10th November, Manchester

NDBML end of year MANCHESTER

Early November saw us back on the road to Manchester for the final round of the one-day Northern Doubles - probably my last FoG ancients outing* ...

We took my Later Sicilian ... probably the most flexible and rewarding army to use in open competition, if not a big points scorer.   Although almost all the figures are more recent, this army dates back to the days of 7th edition and the original Society of Ancients series.

(Manchester Doubles: the Later Sicilians drawn up against Hungarians)

We were very fortunate to get two pretty plausible 'historical' opponents ... Later Hungarian and a less contemporary but very similar Later Castillian.   Both essentially cavalry armies, both with plenty of knights to fight.

The first game was a close draw, cut a bit short due to the tight schedule of the day.   The second game swung against us in the last turn or two and would have seen us defeated had another half hour been available to complete the game.

Despite the changes, I still like these cavalry fights and we can usually get a result somewhere along the line:   two keenly fought games that combined a good attitude with a will to outmatch the enemy and a proper understanding of the rules.    

Good tournament play.

(The Glittering Prizes: lots of trinkets for players of DBMM, FoG-R and FoG Ancients)

I thought we would beat the Castillians by overwhelming their knights ... my worry was that our light troops might be driven off and the Sicilian Medium Foot would not be able to hold the line while the knights did their usual work.

Actually, the medium spear fighters repelled 3 knightly charges and the archers 2.  This enabled all the knights to get committed ... and on my side of the battle, at least ... get killed.   The Saracens finally succumbed to lost bases (auto-break in FoG) but by this stage they had been deserted by their noble compatriots ...

(the Duke of Bavaria leads his formidable Swabian and Ghibelline cavalry)

So a mid-table finish for the year - but we did get to pick up our second place trophies from the Derby round (so we didn't go home empty-handed).

The Castillians were commanded by Peter and Richard Butler who finished top of the Fog League, so we can perhaps pat ourselves on the back that we kept the game and the League in the balance for as long as we did.  Well done to them.

NDBML results 2013

This was the last year of the current organising team, so many thanks need to go to Colin Betts, Geoff Pearson, Mike Goss and Dave Ruddock ... I think Geoff and Dave will be part of the new team, Colin and Mike are taking a break.    

All the great wargames events we enjoy depend on the time and forbearance of volunteer organisers (and they are always outnumbered by players who don't get their lists in on time, roll up late, leave armies at home, don't know the rules etc. etc. i.e. the rest of us ...).  

Take a bow, all you volunteers.

Also in November, we had a big AMW Raphia refight in Northamptonshire ...

Here are the pictures:

(yellow tokens denote average units, red raw)

(down the lines from the Ptolemaic left wing)

(1/72 scale heavy infantry action: stylish old school soldiers from Trebian's expanding collection)

It looked splendid but was by turns engaging and clunky.   AMW has some limitations 'straight from the box' and we haven't got all the tweaks refined for a big Hellenistic battle like this.

Work in Progress.

See the Society of Ancients next at Warfare.   Lost Battles (Sat. only) and the Crusades.

*I enjoy all these wargaming gatherings, and look forward to meeting up with friends at Usk and Burton next year ... I just think I have got what I want out of FoG-AM, now it is in its second version - so I am hoping to try FoG-R for these upcoming events.   I will still take some photos of the ancients games, of course.

8th September, British Legion Club, Derby

Northern Doubles (Field of Glory)

A slightly delayed report pending the scores in this friendly Sunday series.   The scores took a while to come up as the SoA team in the FoG-AM (that'd be me, then ...) messed up their score sheet in the first round.

We used my still quite successful Feudal Aragonese, and, after sorting things out, we came 2nd with a decisive win inside the time limit and a score draw (marginally against us).

This is the same army we won the Halifax round with in 2011, so it certainly seems to suit us, it wins over half its games and doesn't seem too badly affected by V2 syndrome.

Javelin armed skirmishers still seem hard done by (but they are cheap, which means an army without any 'poor' and with plenty of knights still tallies up with 16 units) ... but are not affected by the reduction of ranges - so they are relatively better off, now, compared with bows or slings.

