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.  

Rebasing and Retouches - Wargames Factory Vikings

The first plastic figures I bought were the Wargames Factory Vikings and Saxons, probably five or six years ago.  I realize the reputation those figures have, and deservedly so. Getting a good pose is difficult, hands have hitchhiker thumbs and many of the fine details are muddy and indistinct.

That being said, they can be an efficient way to fill out large warbands. Plus, their sprues contain many arm and weapon options that should find a place in your "bit box" for future conversions.

I originally based them on thick card and rather poorly at that. I decided to rebase them on square and round bases, mostly with snow and winter grass.  The plan is to build a snow scene for an Icelandic feud scenario.

Before rebasing and highlighting

A test figure came apart when I stripped it with Simple Green. It was easily rebuilt, but I didn't want to invest the time into completely re-doing cheap plastics. I decided to just apply some washes and highlights as well as redoing shields.

Until some better plastics are made, the Wargames Factory are the only option for cheap Dark Age archers. 

Below, some good examples of the unique options available. On the left, a warrior with a small Axe held inside the shield, a practice attested to in some of the sagas. The javelin thrower and stone hurler can fill out the skirmishers.

There's a lot of reasons to avoid these figures with better options now available. On the other hand, some of them painted up rather nicely, and I am glad to have the extra heads, arms and weapons. And, I think most agree that the company's figures have improved quite a bit since the early days.  I am eager to buy their AWI Continental Infantry and Woodland Indians.   

Odds and Ends, Vikings and Pilgrims

This past week I have been attacking the pile of unpainted figures.  The pilgrims were an impulse buy, and I cannot explain why I keep purchasing Vikings...maybe some secret desire to do the Great Pagan Army in 1:1.

First, here are some Perry Brothers pilgrims from their First Crusade line.  While not planning on any Crusade era battles, I always need more civilians. These pilgrims could easily fit in an eleventh century Spanish or Byzantine scenario.

The Perry Sculpts are excellent, as their reputation suggests. While slightly thinner and more truly proportionate, they are not out of place with my Gripping Beast and Crusader Miniatures.

Speaking of Gripping Beast, here are some random Vikings from GB and Wargames Foundry, I think.

Finally, in trying to come up with some more uses for my sprues of Wargames Factory Numidians is this Dark Age Irish Warrior.  It is a Numidian Body and a Gripping Beast plastic head.  It was thrown together fairly quickly as a test to see if it was feasible to put together an Irish warband for SAGA.

Kit Bashing Dark Age Skirmishers

SAGA's push to the east, beginning with the Byzantines and Rus in Varjazi & Basilieus has pushed further into Asia with the release of the new Steppe Tribes board in Wargames Illustrated 311.  It is a welcome move, for it is a time period and location in which I have a a great deal of interest and background.

As I have been putting together levies for SAGA and Hail Caesar lately, my expectation is that cheap (low quality) troops need to be acquired cheaply (low cost).  While there is no perfect, dedicated solution for plastic Eastern European and Central Asia armies in the Dark Ages, there are some acceptable substitutes.

A Byzantine Army was one of the first historical armies I began putting almost ten years ago.  Most of my psiloi were archers and a few slingers from Crusader and Gripping Beast, but no javelin-bearers, as SAGA specifies.  Below is a half-unit of Byzantine skirmishers put together from Wargames Factory Numidian bodies, Saxon and German heads as well as a couple of Gripping Beast plastic unarmored heads.  As with any mod, it is a bit of a compromise.  Byzantine troops with standardized tunics and shields would probably have had better footwear and trousers, but I think it works well enough for a game.

Steppe tribes used slaves, captured enemies and even women and children as foot skirmishers.  A favorite tactic of the Khitans and Mongols would be to drive captured enemies towards their own city's walls to create confusion and hesitation among the besieged.  With that in mind, these steppe skirmishers were meant to be a diverse and poorly clad lot that could have come from anywhere between Kievan Rus and Mongolia.  Again, the bodies are Wargames Factory Numidians and Gripping Beast heads.  

More brightly adorned and better equipped are the archers pictured below.  They were intended to look like city militia or merchant guards for the Silk Road cities, such as Samarkand or Bukhara.  These bodies are from Wargames Factory's Persians along with various German and Viking heads.  

Thanks for stopping by, and my next post will be some historical fiction recommendations for Byzantium and steppe tribes before the Mongols.

The Raven's Shadow Review

Last week, I received my copy of The Raven's Shadow from Architects of War, and have been absorbing the rules, and playing some solo practice battles.  The second expansion to the SAGA game shows that Studio Tomahawk is willing to take the basic gameplay in some unexpected directions.

