Old Pierre

 Kings and tyrants come and go

I'll stand judged by what I know

A woodsman's life I'll ne'er gainsay,

Deep in the glades and far away...

The barons of England are in open defiance of King John. French and English armies march and counter-march across the land. Raiders strike at village and farm. Churches and manor houses are sacked. Deep in the woods Old Pierre plies his trade and keeps his own council...

 

A spare figure from the Blue Moon range provided the inspiration for this little vignette. The base is an old CD. Thoroughly dried twigs from our garden provide the logs and pollarded stump. Old Pierre's hut is a basic form made from 1mm cardboard. 

 

Pugnacious Peasantry!

After too long a time away from gaming the mojo is beginning to trickle back. I recently finished slapping pigment on the 15mm Blue Moon medieval peasants I bought two years ago for the First Barons War.

They're now based and awaiting warmer weather for the final varnishing. I did give them a coat of matte varnish once the shading dip dried, but it looks glossy. I was able to score a spray can of matte varnish and another can of hunter green from the local JoAnn's outlet in their closing-down sale for 60% off. It's sad to see a staple of the US hobby scene closing down. My cosplay friends are seriously annoyed.

Happy New Year! And...

Some figures. 

These chaps are the peasantry contingent for the Lion Rampant First Barons War collection.

They have four basic poses - pitchfork, axe, hatchet, and club. I might convert a few to bidowers (light infantry). There's an extra chap in one pack, so I'm thinking of making a small vignette of a woodcutter.

To the Manor ~ Done!

'tis finished at last. I'm going to call this done. 

Camelot! Camelot! Camelot! (It's only a model...) Shush!

The roof is a print from a paper craft HO scale railway model, reduced slightly in scale and varnished. The design began as an American wooden shingle type roof, but looks sufficiently like a medieval stone tile pattern it'll do fine. The windows I left blank, painting them in with a dark brown shade to look more like a natural shadowy interior. The whole was given a coat of Future/Clear/Pledge/Whatever polish with some very diluted sepia and black ink to give it a weathered 'recent rainfall' look.

Now go away, or I shall taunt you a second time!

In the Lion Rampant rules this manor would count as 'Superb cover,' giving a defending unit bonuses for cover etc. Hopefully I'll get it into action in a game before long.

Archers and Yeomen

Slow but steady progress on the Lion Rampant retinues this past week. The first batch of archers are finished, and the foot yeomen need their base work completed. I'd just about finished them when one figure's spear decided to part company with the rest of the casting, so requiring some tedious cutting and filing to replace it with a wire substitute. I'm afraid I might need to do the same to others as this project progresses.

It's a bit difficult to determine what the figures bottom-left are wearing. From one angle they're un-armoured, equipped with a nasal helmet and a jerkin over some kind of tunic. From another angle they could be wearing chainmail. I painted them up as un-armoured foot yeomen, but equally they could be foot serjeants. 

Immediately behind them is a row of undercoated figures including three foot serjeants. These do have clearly defined chainmail. Behind them again on the painting block is a batch of foot men-at-arms halfway through the painting stage. I do like 15mm figures, as I find they and 10mm figures are easier to paint than larger or smaller scales.

Once the foot are done I'll turn to the next batch of mounted men-at-arms. The Early English retinue list shows two such units, two foot serjeants and a unit of archers. The French list has two units of mounted men-at-arms, one each of mounted and foot serjeants, and a unit of crossbowmen. It's entirely up to the gamer how the forces are composed, though, but I have enough figures of all types to stick to the lists.

Once more unto the bleach...

Thanks for all the comments on the attempt to strip paint off the old figures, and suggestions for alternatives. I appreciate them. 

A closer examination of the figures once they'd dried off revealed the Simple Green had some effect on the old paint. It took most of the shine off the awful gloss the previous owner had used, and in some places the bare metal showed through. So, after a bit of thought I decided to pitch the lot back into another batch of the green stuff for another 48-72 hours to see what would happen. Watch this space...