The knights are armoured, not heavily armoured and benefit from a (V2) bonus of +1 MU, so move like cavalry.  This is a real improvement and makes the feel much better (these are Spanish Caballeros, not clumsy French tin cans*) ...

(Game One: vs Carthaginians)

Of course, who you play against will make a big difference ... against the popular big infantry hulks you are probably heading for a draw ... but at Derby - which is an open event - we got drawn, out of period, against a Carthaginian with plenty of horse and medium foot ... and, in period, against Italo-Norman.

(Game Two: vs Italo Norman)

We got lucky against a very game Carthaginian (getting lucky is a familiar theme amongst my tales of victory).   And it was a joy to to get a historical match against the Normans ... though the luck bug bit us back in the last turn there.   

The heavy cavalry are pretty much the same ... the Normans had more spearmen, whereas we had the advantage in javelin skirmishers.   As the spearmen come in big lumps, we also had a couple more units.

A very friendly 2 game/one day competition.   Might be our last year as i still don't expect to play much FoG next year ...

Thom Richardson won the DBMM, Chris Thorn from the Amey/Thorn Impalers, won the FoG Ancients.

Maws NDBML page

More Spanish v Norman eye candy...

(skirmishers go before the King of Aragon and his feudal host)

(Spanish reserves)

(Norman knights holding the left wing)

(densely-packed Norman spearmen)

(the Spanish attack)

(combat all down the line)

*not that French tin cans were clumsy, of course ... I was using the term for effect!

18th and 19th May, Sheffield

TRIPLES 2013

I seemed to be busy the whole time at Triples this year.   We had played both days last year, and had supporting manpower this year as well.   Tag-teaming the DBA meant I only played two games on Saturday (although FoG V2 did wipe out most of Sunday I suppose)

As well as great wargames show with every sort of game and all the big historical wargames traders, Triples, these days, is positively bursting with opportunities to play ancient and medieval wargames in low impact friendly competition. 

The Society of Ancients Northern DBA Cup

The Northern Cup is sponsored by the Society of Ancients and is part of the SoA UK DBA League.

Tony and Paul from Lincoln organise it all and provide armies and terrain boards for a series of loosely historical scenarios.   This year had a Chinese theme.   Something I know nothing about.

(Game one: Early Northern Barbarian - me, near us - vs Shang Chinese)

Some of the match-ups left me scratching my head, and I confess I struggled with the military challenges of unfamiliar troops fighting across terrain not usually found in the middle of my battlefields.  

That is good in a number of ways ... but I didn't win any games for the SoA team (sorry, Chris)

The scenarios were  I/10 Melukhkhan vs I/23a Vedic Indian; I/13b Shang Chinese vs I/14a Early Northern Barbarian; I/32c Western Chou vs I/43a Early Hu; III/9 Burmese vs I/49d Early Vietnamese; II/4b Yeuh Chinese vs II/4a Ch'in Chinese; III/20a Sui Chinese vs III/20b Early Tang Chinese; III/61 Sung Chinese vs III/54 Early Samurai; IV/15 Qara Khitan vs IV/35 Mongol Conquest ...

 

(a very popular Chinese scenario)

The battlefields are all preset, the attacker and defender are specified and the nature of the river is already defined (that river is a 'delaying river', so chops the battlefield in two) ...

I would normally have taken more photographs to add to the SoA/DBA gallery, but although I did like the look of the Samurai (and have bought a book by Stephen Turnbull), in general I have no affinity for this history and can't really tell which army is which :(

(typically smart presentation: III/54 Early Samurai)

(five games produced yet another new winner)

Congratulations to Mark Johnson (1st), Sandy Carruthers (2nd), and Tom Whitehead and Graham Fordham (tied in 3rd).

The gathered players expressed their thanks to the Society for its support, to the hosting show, and to Paul and Tony for putting it all together.

Impetus

My 'out and about' sequence this week is just some shots of the Impetus tables ...

Unfortunately I was unable to photograph more of the Impetus event as due to some oversight somewhere, most of the games were being played on bare tabletops.  That was a pity as this is an interesting game, and some of the armies were appealingly presented.

There was also a WRG 6th edition event, but they kept themselves very much to themselves for some reason.   A testimony to durability, however.  What a lot of choices we have these days.

