Kingmaker Campaign - Battle of Shrewsbury

I must apologise in advance for a rather brief AAR and the quality of photos. This game was played with an opponent - my son Jack. We did not have time for pauses to take notes or ensure lighting was about right for photos. 

For this game I had a Yorkist force against Jack's Lancastrians. As he was the defender he selected which side of the table he would deploy.

Table Size - 4'6" x 3'

Figures - 6mm Baccus

Rules - Ancient & Medieval Wargaming by Neil Thomas (Medieval Module)

ORBATS

Continued -

On the Workbench: WOTR & WW2 Naval

I made pretty good progress this week towards completing the latest Wars of the Roses batch of figures plus a little dabbling in WW2 naval:

Completed and ready to join the ranks are two units of Shire Longbowmen. 

Also on the WOTR theme, almost finished crossbowmen, handgunners and a unit of Pikemen. All WOTR figures are by Baccus.

And now for something completely different:

Continued -

On the Workbench: WOTR - Lots of Armour!

After a rather busy week I have managed to complete all the additional mounted and dismounted men-at-arms required for the forthcoming Wars of the Roses Kingmaker game - The Battle of Shrewsbury.

Light cavalry was also finished and as a result it is only foot figures now required before gaming can proceed.

I am still experimenting with the armour and reasonably happy so far. Basically started with block painting of silver, black wash and then a drybrush of the same silver (in this case Foundry). I had initially tried the GW Nuln Oil but it did not define the features as much as I would have liked. It could be because of the small scale. Their old Armour Wash was better. A thinned down black was used instead but in the longer term I am planning to knock up my own 'magic wash'. i.e. floor polish mixed with black paint.

Kingmaker Campaign Continues: Siege of Alnwick resolved and Map Moves

My son Jack and I finally got to continue the Kingmaker today. We decided to play out the siege of Alnwick as per the boardgame rules. The Yorkists (myself) captured Alnwick and with it Percy who was executed for his treachery. 

The following moves saw both sides manoeuvring and building up their respective forces. I crowned Richard of York in York and summonsed parliament enabling me to shower several of my nobles with titles. In the subsequent move Jack crowned Henry of Lancaster in London. 

With my strength building, I decided to consolidate my hold on the north, Wales and the south west. I sent Stanley, Talbot and Mowbray to secure Wales with most of the rest of my forces concentrating in the north. Jack in the meantime was building substantial forces in and around London.

With my 3 nobles meeting at Shrewsbury, Talbot and Stanley were ordered to take Hereford, a walled town to the south. Hereford was not as yet owned by either side but will resist the Yorkist aggression. So far so good I thought. With the offices and titles awarded to these nobles they will provide for a very powerful base in Wales. Under the rules I had sufficient forces to capture Hereford and the only danger to me would be if either of my nobles were named as killed in the event card. With only 2 nobles committed the odds were pretty good I would be ok. Event card drawn. Nobles killed - Talbot and Stanley! Jack almost fell off the chair laughing as I stared incredulously at the card. In one fell swoop my plan unravelled.

Jack seized on the opportunity presented by this blow to my Welsh forces and dispatched a strong force from London along with Edward of Lancaster to deal with Mowbray who was now holed up in Shrewsbury. Jack had considerably more success capturing Shrewsbury and putting Mowbray to the sword. He did lose one of his nobles in the attack, Hastings, Earl of Worcester.

Richard of York, incensed on hearing of the events along the Welsh border, lead a force out of York to deal with the Lancastrians at Shrewsbury. As Richard approached the town, Edward lead the Lancastrian force out into the field to confront the Yorkists. And so began the Battle of Shrewsbury.

An overview of the board at this stage in the game. Jack is concentrated in London and the south east apart from his force at Shrewsbury (middle left). My reduced forces are now either at Shrewsbury or in the south west where Pole, the Duke of Suffolk, will shortly be landing in Plymouth to join Berkeley.

A closer view of the Shrewsbury battle. My Yorkist forces will slightly outnumber the Lancastrians but not enough for them to be confident of victory.

I will certainly have to paint more figures before this game can be played and I have yet to decided on the rules to be used. I have my own Ancient/Medieval version of General de Brigade but it still requires a good deal of work and unless I can create a fast play version may not be practicable in the time we have available to play out the game. 