Franks: The Battle Pool mechanic was one that I never quite understood when reading the early descriptions.  When reading the book, it is not as complicated as it seemed.  A player of the Franks has the ability to place up to three dice in the Battle Pool.  The effectiveness of other abilities on the Battleboard depend on how many dice were allocated to the Battle Pool.  This faction's challenge lies in the fact that one has to place dice in the Battle Pool, dice on abilities and still have enough dice left over to activate units.  Players using the Franks will probably use larger units and depend on the We Obey rule.  In fact, the Frankish hero Charlemagne can activate up to three units at a L distance as one of his special abilities.  If you are like me, and like to play quick four or five point games, I am afraid the Franks would be of limited use in such situations.

Irish: Similar to the Welsh in that they are lightly protected fighters who must take advantage of the terrain, the Irish faction shows some serious modifications to the rules.  Hero characters called the Curadh are able to operate independently of units and fight as individual warlords to a degree.

Norse Gael - A Viking faction, and like the Jomsvikings from the previous supplement, its variation is in giving the opposing player a choice. Instead of increasing wrath, the choice is a single combat challenge between a Norse Gael figure and an enemy figure.  Winning the combat allows the Norse Gael player to unlock special abilities.

Strathclyde Welsh - a interesting faction choice, for it was a small kingdom that was eventually absorbed into Scotland in the early eleventh century. The units are not all required to be mounted as I previously assumed, but their new abilities depend upon mounted units.  In this case, the new feature is off-table units. With proper activation, they can enter the battlboard from any side, and another ability allows them to make a shooting attack from off the board, if an enemy is within L of the table edge. Should SAGA move into the East, this would be a useful mechanic to handle steppe factions such as Seljuks or the Pechenegs.

The evolution of the rules in The Raven's Shadow does have the potential to slow the game down some, especially with the insertion of more Reaction based abilities, but that should decrease as players become more accustomed to the process.  The faction choices are good, but one must decide what is right for their style of play.  The Franks require an efficient and calculating manager.  The Irish will be favored by the gambling player, who is willing to take a chance on big victories if a "6" can be rolled.  The Norse Gael have some of the most interesting Hero abilities (Brodir of Man's seer powers seem quite fun) but Challenges may be gimmicky like the Jomsviking's wrath.  My preferred faction from this update will most likely be the Strathclyde, because I am eager to see how the off table abilities play out.

Mounted Welsh kit bashed from two boxes of Wargames Factory Ancient Germans with Saxon and Viking heads and weapons. I added javelin quivers and green stuff cloaks to a few.

Not the paint work I am most proud of, but I did manage to complete about 18 mounted figures in a week. Pictured below is all 24, which is three points worth of warriors. Adding in a unit of levies and two hearthguards will be the final warband.

Norman Infantry Review and Conversions

I have had a box of Conquest Games' new Norman Infantry for about a week.  A quick review: if you have their cavalry, buy this box. You will have more than enough troops for a SAGA warband, and you're more than halfway there for a decent sized non-skirmish game. I am currently leaning towards Clash of Empires - haven't tried Hail Caesar, though.  For about $30 USD, you get eight sprues with five bodies. Three bodies are unarmored, one is in a gambeson and one is in knee length chain mail.  Two command sprues contain a leader in chain and an unarmored musician/standard bearer, and a dead knight.  The models are crisp and well molded with a minimal amount of flash.  The line of flash going up the leg wrappings can be difficult to smoothly remove.

I have two small criticisms with the set.  Overall, the sculpting is excellent, though I do not really care for unarmored fellow who is in an awkward half-run pose.  He doesn't make a good spearman and with a sword in his hand he looks like he is about to trip.  And while the set contains plenty of weapon options (spears, swords, two handed axes, kite shields and round shields), it contains no bows or crossbows.  As levies are the weakest SAGA troops, it can painful to pay metal prices for 12 archers when there are plastic options available for warriors and hearthguard.  It's a disincentive to adding levy units to your warband.

My solution was to add in arms and bows from some bits left over from a box of Wargames Factory Saxons. Here are four Conquest Games infantry converted into archers, and given a black wash to highlight details.

The posing is not ideal for archers, but they might fill out the ranks behind a good set of dedicated metal Norman archers. Neither of those critiques should bar one from buying a box or two if a Norman army is your desire.  

Raiding a Saxon Church

     Here are some photos from a recent match up of Vikings against Saxons.  I took the Saxons and a friend of mine whose gotten the Saga bug took the Saxons.  The scenario was a raid, Vikings wanted the gold candlesticks and silver plates in a Saxon Church.  Here the two sides have spotted each other across the field.  Some taunting is probably going on.

