Ten Years Ago - October 2015

October is MOAB month, probably the second biggest wargames convention in Australia. I usually try to pop up for one or two days, and used to play in the HOTT competition (back when there was one). 

So for this months nostalgic look at what I was up to ten years ago let's head off to MOAB 2015. I spent the day playing two games that used to be mainstays of this blog, but which you don't see any more: Munera Sine Missione and Machinas.

Anyway, let's relive the fun of a Saturday spent at MOAB 2015

Gladiators

Peter and I were both looking for a game last night, but I'd packed my gladiators and 'Blood, Sweat & Cheers' to play with someone else who couldn't make it, so we got that out. Peter hadn't played before but picked it up pretty quickly.

We selected gladiators randomly (subject to my personal preference for certain groups not facing each other). I got a dimacherius (Philus) vs the heavily armoured crupellarius Victor. I'm not sure if the crupellarius is a good gladiator for a novice player, but Peter handled him pretty well.

I couldn't get through Victor's defences and in keeping up the attack I suddenly found myself the victim of a counter-attack and wounded!

I was then driven back and knocked down by the blundering behemoth.

But from that point Peter couldn't get what he need to finish me off. I managed to stand up and get back into the fight, then finally get a useful combination of moves together to finish off Victor with a single strike. 

In the second bout I had the archer Toxaris whilst Peter used the thraex Hilarus.

I got in one shot before Hilarus basically spent the whole game drawing Glory cards. This was the first lacerating cut that Toxaris took.

Peter held off cashing in the combat effect of my wounds until right at the end,  using the accumulated four wounds I'd taken to improve the chance of his final slash hitting and finishing off Toxaris.

The bout had actually gone of for a long time; Peter had so many Glory cards that he couldn't close with me to use them a lot of the time, and I wisely kept my distance. At one stage we considered calling it a draw, but played for just one more run through the deck, and that was all it took.

So with one win apiece we played for best of three.

Peter used the hoplomachus Helena, whilst I had the veles Ostorius.

Getting knocked down wasn't a great way to start the bout, but a lucky attack on my part saw Helena knocked down as well, much to the crowd's amusement.

We both got up and I used my agility to keep away from Helena. She managed to throw her spear but I was lucky and was only knocked back by it (a result I could very much use to my advantage). Once again I got the right combination of cards, and used Glory to do a mighty javelin throw, backed up by the crowd's support. It was enough to defeat Helena.

Two of the games were pretty close, with only the middle one being a frustrating disaster for me.

Thanks to Peter for giving these rules a try.

Fight For The Fjords

Ralph put of a WWII naval game for us on Thursday, which was the last club meet of the year. He aimed for something different and mildly spectacular and it looked great. Three tables in an unusual kinked configuration represented a Norwegian fjord, whilst the ships were 1/700th kits covering destroyers and a single light cruiser. The rules were Nimitz.

A force of twelve allied destroyers in three columns are steaming at full speed into the fjord.

At the other end is a German heavy-water storage facility. The destroyers have to shell it. The Germans has three destroyers and a light cruiser to defend it with.

On the middle table was  fifth German ship, a guardship (also a destroyer). So the whole action would be fought with 4" guns and torpedoes, aside from the mighty 6" guns on the light cruiser.

One of the issues that the British had was that there were a lot of ships in a confined space. Movement became an issue of traffic management. Our plan was to send two columns in at high speed to engage the enemy ships, one at a slower speed to act as a mopping-up reserve and a third to head for the target and bombard it.

I was part of the British force. We onto  the central table virtually unmolested; a couple of minor its from the guardship and nothing more. The guardship took a pasting from concentrated fire though. No surprise there!

The rest of the Germans engaged the lead British vessels.

The light cruise Konigsberg ended up far to close to the cliffs of the fjord, cutting down its manuever options and leaving it shooting effectively but unable to turn into the main British force. Amazingly none of teh British destroyers could get a clear torpedo shot at it!

The German destroyers didn't last long. They sank one British ship, but were quickly wiped out.