The Dolmen Done

Work on the dolmen progressed this week, actually helped by the sweltering heat plaguing NW Ohio for the past two weeks. Paint dried quickly, glue set in record time, flock stuck first go. Marvelous!

First off, after the black undercoat had dried I painted the stones successively lighter shades of grey then applied a layer of vinyl adhesive followed up with flock.

Once the flock was stuck firmly I dripped green ink onto it using an eye-dropper, following up by wet brushing it in successively lighter shades of green. The stones also got some green ink treatment in areas which, in real life would be shaded by the rocks to represent moss.

So here it is, the Dolmen is complete and ready to take its place on the wargames table.

Romano-British war leader Gaius Menusius and his entourage contemplate the ancient stones.

Perhaps appealing the ancestors would help rid the land of the Saxon invaders?

Down Among the Dolmen

Dolmen are found all across Northwestern Europe. Composed of a flat slab of stone set tabletop-fashion on two or more upright stones or megaliths, they're what's left of late Mezolithic/Early Neolithic burials. Once, earth covered the stones to a considerable height to form tumuli, or burial mounds. Time, erosion and ploughing wore down the earth until the stones were exposed once more. They stand as spooky reminders of our prehistoric past.

Like the stone circle/henge I made earlier, I thought a dolmen would liven up the wargaming landscape and be suitable for any period.

First step - the base. One metal cap from an orange juice carton, glued to a roughly-cut card circle. The basic shape of the dolmen rests alongside. The capstone is a flat oval-shaped wood chip glued to three other round pieces cut to length. Top left is an isolated megalith made of another piece of wood chip glued to a fender washer.

Some flocking, again of the trusty dried tea leaves. The dolmen shows another side.

More flocking, this time after the dolmen was glued to the centre of the base using vinyl tile adhesive. I began to apply flocking to the megalith base.

The next step once the adhesive's dry will be a black undercoat.

Henge and Bracken

I finished this henge model a couple of days ago, but due to technical issues have only been able to post the results now. So, with the vegetation in place, here it is...

The vegetation is made up of pieces of Spanish moss, mostly painted a dark green-brown, along with a couple of clumps of foam and coffee grounds painted a lighter green and dotted with magenta to represent flowering bushes. A little wet brush stipple work created the dandelion patches.

As Fitz-Badger commented, you have to get the scale right. This model works for 10mm and 15mm figures. Anything larger would find it a bit of a squeeze.

Hadafix the Druid gets down and funky in a private ceremony accompanied by his pet adder, Abernathy, a monstrous snake with a sweet disposition.

Watched admiringly by his wife, Sharon, Hadafix's descendant Father Unctuus blesses the pagan sacrificial stone to remove all that primitive ancestral magic rubbish.

Next up will be another scenery project from the Neolithic Era. Stay tuned...

I see a Wood Henge and I wanna paint it...

...grey.

(With apologies to the Rolling Stones)

The undercoat is all dry, so now it's on to the next stage - dry brushing in successively lighter shades of grey.

I'm concentrating on the 'stones' since the ground around them will be covered by flock. You can see how the brushwork brings out the grain in the wood, making it look like weathered stone. I think at this point I'll stop dry brushing since the stones are light enough. The next step will be the ground work, specifically the grass and vegetation growing up in and around the stones.I'll probably add splotches of green in various shades to the stones to represent lichen, moss, etc.

Zen and the Art of Henge Building

One thing I discovered from my terrain making projects for the tabletop is how wood chip looks very much like stone in the smaller scales. My wife and I recently had a ton of wood chip delivered to use in our garden, so I selected a few likely small pieces from the heap for my next modelling project - a henge for the Dux Britanniarum tabletop.

Henges date from the Neolithic/Early Bronze Age, and are dotted throughout the British Isles. Technically from the archaeological point of view a henge is a space located within a ditch which is itself enclosed by an earthen bank. Stone circles - even mighty Stonehenge - are a different beast, but the term has stuck, so...

