Blood Rage Previews

Pictures of the production versions of the Blood Rage figures have been released, and they certainly seem to live up to the original concepts and masters. On these photos I have removed the blue and sharpened them a little, but otherwise they are as sent. Nice sharp detail throughout, even on the smaller figures. They were originally promised for September but I always reckon on some delay with kickstarter projects. Hopefully they will be in my hands by xmas, giving me a nice project to while away the winter gloom. Even though the figures are part of a boardgame, my intention is to use them in Saga, or Dragon Rampant, or anything at all really. I can just imagine the werewolf stalking the Victorian streets in a game of IHMN or similar. And you don't have to possess the cunning of Loki to imagine what I will be doing with the undead vikings!

Fire Giant and troll

Troll and sea serpent

Mountain Giant and Ice Giant

Undead vikings and werewolf

Blood Rage Previews

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Undead Vikings Painted

I managed to get the first batch of shambling Nordic revenants painted up fairly quickly. Most of these are simply mantic zombies and ghouls, with just a few viking bits to add flavour. Future batches will contain more historical bits, so in the end they will look more viking like than this lot.

There's 13 figures here, enough for a unit in either Lion Rampant or Saga. I see them as lowly fighters, the equivalent of bondi or even levy troops. I am hoping to double their number, and also add some more elite troops. Undead Vikings Painted

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Warg Riders

Lion Rampant formation

I finally finished painting the warg riders. There's eight in total, though as they are mostly metal only six are unique. That's fine for Lion Rampant, when playing Saga there will be a couple of duplicates. I must dig out (or invent) a battle board and get some games with them.

When it came to the palette, I was struck by how much the beasts looked like hyenas rather than wolves. A quick google and I was sold on the pale brown fur. The muzzles are grey for a little contrast. The riders are pretty drab, to match in with my Mordor and Isengard collection. Another unit crossed off my painting list, a satisfying feeling. I have quite a large force of orcs now, so I need to switch my efforts to the good guys for a while - either paint more Rohan or Dwarfs.

Saga formation

Warg Riders

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Undead Vikings

The first fantasy army I collected, over twenty years ago, was the Undead. The first historical army I owned was a viking army. I guess there's a certain inevitability about me starting an undead viking force.

I have a few good reasons to be painting this lot up. First, there's a revenants battle board for the Saga game I can use them with. Secondly, I would like to have a fantasy force available for gaming the new Dragon Rampant game when it surfaces later in the year - I am also thinking that I should receive Blood Rage at about the same time, so having a fantasy force of vikings and undead vikings would make sense. Thirdly, most of these models were already built to be used as zombies in a WHFB army, so it only took a couple of hours over the weekend to get the rest kitbashed. As you probably realise, there's a combination of Army of the Dead, mantic undead, and a smattering of historical bits been used. Fourthly, I enjoy blasting through figures like this at a fast pace, far quicker than I can complete commission work. It's early days yet, this is after just one painting session, but I already feel like I have made a lot of progress. Undead Vikings

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Fantasy Saga

For a good while I have been wondering about playing fantasy factions in Saga. There are Lord of the Rings battle boards on the web, many of them simply the historical boards with renamed abilities. The vikings' aggressive style is taken up by the forces of Isengard, the Normans' love of cavalry and archery is extended to Rohan, that kind of thing. I have yet to try it, as I am still a little bit short of painted troops, but it's at the top of my to do list.

It should also be possible to field just about any fantasy army you can think of. With a little imagination there's a battle board for all my Warhammer forces, I just have to sit down and come up with one. Men, dwarfs and elves are probably the easiest, but things like daemons and undead are perhaps a bit more difficult. But now, there's a little help on the way, from the publishers of the Saga game. On release at Salute, a new battle board and complete faction, for Saga games with a fantasy twist. Full details on the gripping beast site. The rules and battle board will be available for download after the exclusive set has sold out, so that should help with how to field psychological horrors. I am pleasantly surprised by this little snippet of news. Fantasy Saga

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Up in smoke

I have been playing a fair number of skirmish games recently, last night it was a return to Saga. Having played all the official scenarios several times over, I made up a quick and easy one of my own. Viking raiders had to penetrate the Anglo Dane defences and torch the village (they probably looted a few items too if they had any sense). It was a very simple affair, any unit by a hut and not in combat could attempt to burn it by activating and rolling a 4+. After fierce fighting, a pair of hirdmen (bottom left) managed to break through the defences and in the very last turn set the remaining two hovels alight. The whole village up in smoke! Victory to the vikings.

