February Painting Update - Finns, Irish and Scots

No historical content this week, but a few pictures of my painting efforts these past couple of weeks.

More Dark Age Finns, this time some Black Tree Design unarmored Bondi:

Also from Black Tree, some skirmishers with Javelin.  I kept them nondescript enough to use anywhere from the Byzantines to Ireland.  

Four Irish mounted fianna from Gripping Beast: 

Finally, mounted Scot warriors from Crusader Miniatures:  

Surprisingly, these were my only disappointment.  Usually, Crusader is my favorite manufacturer, but these were a bit of a let down.  Part of is my fault for mistakenly ordering the wrong pack (I wanted the Thegns with chain mail) but I was also a bit disappointed in the casting quality.  The horses were fine, but the men had excessive flash, and the faces are "muddied." 

Norse Gaels: Vikings in Ireland

The story of the Vikings in Ireland is a fascinating part of their history, but one that is not as often told as their role in England, Iceland and the New World.  Even Irish national histories minimize the effect of the Norse in their country. The Vikings deserve a great deal of credit for hastening the trend towards centralization and urbanization in Ireland.

Unlike England, the Vikings in Ireland were never present in such numbers as to effectively colonize and conquer large swaths of the country. Instead, they built coastal settlements and focused on raiding and trading. From these bases in the late ninth century, the Vikings formed alliances and fought alongside one Irish kingdom against another. These alliances shifted but could be strengthened through inter-marriage.  Most famously, in 999 AD the Irish High King Brian Boru was married to Gormflaith, an Irish princess who was the mother of Sigtrygg Silkbeard, the Norse king of Dublin, from her previous marriage to Olaf. Sigtrygg was then married to Slaine, one of Brian's daughters.  These Hiberno-Norse (or alternately, Norse Gaels) faded from significance after the Battle of Clontarf in 1014, though Sigtrygg held on to Dublin until 1036.

For SAGA, the Norse Gael faction is a mix of the Vikings and the Irish, leaning a bit towards the Irish.  The Norse-Gaels are fairly "shooty."  The Levy and the Warriors are both javelin throwers. Alternately, warriors and hearthguard can be armed with Dane Axes.  They cannot be mounted as the Irish can, but on the whole, their defensive values are a bit better.  Furthermore, their "gimmick" is the Challenge, in which significant combat bonuses can be achieved - if luck is on your side.

From some of my many unassembled Wargames Factory sprues, I threw together a few dedicated Norse-Gaels.  The first unit of warriors below is kit-bashed from several sets to achieve a mixed Viking-Irish look.

Norse-Gael Warriors with double-handed axes below.  The unit leader in front does not have a double handed axe, he has an axe in each hand. He was inspired by Floki from History Channel's Vikings - which is perhaps the only thing left worth watching on that channel. 

A six point Norse Gael warband below. If all goes well, this will be my army at my next tournament. 

Irish Warband from West Wind

The Irish have been my preferred SAGA warband lately for reasons of both game style and familial lineage. While most of my figures have been from Crusader Miniatures, I picked up an army pack of twenty from West Wind on a sale a few weeks age.

West Wind's Irish warband is, judging from the rest of their offerings, aimed at the early Dark Ages or Age of Arthur. Nonetheless, it is not too much of a stretch to use these for the era of Viking invasions in Ireland, especially in the ninth century.

Below, a group shot of all twenty.  For a paint scheme, I stuck with a limited palette. The shields were all red and white and I worked on plenty of variations of Celtic crosses, some historical and some improvised in that style.

The rank troops are for spear or javelin (unsupplied) and come in four different poses. Hands will need to be drilled out in order to fit the weapon.  Heads are separately cast, and there are 10 variations.  Shields are separate as well (except for the musician).  

There are also four unique figures in the set.  Two are warriors with short swords, which are cast-on and not separate.  For a SAGA warband, these can serve as your Curaidh.  

The other two unique figures are a command character with a banner and a musician.  The rough and improvised banner is the detail that most distinctly places these figures in the pre-Viking age.  Using a separate staff and Viking-era banner is easy, but the metal-cast banner is nicely sculpted and unique among my collection.  I went with it. 

These are good figures but do require a bit of prep work.  Drilling the spear holes is a plus for long term stability, but it is an extra task.  Casting quality is good, but some cleanup of jagged areas is necessary.  The neck pocket will also need to be opened up a bit on most of the figures in order to get the head to glue in properly. That is a small price to pay for having some customizeable options.   

For SAGA, these twenty figures give you two points of warriors, a half a point of Hearthguard (Curaidhs) and a Warlord.  One would need at least 12-20 more figures to get a complete six point warband out of this box, so this could best serve as an expansion to an existing army in that game.  

SAGA Tournament Sept 13

We do have game stores in small towns of Georgia, though they tend to focus on Magic and other CCGs.  I am starting to see some X-Wing in local stores, but if the miniatures are pre-painted, aren't I losing half the fun?

