Tag Archives: 28mm

Chain Of Command Will Make You Re-think Skirmish Games

Dear Readers:

I don’t want to overstep, or come off as a shill (I have no connection to Too Fat Lardies), but I have to tell you about these new WWII skirmish rules, Chain Of Command, from Too Fat Lardies.

These are the best skirmish rules I have ever read. They are revolutionary in the way that SAGA was when it came out. Like SAGA’s battleboards, the “blinds” phase, along with the dice activation and “Chain Of Command” dice will totally change the way you look at WWII gaming.

It’s a “platoon plus” game – you’ll have an infantry platoon plus support – maybe an additional squad, or off table artillery, or a tank, mortar, etc.

Before the game proper starts, there is a “blinds” phase. This is a short mini-game that establishes where each player can place their “jump off points”. The jump off points are where you can deploy your troops. So – you start the game proper with no troops on the table, and you deploy them at your jump off points when you wish.

This solves the “all my troops are known and within 12 inches of my table edge” boring deployment issue. Your opponent doesn’t know exactly what you have until you deploy it on the table. By deploying from a jump off point, you start a lot closer to the enemy than the table edge. Jump off points also enable ambushes and resupply, and are vulnerable to being overrun by the enemy.

This blinds mechanic, all by itself, is revolutionary. All modern games should use this.

Next is the dice activation. You roll several D6 (usually 5) and the result tells you what you can activate – a team, a squad, a leader (who can activate his squad, or give other commands) etc. A roll of 5 on a die also increments your Chain Of Command die. When this gets to 6, you can take special actions that have a greater impact on the battle.

Chain Of Command from Too Fat Lardies. My 15mm Germans are about 1/3 done. You can use your Flames Of War figures as based, or your 28mm Bolt Action figures (but I’m a big 15mm fan, so…)

4_stands_done_7_to_go

Too Fat Lardies made a series of videos explaining the game.  They are excellent, and I love their terrain!

Gripping Beast Anglo-Dane Hearthguard

I’m almost done with my 6 point SAGA warband.  Here’s some dane axes from Gripping Beast, which I got from their US reseller, Architects Of War:

Gripping_beast_anlgo_dane_hearthguard_bare Gripping_beast_anlgo_dane_hearthguard_paintedI primed them with The Army Painter’s Leather Brown spray primer.  I’ve become a huge fan of their color spray primers and the matching brush paint.  It saves so much time to not have to paint the various straps, pouches – AKA the fiddly bits.

I’ve found a local group that plays SAGA once a month.  I’ve played one session with them, and they are a good group of guys.  I’m looking forward to next month.

All I have left in my warband is to base my levy.  They are all painted, only basing is left.

Rules and more Rules

So many rules, so little time.booksFrom top to bottom:

  • SAGA – The base rules plus all the expansions in the folder that came with expansion #4. I play this a lot recently.  I have a six point Anglo-Dane warband.
  • Dreadball Season 2
  • Dreadball  – Base rules.  I love Dreadball.  I play the base game only so far.  I have a season 2 team, unpainted.  It will get painted soon.  Dreadball is a ton of fun.
  • Monster Hunter International – The RPG based on the novels.  I GM a campaign.  Lots of fun.  Humans with guns fight monsters – werewolves, zombies, etc…
  • Star Wars Edge Of Empire –  RPG. I do not currently play.  It seems like a fun game.  Unique dice mechanic.
  • Eclipse Phase –  RPG. I am a player in a campaign.  Great game, and the most high quality rulebook here.  Very unique sci-fi setting. The printed book is well worth it’s price, however, the rules are also available for free.  Creative Commons rules!
  • Chain Of Command – Just released (Fall 2013) WWII platoon level rules from Too Fat Lardies.  I’ve not played them yet, but they seem really nice.
  • Gruntz – 15mm Sci-Fi rules.  A great introductory set of rules, and you can add complexity later.  I’ve played them a few times.  Fun.
  • Tomorrows War – Another 15mm Sci-Fi ruleset.  Well reviewed, but overly complex and, frankly, the book is hard to read.  Black text on a busy background.
  • Traveller – I have so many great memories of playing Traveller as a kid in the ’80s.  Sci-Fi RPG.
  • Traveller 5  – Not the “final” Traveller I’d hoped for.  Overly complex.

So, that’s my physical rules collection.  In digital, I’ve got a bunch more, but the only digital rules that are not also here in physical form that I play / want to play are:

  • Quadrant 13 – Company level 15mm Sci-Fi rules.  Seems like a great game.  I’d love to play some day.
  • Full Thrust: Cross Dimensions – Super fun space fleet combat game.  I’ve got two full fleets of minis painted up for this game.  Quick, deadly, tactical space combat.  Free rules, too.

Painting a 28mm Archer

In this post, I paint a Warhammer bowman.  I’m using these guys to play SAGA, though they may be, historically, a little later.  They look good, though, so I’m not really concerned.

I painted 12 of them.  I primed them “Leather Brown” with spray primer from The Army Painter.  This way I could skip the fiddly leather strap, etc.

I consider myself an average painter.  I’m not going to win any awards.  However, I think my troops look good on the table, and that’s the point, isn’t it?

These first 3 pics are after a base coat only.  The face, however, has a base coat and a highlight coat.  He’s blue tacked to a craft stick (with 2 of his brothers) because I do basing after they are painted.

basecoat_front basecoat_back basecoat_face

 

These next 3 are after I painted the highlights:highlight_front highlight_back highlight_face

 

And these final 3 pics are after a wash with The Army Painter Srong Tone:wash_front wash_back wash_face

SAGA: Anglo-Danes vs Jomsvikings

Had two fun games of SAGA today against my buddy Yu over at At Ease Games.  He played the Jomsvikings and I played the Anglo-Danes.  We played 4 points each, as that’s all we each had painted.  The Jomsviking force was all hearthguard (two points with Dane axes), while the Anglo-Danes were two points of hearthguard (1 point with Dane axes) and two points of warriors.

First we played the Clash Of Warlords scenario:

face_offAnglo-Danes with their backs to the camera.  The Anglo-Dane warlord advanced with a unit of hearthguard at his side.  The Jomsvikings attacked, killed all the hearthguard, then attacked again, and killed the warlord.

Next we played the Battle at the Ford scenario:

crossing_the_bridgeThe Jomsvikings came pouring over the bridge, to be met by Anglo-Dane hearthguard and warriors.  The Jomsvikings put up a good fight, be eventually their warlord was caught exposed and died.

SAGA is a fun game and I can’t wait to get my levy painted so I can try out missile attacks.