As a gaming terrain piece they can therefore appear on any tabletop battlefield set in Britain during any era from the Neolithic on. My aim is to make a small-ish site like those of Arbor Low Henge in Derbyshire or Scorhill on Dartmoor in Devon. I'm in two minds whether to make the outer ditch and bank as the piece will then have a larger footprint on the tabletop. We'll see.

I started with this handful of suspicious-looking brown objects...

Using a mitre box and razor saw I cut them in half, before making the base for the henge. The core of the base is an old CD which I sandwiched between two layers of cereal card, bending the card down around the edges to make a low mound. The cut pieces of wood stand in the background.

Once the card was glued tight on the CD I arranged the wood pieces in a suitable henge configuration and fixed them in place. I decided not to make any trilithon ('table') pieces for the sake of simplicity and robustness. They tend not to feature in the smaller henge sites anyway. The shadows the pieces cast already make them look like the upright stones and sacrificial slab of a small stone henge. I'm on the right track...

The next step was to spread a little spackle around the base and 'stones,' leaving some patches bare. These will be areas of lower ground within the circle when the top layer is done.

Suitably spackled, the piece awaits the undercoat. More to follow...

Steeple

So here it is, the completed steeple, seen in place on the tower of St. Aimless the Confused,* parish church of Much Giggling in the Hay.

Those fine chaps of Sir Rick Astley's** Regiment of Foote guard the church from incursions by those naughty iconoclastic sons-of-fun, the Parliamentarians.

Each of the four faces of the steeple has a small window made from rectangles of coffee stirrer cut to shape and shaved into wedge shapes so as to fit the sloping sides. The windows were painted on. The stripes marking planks, tiles, slates etc. didn't make it through the painting stage but enough showed I was able to go over them again with a sharp pencil. The cross atop the steeple took a bit of doing. A thin strip of wood provided the bulk of it, with the two arms being glued to either side to present a flat profile. I inserted the end of the cross into a small bead, pushing enough of the stem through to go into the apex of the steeple. Once glued in place I painted it all gold.

* Patron Saint of the Permanently befuzzled.

** Sir Rick Astley's a thoroughly reliable officer. He'll never give you up, he'll never let you down...

A Steeple learning curve

Not being in the mind for gaming lately I revisited an old scenery project instead. This N-scale/10mm English church model is a few years old now. It's built from Hirst Arts plaster components and the Gothic style means it can appear in any period from the late 12th century right up to modern times. It has a relatively small footprint to take up less space on the tabletop, but is quite tall to make it seem to fill more space than it does. I always intended it to be changeable to a degree so as to increase its use, so I made the top of the tower configurable. It can be plain flat, have a cupola or - now, a steeple.

Flat

Cupola

Steeple-to-be

The steeple is 3 3/4" tall and made from four isosceles triangles cut from cereal packet card mounted on a square plaster base to give it a bit of heft. Some steeples are octagonal, but that's a little bit too complicated a job for me to want to tackle at the moment. Maybe in future. The sides are marked with a fine Sharpie pen. I'm going to add thin strips of paper to the vertical edges then paint the steeple a neutral mid grey colour so it could be wood like early steeples, or tiles or slate, and the black stripes should show through to give the impression of rows of slates, tiles, planks, etc.

Bracken Hill ~ post game

Bracken Hill had more than a degree of friction in the game; perhaps a bit too much to be quite enjoyable. Even so, the game added to the campaign narrative.

The fighting bogged down to a slogging match in a confined space as Ebba uncharacteristically forewent maneuvers and tried to bull his way through the Romano-British. The home team proved to be too stubborn for that, however, having had enough of the Saxons' deprivations. Gaius Menusius had also found some tactical nous in the down time since the last raid and deployed his levy to good effect. Result - Ebba withdrew unpursued to lick his wounds, leaving the field to the Romano-British along with a Beggar's Bowl of loot - the first time they've picked up any kind of wealth.

The Romano-British win meant the Saxon siege of Durobrivae was lifted, rendering the province safe at least for the rest of the year 472AD.* Ebba won't be able to contest for the province again since there won't be sufficient time before winter to try again.  

