Fistful of Lead Bigger Battles

 This past Sunday we played a game of Fistful of Lead Bigger Battles at the club.   This was our first game with the rules and we made a few mistakes, though nothing major.   The game was set in the sixth century A.D. with Byzantines vs Sassanid Persians.    The Byzantines had six cavalry units and nine infantry units.  The cavalry was bow and javelin armed while the infantry had some units of mixed archers and spear, a couple of units of heavy archers and three units of heavy spear.   All were regulars.  

The Sassanids had two cataphract units, three units of light bow and spear armed cavalry, three units of spear armed infantry, two units of mixed spear and bow infantry, and five archer units.   The cataphracts were regulars, the light cavalry and mixed spear/bow were tribal, and the rest irregulars.  Unfortunately, I forgot to bring the elephants so the Sassanids were missing one of their better troop types.  

During the course of the game the Byzantines had better die throws and broke or eliminated over half the Persian units.   The Persians were only able to eliminate two of the Byzantine infantry units.   One of them disappeared in spectacular fashion when it engaged a Persian unit and both side eliminated the other with their close combat die rolls. 

All units on both sides were eight figures strong.  I only took one decent picture during the game.   It is posted below with the Byzantines at the top and the Sassanids at the bottom.

August Projects

 During August I worked on completing the remaining 25mm Science Fiction items that had not been done.  These included assembling the buildings I got from PaperTerrain.  I also purchased some aliens as noted in the previous blog post and found a tank and an infantry carrier at Wargame Vault.  I needed different vehicles for the forces opposing the Federation.  

The vehicles are made by Tomoko's paper miniatures.  He also has 2d 28mm soldiers.  However, the vehicles are definitely not 28mm.  Fortunately I was able to use Paintshop Pro to enlarge them to 143% of their original size which made them compatible with my 25/28mm figures.  The PDF file has several different camo schemes.  All of them in shades of grey except for the one I chose to use.  The infantry carrier appears to be an M113 APC.  I haven't checked it against the actual vehicle to verify if it is an exact copy or not.   I added the original sized turret from the tank model to convert it into an IFV.  Instead of using the paper tube mounting system for the turrets I again went with thumbtacks glued to the inside of the turret with a strip of cardstock glued across the top of the thumbtack and to the turret floor to keep the thumbtack in place.  The only other modification was to cut the bottom of the track assembly as a wider straight edge instead of the jagged pattern making them easier to assemble.  The files include detailed assembly diagrams unlike the free ones that I made for the Federation.

The buildings from PaperTerrain were also PDF files and include detailed assembly instructions and diagrams.   The number of buttresses, bays, windows, and door openings can be customized as desired.  

The following photos show the buildings and vehicles.  The miniatures are from Grenadier Models, Inc.  They are the licensed Traveler Imperial Marines Imperial Marines.  They are being used as the Pantharii Impeium Marines.  I believe Magister Militum  has the molds, but has not recast them as of this time.   In addition to the marines I also bought a set of the adventurer figures back when they were released.  In addition to the sets of marines, I recently purchased some additional figures that were not part of a complete set that I found on Ebay.  |Fortunately no one else bid against me and I was able to get them for about $2 per figure.  Otherwise, there were a few complete boxed sets being offered at $120 to $160 per set.  I now have about three dozen of them for a complete platoon.

Again these will be used for Wiley Games Galactic Heroes and Bigger Battles.

The four IFV's, one of the tanks, and some of the Pantharii Imperium Marines.

Comparison of the Pantharii and Federation IFV's

Two of the PaperTerrain buildings.  The one on the left will be a bank.  The one on the right will be the town administration building.

The casino complex

Market building on the left and two others.

Alien Invaders

 I had been looking for some figures to use for the aliens who are harassing the rift frontiers (right edge of the map of human space in an earlier post) of the Pantharii, Domain, and Federation.  I had looked at the Ralnai and Klackon ranges for Starguard, but decided against them.  Last week, I was browsing through Khurasan Miniatures 15mm sci fi range and found what I was looking for.  These were the Soriog.  

