost back to normality...for a given value of normality of course; there are certainly a lot less chickens running about the place.

At our last meeting, just two days after Broadside, I was not in any state to play anything too complicated. I had spent the previous couple of days preparing the financial reports, bring and buy monies for club members and generally tieing up the loose ends, I needed something simple but fun to play.

Martin brought along his excellent 15mm ACW collection and half the attending club members played that. A good time was had by all, by the noises coming from that quarter, and a result was reached too. A good nights work by Martin although, he did say that whilst the rules (the ACW version of General de Brigade) were good he felt that Black Powder were better for club nights. The games flow faster and the rules generally simpler to follow for members. I think that was a fair comment, we are limited to three and a half hours and taking into account setting up/ packing away etc. Black Powder is very handy; it also gives a very good game too.

As for me, I ran a board game...War on Terror - the Boardgame!...A neat game that is not overly complicated but is a lot of fun; it can also be played through within our time limit.

For those not aware of the game, it is a bit like risk in that you have to take over the world on a very Risk-esque board. The difference is that you can build various sizes of town, hire terrorist groups, use an array of cards that let you steal, blow up and generally mug your opponents and, importantly, have a lot of fun stitching up your friends.


The cards are great and took a lot of thought to put together I am sure. They certainly make the game a unique experience! I was doing quite well, slowly building up a nice little empire-ette in Africa with some nice options for expansion into Europe and the near east when, without warning or provocation I was nuked! Richard played a handy nuke card into central Africa and the fall out affected every adjoining country!! I was all but wiped out in one go....sadness. This did cause a great deal of laughter and happiness everywhere else of course but that was me pretty much out of the game, I would find it nigh impossible to catch up with the others. The others continued to play some nasty cards against each other, buying new terrorist cells and blowing up each others towns with them, stealing their oil income and generally letting of some vindictive steam.

Richard and Mark quickly became the two front runners, each building new cities and taking over territory; the first to ten points would win. A city is worth one point and entire continents are worth several more depending upon size. As it turned out, Mark and Richard were neck and neck and either could win in a single well planed move...Mark snuck ahead with some fiendishly lucky card purchases and bought his way to victory. Git.

This game was just what I and a few others really needed, something fun and sociable without complexity. I would highly recommend this, fun for all the family!

26th Feb Club Meeting

Our latest club meeting went well...especially for me! We had eight members attend playing three games, a very healthy situation. Mark, the winner of the Miniature Wargames Readers Painting competition (and as it turns out joint second place holder too), brought the mag along for me to see and the two figures he sent in. Slight apology to Mark here as I thought he had sent in two of the figures from the set he painted a while ago; he actually painted up two new figures specially. He was given a bit of a ribbing, obviously, but the figures were very nice and we were all pleased for him...perhaps also a little proud that one of our members won too. So once again, well done Mark, good job mate.

The Operation Squad game
Mark and I played Operation Squad, me with my Italian Paras (and the Brixia mortar :) ) and Mark used his newly finished British Paras. Mark was at a slight disadvantage as he had not been able to work out his full 500 point allowance...I had offered to do this but couldn't find the bloody rule book, nor was there a list on the Op squad forum! We cobbled something together and he basically used my British para list. The problem for the Italian squad I have is that they are almost exclusively armed with shorter ranged machine guns (my choice), this means that you have to use them quite aggressively and can therefore run into trouble. The mortar also has to be directed by the Sergeant who must not be anymore than 20cm away, so that he can shout the range, target and direction etc. This can be a little limiting so you need to have a bit of a plan from the outset; as you should anyway.