The game also gave me a chance to try out my new terrain. I still need to make up some boundaries (hedges or walls) and I think my battle mat needs some roads or muddy areas marked on it, to break up the expanses of green meadow land. Skirmish gaming is my thing at the moment, I am bouncing from Saga to Lion Rampant to Dux Britanniarum and back again. At some point I should write a comparison of the different systems.

Up in smoke

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Wargames In the Dining Room

For the past few years I have enjoyed many a game in Matt's sumptuous wargaming dungeon. He has lots of space, a large hand built gaming table, with modular boards and a terrain collection he has built up over the years. From small skirmishes in the Indian Wars, robberies on the streets of Victorian London, to mass fantasy battles and the occasional flight into space. There's even a wine cellar attached!

My own set up is a far more modest, portable affair. I have a painted fleece blanket which I throw over the dining room table, a few books as hills and a bit of scatter terrain. It's a 5 x 3 space, so ideal for many of the skirmish games we play. Once I get my terrain collection upgraded, it should be just fine for games like LotR skirmish, Saga, Lion Rampant, Of Gods and Mortals, maybe I will even get my Dystopian Legions forces finished one day.

There are two advantages I can claim over the dungeon (yes, I do have dungeon envy). My system is light and portable. A couple of weeks back I rolled up my battle mat and loaded it and my box of dark ages figures into the boot of the car and they travelled 100 miles to a family visit, where I was able to demonstrate wargaming to my brother in law. And secondly, as you can see from these glorious technicolour images, the lighting is pretty good for photography. I use the dining room as my painting area, so it's equipped with a good daylight bulb in the ceiling and in a portable floor lamp, to aid vision through the long dark of the winter months. Admittedly, that's all a poor second to the nerd heaven of a dedicated gaming room, but it's a start! Wargames In the Dining Room

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Saxon command group

There's not much to report at the moment, though I have completed the build of the Saxon command figures. I also found an old resin cross that I think I originally had earmarked for a Vampire Counts army, but thought it would make a nice little bit of terrain or objective marker.

As usual I really struggled with the metal claws (hands), it was a real struggle getting the plastic pole in there. For the rest I decided not to bother, clipped off the metal claws and replaced them with plastic bits. Time and time again I see people on forums swearing that metal is better - do not believe them! Saxon command group

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A small haul

A windy drive up north of the border today, to the Albanich show in Dumfries. I am by no means an expert on wargames shows - my personal tally is just York, Scarborough and Phalanx in St Helens - but I think this must be one of the smaller on the circuit. I went along hoping to pick up some terrain and maybe a few bargains, but came out with something else. I suspect this is how many wargamers operate.

Along with a few basic mdf bases, I bought some Highland cattle from warbases to add to my farmyard collection - very useful for those cattle raid scenarios which seem to crop up frequently in dark ages wargaming. I also spotted a couple of bargain Rackham Confrontation orcs and added them to my growing collection of this range. I have no idea as yet what I will do with them, I just like the figures and will get to them one day.