They are slightly shorter than the 28mm sci fi figures.  I placed the order on Monday and they arrived on the Saturday.  Kudos to Khurasan for speedy delivery.    For their environmental suits, I painted them light khaki, and used a medium brown for their weapons.  They were given a bright blue skin color for their faces and other parts of their warlock (a psionic).   The humans refer to them as the "blue meenees".  They have a prehensile tail, hands with a thumb and two fingers, and a raptor talon on their legs.

Wiley games printed a book of various sci fi races and I chose the Aeldarin for their characteristics.  These are based on not-space elves.  

The figures are organized into four squads of ten.  Consisting of a squad leader, seven other laser rifle armed infantry, a heavy laser, and a flamer.  There is four figure command team consisting of the commander, a warlock, and two junior officers.

The four squads with the command team in front.

The command team.  From left to right a junior officer, the warlock, the commander, and the other junior officer.

Fistful of Lead: Starfighters

This past month Wiley Games released their latest addition to their rule sets called "Starfighters".  Play follows the usual procedure of the Fistful of Lead series of games.  Several examples of play can be found on YouTube by searching for Fistful of Lead: Galactic Heroes or other rule titles that Wiley Games has published.

They are fairly simple rules to play, but are a lot of fun.  Don't expect a hard science type of game like Starcruiser.  Some players are thinking of adapting them to airplane combat.   In addition to the light, medium, and heavy fighters there is a section for including larger ships as part of the fighter combat game.

One thing I had not expected was a section in the later part of the rules for fleet actions using frigates on up through battleships.  Fighters still play a part in a fleet battle, but they operate as a flight of six fighters and only engage in close quarters combat against the larger ships and other fighters.

One of the members of the Wiley Games Facebook group recently posted a report on a fleet action game he played and it looked like a good alternative to Starcruiser.  As such, I am adapting the ship specifications for the Pantharii Imperium, Domain, Federation, and others to Starfighter specifications.  this has been done by dividing the number of weapon batteries, missiles, and damage repair teams by six and shields and armor levels by three. While the design methods are entirely different I was able to convert all the ships directly to different specifications except for the Federation BCG300 class battle cruisers.  These would have required at least 30 spaces just for the missile load they carry and resulted in a ship with 40 spaces which is way beyond the levels of the game. 

 Ships of the Domain.  Top and bottom rows are three frigates, Second and fourth rows have a battle cruiser on the left followed by two cruisers.  The middle row is led by a cruiser on the left, the battleship which also serves as the fleet command ship, a fighter carrier, and another frigate at the right end.  The carrier has eight flights of fighters and the battleship carries another two flights.  The entire fleet totals 166 spaces.  Currently the Pantharii Imperium fleet totals 106 spaces and will be adding a fighter carrier for another 16 spaces.  Three additional cruisers and two more frigates will match their total to the Domain's.  this will give them two battleships, seven cruisers, six frigates, and a carrier. Both fleets will have sixteen ships and ten fighter flights..

The alien marauders.  Two class A ships on the left and two class B ships.  They total 52 spaces.  I need to find some ships that can fill in for the class D and Class E ships.

I plan on running a solo game or two pitting the Federation against the Domain to see how the game plays.  The BCG300's will either be ships with 15 spaces and six missiles or ships with 20 spaces and eleven missiles.   A few modifications to the rules to bring them slightly closer to how things are in Starcruiser will also be tested.  These are doubling the missile  movement to 24 inches, increasing the firing arc for turrets to 180 degrees except through the rear of the ship, allowing two single shot laser batteries per ship to double as point defense systems and function like the defense drones against missiles and fighters, and reducing standard ship movement to six which is the normal movement rate for most ships in Starcruiser.  Slow ships in Starcruiser move at a velocity of three.  Hopefully these modifications will not upset the game balance.

