December 2013 Game Night

Last Friday evening our club had our monthly game night. We don't always get to do an event in December, but this year the dates lined up to allow us to get an event in between Christmas and New Years Day. I played in a 28mm Renaissance game hosted by my friend John (left). The game used rules I wrote about 15 years ago, Halberdier, which John has kept alive by using. I forgot how much fun they were. With encouragement from several people last Friday I may resurrect these rules for use. I had lost the files in a hard drive crash, but still have a hard copy version to start from.

The game was Teutonic Knights vs. Knights Templar with various assorted foot and dismounted figures: pikes, spears, longbows and dismounted knights. In the end the weight of the Teutonic Knight's mounted was too much for the Templar to hold up to and the victory went to the Teutonic side.

We had a very large turn out and there were three other excellent (and completely full) games run including Michael's Ships of Glory game. Michael participated in the kickstarter campaign for this game and contributed enough to get the starter box set and the very nice play mat shown in the photos. Everyone who played the game said that the rules are very enjoyable.

Kevin (standing left) ran a beautiful 15mm "Phoney War" 1939 France vs German game featuring Char 2B tanks and lovely terrain. The rules were "Panzer Blitz" and reference cards featured blown up "chits" which looked like they came from a board game but were actually made up by Kevin. These made looking up stats for forces quite easy.

 

Last but not least, new member pledge Greg ran a Carnage & Glory 9 Years War game using 28mm figures.  Our club loves Carnage & Glory and knows and appreciates how much work setting up and running a C&G game is. Thanks Greg!

Merry Christmas!

I know I've been woefully sparse in the updates department. End of the year work deadlines have me not spending much hobby time at home. Hopefully I'll get a few small projects out during holiday shut down at work. I do know that I have a couple games to go to next week which should provide good fodder for the blog.

May all of you have a Merry Christmas and a happy new year. May your figure collection grow and your unpainted lead pile shrink. May you have more fun gaming ahead for 2014 and your dice roll true.

The Battle of Tauromenion

Over the past few weeks we got together for two sessions to fight the second battle in our ongoing 28mm First Punic War campaign. Pictured to the left on the left is the Carthiginian commander and on the right the commander of Rome's forces. In the middle our arbiter, the benevolent and all powerful Mammers (aka Mars).

The game took two sessions to fight and in the end the casualties were so complete and devastating that even Phyros would have been appalled. In fact if this battle had actually taken place Phyros would have fought a series of Tauromenionian victories.  In the end Rome had a tenuous hold on the road to Tauromenion and it's garrison, which after the battle was as large as either field army. At the start of the battle the garrison was approximately 20% of the size of either army.

This was a fun game with beautiful troops and terrain. All who played had a good time. I was able to field part of the Carthiginian army with my recently painted troops thanks to my uncle providing the missing units. I look forward to the returns after the battle when Mammers sorts them out. Will there be more battles to fight? Will either army be able to field enough troops? Will Syracuse sweep both Rome and Carthage from Sicily? Only Mammers knows.