Hello all, just a quickie to let you know i have listed some more stuff on ebay, so if you are looking for a project to keep your self busy over this period of ...errr....oddness why not have a punt?. But before i show the lots its time for....

Yep, you read the title correctly.......but first:

Before there was grunge.....there was Mudhoney!!!.


Right on to the naming and ruddy shaming (rant upcoming!).

My wife, the Amazing Mrs Sprinks was right, there i have said it!. Do i feel better.....well, sort of!. 'but what was she right about?' i hear you cry, well Mrs Sprinks has often been known to proclaim the mighty maxim 'DONT YOU HAVE ENOUGH LITTLE MEN BY NOW YOU WONDERFUL, BUFF, KINDHEARTED EXAMPLE OF A MAN?' (she may not use those words exactly). My normal response being to don the metaphorical smoking jacket and quip 'My dear, you simply cannot have too many of these wonderful little toys, for there is much to explore. Dont worry your pretty head about such things' for the record this response was never finished in its entirety and always ended in '.OWW!!'.

But i have finally come to the realization that she may have a point!. I know, pick yourself up oh fellow hobbiest and gurdle your loins, this next bit may require the use of smelling salts to plough through!. I had decided to sell off a few bits and bobs i was never going to get on the table to fund the purchase of some more 12mm goodness and to that end i decided it would be a good idea to organize my collection of 1/72 plastics to see what was surplus. I skipped to the hobby area (where Mrs Sprinks keeps the 'little men' out of eyeshot of visitors!) with a roll of plastic sandwich bags in hand to quickly execute said task and then put my feet up. Two hours later i had maybe sorted a fifth of my bits and run out of bags!. With hindsight this should have sounded the alarm in my head that all was not well. Another roll of bags and three days later the plastic goodies are sorted into sets ready to decide whats staying. It looked like this!:

Just a quick update to let you know what i have been busying my child like brain with when im not babbling on here. There have been several Y.E.P (Yay, Evidence of Progress) moments over the past week:

Y.E.P #1: I have been thinking about my new fast play pike and shotteeee(ish) system and have made some progress in putting the rules together. The test games have been positive and i have gone down the 'simple is always better than 10000000000 rules to simulate the same thing' route which is going well, but i am attempting to leave enough 'meat' on the bone of rule (which is not a thing i know before anyone starts :-)) to add character to the troops and shires without loosing the core of 'good tactics over spammy list gaming*....god i hate spammy list gaming!).

Y.E.P#2: I have almost finished basing up my first shire force:


A little pic of the Fossestershire force as it stands, i had to do them first as i already had the troops to do the curmudgeonly old bastards (they are stuck in the past so i had a good excuse to use up some medieval bits for the militia troops). Mr Philotep made the suggestion of using flags which got the ol' brain (such as it is) ticking over. Paint was a no go considering how small the flags would be and an experiment with sharpies left rather a lot to be desired!. So in the end i went with the old standby of tape. The flags are strictly table top standard but they work ok for what i'm after.

Y.E.P#3: The recent ebay haul has payed for the following:


A big thank you to all who had a cheeky bid on my sales page (more delightful bargins finishing Monday if your interested) and Mr Otep who relieved me of a large quantity of El Cid goodness (thank you sir!). This gives me all of the basic troops i have been needing to sort out the Shires (and a few other bits too).

So, all good at the mo, onwards to basing Crivenshire methinks!.

.....'till next time....




* Spammy gaming: Pouring over army lists looking for rules loopholes and combinations of troop types that will give any advantage in a game with no regard for game balance, your opponents fun or the tone and flavor of the force you are picking.

In my last post i mentioned i was going to float the idea of a campaign to the sprinklings (well sprinkling 2: Son of Sprinks and sprinkling 3: the Revenge anyway, although Sprinkling 1: the Spawning did do some of the wonderful photography included in this post). They not only failed to glaze over and dribble while i was explaining what that meant to them but to my surprise jumped at the idea!. We set about coming up with some ideas for games and i let them ransack my mini collection to pick their forces ( my nerves will never be the same again!). Having settled on forces of their choosing ( Undead for Sprinkling 2 and an Egyptian(ish) force for Sprinkling 3 because they had an 'AWESOME GIANT SNAKE!!!!!', more of which later) we sat down to come up with an idea for a background and drew a campaign map. This one as it goes:

I admit this game has been a strange one to write up what with the prologue being split over the previous two posts (Down the bottom of this one and the whole of this one). However 'normal' service is about to be resumed as bellow is the whole bloomin' report and also the details of the scenario i made up and played!. This is also a bit of a first for me as its the first documented ding dong between Verland and the Guilds, which has been in the offing in my mangled brain for quite some time!.

The scenario
As the prologues suggest the game is set in the disputed state of Arradan in one of the many areas of no mans land that lay within its borders. A run away experimental Steam tank made by the Guilds has come to a stop and is stranded between two advancing forces intent on capturing it for their own ends!. The object of the game is to lay claim to the stricken tank and to drive off the enemy.

The rules
deployment: The opposing forces set up on opposite table edges according to the normal deployment rules. I used the basic Kings of War rules by mantic but whatever rule set you are using as long as the armies are set up on opposite table edges with a good area of open ground between the two.

The tank: The steam tank needs to be placed in the middle of the table an equal(ish) distance between the two forces. It is well and truly broken. The crew of the tank are inside trying to bodge anything they can to get it moving again. To represent the attempted fix the Guild player may roll 1d6 at the end of his turn and consult the table below to see if the crew have managed to do anything!.

1D6 roll Result
1-4 No luck!, the tank is still broken.
5 Fixed the cannon!, the tank itself is broken but the cannon is fixed, It
counts as a cannon with a 360 degree field of fire that the Guild player
controls.
6 Bodged it!, The tank may move up to 3 inches per turn and may turn up
to 90 degrees before moving. The cannon is still broken unless you have
rolled a 5 in a previous turn.

The tank may not charge into combat and may not fight in any way. If it is fixed in any way the opposing Verland troops may attack it as normal. It has 1d6 hits (determined at the start of each attack) and counts as having heavy armour (whatever that is in the system you are using, its Wronghammer, bodge it!). Should any attacking enemy reduce the tanks hits to zero it counts as broken again and will loose the cannon and/or any movement it may had gained.

Winning: The Verland force wins if it manages to get 1 unit of unengaged troops within 5 inches of the tank at the end of the game with no Guild forces within 5 inches of the tank. Any other result is a win for whichever force kills the most enemy troops.

The forces: I used 1500 point forces for each side to give a large(ish) game. Feel free to use any size you like. Its your game after all!

GENARAL FALLACS VERLAND REPO FORCE!

Rear left to right: Pike horde, Militia horde, Pole-arms horde.
Front left to right: Crossbow regiment, General Fallac on Quentin the great eagle (counts as General on winged beast), Scout sargent Fitzerran (counts as a Hero), Crossbow regiment.

From left: Border guard regiment (mounted sargeants), Royal Guard horse regiment (count as Knights with elite), Verland Knights regiment.

The verland force are based on red and white bases and are made up of minis by Red box, Mini art and Strelets.

COMMANDER ALRRANS GUILD RECLAMATION CREW!

From rear: 2 Cannon, Commander Allran (general on horse), Pike and shot horde (a pike horde with the Ra and Special of an Arquebusier regiment).
Front: Enforcer regiment (count as foot guard with the Ra and Special of an Arquebusier troop), Pike and Shot horde (see above), Swordsmen regiment (count as shield wall).

From left: Two Guild lancer regiments (count as Knights)

The Guild forces are based on Red and Yellow bases. The force is made up of minis by Zvesda, Ceaser, Revell, A call to arms and Red box.

THE TABLE

Another quiet day in the peaceful wastes of Arradan. (photo taken from the Arradan tourist board archive).

SET UP

The center with the stricken Steam tank in the middle, Verland to the Left and the Guild force on the right.

The Verland battle line ready to attack!

Crossbows and Knights watch the left ready to spring into action!.
In response the Guild forces form a gun line in the center.