Excitement levels peaked when I found one trader selling the new Claymore Castings crossbowmen. I have been wowed by a picture of them on the Lead Adventure forum and was keen to get hold of them. Unfortunately, there was only one of three packs available, but now that I have seen them in the flesh I will definitely be getting the others. I am a bit picky when it comes historical metals, but these are probably the finest figures in my  historical collection - we'll see how good they look when I get them painted. I seem to have picked up the medieval bug lately. The Wars of the Roses retinue I have almost finished for Lion Rampant was partly chosen from the convenience of having a box of Perry miniatures in the house. Now I am actively seeking new figures to start a new retinue, one comprised of the finest figures I can find from the era. It may be historical, more likely I will mix it up a little and just go with the most aesthetically pleasing. A small haul

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Dark Ages Collection

My complete collection of dark ages figures, all neatly organised in a box file. For the past year they have sat in a variety of places, including a shoe box and a pizza box! Now they have a nice new magnetic home. The box file cost me £4 from a local stationery supplier, while the magnetic sheet costs about £1 from ebay for an A4 sized sheet - this is one and a bit sheets in fact. Based on magnetic pennies, the figures are reasonably secure. If I tip the box up by 30 degrees there is no movement, but I doubt it would survive a complete upending. For storage and trips round to my mate's house for gaming, it's a good  solution.

There's about 100 figures in here, roughly half Viking and half Saxon, with a mix of plastics and metals. Still to be added are my Drabant viking archers, which remain unpainted for the time being. I could also double the number of Wargames Factory levy, but I won't because they are poor figures. I will probably use them as casualty markers, maybe as conversion fodder for zombies. I also have plenty of Gripping Beast plastic Saxons I could build, which might get done one day. But at the moment this gives me enough for two six point Saga forces, or two Dux Britanniarum starter armies, which is all I need. They will probably also be fielded en masse in Hail Caesar games, when we finally get round to it. There's something very satisfying about looking at a set of figures you have worked on, knowing they are ticked off your to do list. Dark Ages Collection

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Dark Ages Levy

My Dark Ages collection continues to grow, the newest addition is these plastic levy troops from Gripping Beast. As a long time collector of fantasy figures, most of them the finely detailed examples available from GW, I have to say that I was a little underwhelmed when the promo pictures for the levy were first released. I had waited for them for so long, then eventually gave up and bought metal figures. However, when xmas came around I received a frame of these new plastics from gaming buddy Matt as a gift - my one and only wargaming gift of the season!

Looking at the frames the quality of the casting and mould lines is very good, as you would expect from Renedra. The sculpts are okay, the bodies are stooped a little and the heads are dominated by the older inhabitants of the village, but decent enough for levy. Assembled with spears I think they are passable, certainly better than the Wargames Factory plastics, though I remain unconvinced by the slinger poses.

They are easy to paint up, a few washes and they are done. With shields attached and assembled en-masse they look pretty decent, certainly as good as many of the metals on offer. Their biggest advantage is the cost. Forty figures to a box, that's five points of warrior quality troops in Saga terms, for about twenty pounds. Add in a blister of metals and a warlord and you have a six point warband. They are pretty generic so could be used as Vikings, Saxons, Danes, etc. If you are not too fussed about historical accuracy you could probably count them as just about any of the Saga factions warrior or levy troops. A good way to add numbers to your collection. Dark Ages Levy

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Tanatus Saxon Archers

It's been a few weeks since I previewed the Saxon archers by Tanatus Miniatures (original post here). Now that they are painted and based, I will reiterate what I said then, that these are finely detailed historical miniatures. They paint up really nicely with a few washes and glazes. I was sufficiently impressed to go a little further with them and add bow strings, using human hair double twisted for strength. They don't score any more hits on the battlefield, but they look like they mean to!

As usual with my dark age figures I have based them on pennies, which are magnetic. This means I can use them on their round bases in skirmish games like Saga, or I can build a movement tray for more conventional unit based games, most likely Hail Caesar at some point.

I have more dark ages metals on the way, coming to me all the way from Salute. When I have those ready I will take some pictures to compare the different manufacturers in my collection. Tanatus Saxon Archers

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Playing a 10 point Saga game

I reckon that the most played game for me last year was Saga. We must have tried half the factions and all the scenarios several times over, even a small campaign, all at the recommended six points level. It gives a good game with plenty of decisions to be made, but inevitably there comes a time when something new is needed.