With the light cruiser too far out of the fight to be useful the British now had a clear run at the target, and we called the game, claiming a British victory.

Thanks to Ralph for a fun, and surprisingly quick, game. Nimitz really rattles along when you know what you are doing.

With some time to spare I played a quick game of 'Blood, Sweat & Cheers' with Daniel, who hadn't played before. He wanted 'one of those guys with a net' so ended up with the retiarius Cupido. I took a classic opponent, the secutor Astinax.

Daniel controlled the game early on as I couldn't find an opening against the speedy retiarius.. I also got lightly wounded, which slowed me down somewhat.

On the plus side, whilst I couldn't get in a decent attack, Daniel found that I had ways of blocking every effective attack he made against me. To be fair several times that involved throwing sand at my foe (much to the crowd's displeasure), but it got me out of a tight fix a couple of times.

At one stage I got knocked down, but Cupido still couldn't finish me off. I even managed some rolling evades and ended up on the other side of the arena before finally being able to stand up.

And from that point on I found my stride. Astinax started to get some decent attacks together and I whittled down Daniel's gladiator, eventually striking him down for a win. The crowd were in my favour by that stage but he rolled well for missio and Cupido was spared.

So two fun games  to finish my club wargaming year!

Eques

I got my gladiators out the other day (for what I think is the first time this year) so that I could try some ideas I had for running the Eques type in 'Blood, Sweat & Cheers'. I first tried them out last year but wasn't entirely satisfied with how they played.

I'm still looking at the exact nature of their setup but I have abandoned the idea of them throwing their spears (indeed one piece I read suggested that they didn't even have spears if, indeed, they even fought on horseback). I have tried to emphasis the speed and mobility of being on horseback for the mounted phase of the combat, and then run with my idea from the previous post of running the foot version as a  lightly armoured secutor.

So here they are ready to go; Habilis in white the red shield and Maternus with the red tunic.

Habilis got in an early attack which missed.

Maternus wheeled and his attack unhorsed Habilis.

I stuck to the rules I'd used before for dealing with the mounted and foot phase of the fight; they would fight on horseback until one was defeated, or until one was knocked down. In the event of a knock down the turn ends, the knocked down gladiator stands up in the space he was in and his opponent can be placed in any adjacent space. In addition the opponent gets one point of Crowd Favour. The fight then continues on foot.

Maternus pushed his advantage and wounded Habilis.

There followed a free-wheeling fight around the arena before Habilis managed to get in a powerful blow that took down Maternus in one go!

The secutor stats felt far better and made for a more mobile fight on foot. The mounted phase didn't really last long enough for me to get a feel for whether I liked the new setup, so I will have to try a few more games. One thing I have realised is that so long as I don't make any of the abilities too overpowered I don't have to worry a great deal about balance, since these gladiators will only fight each other.

15mm Gladiators

The other day I finished another batch of painting - some 15mm gladiators. I started these last year but lost momentum on them. In the end it took under an hour to finish them, which just goes to show.

They are mostly Museum Miniatures, with one exception. I bought them years ago (back when I lived in the UK in fact). I just thought that it might be fun to have some 15mm figures for smaller more portable games. And that's still the plan now.

I painted one of each of the basic gladiator types from Blood, Sweat and Cheers, bar the Cestus. I have two figures for those and will complete them as a pair at some stage. In my games I tend to use the Cestus type for lightly-armed gladiators, but I couldn't find a suitable 15mm equivalent figure. 

Anyway, here'd the gladiators in  more detail. First the Veles (listed by Museum as a Gaetulian) and what I'm using as a Crupellarius. The latter is a Murmillo of some type but I added a bit of milliput armour.

Next is the Murmillo and the Hoplomachus.

Retiarius and Secutor.

Finally the Sagittarius, Thraex and Dimachaerus. The former is a spare Chariot Miniatures Nubian archer.

They aren't great figures, but there aren't many 15mm options (or there weren't when I bought these). As yet these chaps don't have names. 

A Barbarian In The Arena

This evening I played a few games of 'Blood, Sweat & Cheers' to try out some ideas I had for running a barbarian gladiator. Regular readers of this blog will know that this has been occupying some of my attention for a couple of years now (although admittedly not constantly, because that would be weirdly obsessive).