Repair Bots, buildings, and scatter terrain

spent last week assembling some more 28mm science fiction items.   These are free items from the website mentioned in previous posts. 

I added five more buildings to the previous two that I made.   They come in three different sidings - brick, planks, and panels and a variety of colors.   The panels consist of six with windows, two with ventilators/chimneys, and six solid that can be arranged in any order desired of twelve panels.  They also have a doorway and up to three dormers that can be added.  I made the two buildings with panels into a combined structure by adding the extra part provided for joining buildings together.  I left the bottom of the buildings open so that I can stack them and save storage space.

Now I am waiting for an order of business signs from Iliada Game Studio that I will be adding to various buildings that I have already made and some additional ones that I will be making that I just purchased from PaperTerrain.   These were announced back in March and are available already printed or in PDF format.  One of the sets includes three buildings that can be joined together or used separately.   He also has a wall and gate set and a set of storage containers.  The picture is from his website.  I purchased the tower, the two story building next to it,  the three stall market building next that and the three building combination in the lower ;right, along with the gate and wall set.  The tower and the individual buildings occupy about a six in square area as to the three modules in the combination set.  Except for the tower, each set includes exterior wall panels, buttresses, doors and bays that can be placed as desired or left off.  It appears that one of the wall sections has been shortened next to the gate in the lower right of the picture.  The sets look to be easy and quick to assemble.

The last picture is of the repair vehicles and bots, a pair of forklifts, and a couple of accumulators.  The vehicles and bots can be printed in different color sets if desired.   I chose to use the yellow set.  The repair vehicles consist of a control vehicle, two tool chests and an open trailer.

Army of the Dark Lord part 3

I finished painting four units of heavy infantry and three units of archers.  There is another unit of heavy infantry to paint along with half a unit of elf light infantry and another half unit of human light infantry.  These will be done at a later date while I work on some other projects.  These figures were all primed and the Black Guard was finished a while back.  Front row from left to right two units of human archers, one unit of elf crossbowmen.  Back row from left to right a unit of heavy infantry (most of the figures are from the Battle Masters game) the Black Guard, another unit of heavy infantry, and a unit of elf spearmen.  The Black Guard has their weapons, shield designs, and other metal items highlighted with antique gold.  This doesn't show up too well in the picture, but there is a out of focus closeup of them in the third picture down in the Battle of Rabid Rabbits Rapids report here

Federation armed forces.

I decided to spend some time working on another project, having spent the last couple of months painting 28mm fantasy figures.  I am still doing some painting, but I am not spending as much time doing so as I previously had.

For the past week and a half I have been assembling some tanks and IFV's for my 28mm science fiction figures.  These are from the free website that I previously mentioned.  free items   I had to use Paintshop Pro and import the camo scheme from ones that I previously made.  This took a couple of days to complete.

The models are better than the other one I had made, but the directions could use a couple of additional diagrams to help with assembling them.  They include a variety of detail parts and choice of weapons for the IFV and secondary armament for the tank.  I chose to use the smaller remote controlled turret for the IFV and chose the auto-cannon for it.  The tank also has a remote controlled turret, but I decided to not use it due to its large size.  I also added thumbtacks to the turrets to allow them to be rotated. and also made some other minor modifications to the locations of items on the tank turret and the IFV turret location.

I did post a picture of some of the figures in a previous post. See previous post They are from Anvil Industries.   These were available in a set called the Martian Orbital Fusiliers under their regiments range.  I purchased three of the 10 figure sets along with a six man heavy weapons set and a five man command set in order to get the free shipping.  Purchasing the two additional sets of 10 figures reduced the cost per set by four UK pounds.

This set of figures is no longer listed,, but all the parts to make the figures are still listed on their site.  These include the Gothic Void helmet, and torsos (the specialist weapon guy has the plain back and the rest have the standard back), armored legs and arms, and the Tesla disintegrator under the rifles with stocks range.