In terms of casualties it was a Pyrrhic victory for the Romano-British. They came off worse by suffering heavy casualties to the Saxons' moderate losses. Ebba can recover sooner than they, and stage another raid come October - the last month in the campaigning season. The Romano-British will still be down a significant number of men. They lack the wealth to raise mercenaries and Gaius Menusius lacks the status to build watchtowers to warn against Saxon incursions.

So, what happens next? Ebba's taken care of the annual tribute he has to pay his king back home, so that's out of the way. He will raid again in October in search of more loot confident the Romano-British lack the strength to put up much of a fight. With more wealth he'll be in a good position to contest for Durobrivae next year, when the new campaigning season opens in March 473AD. On the other side of the hill, the Romano-British can attempt to stop the raid, even at the risk of taking more casualties, because they'll have the winter months to recoup their losses.

A roll of the die turns up Raid Scenario #1 ~ Raid on a Church. Ebba has his eye on a potentially lucrative target. The Romano-British will attempt to stop him cold before he can perpetrate such sacrilege on a holy site.

*According to the Dux Britanniarum rule book the Saxons should attack the province of Caer Lind Colun first, in 472AD. I feel given the extensive waterways that radiated off the Wash at that time, seaborne raiders like the Saxons and later Vikings would've used them to penetrate deep into Durobrivae.

A touch of the 13th Century

I think we all have those odd figures in our collections or lead piles. They're the ones that make you wonder 'why did I get these?' Often enough they're the result of a passing fancy or unexpected gift. In this case it's a small heap of 13th century men at arms and knights, and I have a vague recollection of a guy gifting me these years ago as he was getting out of the hobby.

They're all 15mm and (I'm pretty sure) Minfigs. There are about a hundred or so figures, about half of which are painted, and some are stuck to flimsy cardboard bases.

Although a few are painted up to a reasonable quality I'm not keen on the general look of the paint job. The guy looks like he used gloss for a lot of the cavalry for a start. I'm researching online for the best environmentally friendly method of stripping the paint off them.

From little clues here and there I think the collection is intended for the Second Barons War, when Simon de Monfort challenged the autocratic power of King Henry III, only to get his head served to him on a plate after the Battle of Evesham by Henry's son, the future Edward I.

A few of the figures look like they might be Crusades-specific. I'm not sure the turbaned helmets and round studded shields saw much service in England. If they were I'll be happy to be educated.

I can use them for a small scratch force for both Royal and Baronial factions, although if there are shield transfers/decals available I'd love to know where I can get them, since the thought of painting heraldic devices in this scale is already making my eyes water.

Dux B - post game thoughts

On the whole I like the Dux Britanniarum rules. The random movement through dice rolls and the card activation system work well for solo play, opening some options and narrowing others. Once in combat the dice and cards do pretty much all the work, and in the recent game there were plenty of surprises and moments where I thought 'Huh. I didn't see that one coming.'

Another factor is the pre-game ability of the player with initiative to move areas of scenery to best advantage. As the Saxon Lord Ebba scored higher I determined he would ensure a pretty clear path for his force up the centre of the board, the quicker to get his stolen cattle away. The judicious placement of areas of bracken and a rocky outcrop made it difficult for the Romano-British to get a clear line of advance on the raiders.

For the raid scenarios it's a matter of a die roll to determine how far the defending force travels before the enemy appears, and where that enemy enters the board. In the cattle raid game just played the Romano-British appeared hard on the left flank of the Saxons after they'd travelled just two moves with the stolen cattle. I thought at the time it would be a short game as the Saxons would be embroiled with a host of angry Romano-British and defeated before they got the cattle away to safety. As it turned out the dice and cards introduced a hefty amount of friction to the plans of the two Lords.

The scenery blocked the Romano-British path, but not to the extent I thought it would. They got a force of levy within striking distance of the stolen cattle and the drovers, but stalled when the Saxons managed to put on a spurt of movement and place a formation of hearthguard within striking distance. At that point I considered the lord commanding the levy would err on the side of caution and form shieldwall.

