LOTR - Round 3

Army of Ithilien vs Army of Harad

The forces of Harad bite off more than they can chew as the near full strength force of Ithilien descended upon them in a pitch battle.

The left flank was fairly static with a Harad Warband advancing and forcing a standoff, as the main force of Haradrim Archers tried some long distance shooting to weaken the opposition. A late charge from the warband saw off the rival unit which had moved closer after a failed charge declaration.

In the centre the Oliphant was enjoying itself as it first faced a charge from the Gondorian command crew. The loss of a Gondorian commander to the combined might of the beast and some charging archers, and the routing of both the leader (also wounded) and standard bearer caused minor problems to the Gondorians, where as the charge of the newly free Mumakil and the Harad Leaders into some spearmen was more serious.

The Orcs on the right flank faced a pounding from the Gondorian Cavalry, who had already successfully seen of the screening force of Haradrim Horse Archers, with one of the Orc units breaking in the final turn.

Despite punching above their weight relative to the two forces strengths, the Haradrim had to concede defeat.

Meanwhile... If you go down to the woods today...

Army of the White Hand vs Elves of Lorien

The sneaky elves were up to their dirty tricks again this time ambushing the forces of Saruman. The confusion was enough to cause the orcs to panic in what quickly became a one sided battle. The Elven casualties amounted to one dead and another who died but got better. (i.e. made the replacement roll.)

Agincourt 06 Game

A St. George's Day special, held upstairs at the Duke of Edinburgh.

King Henry the Tel's weak force was given the task of holding off the French.

A game played under Warmaster Ancients rules (despite it being medieval).

The 'plucky' english managed to hold the position despite the French penertrating the line (after tripping over themselves).


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Wars (Great and Silly)

Was in observer mode at wargames on Tuesday to witness a game of Warhammer Great War. First full game for all the participants; as the Turks lead by Matt and Alan took on the entrenched Australians of Dave S. The Army Lists being made up based on the early war lists in the main rules (The proper rules for the theatre are suppose to be coming from Warhammer Historical some time in the future).

The rules, terrain and troops were supplied by Dave M. The minis were 20mm plastic. Airfix for Aussies, HaT for Turks, and looked good at a distance despite the desert uniforms not being the most colourful.



The Aussies had a limited amount of trenching and wire and set up the MGs and sole Artillery piece on the flanks.


The Turks advanced en mass but were slowed down by the rough terrain. Both Turkish MGs and Artillery set up against the same flank and managed to eventually clear both Aussie MGs.


Despite numerous rules checks the game played remarkably quickly and everyone involved agreed that the system played well

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Also playing was a game of Tankwreck, a 'trial' scenario by its author Martin. This involved the forces of Iraq, lead by the Minister of Truth 'Comical' Baldi, invading Sweden. Despite having a well drilled force of Volvo's Sweden fell to the Iraqis after a gallant, but ultimately futile, head on assault against the Iraqi armour.

New Wings

The new Wings of War Booster packs, Dogfight and Immelmann, finally turned up at the Post Office on Monday after failure to deliver on Saturday.

It looks like the RAF SEa from the Dogfight booster is going to be one of the favourite allied planes to play as its as fast as a SPAD XIII but more maneuverable. I'm hopeful that it'll appear in Series 4 of the miniatures, and would like it to include one of the night fighter colour schemes just to give the allies a bit of colour for a change. That is still in the far future as we are still waiting for Series 3 to be released and also the box set for the bombers.

The early war planes from the Immelmann pack also make an interesting addition to the game as they seem closely matched against each other. They are still totally outclassed by the later planes but, given the nature of the random damage, still have a chance. It would be interesting to find out of a single SE5a could take out a couple of Fokker E.IIIs. If playing altitude rules then the SE5a would be almost impossible to pin down as its climb rate and altitude ceiling is far greater than the poor Eindecker. (But still not as good as the Siemens D.IV that also appear in Dogfight!)
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Phalanx 07 Game

Our trip down to Phalanx in St Helen's. Martin dipped into club funds to pay the entry fee. Was too late to hire a mini-bus so the group convoyed by car.

Despite invites in the past this was the first time the club set up an exhibition game with Alan and Matt's Romans and Celts.. Some how the table managed to win a couple of prizes!

Shame we never got organised to put something on this year (08). I did go down on my own and met up with others down there.

Once again a report by Alan appears on the Classical Hack site.

And a summary of the show and some ugly mug shots from the organisers themselves.


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Xmas 07 Game

With the unfortunate loss of the Photo Gallery on the Furness Wargamers website I'm going to try and reconstitute what photos I can find onto this Blog via Picasa over the next few weeks.

Held at the Abbey Baptists over Christmas in part to make up for the loss of the regular game nights. Terrain and Minis by Alan and Matt. Rules were Classical Hack. Photos care of Martin.

The whisky swilling barbarians once again have a crack at Hadrian's Wall by setting a rather blatant trap.

For a more detailed report by Alan check out the following...

Four Elves...

...walk into a bar. And the barkeeper says 'is this some type of joke?'

Dragonlance finally kicked off on Wednesday with the obligatory party meet up in the local drinking hole (somewhere in post Dragon War northern Ergoth). Usual banter with annoying landlord and even more annoying singing Gnome and his magical musical mandolin. Even worse Igrane joined in the resultant karaoke. He's got a good singing voice but despite enquires he's remaining very elusive about his own background.

Looks like we're one down in the party already as we've not heard a word from the newbie, Lawrence. Since he never joined the party proper we don't even get the chance to loot the body.

Could soon be two down as my cleric has already been dropped down to negative in the first combat with Goblins. The green creatures seem to be running some sort of sting operation with the suspected assistance of the Gnome. First he spreads rumours of attacks on neighbouring villages by a Dragon, then the Goblins use some mechanical contrivance to pretend to be the thing approaching, scaring the villagers off, and leaving the place empty to be looted at leisure.

The party is slowly turning the battle round despite being split up at the start of combat. Solaris the Mages' luck held up as he managed to avoid repeated attacks against him until Igrane could move in and assist him. Azacel, who had spent the night in a tree outside the Inn, ditched trying to shoot the Goblins at range thru the heavy morning fog to move in for some close-up work.