I am therefore looking at others in my possession with Impetus and Sword & Spear being front runners. For now then Kingmaker will be stalled again but hopefully not as long this time.

Kingmaker Campaign: Battle of Ludlow and Map Moves

With my son, Jack, free today we took the opportunity of continuing the Kingmaker campaign.

The battle of Ludlow was fought using the Kingmaker board game rules rather than fought on the tabletop. With the heavily outnumbered Greystoke there could only be one result which the game confirmed. He was quickly defeated.

This was bad news for me with only Stanley, Pole and Howard now under my control. As Jack continued to consolidate his hold on the south of England I focused on the north. With more Nobles joining both our forces I took the opportunity of moving my forces into York which I now owned and took control of Richard Duke of York. With an Archbishop present I held a coronation crowning him King.

This spurred on Jack who captured London and Henry of Lancaster. He also quickly took control of Margaret of Anjou and Edward of Lancaster now having the whole of the house of Lancaster in his possession. He was not as yet in a position to Crown Henry. He also had two Yorkists, George Clarence and Edward Earl of March. He had them both executed.

Percy, Earl of Northumberland, declared for Jack in his fortress at Alnwick Castle. With Neville, Earl of Warwick, joining my forces, it was clear that I had to purge the north of opposition. I drew an embassy card with the King travelling to Ravenser on the Yorkshire coast. This put a slight spanner in the works as I now had to split my forces to provide the King with an escort.

Pole, Duke of Suffolk, took command of the main force, and with Neville, Earl of Warwick, and Howard, Earl of Essex, laid siege to Alnwick Castle.

The overall situation at this stage in the game. 

  A closeup of the siege at Alnwick Castle.

Normally we would have played out the siege as per the boardgame rules. However, we decided that it would be fun to play this one out. With my total of 260 points to Jack's 200 (Percy's 100 + 100 garrison) I would have won in the boardgame, but not so sure now!

You may be wondering why Percy and Neville have so quickly reappeared having been killed off earlier in the game. That's my fault. Whenever I have a pack of cards in my hand I automatically shuffle them without thinking. That is what happened here! Their offspring were clearly all to keen to get back into the fray.

There will be a delay before I can get this onto the board. I will need a castle! Leven Miniatures looks favourite. Almost certainly new figures will need to be painted. So onward to:

NEXT: THE SIEGE OF ALNWICK CASTLE

Kingmaker Campaign: Map Moves

The Battle of Milford Haven was a serious loss to me. Half my nobles were destroyed in one battle. I had effectively become the Lancastrian force with Jack controlling 2 Yorkist royal pieces.

The next turn saw a partial reversal of fortune. Jack attacked London with the aim of capturing Henry of Lancaster. He failed in the attempt and crucially, Percy was killed. This was a major loss for Jack but still left him in a commanding position. 

I had Stanley disembarking in Preston and Greystoke now stranded in Wales. Pole and Howard were in the north.

As I tried to extricate Greystoke from Wales he was attacked in the area of Ludlow by the triumphant Buckingham and Worcester.

The intention was to play this out as a wargame but after further discussion with Jack we both felt it would be a pointless exercise. Greystoke's small force is so heavily outnumbered we would be playing out a short massacre. We therefore agreed that at our next meeting we would use the boardgame mechanism to resolve this battle. So the next posting for this campaign will be the result of that action and further map moves. 

Kingmaker Campaign: The Battle of Milford Haven

This is the first battle in the Kingmaker campaign with my son, Jack. A reminder of how this battle has occurred:

In the early moves of the campaign it was very much a case of assembling forces and identifying the best way of capturing Royal Pieces. Jack developed a clear lead on this gaining control of George of Clarence and Edward Earl of March. He had also assembled a sizeable force in the vicinity of London threatening to capture King Henry VI who was in residence there. I, on the other hand, controlled nobody! 

I saw an opportunity though of capturing George of Clarence from Jack who was busily attempting to evacuate him through the port of Milford Haven (south west tip of Wales). I sent a force under the command of none other than Neville - Earl of Warwick (The Kingmaker) together with Nobles, Clifford, Scrope and Cromwell towards Milford Haven with the intention of intercepting Jack's force before they could embark their ships. Using the road network I achieved my aim and Jack's force under the command of Stafford - Duke of Buckingham with Hastings - Earl of Worcester moved out to meet my force.