In the back of the Saga book there is a one page suggestion for increasing the number of points played. Eight points didn't seem much different to six points, so we tried a ten point battle. My vikings have been hired by a Saxon lord to fight against a rival - so most of my collection against (about half of?) Matt's collection. In the picture, my vikings and Saxons are on the left in the distance, the nearer figures are Matt's Saxon hoard. And a hoard it was too, the Saxons really benefited from the numbers a large game allows, easily repelling the usurper and his mercenaries.

The game has more of a small battle feel to it, rather than a large skirmish. The extra points tend to be used to boost numbers per unit, rather than number of units. The Saga dice still never seem to be enough, so it can be a little frustrating as first one wing acts, then the centre, then the other wing, but overall it seems to work quite well. I think we might move on to twelve point battles next - after all, this is just one extra warlord and maybe his bodyguard, so it's not necessarily a huge number of extra troops, but the extra warlord should give extra control (and thus more action) on the battlefield.

There's plenty still to explore in Saga. I realise that there's a new expansion due out soon, but I am keen to try it out at this slightly larger scale, using Lord of the Rings forces, as well as our dark age armies. We are also planning on trying Hail Caesar, looking forward to starting a whole new gaming experience, though the masses of rules on movement seems particularly daunting after the simplicity of moving skirmish forces around. I'm sure it will be worth the effort and hopefully will have a battle report in the not too distant future. Playing a 10 point Saga game

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Playing Lord of the Rings using Saga rules

Last year I enjoyed many a game of the Lord of the Rings strategy battle game. It's not a complex ruleset, there are few stats to memorise and just one chart in the rulebook. So it's simple to learn and provides a couple of hours of relaxed gaming, especially suited to scenario driven encounters. It works well at about 30 or so figures per side, though in theory it can be more than this. A couple of times I fielded my orc horde of about 70 figures, which slowed the game right down. The main problem is that each combat is treated separately, there is no aggregation into units, so it can get a bit bogged down into endless dice rolls when your horde starts swinging their rusty weapons. In summary, it's a nice easy system for small skirmishes, but struggles a little with bigger encounters.

Saga is a similar game to Lotr, it's a dark ages skirmish game (and let's face it, Lotr is basically dark ages warfare with a little extra magic and the occasional monster). Saga is primarily designed with six point warbands in mind, which translates into 24 elite warriors, or 48 average warriors, or 72 levy (poor) warriors - obviously most players take combinations of these, so a typical warband is around 40 or 50 figures. A game can be easily fought in an hour or so and there are half a dozen scenarios and four distinct factions to battle with in the basic game, with about another dozen in the expansions.

While the Saga rules are very, very simple, with no real stats even, the clever bit is that each force is made unique by the special abilities that can be called on using the Saga dice. The vikings, for example, have many abilities that allow them to boost their combat potential, while the Welsh faction are more suited to hit and run guerilla tactics. Each faction has it's own flavour and fighting style, more fantasy-historical than historical, which suits me down to the ground.

Inevitably, gamers across the web have designed their own Saga boards to field their own factions. There are historical factions, from ancient Greeks and Thebans to Crusaders. There are also fantasy battle boards around, I have seen discussions on Game of Thrones battle boards, but of course my main interest has been in the Lord of the Rings. I found a great blog, Figures and Stories, which not only has battle boards for the main Tolkien factions but also some quite fantastic painting and pictures, well worth a viewing. I have downloaded most of the pdfs and hope to give a few of them a trial in the coming months. The Saga continues! Playing Lord of the Rings using Saga rules

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Tanatus Saxon Archers Review Part 1

When I first started playing Saga, I did so by buying two boxes of plastic figures for a Saxon warband. It allowed me to quickly assemble six points at relatively low cost. In fact, I could probably double the force with the bits I have left over from the plastics. I really wanted to make up a unit of bow armed levy troops, but they are not that convincing when assembled this way. What to do?