Since I had my West Wind gladiatrices out for a Facebook photo-shoot (they're one of the packs not illustrated on Old Glory's website), I decided to use some of them in the games, so picked one of my female barbarians to match them. This is Andromache. She used to be a Copplestone cave-girl, which explains her footwear and fur loin-cloth.

Her first opponent was the secutor Marpesia. In terms of abilities I have been running Barbarians with the same 2 x Glory ability that Murmillos have (+1 on an attack with a bonus push and knock-down if you win), as this nicely reflects a rage-induced attack or a charge of some kind. It's the 1 x Glory ability I've struggled with. For this game I allowed Andromache to move one area and attack at +1 - a Charge.

She used it well, pushing Marpesia back, before downing her and defeating her. 

Andromache's next opponent was the thraex Artemisia.

Artemisia proved a much more dangerous foes, knocking down Andromache and wounding her.

This left Andromache very much at a disadvantage, but she put up quite a fight. Needing a breather to replenish her hand she managed an adrenaline-fuelled retreat across the board, although an attack by Artermisia as she did so meant she ended up knocked down at her destination - a quirk of the combat rules that allows attacks to happen if the gladiators either start or finish in the same space.

Anyway, Andromache was down to her last hit, but managed to fight back and put a couple of wounds on Artemisia. She even managed to get an attack card with the adrenaline bonus, which allows you to add your current wounds to the attack, but rolled badly and it didn't connect. Artemisia used a lightining slash to finish off Andromache, although the crowd spared her.

I was finding that the Charge effect for 1 x Glory wasn't working for me and, oddly enough, felt that it was possibly a touch to much for a singly Glory ability. Allowing an attack plus a one space move was a possibility, but seemed a bit dull. So I had a rethink.

I settled on Intimidate - for 1 x Glory Andromache could attack with her normal value, but if her opponent won their score was reduced by 2 (which actually means that the opponent could then lose by 1 point). This represents an attack that reduces an opponent's ability to strike back, although to be fair it doesn't really do anything is the opponent just defends, which may be a problem.

Anyway, Andromache's next opponent was the retiarius Medusa.

The bout ended is seconds as Andromache charged and was stabbed by a sneaky dagger attack.

I started again.

Andromache managed to use her intimidate ability to block an attack. After a brief, but entertaining fight she emerged the victor.

I might pursue the Intimidate idea as I like the idea of a defence ability that's also an attack. It might still be a bit much for a single Glory ability, but we'll see.

After playing I needed to sort out my gladiators, which are normally stored by type but which had become mixed up. So I took a group-shot of them. There's eighty-three of them, plus the eques pair and three officials.

Gladiators At MOAB

I made a couple of trips to MOAB this year. On the Sunday I popped in for the afternoon to look around the stalls and games. Picked up a few figures, some more paints and a copy of an out of print sled-racing boardgame called 'Snow Tails'. It was too hot to do much else though.

On the Monday I'd said I'd go up to play and help with a demo of  'Blood On The Sands' gladiator rules, that I've blogged about here a couple of times (most recently last year). When I arrived three games were in full flow:

My first game saw a thraex get beaten up by Victor's murmillo.

My next game was with Damian. By this stage I'd got the hang of what I was doing and we had an epic fight between my secutor and his retiarius. A couple of times we both had our opponent on the ropes, and both of us were sliced up and bleeding by the end. I managed one last desperate attack before I was due to pass out from blood loss and sliced off the retiarius's head.

My final game saw me beaten to a pulp in just under a turn by a very aggressive thraex. The less said about that the better.

Here's a few more pictures. 

A hoplomachus and a murmillo.

Frank (the author) and Paul discussing some finer points of the game.

Frank's fantastic arena. You can read about how he built it HERE, HERE and HERE

I'm really quite taken with 'Blood On The Sands'; it flows really well and is great if you want a crunchy detailed game that's actually not that complicated. Still no word on when it's likely to be published though.