Saturday 30 January 2016

Blog Record!

This month marks the highest point in views of my blog and from here I would like to thank all of you who devout some of your time to take a look at my humble posts; be you follower or just a passing visitor your support is greaty appreciated!

Looking at these statistics it becomes clear that January/November 2015 and January 2016 have been the most visited months. I've come to the realitzation that since these months share posts that offer wargaming products for low prices (unerground terrain and scratchbuilt gargants) the thing that the viewers want is content that is both cheap to make and innovative/classic-old because it offers something that is out of what you usually see and provides a cheap alternative to usually expensive gaming. January 2016 has also been given a boost from the sh*tstorm about some badly designed british flags that made lots of TMP users come here to see them for themselves!

However if you look at the graphics you'll also see that from January 2015 the thing went down as I made more and more Horus Heresy models, that's suff that everyone has seen, (meh more marines) and hence gets little to no attention. Since I'm planning on making more marines from now to the summer visits'll plummet at least until the next warhammer campaign based in the empire. Not really, the green fields of the empire are something too mainstream to pick any interests, but it'll surelly take the graphic out from the marine abyss XD. However I'm planning to create a wargame of my own about a previously unexplored setting that could be or not a revelation.

Again thanks for your support, I never created the blog for attention fishing but it's always good to know that one's work is checked out.

Third day of the Karak Eight Peaks campaign: Battle for the Bone Caves

 Today I met with the skaven player at his home for the Karak Eight Peaks campaign.
First we deployed both our armies as shown above, since the dwarf player couldn't come we didn't touch any of his armies/territories, a system we developed to play camapigns without needing everyone everytime.
 The skavens got first turn, and in the month of Pflugzeit retreated deeper underground in the west tunnels. In mighty empires the ratties have to burn all the territories where they move to but do not suffer from hunger when moving through burned lands, with this scorched earth policy they become the russians of the setting!.
The orcs moved into the abandoned territories while one of their banners dug a tunnel
 At the beginning of Sigmarzeit the skaven 4th army attacked an orc force in the Bone Caves, while their 1st army moved up from their capital
 We rolled the hurried battle scenario, the battlefield was a vast cavern partially divided by a chasm.
 The orc 5th army: a giant, 20 night goblins and 15 orcs with two hand weapons
 Sakeven 4th army: 20 clan warriors+mortar, 6 rat oges, 2 stormvermin+warpfire thrower and some giant rats
 The orcs got first turn and marched forwards
 The ramshackle skaven weaponry perdictabilly failed to hit anything
 The giant rats came too close to the night goblins...
 Making them release their fanatics, as always the fanatics didn't kill any skaven but some orcs and goblins; typical!
 In the next turn the giant charged the rats who routed, dragging all the army with them as panic spread and unit after unit failed their Ld tests
 Sauve qui peut!
 The skavens managed to rally the clanrats but when in the  next turn they recieved the giant's charge they ran again and the skavens conceded
Since they lost, the skaven army retraced its steps. The orc army recovered roughly half of the fanatic's victims. Next day'll hopefully see some dwarfs vs orcs action.

Warhammer is sure weird, when you can win combats and even battles without killing anyone

Wednesday 27 January 2016

Ligny 1815

 Refight of this battle with Lasalle: 2 days before Waterloo Napoleon must defeat the prussian army under Blücher before going against Wellington. The french have an appalling prospect before them, a numerically superior enemy entrenched in a series of villages along the river, Napoleon has the edge of better troops in his Imperial Guard but will that be enough to achieve victory?

PS: note my "scenario notebook" on the inferior left corner, many battles planned there!
 Behold the glorious tin foil river! (yes I left the cardboard at another place)
 Prussian center and left under Pirch
 Prussian reserve cavalry under Tielemann
 French right was commanded by general Gérard
 The center and left by Vandamme
 I took the role of the french since my father was tired of always being in numerical inferiority (history, like real life is never fair y'know)
 En avant! Guard and ligne marching against St. Amand
 Vandamme sent some more ligne to Wagenele
 The grand battery made it rain on St. Amand, to soften the pesky germans before the assault

 The prussians marched to cross the river
 Their cavalry manoeuvred to the Ligny-Torgrinne gap
 Vive l'empreur!

 Gérard kept out of musket range waiting for the prussian horse to come at him
 The ligne was repulsed, but the Guard routed the prussians and entered St. Amand 
 More prussians went on to crossing the river

 Wagenele was occupied
 The guard charged some prussian guns that inexplicabily were turned around
 Formé le carré, les prussiens sont sour nous!
 The Guard took some punishemt from the cannons in the hill
 The cuirassiers charged enemy hussars, but just pushed them back
 Instead of going for the guns the prussian infantry marched trough the field under canister for several turns, of course they were routed in no time
 Unsurprising repulse
 Vandamme concentrated now all his infantry against St. Amand la Haye, redeploying the guard to St Amand.
The Guards kept suffering from canister even tough they were in cover
 The prussian garrison of St. Amand la Haye now opened a lively fire on the upcoming frenchies, causing some damage
 The hand to hand before ligny bore notorious losses: Tielemann had been wounded...
 ... and Gérard killed! Now who's gonna tell Grouchy to go to Waterloo?
 After several turns of struggle the cuirassiers destroyed the lighter hussars
 Pincer attack on St. Amand la Haye by Vandamme's forces. They didn't dislodge the landwehr but eroded their forces
 Another unit of hussars was pincered: the disciplined french broke their square, formed orderly into attack column and then charged forwards; a true show of élan francais!
  Alas, the canister of the prussian guns was too much for them and the Guard routed for the first time in this blog's history! I should have retreated them behind the village (but the guard never rertreats!)
 Vandamme was wounded in the fight
 The prussian hussars routed, and that left a single prussian column against the french steamroller
 The french guns now set their sights on Ligny, causing some loss
 The prussian column failed to change their formation and wheeled about instead
 Vandammes's force finally broke the deadlock and expelled the prussians from the village
 With their lines broken in multiple places and having sufferd horrific losses, the prussians packed their things and went home. If we had played more turns the thing would have went like this: the prussian column would have routed, the guns on the hill would have been taken by Vandamme's troops and finally Ligny's garrison, all alone, would have been brought to the brink of destruction  by the french guns and then swept away by two or three french units.

 Well, second time that I command the french and second victory! Yes I have lost the Guard for the first time but it's better to sacrifice it to achieve victory than keep it in reserve like other players (two come now to mind) that preserve the Guard but lose the army just like in real life.

It didn't went much like the actual battle: the french didn't attack the prussian center, and the prussians sallied forth from their lines just to be cut down. A great french victory since not only just one unit was lost but the terrain and numbers were aginst Napoloen from the beginning.