The Saxons advance.

Here a unit of Berserkers has just decimated some Saxon Huscarls.  Sixteen attack dice can do that.  

The Viking and Saxon warlords face off with their warriors.

The Saxons eventually won the day.  After losing outside, the Saxon warlord made it inside the church and through divine providence, and good dice rolls, proved impossible to dislodge.  After losing half their men, my Vikings figured the small church wasn't worth their effort.  The fact that it was 11:30 PM also didn't help my resolve very much either.  

Figures are mostly plastic Wargames Factory and Gripping Beast.  The church was built from Hirst Arts blocks.  

Icelanders

     Viking is an overused term, but figure collectors and wargamers love it anyways.  The people of Njal's Saga were mostly landowners and farmers concerned with earning a living from their land.  Young men, such as Njal's sons Grim and Helgi, spent a few seasons as crew on a boat, presumably raiding.  However, most of the Icelanders were settlers seeking cheap land far from the increasingly centralized and autocratic rulers of Norway and Denmark in the tenth and eleventh centuries.

Njal was a prominent landowner, lawyer and judge who over the course of fifty years gets entangled in a web of vengeance and violence that proved inescapable.  His oldest son, Skarphedin, was a renowned fighter, and supposedly capable of jumping 18 feet across a river with his battleaxe.  These next two figures are Gripping Beast's character figures of Njal and Skarphedin. 

Njal's Saga is set exactly at the time in which Icelanders voted to convert to Christianity from paganism.  This was accomplished somewhat peacefully, though a few killings did occur in both directions.  Wizards, seers and berserkers make their appearances in Njal's Saga.   

One weapon often described in the Sagas, but rarely depicted on miniatures, is the rock.  During sea-borne battles, rocks are frequently mentioned, presumably obtained from the bottom of the ship where some were probably stored as ballast.  Among the Icelanders, swords and armor were expensive and less frequent so rocks were a ready made missile weapon.  These are Wargames Factory unarmored Bondi converted to rock throwers with a few bits from my backyard. 

A Month of Vikings

After a month without posting, March should bring in regular updates featuring a variety of Vikings and Viking related literature.  First, the often maligned Wargames Factory's Dark Ages offerings.  The Viking Bondi differ from the Anglo-Saxon unarmored set in only the head and accessory sprue.  Otherwise, both sets offer the same unarmored/lightly armored bodies in a standing or awkwardly walking pose.  To its main credit, this is the only plastic set currently available that one can use to fill out their ranks of Viking thralls/archers.  It can be difficult to get natural poses from the figures, but with a little shaving of the arms and a willingness to create some lefty archers, some good results can be achieved.

These painted fairly well, at least by my middling standards.  The Norse preference for axes and sword permeates popular history and media, but the bow was a prized weapon by even the best warriors.  In The Icelandic Njal's Saga, the ever feuding Gunnar, armed with a bow and spear, fights off thirteen enemies, slaying many before they even approach him.

My biggest gripe with this line of figures are the heads.  It can take a lot of work to get them to sit naturally.   Here's a group shot of a point's worth of Saga thralls.  A few wear chain, but maybe they were lucky scavengers.  

Njal's Saga may be my favorite Icelandic saga.  Set at the turn of the eleventh century, it is a violent and darkly humorous account of the blood feuds among the self-governing Icelandic settlers.  There are no epic battles or king-making moments of glory in this account.  It does have more premeditated murder and domestic violence than a hard-boiled mystery novel.

Njal's Saga at Amazon.

Welsh Light Cavalry

Before starting SAGA, I had enough models to skirmish with Normans, Vikings and Saxons.  The Welsh faction was a notable hole in my collection.  I did stumble upon the idea of using Wargames Factory ancient German cavalry as a base for conversion.  

The bearded fellow in front is just a German painted in a late dark ages scheme.  Welsh at this time period were predominantly beardless, but that doesn't preclude a warrior with a shaggier personal preference: 

This is a conversion involved using a Gripping Beast Saxon head with a cape made from Green stuff:

A group shot of some Welsh priodaur:

Finally, a conversion that's a WIP for a Welsh warlord combines a Conquest Games Norman body with a WF Saxon head.  I love Conquest's Normans.  The extra bodies in each box have a great deal of conversion potential.

 

Although in hindsight, this one looks more like Charlton Heston in El Cid than a Welsh nobleman.  Hmm...next project:  Conquest Normans into El Cid Spaniards...