Chain of Command - Somewhere in Holland 1944

Just a few snapshots of a recent game of Chain of Command we had at my place. It saw an American advance column facing off against German Fallschirmjäger somewhere in Holland late summer 1944.
Both forces were regular and had minimal support, i.e. no tanks or other flights of fancy.
The Germans started off with a Force Morale rating of 10, where as the Americans had to make do with a mere 8.

The attackers table edge

A new Dux Brittaniarum Campaign...

On sunday Chris and I had another go at the TFL's Dux Britaniarum. As the last campaign was almost done (with the british beeing almost constantly beaten) and me having lost the character sheets of my Nobles during the summers renovation we decided to start a new one. To prevent me from loosing my stuff again I decided to keep track of my characters' developement and the general events of the campaign on a dedicated site on this blog.

The first game was to be a raid on a small british farmstead. We set up the table and I thought I was lucky when rolling for my entry point and coming out next to the farm. But as Chris rolled for how much head start he would have before my forces would arrive my luck ran out. He had three full movements with his Saxons before I was able to deploy my British.

The battlefield

The Saxon force

Impressione: Saga 'Clash of Empires'

Last week Chris (Aka Axebreaker) and me had a game of SAGA. He pitted his new Early Saxons (using the Viking Battleboard) against my Late Romans (using the Anglo-Saxon Battleboard). We played the 'Sacred Ground' scenario from the basic ruleset. In this scenario you have to accumulate as many victory points (VP) as possible. These you gain by the number of troops you have on the three terrain features and of course by killing the troops of your opponent. For the Warlord on the terrain you gain three VP's, every Hearthguard warrior gives you one point and every second normal warrior or levy generates one point.

A Wicca Priest as guardian of the holy grove  .

Impressions: A game of Bolt Action 'Watch on the Rhine'

Saturday last week saw a game of Bolt Action at Axebreakers mansion. Chris' superbly painted 101 Airborne saw action against my Luftwaffenfelddivision.
We didn't field any armour as we wanted to get into the game without too much special rules as it was only my 3rd and Chris' first game. As always my dice rolling proofed to be sub-par and I lost half my force before inflicting the first casualty on the Airborne.

The lay of the land

Impressions of 'Operation Squad': Last days of the Reich

As mentioned in an earlier post this weekend saw a game of 'Operation Squad' at Axebreakers and as an exception I managed to take some photos.

It's May the 6th in the year of the lord 1945. The Führer 'Adolf Hitler' in an act of cowardice has killed himself, Berlin lays in ruins and the Wehrmacht is in full retreat on all fronts. To save huge remnants of the german armies on the eastern front from russian captivity desperate rearguard actions are fought by brave men facing almost certain death. 

In these desperate hours a small battlegroup is caught in a small pocket near Prague. To not let the secret codebooks fall into the Bolsheviks hands the soldiers take up their arms on last time.
The russians in a rush to get their hands on some of the last secrets of the Reich unleash the brutal might of the soviet sledgehammer.

Dux Britanniarum Campaign: II & III Game

 

 For more than two weeks I didn't even see my painting table. It was simply to hot to even take up the brush and my profession as an "Airconditioning & Refrigeration" craftsman led to me running round in circles at work. But after Chris writing up a short report about our last games of 'Dux Britanniarum' over on his Blog, I had to get my arse up too. As I can't remember the details correctly I'd recommend to you to check back on his Blog for further details.

Theodosius could almost hear the chatter behind his bag. "The simple" they called him nowadays when they thought he was out of earshot. 'Was it my fault that these drunken bastards didn't get up in time to catch the saxons before they could raid the church of Sheepsend?", he mused.

It was time to knock some heads together, Theodosius decided and went of to get his soldiers back on proper duty. 

"Maybe I should start with Ellifer the old crock...", Theodosius wondered quietly "...the boys don't call him Dungbreath for nothing."

Two weeks later Eliffer stood on a hill and tried to shirm his eyes from the sun. Far in the east he believed to see the towers of his (at least for the moment) kings castle. With a awkward motion he rubbed his head and turned back to the men this son of a humiliore Theodosius has sent with him to scout the western parts of the kingdom for any signs of the saxons. "Of course we didn't see anything near to a saxon" he muttered and spat out. "This dickhead wanted to make an example of me, wanted to silence me because I told the truth about his failure at this church." Caught in his own thoughts he didn't realise the blinking of speartips and the scratching of shields against chainmail to the north. Just as it was almost to late Brutus, his second in command, let out a nervous shout...

Fabula de primo bello:

The first game was about the saxons had to catch a noble, on his way back from scouting, for ransom.

The lay of the land. Maybe you, dear rambler, now get a concept why to fight for this forgotten piece of earth.

Dux Britanniarum Campaign: First Game

Last week, ok well it's been 9 days since, I had a very enjoyable game of 'Dux Britanniarum' at Axebreakers mansion. Chris himself has written some words about the game.
As he already did the job of explaining the idea behind the game (and I go pretty much along with him) you should really head over to his blog.


Cyrric the Flatulent king of a small province in the outermost southwest of Britannia called Noviomagus Regnorum felt the cold creeping into his old bones as he was starring into the chilly spring night. He knew they were out there. Somewhere in the dark these vain saxon dogs were about to raid his kingdom.
After a rainy summer followed by poor harvest before a hard winter he knew his little realm was in no way prepared to meet the saxon threat. Just as he was about to leave the walls of his little stronghold he saw the luminous glare of burning huts in the otherwise deep black sky.

'Get ready you bunch of lazy bastards!' Theodosius Magnus bellowed at a group of drowsy figures.
This was one of these moments he asked himself why the hell he was here in this god forsaken part of the world.
Born in Rome as bastard of a high ranking officer in the field legions and a young slavegirl, he was part of the last Legions in Britannia as the Emperor decided to withdraw his troops to the continent.

Just hours before he had to embark, Cyrric this drunken piece of sheepdung, now calling himself king of Noviomagus Regnorum, asked him to stay and become leader of his despicable bodyguard. If it wasn't for this little girl having made eyes at him he would have refused the offer.

Now he was in the mud of a true british spring, his girl already in the hands of some other bugger, leading some dirty skits of soldiers to fight a band of marauding saxons. He knew he was already late as he had seen the fires of burning huts in the distance. Now it was all about swiftness to catch these saxons before they were to recover into the safety of the lost lands...

We played the first scenario 'Raiding a church' where I had to prevent Chris's Saxons from plundering the church and take the monk as hostage. The fight would be over when the troops taking the monk with them leave the table.

The real battle began after some rounds of aggressive maneuvering. As Chris's saxons had a headstart of three full movements I had to be quick to get my troops on the board and ready for action. Unfortunately most of the time my troops were standing in the way of each other due to my ignorance of the movement and formation rules.

First troops in contact with enemy warriors were a single group of levies...

Rush for Berlin 6: MG-34 & Rifleman added/ SAGA: Late Romans vs. Vikings

Finally finished the last of the ordinary footsloggers for my Luftwaffenfelddivision.
As Artizan don't do a late war guy carrying a MG-34 I did a little conversion on a former MG-42  shooter giving him the barrel of a plastics MG-34 from Warlord Games. Still need some guys with Gewehr 43...unfortunately There aren't any available from Artizan.