I started to look around at metals. There are some decent figures around, though I do find a lot of historical metal ranges to be far too chunky. I was beginning to think I would never find a suitable range, when I stumbled across Tanatus Miniatures. As you can see from the link, they are distributed by North Star Military figures. I thought they looked very well proportioned from the pictures, but balked a little at the price - a unit of 12 metal levy troops, the worst in the army, would cost the same as a whole box of hearthguard, the best in the force. Put another way, twenty pounds can buy you one point of metal mediocre troops, or ten points of plastic superior troops. It's easy to see why many stick with the plastics. For me, however, the aesthetics are as important as performance on the gaming table. Having spent so much time looking for decent figures, I decided to take the plunge. I have recently sold off some excess vikings on ebay, so the funds had been raised anyway. I ordered on Monday and they arrived on Thursday.

When you tip the figures out of their plastic bag, they look like this. The excess metal bits are easily clipped away and, after a couple of hours of tedious filing, I had removed the mould lines. The casting I would class as very good, with no obvious flaws to be seen. There are no bases included, but this is no problem as most historical gamers have their own preferred way of basing. For me, this means glueing them to pennies, then adding a sand/pva paste mix.

After a white primer and a thin guiding wash, they are ready to paint. You can see that they are quite finely detailed, with good proportions, not too clunky or chunky, which has been the main stumbling block with most historical metals I have experienced to date. I have a ten point Saga game planned for next week, hopefully they will be ready by then. I am playing my vikings, but I think a few Saxon slaves with bows being pressed into service is not an unreasonable thing to do. When the figures are fully painted, I will take a few comparison shots to show them alongside my other Saga troops. Tanatus Saxon Archers Review Part 1

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Review of the Year

It's traditional at the start of a new year to take a look back at the preceding twelve months, so here's my highs and lows of 2013.

The year started on a very promising note. I was determined to continue trying new games and quickly got some Sedition Wars figures painted up. Well, the painting was quick enough, the cleaning and prep work on the plastic resin mix was more work than usual. The final painted result was worth the hassle. Rather than just get stuck into a game, I checked the forums on a few rules queries and found there were lots of issues with the gameplay, confusion and lack of balance. There was a promise to get everything sorted, but it seemed to drag on and my initial enthusiasm drained away. I started to look into alternative rules sets but didn't get very far. In the end, about mid way through the year, the second consignment of figures arrived along with new cards and new rules. However, these seemed just as unbalanced as the first set and I was really put off even trying the game, which is pretty stupid really when you think about it. Maybe I should just give them a whirl in the new year.

Saga proved to be a far better gaming experience. I have played many a game over the year and while the newness has worn off a little, I still feel that the system has much to offer. I have tried roughly half of the available factions and maybe need to look into new scenarios, but still like the game enough to invest time and money into building my collection of dark ages warbands. The miniatures leave me less excited, I feel that most historical miniatures are adequate and not much more, but am pleased to now have two starter warbands fully painted.

Lord of the Rings was probably the biggest revelation for me this year. It's a decent set of rules with fairly quick gameplay, heavily reliant on the scenarios and background. It works well with about 30 or so miniatures per side, but starts to break down after that as it handles every combat singly. If you are using orcs and have over 60 combats to roll, it can get a bit tedious. While the game is decent I find the minis to be excellent, I can't understand why they are not more popular. I have a sizeable collection of orcs painted and a reasonable Isengard force started, with a Rohan contingent waiting for paint.

The only thing that tops Lord of the Rings figures, for me at least, is my Warhammer fantasy collection. While the official figures have got steadily worse in my eyes, I have enjoyed finding and painting alternatives. My top highlight of the year was adding a unit of grave guard (built from Lord of the Rings figures!) and a varghulf to my Vampire Counts army, though I only got to use them once in a game. I also added a few chaos characters to my army and played a few games with my daemons, but overall it was a very quiet year for the game that was once all engrossing.

When I look at my painting list for the year, it's quite impressive compared to previous years. Most of it is shown here in this review, though I have also pretty much finished a unit of marauders for my chaos army too. I have spent less time on painting individual models, though I do have something nice to post in the new year. I have also managed to add a fair few bits to my terrain collection, so it's been a good year for my wargaming collection.