I decided that the mortar was to be central to the plan and have the rest of the squad deployed to cover it and take advantage of any damage it managed to do. I managed to move it up into a field just behind a ruined house whilst the Sergeant moved forward to a hedge lined road to act as spotter. My Breda MG covered the main road of the hamlet we were fighting over from the edge of a wood This was itself protected by three squad members deployed forward of it and all three were hidden. the rest of the squad was moved up the the same hedge line as the Sergeant, to support him and cover the left flank of the mortar position. I was quite pleased with the dispositions as Mark's figures moved forward. Mark focused upon another large ruined building in front of my lines and his end of the long wood that concealed by Breda MG. I think he was hoping to hold a strong centre whilst he swept the woods, thus keeping my right flank troops out of the game. This actually suited me as it would allow my mortar a free rein.

First blood fell to me and my Breda MG as Mark tried to move a figure around the house and up to the main road. The Breda team managed to spot the figure (a test they had to pass before they could even think of shooting) and won the initiative. Of the four shots they were allowed it was the very first one that killed the British Para outright! Poor Mark rolled some appalling defence dice.
I took out a second Brit para, who was foolish enough to wander into the field opposite the hedge line, with one of my figures covering the mortar; although that figure was then taken out by the British Bren gun positioned in the house. this all happened during one of the frenetic episodes of multi-figure interaction that makes Op Squad the great game that it is. You work out who is trying to do what and to whom (up to three figures from each side) and then roll to see the order in which those actions occur. My hedge line guy went first and killed the para in the field. My Breda MG was supposed to go next but as the target para was killed by the hedge line guy the Breda lost its go. The dead British para was to go third, but was now dead, so the last figure to come into play was Mark's Bren gun. It had targeted my hedge line guy and took him out with a couple of shots.That Bren gun was well defended and placed to cover any attack I made against it...but I have a mortar!

I moved my Sergeant forward and successfully managed to spot the Bren gun in the building before communicating this to the mortar team. As Mark had already activated the Bren gun team he could not now move them, when it was my turn to activate a figure I chose the mortar team! To hit with a mortar you need to roll 1d6 and score equal to or less than the figures Tactical Value, in this case a four. The Brixia is a light mortar so fires shells half the size of ordinary mortars in the game but, it has a greater rate of fire so gets two shots! The first shot rolled a five, so the round missed. You then have to roll a d10 to see where it went, double the number rolled for distance off and follow the pointy bit of the D10 to see in which direction; that one fell short. Shot two was a direct hit! The radius of the burst circle for this mortar is only 10cm but was more than enough to catch the Bren gunner and his assistant. The gunner was taken out but due to crappy die rolls on my part the assistant wasn't even touched...a bit deafened perhaps. I was one casualty off making Mark make a morale check but, club nights having the time restrictions that they do, the game wound down.

This was a good game but it did raise issues that we now need to check, principally, whether a figure that makes a 'move & fire' move that then doesn't fire can fire if an opportunity arises later in the move.

Blood, Bilge & Iron Balls
Andy and Dave G. played Blood, Bilge & Iron Balls, a reduced version of one of the scenarios in the rule book. A British fleet is trying to stop a number of French transports and their escorts escaping from port. Dave chose to be the Brits and immediately fell fowl of a changing wind direction. He found it very difficult to keep station as the French approached and this had an effect on his firing. The French, on the other hand and as the fact that they were making an escape attempt in the first place suggested, were taking full advantage  of the wind direction. Andy, the frogy commander, said this of the game;

'One of the French 74's got off table, as did one of the transports, the others following in line astern. Subject to any damage Dave might have inflicted I think the remaining merchants would have escaped in another turn or two. The other French 74's were still on table, at close range with the British.

Overall I think the French can claim victory, none of the men o' war had any significant damage; a couple of the merchants had lost some cargo due to damage inflicted, and one was running out of crew.

HMS Ardent was the ship caught by the stern rake, she was completely dismasted and had, I think, several fires started. Not surprising with a total of 23 damage cards drawn (6 hits @ 3 cards/hit because of the Stern Rake, one of which was a Joker = another 5 cards). A couple of the other RN ships had taken some damage, but I don't know the details.'