After priming them with white spray primer, I painted the figures with a rough wash of a bluish grey color to give them a similar camo pattern to the vehicles.  The wash left different parts of the figures with dark, medium, and light patches.

 The complete force.  Three tanks, four IFV's, one command squad with 11 figures and four ten man squads.   The ten man squads have a two man ATGM team, two team leaders with rifles, and six riflemen.  The command squad has 11 men armed with rifles.  This gives me 15 units and a commander for Wiley Games Bigger Battles rules.  These are for the Federation armed forces.  One of several factions of the Human Space setting which also includes the Panthari Imperium and the Domain.

  The tank. 150mm main gun with co-axial machinegun.

 IFV with ten man squad.  50mm main gun.

Close-up of the ten man squad.  The missile team is in the top right corner,  The heavy weapons man is just to the left of the figure at the top center. One of the two team leaders is at left center and the other is cut off at the right center.  The multi-part figures allow a variety of poses.  While there are some similar poses in the four squads they are all have minor differences.

The army of the Dark Lord part two

I finished painting and basing the next batch of units for the Dark Lord's army this morning.  Two of them had to be primed.  Though I used a grey spray primer, it was not the right shade of grey and I had to paint all the figures with Charcoal Grey from Howard Hughes..  This batch went quickly as there were only seven other colors that I used.  Where I could I did paint some teeth and tongues   There are two units of spearmen in the back row, two units of archers in the front row and one unit of javelin armed skirmishers in the center of the front row..  I will be starting on the next part tomorrow.

These are being used for a fictional campaign using a map that I used several years ago.  The Dark Lord is located in the northeast corner of the map.

Army of the Dark Lord part one

I started painting the next army this week.  Two units were already finished and a third was almost done, but there were three infantry units and one mounted unit that needed to be primed.  All the rest of was just primed.   As of this morning I completed the one that was almost done, primed and finished the unprimed mounted unit and completed three other units.  The other unit that was already finished will be included with the other units of the same type.

 All six units

 The Dark Lord's mounted guard.  This was one of the two finished units. 

 Elf knights on reptiles.  This was one of the unprimed units

 Another knight unit.  Most of these came from the Battle Master board game.

 Reptiles riding reptiles

 Light horse.  this was the unit that was almost finished.

 Dire Wolves

 Character figures

 Two subordinate commanders to left and in front.  Army commander in center

Two heroes.

Elf Army Part Three

Last night I finished painting the elf cavalry and ten character figures.  The elf cavalry is organized as eight units of eight figures each. While most of the horses were almost finished the riders needed to have their armor repainted to match the heavy infantry.  Six of the units are on partly armored horses and two are on unarmored horses. The army's units equipment and organization is based on the Maurikian Byzantine reforms.  The cavalry has lances and bows.

The figures are all plastic and were purchased years ago at much less cost than the current offerings from Games Workshop.  While most of the figures I have were made or designed by GW there are several from other figure makers. This is the last of three posts.  Clicking on older post will go directly to the previous post.  The first post also has links in it to the dwarf army and human army units.

 All eight units

 The guard cavalry.

 One of the two units on unarmored horses.  They carry a mix of equipment

 The other unit on unarmored horses

 The army commander at the left and two subordinates.

 Two mounted heroes

 A mage

Four heroes on foot.

I also found a couple of figures that I could use to finish the sixth unit of light infantry.

Elf Army Project Part Two

Last night I finished painting five, sixteen figure units of Elf light infantry and another 14 Elf light infantry.  I will either base the extra 14 figures as an understrength unit or add a couple of extra heavy infantry figures to bring it up to 15 figures.  These figures required more work as they were just primed.   I have ordered some plastic glue from Amazon so that I can make needed repairs to some figures and add standards to two of these units.  I will be flocking bases later.