In combat terms this proved a shrewd move. The sheildwall was able to deflect the missiles hurled by the hearthguard on their way in to attack, and also proved resilient in hand to hand combat. Had the levy not formed shieldwall and made a stand it's pretty much odds-on that they would've been caught and destroyed without being able to intercept the cattle, leading to a much great Romano-British loss at the end of the game.

From the first the group of Saxon warriors driving the cattle lacked a Lord to guide them. I didn't consider this much of a problem since leaderless groups activate at the end of the turn in any case, but having a leader with them made them move much quicker and sooner, especially when a Step Forth or Bounding Move card is played.

The end of the game saw the Saxons with two Retreat cards and the Romano-British with but one Pursuit card. Although I felt the Saxons had the worst of the fighting, totting everything up at the end saw them with a marginal victory from the raid. Ebba will have to lick his wounds for a couple of months, as will Gaius Menusius. This means they'll both take to the field again in June.

Ebba's Cattle Raid

The Saxon warlord Ebba sensed the Romano-British were close by, lurking in the mist-haunted flat landscape of the Fen country. He deployed his forces as best he could to anticipate attack from any direction. A group of warriors drove the stolen cattle onward, the hearthguard to the right flank, the remaining warriors and skirmishers to the left.

Ebba's instincts proved correct when groups of British warriors and elites emerged on his left flank...

First priority - get the cattle away. The drovers urge the beasts to greater speed whilst the raiders turn to face the enemy.The skirmishers fire at the oncoming Roman-British, inflicting mild shock on the warriors.

Cynbel the Magnificent leads the elites in a fierce charge against the Saxon intruders. Facing off against his opposite number Oeric the Insane, shrewd blows are traded.

As Cynbel engages the enemy Lord Barriventus leads the levy across the broken ground to intercept the cattle drovers. Has he made it in time?

Cynbel's men strike down two Saxons. Armour Bright preserves both British and Saxon Lords from harm. 

Barriventus is more concerned with the safety of his levy than with intercepting the stolen cattle. He orders the two groups into formation and erects the shieldwall just in time. Ebba himself leads his hearthguard into action. A hail of missiles strikes the shieldwall to no effect before the clash of arms commences. A third group of levy are hung up in the gorse and bracken, but are poised to come in on Ebba's flank - if they can pluck up the nerve to tangle with the fierce Saxon elites.

It looks like Barriventus' taking his eye off the ball will cost the Romano-British dearly. At Ebba's behest Saxon Lord Wigmund leaves the hearthguard and joins the cattle drovers in urging the beasts onward. The cattle need little encouragement to get away from the screaming and clashing of combat.

Over on the left flank the Romano-British warriors engage. The pressure is too much for the Saxons. One group breaks and routs. Satisfied all is well there, Gaius Menusius becomes anxious about the cattle. He pushes through the rough heathland to the isolated group of levy, and sees all is far from well with Barriventus.

The stalwart Lord is holding the Saxon hearthguard, who can make little impression on the shieldwall, but beyond the melee Gaius can see the cattle being driven away. Cursing under his breath Gaius urges the levy group into combat in a bid to break the Saxons so he can get to the cattle before it's too late. Coming in on the flank and rear of the hearthguard makes a serious impact for which the Saxons have little response.

Concerned for his fellows, Wigmund pauses to look back at the battle. The sight of Saxon warriors running away from battle justifies his concern, but he has almost got the cattle clear from the scene.

Gaius' plan works. The Saxon hearthguard take enough casualties and shock to make them fall back. Shaking the levy free of the fading melee Gaius leads them in a race against time - but the hot pursuit isn't hot enough. With a last effort Wigmund and his men drive the stolen cattle into the Fenland mists and safety.

The end of the affair. The deaths of numerous Saxon warriors will lead to much weeping amongst the womenfolk in the halls and bothies back home. Tired and battered, the survivors make their escape. Two won't reach the halls again, falling victim to accident and banditry in the hostile countryside, but the cattle are won and there's loot to share out. Ebba grudgingly concedes the enemy aren't as weak and feeble as he'd been led to believe, but he is content enough. Once he's had time to lick his wounds and recoup his losses, he'll be back to test the Romano-British once more.