Sounds pretty good to me Andy, quite a convincing win for the French. That stern rake was pretty nasty, as stern rakes should be of course. That many hit cards at once could sink a ship or leave it a smoking ruin...always a laugh if it isn't your ship being hit. The Brits were forced to make a series of tricky manoeuvres to try and keep their guns trained on the enemy but this is easier said than done in a battle. The guys had fun and became a little more familiar with the rules, always a good thing...although I am a little biased :)

WRG 6th Edition
The third game being played was a trip to retro-ville. Richard and Bob C. fielded an army of Macedonians against Clive and Martin's Persians. Bob C. said this of the game;

It took me a while to get used to the charts and die rolls, but I really enjoyed it. Richard laid out the armies and told me when to put the archers in front or behind. He then used one group of light cavalry to roll up the Persian's left flank. Right, it did not go well for the Persians but they seemed to enjoy the game.
The melee is quite complex but with ancients, probably needs to be. I like the simultaneous moves. They give me all sorts of ideas for campaigns.

On the drive home Martin explained that the Persian army was of lower quality class-wise than the Macedonians and that made a Persian loss almost inevitable. I put this to Martin's compatriot, Clive. Clive had a slightly different view to Martin;

Martin and I thrashed them by killing at least 6 Macedonian figures for only the loss of the equivalent number of Persian units!

...Which seems to settle things I think! Usually, Ancient games at our club are usually run with Hail Caesar, Might of Arms or, very occasionally, DBA. The ancient players amongst us do have an interesting hankering for the old-school and do play the older rules on occasion. Personally, I do not like the old style rules, I find them slow and heavy going. You don't get any better or more historical results but do get the headaches and nosebleeds from the endless table reading.

The MHWC 2012 Christmas meeting

Oh Boy, where to start? Every club can claim a great meeting, one that stands out for a specific reason....fantastic win, thousands of figures, bizaar outcomes....this meeting I feel may have been quite unique.

We had a great meeting, our last of the year, and all...apart from Mark, I'll explain later....had a very good time; I doubt many of us had ever laughed so much. The trouble is that it was such an extraordinary meeting I have been struggling to write it up. This is my sixth attempt! I am going to have to start at the very beginning and let the story unfold organically. Cue wobbly fade-out picture and eerie music.....ooooooeeeeeeooooooooeeeeeeeeeooooooo etc

 ........Welcome to the Western town of Clubville. A festive little place caught in a snow drift and sporting a town Christmas tree (fully decorated and with working fairy lights thanks to Mark) and doesn't it look pretty? This was where we were to play out our gunfight, the scene was now set. I had even provided everyone with a home made Christmas cracker and instructed everyone that the wearing of the silly hats was compulsory....I am Chairman after all. As explained in the previous post, the game is driven by playing cards and the higher the card the better, Jokers trumped all. To help with the Christmassy feel I added couple of rule twists....whenever an Ace of a Joker were played there would be the tinkling a fairy bells and a Christmas Present would be delivered to one of the sites on the table; one of the houses, the tree or the Graveyard. If a player moved his figure onto the present he would be rewarded with a random prize to use in the game, a stick of dynamite, a reindeer, a penguin, a snowman, a cuddly polar bear or Santa himself!

Some of the tokens in play....note Santa looking as if he is surrendering :)

You wouldn't believe the trouble I had getting these figures at the right size! Each figure would give the owner a bonus, the penguin increased your initiative, the reindeer your movement, the snowman took a bullet for you and the polar bear gave one out. If you were lucky enough to get Santa then you could pick the bonus you wanted when you needed it. One use only these bonuses. Also note the present awaiting collection in the graveyard.

We almost had a full house for the meeting, so many I had to pull out of the game and umpire it, the lot of a Chairman. There are only 54 cards in a pack and with every player needing five we only just managed. I ran through the simple rules with the players, ensuring they were all wearing their hats and using the new club tape measures I had arranged for them all and had placed into the Christmas crackers. I am such a nice Chairman. The object of the game was to kill as many of each other as they could, a kill won you a specially made token and whoever had the most tokens won the prize, a milk chocolate Battleships game! And off we went.....and all seemed well, the game rolled along...Mark was shot dead almost immediately which did cause some sniggering. All such killed players returned next turn in a random location....and no, not as zombies either.