Gigabytes, my favorite game store in the Atlanta area, is a great place to visit when I can get away and look for an authentic game store experience. The store supports a wide variety of sci-fi, fantasy and historical games and they have a new, larger location. Yesterday (Sept 13), the store was the location for a SAGA tournament and so me and another local player made the trip down the interstate to the big city.  It was a great day all around, largely because of the expertise of Richard, the tournament organizer and the other players, all a great bunch of gamers.

I had been playing the Irish a lot lately, and I felt like I had a good feel for what they could do.

Game One - Clash of Warlords

Here I played against Vikings.  We chose terrain according to bid system in the basic rules and I went for maximum, with four being the result.

I made the most of the terrain throughout the match.  Most of my SAGA dice were spent on Sons of Dana (a free shooting) and blocking the opponent with Heirs of Mil (which prevent units from approaching a unit if it is S away). If I had to stand and fight, I tried to make sure I could use Sidh on them.

On turn six, I was probably leading in victory points, and so the opposing warlord took a risk  and attacked...but the dogs won.

If this had gone the other way, I did have a unit of hearthguard in reserve that could have double activated and hit the warlord - but as it turned out I was far enough ahead in points to win. In addition to my warlord and two curadhs surviving, a whole unit or warriors and hearthguard survived untouched. 

My opponent in this match was Henry at Plastic Pirates.  He was a great guy to talk with, and was enthusiastic about the game.  Hope to meet him again! 

 Game Two - Escort

I really, really, really did not want to be the baggage player in this scenario.  It was determined by low bid and I stupidly bid 5 points.  My opponent was playing Anglo-Danes and with their intimidation and cancellation abilities his desire for the attacker should have been a given.

The set-up:  Anglo-Danes closet to the camera, the Irish and baggage on the other side.

Mu whole strategy was to whittle down his units with Sons of Dana. Then, open a lane with levy or warriors protected by Heirs of Mil, and then move the baggage behind it.  His strategy was to place fatigues on my baggage, and half their movement or cancel it entirely until the turn count ran out.  But, he still had to destroy all three units for an uncontested win.  

  

So I just moved and shielded baggage as best I could.  I would like to say that I was intentionally playing for a draw because that was the best I could do against the Anglo-Danes.  I could say that, but in reality a good dice roll saved me from a total loss. On the last phase of the last turn, I lost two of the three baggage pieces, and barely survived the third.


Game Three - Sacred Grounds

In this round, my opponent was Skip, who I drove down with and he is my somewhat regular gaming opponent.  He brought his Old Glory Normans.

Winning initiative and following the scenario rules were critical in determining the victor. At the end of each player's phase, the number of opposing models on the three terrain pieces are scored.  I won initiative, and my opponent had no chance of scoring at the end of my phase.  By doing a double activation, I placed two units on a terrain piece, played Heirs of Mil on them, and they remained there at the end of his phase, scoring me eight points. This extra score was very significant, although I did not realize it at the time.

The Norman cavalry scored a lot of points when he put two units of six on a terrain piece, but then lost some of those points, as eight was the maximum scoreable amount per area. 

The most dramatic moment of the game was showdown between the two warlords.  I played Blood of the Kings and sloughed off three hits. My warlord then brought up three warriors who were (I think) able to take out two of the knights with a missile attack.

After eight rounds, the points were added up and it was a more close than comfortable win for my Irish.  Skip is the most gracious and friendly gamer I have ever met.  He is the type of opponent who reminds you when he has fatigue and asks if you want to use it against him.  In fact, he won the Favorite Opponent Award, and walked away with a hero figure pack. 

Game Four - Homeland 

The pre-game portion of this scenario was again based on bidding - Each player offered a number of points they were willing to be the defender.  With the Irish, I announced that I wished to be the raider, and would bid six.  My opponent saw things the same way, so we had to roll off to play defense and I lost - but I at least got my six points.  I played no curadhs and no dogs - I needed more bodies to occupy the buildings.  My opponent had the choice of terrain and he chose none.  Didn't want to get hit by random missile fire in the underbrush.  

I was easily dislodged from the small house, and put two units of hearthguard and the Warlord in the large church. When one unit + 1 hearthguard were wiped out, I moved a unit of warriors into the church that I was keeping by the backdoor.  

Again, my win was based on playing the victory conditions and I still held one building, in which was a unit of warriors, and encircled by javelin throwing levy.  But, I was slaughtered in kill points.  I lost the warlord, three units of hearthguard and a unit of warriors.

The Saxon player was Sean and we laughed at the amount of dead Irish and Saxons that must have been filling up the doorway of that church.  A great guy to talk to and game with, and in fact, everybody I met that day was welcoming and and a pleasure to meet. 

End Results & Summary

I won three and tied one match, which won the tournament by win/loss record, though I don't think I was even in third place in terms of number of kill points or bonus points.  I believe Henry took that honor. The last two wins were based on those particular scenario victory conditions.  Which is a fair win, I guess, and nobody should ever expect the Irish to stand and fight shield to shield.  We hit, run and hit some more.