So ends my first game of Dux Britanniarum, and very enjoyable it was too. I'll post a write-up of the way the rules played soon, head cold and time permitting.

Dux Britanniarum - Beginning the campaign

Ebba was Wodenborn, son of a foederatii dwelling in that part of south-eastern Britain his people had named Ceint. He was used to the relics of the old Romans - or so he thought. Leading his men through the early morning on their first raid into the soft heartland of the effete Romano-British they'd come across one of the old Roman canal and dyke systems. The watercourse stretched for miles across the misty flat landscape, running as straight as an arrow from horizon to horizon. Time had worn away at the banks, and parts of the low lying land had flooded with the spring rains, but the canal still carried water, the dyke still held back most of the floods. It all had a sobering effect on Ebba's men. Even the braggarts making up the contingent of warriors from the old country across the sea fell silent in the presence of such monumental works. Ebba sucked his teeth as they walked, contemplating the canal and wondering how he and his warriors would have measured up against the Romans of old.

Everyone cheered up when they reached a juicy target for their raid - a cattle farm, not far from the canal, guarded by a man and his sons. The man and two of his boys had perished in defence of their property at the hands of the Saxon warriors. The rest and their womenfolk had fled in terror. Mindful that the Romano-British were not entirely without teeth and might well be somewhere close by, Ebba had called his men off pursuing the peasants. They'd reluctantly come to heel, but appeared satisfied with the booty - six prime head of cattle.

Now they were on the return journey to the coast, driving the obstinate cattle before them. The mist had thickened during the day and Ebba cast his gaze all around, trying not to let his anxiety show on his face. A niggling itch in the back of his mind told him the enemy were close to hand, their forces gathering somewhere in the pestilential mist. Barking sharp words of command Ebba deployed his force as best he could, allowing for the landscape. Woodland lay to the right, interspersed with breaks of bracken and gorse. To his left more bracken and gorse, and an outcrop of rock at the western end of a low hill. The way ahead looked clear of obstacles, so Ebba directed the cattle drovers to steer the beasts in that direction.

A low, eerie sound carried through the mists. Someone was blowing a horn, the baritone note humming and throbbing through the murky air. All around Ebba his men instinctively gripped shield and spear as they tensed, looking for the source of the noise. Away to the left a shout rose. 'Enemy! Over there!"

Ebba looked in the direction of his left flank. Glints of something reflecting the weak sunlight sparked here and there until, emerging from the mist hard on his left flank came lines of men, girded for war and marching with purpose in their step. Ebba swore, snatched his helmet from the strap where it hung from his belt and jammed it on his head. "Drovers! Get those beasts moving. Hearthguard, to me!"

As his men began to move to the commands of his lords, Ebba growled softly. The Romans may have caught me by surprise, but we'll see who emerges the victor in this fight...

Rumours of Saxons

This past weekend turned into a bugger's muddle, what with one thing and another. Still, with luck and a following wind I'm going to place an order with Splintered Light Miniatures for their 15mm Early Saxon Dux Britanniarum force within the next few weeks. Then I'll finally have some opposition for the Romano-British who've kicked their heels for all this time.

Now I'll need to make trees, a lot of trees...

And the cart project keeps rolling along...

By fits and starts, anyway. Work's been busy lately, plus I'm painting wooden latticework for a garden fence - which is a lot less exciting than it sounds. Still, I have made progress on the carts. The drivers are done and the bases are now underway.

Ieremius Clarksonius, Centurion Slowimus and Hamstericus wait impatiently for the course to be laid. No sign yet of Stigimus Maximus.

I did think of using plastic card for the bases, but James Wappel happened to be working on a road-making project which used wood filler. As he points out it doesn't shrink and can be worked easily. I have some wood filler handy so gave it a try using rectangles of basswood, and it works just fine.

I'm a bit further along than the photo above, but it's late and I'm pie-eyed from painting latticework, so I'll delay putting the anything more up until I have finished the lot.