Our specially made Kill tokens, actually modified children's party badges...isn't eBay great?!

 Everyone was having a good time and the insults and laughter was already building to notably high levels when Maria called out from the hall kitchen that we had a visitor. A guy called John came over and said that he had come along for the meeting and was interested in joining. I introduced my self, gave the man a cracker and a seat at the game. I explained that, this being our last meeting of the year, we played one game that all the members could play together. He settled down and was soon chatting to the other members and asked about the club, were we going to write about the game in the parish magazine and so on. I said we might well do, we often provide pieces for such publication as we like to take part in the local community etc etc etc. and so in like manner all John's questions were thus answered...although John did look a tad unsure about something.

The game continued with more than the usual degree of one upmanship....just because you were shot by someone seemed reason enough to then seek that person out to return the favour; high cards were trumped, turns and initiative stolen, cries of victory and groans of defeat resounded....loudly and accompanied by more laughter and insults....and the sticky badges were being handed out as the dead were piled high and new John took full part. It was then, at the height of the raucousness, that Dave casually asked new John what period and scales he played. John didn't have a clue what he was talking about and said he had never seen wargames before...John, in fact, was there to be co-opted onto the Iwade Parish Council but had got the wrong day; the parish council meeting was the next evening!! This caused riotous laughter that was actually painful...side splitting in fact. To a group of wargamers already in a high and jolly mood (and with not a drop of alcohol in sight) this news stopped play with not a dry eye in the house. All those questions new John had asked had fitted our profile and activities and so the confusion, like a TV sitcom, continued until the truth was revealed. It could not have been written any better. New John, to his credit (and enjoyment I am sure) carried on with the game until the end and even gained a badge or two...along with a club membership application form. I wonder if he will come back? I wonder what he told his wife when he got home and she asked how his evening went????

To add to the general hysteria Mark spent the entire game either dead or with no usable cards in his hand and Clive, in an attempt to navigate past a chair, instead fell full length over it whilst still keeping his party hat on. The game became several smaller and more personal actions as vengeance was sought in various quarters and ended with poor Mark deciding to use the only cards he could to move his figure and the Santa token off the table to end his misery. Even then, with the shotgun armed cowboy leading away a Santa with arms raised in seeming surrender, the silliness continued. Several people wondered what Mark's figure intended to do with poor Santa and you can imagine the scenarios these over excited wargamers came up with! Certainly not a game for the ladies.

The game was eventually won by Bob who had managed to kill five or six cowboys during the evening leaving him the clear winner. Several wondered whether Bob's American roots had something to do with it but all agreed that the game was a great success....except for Mark perhaps. I know it took two days for my laughter induced headache to go away! I may have cracked a rib too.

Dark Age Hail Caesar!

Our last meeting had two games, a ww2, 20mm Rapid Fire affair...which didn't really get off the ground due to the late arrival of the games organiser....and another Hail Caesar bash.

I wont go into too much detail for the Rapid Fire game, there is not a lot to say. Quite a few people brought newly painted figures along especially for this game, there were quite a few unopened boxes around that evening and one or two disapointed little faces. The players did eventually manage to cobble a game of sorts together but it wasn't exactly Kursk. This didn't worry me too much, I was running the Hail Caesar game :) Don't like Rapid Fire anyway ;p

The club recently purchased a good number of painted 15mm Saxons, Normans etc. We thought they would be useful for several types of club game, HC in particular but also for others, even for SAGA games using one base of figures for each figure the rules require; why not?

I spent days going through the figures and putting together two good sized forces along with a few useful and neat special unit specs such as 'Pigs Head Formation', even worked out a simple but historically accurate scenario. Once again, club member Dave has prepared a game report; top bloke our Dave.