Also, I need to get sharper for tournament play.  I realized that I had been playing movement through uneven ground a bit wrong, and I have a bad habit of not remembering to put fatigues on friendly units if a unit was wiped out within S.  I also thought that Warlords were immune to that particular fatigue, but I may have been mistaking it for the special ability of a named hero.  Those might be common mistakes, I sometimes see players using the Warlord's Activation for shooting or resting, which is not allowed.  So it is good to get out, play with others, learn some new tricks and, most of all, have fun!

Predictably Unpredictable: Norse Gaels v. Irish SAGA AAR

At this weekend's SAGA game we decided to put the Norse Gaels against the Irish, especially with this year being the millennial anniversary of the Battle of Clontarf.

The scenario was called "To the Green Fields Beyond," a custom "hold the pass" variation from the Studio Tomahawk forum.  The pass between the hills and rocks is open ground, but impassable for 6" on both sides.  Beyond that, the hills and trees are considered rough going.  The faction that gets the most figures (counted by victory points) on the other side of the board after eight turns wins.

Here's the board after deployment. On the left the Irish have a unit of war dogs, six Fianna with Dane axes, two Curaidh, the warlord and a unit of eight warriors.  On the right, beginning closest to the camera, my Norse Gaels are fielding the warlord, four hearthguard with Dane axes, twelve slaves with javelins, four Vikings and unit of eight warriors.

The Irish move first, and their warlord, Fianna and two Curaidh approach the pass.  My levy take two moves, fire their javelins... 

and three Irish fianna are gone.  If the slave levy does nothing else this game, they have already done more than enough.  Fortunately there is more fight still left in them.

Meanwhile on the left, my Norse jarl climbs the hill with his bodyguard, and the Irish leave their wardogs on the other side to await his arrival.  

On the Norse Gael right flank, the warriors are moving to press through the trees, but the Irish beat them there, and pepper them with javelins, doing some damage.

I approach their warriors with reduced numbers, but with a successful Challenge  followed by Ostmen's Fury, I should be able to overcome these Irish.  Unfortunately, despite rolling more dice than the Irish champion, the Norse champion falls.  It is a pattern that will be repeated.  

Then, the four Viking hearthguard move in, and surely this challenge will be won...Again, no and another Viking goes down in the subsequent combat.

On the other hand, all of my luck must have been going to the slave levy, because these guys manage to take out all six hearthguard, with one of them even surviving combat with a curaidah.

As fortunate as the levy were, my opponent decided to move the dogs across the table to take out the last survivor. Meanwhile, the turn counter is drawing close to the end.

Fortunately for me that meant my Warlord was able to cross the treeline uncontested. For the Irish to win, their player needed to take out both remaining Vikings on the right with a single of warrior and make it back through the trees. He killed one, but failed to cross to the other side in time.

Final victory points: Norse Gaels 8, Irish 7 1/2.

With a Viking army, you have the option (with some figure variations) of running them as traditional Vikings, Jomsvikings or Norse Gaels. I like the offensive power of the Vikings, but find the Jomsvikings too limited, perhaps requiring too  much of a long game to build their rage. I want to like the Norse Gaels but, I have to say I am disappointed. All five of my challenges failed and on three of them I was rolling more dice than my opponent. My most useful unit turned out to be the Levy and that is without the Norse Gaels having a single shooting ability on on the battle board. If you're on good terms with the dice gods, this may be your faction; I think I will stick with their more predictable Viking cousins. 

How I Paint - Irish Warriors

A little background on myself - last summer for my birthday my wife bought me the DNA test from the popular genealogy web site.  It was great fun, and I found out some interesting facts about my ancestry.  About 90% of my DNA matched to three areas of Europe: Northern France, Ireland and Scandanavia.  So apparently, my genetic stock is composed of the Normans and Vikings that invaded and settled in Ireland.  Not the nicest bunch of ancestors, but it might explain my enthusiasm for this particular time and place.

The wargamer and miniature collector in me noticed a problem.  Viking ancestors? Got them. Normans? Loads of them. Irish?  Uh oh, nothing there. I had a few random Crusader Irish from a grab bag purchase, so to fill out a small warband I ordered some extra packs from Age of Glory.  They are a good source of Crusader Miniatures in the U.S., and my order arrived within a week.

I don't rate myself as a top painter by any means, but some of my students interested in gaming and miniatures have asked about how I paint, so here is a summary of the process:

First step is priming.  Testors white primer if I am painting lots of flesh tones and fabric, black if I am painting chainmail and fur.  

Block painted. I would like to say that I always think about selecting a color palette for a unit to create visual cohesion, but I am more intuitive than that.  I try to think of colors and patterns that are historically appropriate yet visually appealing. 

Washing and shading.  I generally apply a sepia wash to whites, yellows and tan colors, and mix a darker shade on colors like reds, greens and blues. 

Highlighting, fabric patterns and eyes

Glued onto circular bases. I then add a mix of white glue and sand or railroad ballast.

Bases with static grass and Army Painter grass clumps.