My highlights for the year then would have to be painting the Vampire Counts, playing Saga and discovering the quality of the Lords of the Rings figures. If only there was some way to combine the Saga rules with the Lord of the Rings figures. Well actually, there is, but I will come back to that in a future post. The low points were probably failing to find decent dark ages figures and my declining interest in playing WHFB. If only I could use my fantasy collection without having to rely on the actual rulebooks. Again, that's something I will be looking into next year. I have some interesting plans and ideas for 2014 and will post about them in the next few days. Happy new year folks! Review of the Year

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Saga Four Points Viking Warband

My four point viking warband, with hand painted shields, completed in  less than a month. That's not a bad result, though apart from the shields, I can't say I enjoyed painting it that much. It was the poor sculpts that made it a chore, though en masse they look quite decent. I am not used to such mediocre models in my hands. I would not recommend the Gripping Beast starter warband as a product, but would suggest you look elsewhere. There are a few Foundry vikings in the mix and they are more dynamic models, though a little more chunky in build. At some time in the new year I will try the Drabant miniatures, which I first mentioned in this post.

I have already detailed my choice of the clothing palette (in this post). For the shields I googled lots of designs and used some of them as inspiration, sticking to a limited palette of mainly red and white, with black and yellow as secondary colours. I also looked at  viking jewellery, a couple of the shields have knots and beasts from images of pendants, one even from my wedding ring. The shields have really transformed the warband for me, I will definitely be enlarging it to six points in the new year. Until then, here's a few close ups of each of the four points.

Saga Four Points Viking Warband

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Vikings nearly done

Just a very quick update to show that the viking warband is almost completely painted. It has already been in action a couple of times over the xmas break, which was the reason for rushing them through in the past month. Just the shields to complete on the last few and they are completely finished. In this photo they are packed tightly on to a piece of magnetic paper, which roughly shows how they would look in a conventional wargaming movement tray. Vikings nearly done

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Vikings sighted

This is the first two points of my Saga vikings warband, fully painted. I stuck to a desaturated palette for the clothing, hoping that the shields bring them alive. Those on the left are the bondi, the basic troops available to the warlord. They are armed with spears and shields for the most part, with little or no armour. The four figures on the right are the hirdmen, the warlord's best fighting troops, with armour, swords and helmets and better decorated shields.

All the shields are freehand designs, from simple quarters to stylised birds, serpents and a quite ambitious knotted dragon (second from right). While this approach is more time-consuming than transfers, I do get a little "decal fatigue" when browsing images on the web and wanted to have a unique look to my own warband. They are not quite as polished as they could be, but for wargaming figures they are good enough. Vikings sighted

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Drabant Miniatures Vikings

If you have been following my posts on the Saga viking warband, you may have noticed that I have been a little curmudgeonly about the figures I have. I spent about a year looking at what the market had to offer and was a little surprised that the range by the historical manufacturers was less than inspiring. After all, vikings are an iconic part of European dark age history, so you would expect there to be plenty to entice the gamer.

I looked at Foundry, but find them a little chunky and leaning towards fantasy style. Gripping Beast are more historically accurate but fairly stolid, their range has barely been updated in twenty years (though the newer Jomsvikings look much better). There are a couple more smaller metal ranges which fall somewhere between these two. And then there are plastics by both Wargames Factory and Gripping Beast. I have held these in my hand, seen them up close. They are okay, not up to the standards expected by fantasy players, but cheaper than metals and so a possible starting point. In the end, after dithering for months, I went with the Gripping Beast viking starter set, mostly because I managed to get a deal with a rulebook and dice thrown in, hoping that I could make them decent enough with some nice shields.

The good news is that I have finally found what I was looking for. A very nice set of viking sculpts, leaning towards historical accuracy rather than fantasy looking, with good proportions and some dynamic poses. And with hands that actually grip their weapons. Drabant Miniatures is a Russian company with a small but very nice looking range of vikings. The UK supplier of the range seems to be Old Glory. My favourite set is those shown at top, but I would be very happy to include the others in my warband too. These three packs would make a unit of hirdmen and a unit of bondi, taking my starter warband up to six points. Something to look forward to in the new year I think. Drabant Miniatures Vikings

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