Yet again the great unwashed attempted to infect the civilised world in this great game of Dark Ages Hail Ceaser, where the rebel Saxon forces of Leofwine Lostlandson (sounds like a cheap vintage from Tesco) supported by hordes of Danes, Scots and Irish, invaded Northern England. Leofwine Lostlandson – Saxon Theigns – and Olaf Thereindeerson – Danish Division played by Clive
Allies Hootsmon Gae Gordon – Lowland Scots Division – and Clannad O’Corrs – Irish Division – played by Martin. Judging by their well-founded names, they were doomed to fail !! The valiant and stout defenders, Prince William the Silly – Royal Norman Knights relief Division – supported by the Southern Saxon Fyrd played by Dave. Allied with the local Norman Lord Wilfred De Bramble and the Northern Saxon Fyrd played by Rob.

The scenario was simple. Hold the Kings Highway and prevent the hordes going south. The Saxon Theigns took the right flank with the only mounted units in the rebel army and the Danish allies took the centre right making a solid and tough Viking position. Facing off against them was the local Lord who may have been a bit apprehensive as 2 units of his troops quickly raced forward to take cover in a rather handy wood, leaving his outnumbered mounted unit to cover the flank.  The Northern Fyrd sat on the road waiting for the inevitable advance of the enemy.

Meanwhile, the Scots and Irish war bands massed for their mad rush forward. They were soon to be out paced by the mounted Royal knights who arrived on the right flank of the field in column to ensure movement even with failed commands. The Southern Fyrd raced along behind in a newly learned formation – The Pigs Head.

The first few turns rolled on with the rebel right being somewhat frustrated with failed commands. The Vikings advanced in solid formation whilst the Scots and Irish suffered similarly with failed commands. The Norman archers remained practicing their wood craft in the woods, only getting off a few rounds of ineffective fire.

The Norman Prince gallops forward with his knights, whilst the Scots Irish sit looking rather pensive (would have been messing their pants, but weren’t wearing any!!)

Leofwine Lostlandson must have given his Saxon rebels a good talking to as they soon got underway closing down the rebel right flank. They charged but failed to break the Norman Lords mounted knights who were soon joined in support by foot troops. 

The Vikings closed on the waiting Fyrd along the road. The battle was joined with the Viking units supporting each other to give a massive hitting power. Not to be out matched though, the Norman foot knights were themselves a large unit and were supported by the Fyrd. This became a good old slog it out. Ultimately, the Vikings destroyed the Normans, leaving the Fyrd to defend itself.

On the opposite flank, the Royal Norman cavalry, the crème de la crème, charged into the war bands. There was a sudden panic, as unexpectedly, the far right war band held and in turn destroyed the Norman unit. There was much cheering as Martin rolled his rather perfect dice and the Normans were removed from play. Bah Humbug. Well the Prince was none to happy and a slogging match ensued with the remaining cavalry and war bands.

It was all turning rather messy. The rebel Saxons were eventually turned and their flank collapsed, leaving the Vikings alone in the centre. The Vikings held on with their tough fighter rule and 7 sustained value.  The Norman Pigs Head steam rolled forward and met the Scots Irish. Scots Irish threw their javelins, but to no effect. The support offered by the 2 rear units to the front superior troops of the Pigs Head was invaluable and eventually won the day. The Norman Cavalry just managed to win each round of combat but only enough to force the war bands to retreat and not break – not until the end anyway. Soon the rebel left flank was in disarray and it was all over.

From the game, it again proved how fairly ineffective missile troops are. They don’t roll enough dice. War bands seem to hold their own against good regular infantry, or in this case mounted knights. Or was it just my bad dice rolls again and Martins good dice !!

An excellent game of 9 -10 turns played out to a conclusion in 2 hours. Thanks to Alan for purchasing the armies on behalf of the club and for putting all the time and effort into creating the army lists and especially naming the generals.