Sunday: the Northern Doubles League

(the well-supported Sheffield round of this evergreen competition)

This is Colin and Geoff's last year running the series so I had hoped to play more often. 

  

There is a round at the Royal Armouries in Leeds which would be great were it not for COW being the same weekend (but those of you not going to Knuston Hall ought to make a note in your diaries).

I was very pleased Chris agreed to using my Hawkwood Condotta Italian - it is a favourite army and needs to come out every year.  

I had hoped that it might fair better under FoG V2 with the marginal boost to rear rank shooting at impact (no minus poa now for the rear rank archers/crossbowmen) - actually, I think the army loses much more from the neutering of skirmish troops than it gains from the impact bonus ... so it remains more a decorative than a competitive army.

On this occasion we got no historical match ups so our knights fought gamely against Palestinian Insurgents - and some Greeks from the Middle East who predominantly fought with what, for us, would have been thought Swiss equipment.  Seleucid and Jewish Revolt, to be specific.

Although I don't really see the point of mismatched games like these, they were very amiable and tense, and at time I almost forgot it wasn't history!  

Unfortunately neither game got to a conclusion.

More thoughts on V2 FoG

Our first 8 Doubles games produced just 1 decisive outcome and sadly a whole day's wargaming did not add to that total.   Despite rattling through as many turns as we could in a losing second game, it still did not reach a natural result within the 3.5 hours.  The earlier game was a 10:10 draw with only 2 units broken on each side (of the 30 or so on the table).  V2 continues to disappoint in this respect and I am losing interest I think.

NDBML page

******

With the two full length games of FoG on Sunday, I was not able to get back into the main show and only had lunchtime with the Bosworth game.   Overall, I felt I missed out a bit (as the slideshow demonstrates).  Fortunately there are many good blogs with pictures of the main areas.  However, I'm not sure I would do Triples this way again.

After a weekend off, it is Partizan and we can devote ourselves fully to the show, the visitors and to the Bosworth project.  

4th November, Manchester

Northern Doubles League - Round 5.

A quick return to playing Field of Glory for this event (before the trip to Glasgow's annual Armati event!)

This is a great series of events with a nice crowd.   I enjoy playing doubles, and two games of FoG suits me well enough for a wargames trip.   The League offers FoG-R and DBMM as well (and single entries are accepted - but shout around if you are short of a partner ... the social experience of the doubles game is best shared).

Chris and I took my trusty Late 12th Century Spanish and crossed our fingers that we would get some suitable opposition to charge into ...

(Spanish adventure: Game One)

Well, we struggled against the well-organised and practiced Han Chinese ... MFs with heavy weapons and portable obstacles which they pick up and drop down more easily than modern soldiers can do trenches and barbed wire (translate MFs anyway you like!).   A good-natured and challenging game in which we could make no progress at all.

(Spanish adventure: Game Two)

Our second game was against more plausible Euro/Mediterranean opposition: an Ottoman army which, despite its radio-controlled Janissaries, has some similarities with the Moslem armies that were historical foes for our Spanish.

This game didn't go at all well for quite some time, but after some sparkling die rolling by Chris (I wish I could say that every game ...)... we came close to a decisive win inside the distance.

Around the tables, there was a familiar array of old friends and the usual display of big and beautifully turned out wargames armies ...  Doubles events certainly fill up the table spaces.  I particularly liked ...

 (Assyrians vs Mycenneans ... a big battle)

(Romans bullying unarmoured natives ... don't they ever stop?)

And, presumably a big army swansong ... the biggest army I have ever seen used in a tournament ...

 

(Ruddock's huge Andalusian army swarms around the Swiss)

Those Andalusians would have made very good period opposition for us, but I'm sort of pleased we avoided being swamped by a swarm!   Anyway, I enjoyed the games we did get.

So, one 'getting nowhere' defeat and one 'nearly cracked it' lucky victory ... no trophies for us this time.  Others did better ..

Well done to the winners (some of whom are, shall we say, familiar? with the victor's rostrum) who were rewarded with trophies and a warm handshake from Colin Betts. 

NDBML Results Page

That's the last double game for me until Usk next year.  And the last FoG (time to rummage around for my Armati rule book) ... I'm beginning to look at Big Battle DBA, you know ...

2013 will be the last year for the Northern League under the current seamless management  (Betts/PearsonGoss) ... a big thankyou to them, and here's to giving them a good farewell turnout next year.

19th-20th May, Sheffield

Triples 2012

Triples was such a big weekend for the Society Shows Team that I will be splitting my report into two.

On the Saturday, Triples, as well as being a fine 'must see' show, has for 8 years now, hosted the DBA Northern Cup, sponsored by the Society of Ancients.

(intrepid adventurers find out more about the Society of Ancients)

This has been a very fine venture, and we have customarily had a presence and a stand with the event.  It has, of course, left us with a conundrum as to what to do for the second day of the two day show.

This year, the Northern Doubles League took up the invitation to add Triples to its popular series of one-day FoG/DBMM events.   This was a very attractive prospect as the key stand personnel like to play occasional Sundays in the NDBML.

(Rob's Plataea table - left foreground, a visitor flips through the latest Slingshot)

But would it take the Society out of the show entirely?   Enter Rob Broom and his War & Conquest/Scarab Miniatures stand and his offer to host Slingshot on his table in the main part of the show.

I'm not saying the solution was perfect straight out of the box, but it certainly kept plenty of us busy and entertained all weekend (and I think if we can just give Rob a bit more support along the way, we may have it cracked).

(NDBML tournament tables against the backdrop of the running track)

So this is a view of the show as a whole, and of the NDBML Sunday event that was part of it.  Rob's weekend is covered here, and my separate report on the Saturday's DBA Northern Cup will follow.

Highlights from the show

So, we had the Lords of the Nile out with the DBA, Rob was doing Plataea and the Lance & Longbow Society were refighting Grandson (title picture).   Impartially, I'd say those were the best games in out period.

There were a number of good participation games at Triples ...

(WD's popular participation game ran all weekend)

I didn't get to play the jazzed up version of Rollbahn Ost (but am a veteran of the felt pen version) ...

And there were some very good smaller scale battles

The 28mm WWI game was much more interesting than is often the case, and had a number of nice vignettes around the board (the sort of thing I might do in smaller scales ...) ...

(Dachshunds and Bulldogs)

And there was a useful presentation board.

So I thought this massive presentation was worth its space.

 (click on the pictures fro a larger image)

My favourite was, of course, the Old School game resplendent with 40mm Prince August semi-rounds - looking like episodes from Charge! or The Wargame (although the original figures were smaller of course: but somehow this impression of an old wargame looks exactly right).

(classic looks from Ilkley Old School)

Good to see some of the players had the decency to wear their ties (smoking and drink-driving being out of fashion, wargaming in a tie is about it for a 60's revival these days ...)...

Tucked away in the smaller front hall, mention should go to the Burton 18th Century Colonial game which had a very  convincing look to it.

NDBML

Two games of FoG of a Sunday is about right for me, and having had a reasonable look around they show on Saturday, it was nice ot get some games in against old friends.  Graham Fordham partnered me in the morning so it was with old friends, too.  Graham and I have been doing shows for around 25 years, but seldom get to team up these days.   A quarter of a century.  Hmm...

(the masters at work)

I hope the 'Sunday only' players got enough time between the games to get good value from the show.

We used my Later Sicilian army for this event, and came out just ahead of par over the two games (it's a 'class II' army, so for us the best is yet to come). 

 (FoG on the Steppes)

In the afternoon, we had the luxury of one of those tournament 'what ifs' ... we invaded we invaded Medieval Peru and fought against a sea of barely clad footsoldiers armed with slings and clubs.

They made life difficult for the Sicilian horsemen by clinging to every bit of field and lowland cover they could find, but by sunset we had got a strangle hold on the game.  But by then the game had ended.

A very good day, which I hope will be repeated next year.

(Colin Betts dishes out the trophies)

Jon Fletcher won the DBMM, Dave Ruddock and David Eltringham won the (Ancient and Medieval) Field of Glory ...
More info on the NDBML: Maws Northern Doubles site

(Newcomer to the SoA stable: Call it Qids)