Buckingham positioned his force across a valley blocking Warwick's advance.

Scale = 6mm

Figures = Baccus

Rules = My own*

Table size = 3'9" x 3'

* A brief note about my rules.  They use the basic General de Brigade engine but heavily reworked for ancients/medieval. They are very much a work in progress. Readers familiar with General de Brigade will recognise some of the mechanisms used in the after action reports.

Kingmaker Campaign: Prelude to the Battle of Milford Haven

I have now completed painting the Wars of the Roses figures (6mm) for the first battle in the Kingmaker campaign, the Battle of Milford Haven. As soon as Jack (my son) is free the battle will be fought but in the meantime here are the forces involved:

Stafford Duke of Buckingham (Jack) with Hasting Earl of Worcester gathers the troops:

Buckingham's Battle (right), Worcester's Battle (left)

Plans for 2018

With 2017 coming to a close, it is now time to look at what I intend to do in 2018. 'Intention' of course is not necessarily what I achieve and it will be interesting to see at the end of next year precisely what I have completed! I will break it down into 'Battles', 'Campaigns' and 'Painting'.

The Wargames Room and Storage

I thought I would have a brief break from the Campaign series to provide an update on my wargames room and a Eureka moment for me on storing my 6mm armies.

I recently completed decorating the house and included in that was my wargames room. I took the opportunity of reorganising it which has given me a little more space to expand the playable area of my wargames table.

1st up was to align all my shelves along one wall. The wooden boxes are storage solutions for my figures I started making over 20 years ago when I used to transport them some distance to a club. I wanted something robust that would hold the figures steady. The downside is that when full the larger boxes in particular are quite heavy and cumbersome. More of how I intend to resolve that later. There is more stuff stored in my garage including the bulk of my terrain boards. The towels on the right should be on their way soon giving me a couple more shelves.

My rather cluttered painting desk. I just never seem to have enough space on the damn thing! 

Over the years my wargames table has taken various forms. The best though proved to be what I have now. A couple of years ago I purchased a set of 3 trestle tables from my local Lidl store for something like £30. They are very light and can take an amazing amount of weight considering their flimsy looking appearance. They have proved to be very adaptable. I can use just the number of tables I require for the size of any particular battle. When all three are aligned they cover an area 6' x 3'. I cover them in MDF boards which give me anything up to the 7'6" x 4'6" maximum for the room.

Onto figure storage. As my 6mm figure range expanded, my wooden storage boxes were proving to be not up to the task. The main problem being organising the figures into various units then after a battle remembering where they all went. I had marked on the base of the boxes where they should go but it was not very clear. I did not have this problem with my old 15mm or 28mm figs. The problem now being that instead of a few hundred figures I now have 1,000's of the little blighters! The solution was embarrassingly simple that many wargamers have been using over the years. That of the clear plastic A4 size storage trays. I already have quite a few for storing terrain but dismissed them as being too small for my figures. Having seen online quite a few examples of figures being stored in these I came up with:

This is the entire French 1st Corps for Waterloo at a ratio of 1:20. So a little over 1,000 figures stored in one box. I also printed out a template which I stuck to the bottom of the tray showing the location of each unit. A second copy was attached to the underside of the lid so that I could see at a glance which unit was where. So I now have 30 boxes on order! I will certainly have some work to do when they arrive. 

And finally my latest painting project:

Wars of the Roses Crossbowmen and Handgunners for the forthcoming Kingmaker campaign. 

Hope you enjoyed this brief interlude from the campaign and an overview of my hobby space.

Kingmaker - Wars of the Roses

With the Wars of the Roses campaign about to start with my son, Jack, here is an overview of what this is all about.

The boardgame 'Kingmaker' is being used as the source for the campaign. We are essentially playing the boardgame as is but instead of resolving any battles as per the game, these will be played out on the tabletop. Sieges will be resolved as in the boardgame however, although we may chose to play one or two on the tabletop if viable.

Current and Future Projects

A brief look at planned battles I intend to post on the blog together with current projects. Within a couple of days I will have completed a rather less than enjoyable period of decorating the house! On a positive note though I am reorganising my wargames room which should enable me to extend the maximum wargames surface to 7'6" x 4'6" from the old 6'9" x 4'6" (my terrain boards are 9" squares). And then on to the following: