Be Gad, but it's warm

Of course it's summertime but even so this is hot!  I'm actually finding painting difficult as paint is skinning over on my coffee jar lid palettes and glue is going off before I finish mounting figures.  Time to do something different I suppose, but what?  I'd play a game but my usual venue, the conservatory, is self identifying as a sauna at the moment.  I've caught up on my SK regimental admin and read all my favourite blogs.  Hell, I even did some gardening until the heat beat me.

All of that said I have now reached the point where I have painted more 6mm cavalry than I have bought so far this year (so far being the operative phrase) and have rather a lot of 6mm foot on the painting table, so failing a sudden rush of blood at the Joy of Six show this coming weekend I'm on target to reduce the lead pile again this year.

In other news I had one of 'those' birthdays at the end of June.  One of those that ends in a zero, yes one of those that causes you take stock of the remaining time before you.  Sensible me says you really shouldn't keep buying more troops but the other me doesn't agree and points out how much I like looking at the serried ranks of completed figures.  Possibly time for an army parade for my little lead warriors?  At the last census I'm well over the 4,000 figure mark so it should be impressive.  I just need to clear a table top to lay everything out on.

Finally again in reference to birthdays I was lucky enough to receive the gift pictured below from my family.  Signed by the Under 21 and  First Teams courtesy of my granddaughter's boyfriend who worked for the club as an intern and then under a fixed term contract and provided performance analysis to both those sides.

Signed Blackburn Rover's shirts first and second strips.

Alan?, ALAN!......

Following on from the Goths are the Alans.  Both the DBA and ADLG lists give Alannic Horse Archers as an option in the Visigothic lists.  I thought they would make a nice change from Huns in that role, so I opted for them.  Having managed to confuse myself over the appearance of the Goths I was ready for even more confusion over the Alans.  

They seem to have originated as a fusion between a Sarmatian tribe and remnants of the Scythian Saka peoples,  They originally lived somewhere between the Black and Caspian seas.  The Romans knew of their existence as early as the reign of Augustus but didn't consider them as a threat as they were only raiding into Parthian territory.  From Hadrian's reign we have Arrian's 'Order of battle against the Alans' to fall back on for details of the tactics and by inference some evidence for their equipment.  This was written shortly after 135CE and describes Roman tactics and deployment against an Alanni raiding force which had entered the Eastern Roman province of Cappadocia, in what is now North Eastern Turkey.  There are other mentions of them in Cassius Deo and Tacitus and in Parthian and Persian sources.  Rome hired them as mercenaries and by the time the Notitia Dignitatum was drafted, had some regular cavalry units either made up of Alans or named for them and presumably equipped in a similar way.  Arrian terms them Scythians but the Parthians (who were of Scythian descent) said otherwise

The Alans were living in the south part of modern day Ukraine when the Goth's came along and settled slap bang in the middle of their lands.  This split them into two groups the eastern half were conquered by the Huns with survivors ended up in modern Ossetia.  The Western group eventually settled on the fringes of Brittany hence Alain being a common Breton name.  Along the way they seem to have hung onto their 'genetic' identity rather more successfully than the Goths as both groups are described as tall and blond with piercing blue eyes.  Even in the 21st century it is not uncommon for Ossetians to fit that description.  A third group settled in the north of Pakistan probably having moved with the White Huns who invaded that area, and have also kept their blond, blue eyed look.

I used a slightly heavier ink wash than normal...whaddya think?

And clearly I need to get a handle on the iPhones focal length

So we have a reasonable idea as to the background and physical appearance of the Alans but what of their clothing and equipment?  Other Sarmatian peoples had a liking for heavy cavalry in scale or lamella armour armed with a Kontos, sword and often a bow too.  The Alans seem to have followed that pattern.  Arrian certainly deployed his troops to deal with a frontal charge by heavy cavalry and made sure to anchor his flanks on higher ground. He instructed the first four ranks to use their pila as spears (some commentators seem to assume this means they had long spears but Arrian mentions the long iron shaft which sounds like a pilum to me) with rear ranks throwing 'javelins' and adding bow fire to the defence.  He notes that their horses lack armour and are vulnerable to missile fire but expects that they will always charge on sight.  That said they don't appear to have done so when faced with Arrian's deployment but why that was isn't certain.  Arrian's determination to have his flanks covered suggests that they had sufficient light cavalry to make an attempt to get around the flanks a real risk.  

I can't find much information on clothing for Alan light cavalry but I'd expect the standard steppe horse warrior tunic and trousers.  The tunic may still have had the overlap frontal fastening (a bit like a double breasted suit jacket) favoured by their Saka ancestors and Parthian light cavalry but the pointed three lappet cap seems to no longer be in use.  In 6mm I have gone for Late Roman horse archers rather than Saka/Scythian horse archers.  I went with pale tunics and bright coloured trousers as the main colour choice and of course lots of blond hair, blue eyes though are beyond me at this scale!  When I get around to adding heavy cavalry I will use a mix of armoured and unarmoured Sarmatian cavalry.

Oh and when I looked a bit closer it wasn't Alan at all, it was Dave.

How Goth were the Goths?

Before we start let’s just park my dodgy dad jokes about black eye liner and black clothes right here shall we?  Good call, as this post actually came about as I tried to decide what colours to paint some Baccus 6mm gothic infantry and led to a bit of an argument from Google's wonderful (not wonderful in the least) AI assistant.  Again no jokes about needing to buy more black paint eh?  More on the failings of AI later.

Goths, or Vandals or Ostrogoths and even possibly Visigoths

We don't have a huge amount of information on the earliest Gothic people and there is a still some “healthy” debate as to where they originated.  Most of our sources come from the 'civilised' peoples around the Mediterranean and have to be taken with a pinch of salt as they tended to be biased about the hairy barbarian types beyond the frontiers!  The usual wargaming view is that Goths come in two flavours Visigoths and Ostrogoths (aka Tervingi and Greuthingi).  However, the Romans just called them all Goths until Attila's time, as they didn’t really have any information on the sub-divisions amongst them.  It wasn’t until after the fall of the Western Roman Empire that the term Visigoths came into use so that term isn't entirely useful either.  I'd say that they are Goths, then Goths and Ostrogoths then Visigoths and Ostrogoths once the Toulousean Kingdom is established in the mid 5th Century

The Goth's first came to the attention of the wider world while living in modern Ukraine in the area either side of the Dneiper River.  by the time that  Jordanes was writing in the 5th century the Goths themselves seem to have believed that they originally came from an island far to the north of the Ukraine.  That gives rise to the idea that they originated in Scandinavia supported by the names of areas in Southern Sweden like Gothenburg and Gotland.  However this may be a bit of a stretch, it's like suggesting that the town of Reading had ancient inhabitants who liked to peruse the written word more than their neighbours!  Still there is some archaeological evidence of a people related to the Goths and Vandals moving south through Poland and Western Russia.  For this period there is no solid evidence for the appearance of the Goths other than some grave goods.

Once in the Dneiper region the Vandals seem to have settled to the north of the Goths and the Goths them selves to have divided into the Tervingi west of the Dneiper and the Greuthingi to the east. They seem to have taken over some Alannic  terriotory splitting the Alans into a western and an eastern group.  What we do know is that a large proportion of the Tervingi moved ahead of the expanding horse tribes displacing the Carpi (a remnant Dacian people) in Transylvania on the way and ultimately bumping into the Roman frontier in the first part of the third century.  The remainder of the Goths and the eastern Alans became subjects of the Hunnic empire and eventually moved west along with them.

So what has the above Tourists guide to Europe for travelling barbarians got to do with the appearance of the Goths?  Well in part their appearance is connected to the people they met and intermarried along the way.  The Ostrogoths stayed in Hunnic territory and probably mixed with both Alanni and Hunnic types and possibly Heruls and Gepids.  The Visigoths on the other hand moved into the area occupied by the Carpi and so picked up some Dacian genomes before moving further along the frontier and mixing with other Germanic peoples..  Eventually they joined with the Vandals in Spain and North Africa as well as that part of the Alans who had also moved west ahead of the Huns.

We have some documentary evidence that suggests that the Goths favoured furs and animal skins over 'civilised' clothing.  I have read some sources which state that they carried their swords hanging from a baldrick type shoulder belt rather than suspending them from a belt Roman style.  Shields were round or oval.  I noted that the coffin style shield is not mentioned.  One source mentions green cloaks with red edges as being popular.  All of the images show them as wearing late Roman style tunics and trousers as a base layer.  Lastly there is some archaeological evidence suggesting that some Goth's took up the steppe nomad practice of skull binding.

I was initially interested in hair colour and this is where Google's AI comes into the story.  This tells me that the Goths were generally fair haired, being blonde, light brown or red brown hair coloured.  It also states that Visigoths were also fair haired.  Ask about Ostrogoths and the confusion starts.  The Ostrogoths, it tells me were dark haired with mostly dark browns and black predominating.  What it doesn't do is say what the source of that information is or for what period this covers.  I kind of get the feeling that the AI doesn't rank information sources by quality when deciding what to report but rather goes with quantity of supporting web sites (be they good, bad or indifferent).  I couldn't find any detailed  information regarding shield patterns and or colours either so it’s going to be guess work for that.  

So I decided on mostly fair haired tones with linens and mainly subdued natural coloured clothing with an above average (for my painting) amount of green tunics and cloaks.  Shields will be derived from later Roman patterns especially those associated with Goths, Vandals and Alans.  So at least the Goths are progressing (probably westwards in some haste!).

I must go down to the seas again

Or 'more DBSA antics' (and apologies are probably owed to John Masefield).  

After my initial outing with the rules proved to be a reasonable success I have been thinking about the issues I had came across.  OK there was nothing major thrown up, and I'm prepared to bet that all my points were considered by Phil Barker and decided against for the sake of keeping the rules simple, but, well you know how I like to bolt on additional chrome.  

The first point was that in the real world damage to a warship has an effect beyond making it easier to sink.  This is either a reduction in combat efficiency or a reduction in speed/manoeuvrability.  Secondly, a crippled ship simply halting feels wrong (inertia and all that) even with fairly long 15 minute game turns some headway would be maintained.  Lastly I think the Hong Kong Wargame Societies idea of having some differences between the capital ships (Cruisers and Battleships) has merit.  This should include both a reflection of different armament, weight of fire in the different shooting arcs. and some reflection of advances in range finding and gunnery technology.  All that said I don't really want to loose the essential simplicity of the rules as conceived by Mr B.

Other players have tried to address some of these issues previously so I'm going to incorporate those ideas where ever possible.  There is a bit of retro-engineering involved in some cases to attempt to understand how their changes were arrived at, but nothing too difficult.  The hardest part will be finding a way to calculate a factor to reflect weight of shot in each firing arc as that will have to be done on a ship by ship basis.  I'm thinking some sort of Excel calculator (you know how I like to play with Excel).

My initial thought is to use some combination of shell weight, rate of fire and perhaps range finder capability, although the latter is problematic.  That would create a number for weight of fire reaching target but wouldn't take into account ability to penetrate armour.  I need to have a bit of a think on this.

Through the Square Window Rules review

I promised a review of the 'Through the Square Window' rules for the Thirty Years War  I picked up at Partizan recently, so here it is.

The rules cover and the one colour illustration

Summary

I like them.  The author has a similar view on how seventeenth century warfare worked to my own.  The combat mechanisms are elegant and uncomplicated and there are straight forward rules for depicting the various combat formations that evolved as the TYW progressed.  There is also a nice section covering the various armies involved and how to depict them on the table top, not dissimilar to my blog posts on the same topic for my own rules.  There are no grids (hooray), but a lot of dice, although this speeds up combat and especially morale/reaction tests so I don't mind that.  They use the battalia/squadron as the standard combat formations which is where I like to operate for pike and shot gaming.  All dice used are D6 so there are no oddball dice to acquire.  I haven't played them yet but other than changing the base sizes and ground scale to reflect the fact that my own troops are 6mm rather than the author's 15mm chaps I don't feel any need to fiddle.  The price doesn't hurt either, my copy came in at £10 from the author and I think they are also available from Caliver for £15.  

Details

The rules come as a spiral bound A4 book with clear plastic front and back covers.  It's printed on a good quality heavy paper, almost a light cardstock, and runs to 50 pages overall.  Of those only the first 16 pages are the rules.  Once set up, unit formations and definitions are taken out of the equation there are only 11 pages of rules covering the fighting on the tabletop.  Don't be put off by the short page run for this section though as despite the larger than average font used (Looks to be around 12-14 point which is nice as my eyes are not as young as they were) there is a lot subtle game play mechanisms in those pages .  This is achieved by the use of different tactical styles and formations.

There are few illustrations and these are simple black and white diagrams covering formations and arcs of fire.  To be honest the rules don't need more.  There is a good contents page so finding things is fairly easy which is good as there is no quick reference sheet.  The author says he tried to create one but couldn't compress the information to a single sheet.

Here are some images of my 6mm troops in the relevant infantry formations.  Apologies for using non 30 Years War figures I went with what I had.

A Dutch style battalion

A Swedish equivalent looks weedy but gets a salvo bonus

Wallenstein style Imperial battalion note shot bases in front of pike

Unit basing and formations all make perfect sense and, as mentioned above, do have an impact on how each different formation fights.  Each formation has a training/morale class of well trained, trained or poor, again this impacts how a formation fights.  I will create some specific mixed pike and shot bases for the Imperial squadron shown above so that they are closer to the concept in the rules.  That is probably the only change to my basing I need to consider.  Units also have a number of strength points based on the troop types in it and the number of bases of each type.  This defines how much punishment a formation can suffer before it breaks.

Spanish style large Tercio

Later Spanish Small Tercio

The rules use square bases but I have not fully followed that  as I already have 6mm troops based and don't want to change them (again).  If I was starting from scratch I would definitely go with the basing as suggested.  As it is my square bases are equivalent to those in the rules and my longer bases are equivalent to two of the square bases.  There was a chat on Face Book about basing and the consensus was (including the author's) was that as long as both sides are using the same base sizes and they are not too different to the rules it will be fine (but see bit about command rules below).

Each unit has a number of actions it can take each turn although there are some restrictions on doing the same thing more than once per turn.  So for example infantry and cavalry have two actions per turn while light cavalry have three.  Infantry cannot perform the same action twice in their turn.  Cavalry (except for shooting) can carry out the same action twice.  This limits how fast foot can move compared to cavalry.  There are 14 possible actions for units to to use, although three are artillery only and one is dragoons only.

Combat is straight forward with each base in a formation allocated a number of dice for shooting and a separate number for melee.  This varies based on the troop type on the base and their training level and brings more period flavour to the rules.  The combat system  is roll the total number of dice for the bases in combat and count hits, which are usually 6's but can be 5or 6's in some situations.  Each hit removes a strength point from the enemy unit.  

Morale works in a similar fashion.  There are several trigger events which cause a morale check and once triggered some additional situations add extra dice to the roll.  Every dice with a score of 1 or 2 can create a morale effect other scores have no impact.  Scores of 2 only effect poor troops while scores of 1 effect all troops and take precedent over the less severe outcomes of rolling a two. Scores of 1 are cumulative within the one set of rolls, think of it as a unit being overwhelmed by the number of things not going their way.  Its quick and effective with minimal charts required.  The effect of failing a roll can halt an advance and then cause a unit to rout if a further dice score of one is in the same set of dice rolls.  It sounds cumbersome but is actually fast to resolve.  It's worth noting routing troops can be rallied.

Command uses a command radii to test if units are able to take new orders directly.  The rules don't ask for specific orders for each unit they simply advance to contact.  Lack of command works by forcing halts and potentially removing a unit's ability to act, which I think means they are stuck in place and can only react to enemy actions.  This is possibly the least well explained part of the rules.  As a unit simply halting and not doing anything seems odd.  I'd expect them to at least be able to shoot.  I suspect that the number of generals is the defining factor here and that command needs to be modelled down to brigade level.  The only clue I can find is in the army costs (page 16) which gives a point cost for a general and says there must be a minimum of four generals.  That would suggest a CinC and a general for each wing and the centre.  This is something where I probably need to have game under my belt to fully grasp. As a secondary point this is where changing the base sizes might cause a slight issue.  Placing troops on much larger bases then recommended would have the potential to move unit's out of command range as it would spread units out more.  There is of course an easy fix, extend the command range by the same percentage that the base sizes are increased by.

Conclusions

Are these a detailed simulation of pike and shot combat ?- No, but no set of rules can cover every detail especially in a period where there was substantial change under way.  I don't hold this against the rules.  Every writer has to make a decision on which aspects to leave out and I think the author has taken a sensible view on this.

Do they provide  differences between the different tactical styles and formations?  Yes, this is one of the strengths of these rules and clearly was at the forefront of the author's mind.  The differences will allow players to feel that an early Spanish Style Tercio has to be used in a different way to a Swedish Brigade and reward doing that.

Do they feel right?  Well I haven't played a game yet but reading through my take is that they will give a period feel to game play.  There are enough differences in troop types to allow an early TYW army to act differently to a late TYW army or a BCW Army.

Overall, I think I have found my go to set of rules for the TYW.

Oh and yes the title is a nod to both The Defenestration of Prague and BBC's old pre-school programme Playschool.  Don't you love it when the author is a similar vintage to yourself?

Partisan 2025 and a sacrifice to the carpet people

So I stirred my stumps and drove down to Newark for this years Partisan show.  I was a little later than I had hoped and some 1,200 gamers had already arrived before me at 11.45am and some had already made their purchases and were heading for home.  As always the first impression is one of the scale of the show and how busy it is.  It is a show which tends towards some huge display games and this year's show is no exception.

I was slightly disappointed that many of the large games were simple table edge to table edge lines of troops as that gives little scope for doing anything other than an advance to contact and slugging or shooting it out.  I like a bit of space around the troops as the real world rarely has hard edges you can use to shield the flanks of your army!  One game really caught my eye though, as being the exception to this.  This was the Tradeston Wargames Group presentation of the Battle of Rocroi 1643.  Even better the team running this were chatty and keen to explain how the rules worked unlike some other display games.  The game was using a set of rules I don't know much about 'Through the Square Window' and the author, Gordon Crawford, was on the team so we were able to have a good chat about the mechanisms and concepts.  I was rather taken with the system and went back later to buy a copy of the rules, which I will review in a later post (spoiler alert; I rather like them).

Rocroi using Through the Square Window rules

Close up of the Spanish Infantry in the Rocroi game

Next up was a trip to see that honest purveyor of wargames figures that is Peter Berry at Baccus 6mm.  I splurged on figures here as I needed to buy castings to complete my Moorish and Gothic armies.  Funds didn't permit me to add the additional Hunnic cavalry I need so there will be more splurging to come. 

This was followed by a quick chat with old Sealed Knot friends Paul and Christine Eaglestone of Empress Miniatures although I managed to avoid the temptations of their western gunfight range this time.  I did mention to them that I had an issue with their figures as they are far betting castings than I really know how to paint!

While I was doing the rounds I also had a chat with my old gaming friend Graham (Trebian) Evans on the Northamptonshire Battlefields stand where I picked up a copy of their 'Wargamers Guide to Edgcote'.  I didn't take a turn at the display game of the battle as I have played it a couple of times before and there was lots more to see. It seemed to be keeping Graham busy though without my trade.  The game is fun and a great introduction to Wars of the Roses games so if you see it while it's doing the rounds I strongly recommend giving it a try.

The Edgcote booklet is a rather useful item nicely illustrated in full colour with a really welcome section covering the heraldry of the combatants and a set of entry level rules as well as an explanation of the military background to the fight.  It's a great companion to Graham's earlier work 'The Battle of Edgcote 1469 - Re-evaluating the evidence' which is also a rather useful volume to have on your bookshelf if you have an interest in the Wars of the Roses.

My last purchase was from Warbases who now do a range of pre-painted buildings under the banner 'Table Ready Terrain'.  I bought another store for my town of De Lancy, Texas.  This was the Trading Post kit.  I have to say the colouring is really well done and I will be adding some more of these to the collection at some point.

Pretty sure I know who and what this game is.  It was nicely presented

I missed recording whose game this was, but this is what I mean by edge to edge deployment

So having spent my filthy lucre, I took myself around the display games.  First port of call was The League of Extraordinary Wargamer's Wake Island game.  I know a couple of these chaps from the SK and they are as mad as their selection of headgear for this game suggests.  The game looked pretty good too.  A fictional attack by the Japanese in the mid 1920's.  It gives a good excuse to get some toys on the table that were too late to see action in the First World War and were obsolete by the start of the Second.

Wake Island, Houla Shirts optional.  The outfits did make sense honest!

I was quite taken with the selection of oddball topics to be found.  Witch Racing around Ankh-Morpork looked fun and the figures being used were straight from the Josh Kirby cover art for the Discworld books.  How you stop Granny Weatherwax winning or Nanny Ogg cheating I couldn't tell.  There were also pig mounted Hobbits having jousting fun available on the next table.  Elsewhere there were a number of very large games on big tables not all of which I got details of.  

Gladiatorial Combat with a very nice amphitheatre

Racing around Ankh-Morpork.  Apologies to the presenter who clearly had just lost (again)

I couldn't resist this shot, a banjo playing Nanny Ogg rides again

I did stop and chat with the Doncaster gamers who were putting on a Gun Fight at the OK Corral game using Deadman's Hand rules.  Given the amount weaponry being displayed on the side of their table I doubt there would have been much debate about the rules.

After a good three hours I headed home and had a pretty clear run back to home.

Ah but what about the sacrifice to the carpet people I hear you cry?  Well once I got home  I decided to dry fit the parts of the Trading post kit and so popped them out of their frames.  The fit was perfect (as if I expected anything different) so I popped them onto my book purchases to carry to my hobby space.  I got up there and turned to put the books on my desk and 'pop' the book flexed and all the parts headed floorward.  I could see where they landed so down to my hands and knees I go to pick them all up (down is easy getting back up is the real trick).  Except two window frames and an awning support were nowhere to be found.  This morning I have turned my office upside down but can I find the little blighters?  Nary a trace to be had.  I checked my route from downstairs several times to no avail, moved the furniture in my office, nothing and even cleared my desk in case they were buried in one of the deeper dust drifts!  So I can only assume that the carpet people got them or that they are nestling deep within the dog, and I'm not looking for them there.  So I'm off to scratch build replacement parts now.