Back in the Saddle with Song of Blades & Heroes

A few guys from the club got together in my basement recently for an off-week game night. Our goal was to showcase some newly painted fantasy figures and terrain that we've been slowly accumulating ahead of the summer fantasy campaign. We were all collectively itching to play some more Song of Blades & Heroes, a fantastic ruleset that has served us well since the club's inception in 2010. (Spoiler: for readers who enjoyed last summer's Iron Isle campaign, get ready for a treat. We're going back to that wondrous world with this new campaign! More details to come...)

For this game night, we tried a slightly different table configuration for my small basement game area. It turned out really well -- everyone was basically sitting by everyone else, so we could chat and talk trash and sort of watch all the other games unfold. We played 6 separate 1-on-1 games of Song of Blades & Heroes, switching seats between each game so people could play against different opponents on different boards.

As you can see from the photos, we set up three distinct 3x3-foot skirmish boards: a medieval village, a wooded glade and a grim canyon dominated by a fortified watchtower.

Rather than attempt to reconstruct the chaos and fury of last night's games, I'll just present the photos and try to examine the little vignettes that played out on the tabletop.

In the first game, Karl's chaos knights (the Night Herons of the Black Crown) faced off against Jon's orc raiders. The two sides came to blows quickly, and both factions were kitted out for close combat. Karl's knights started the game by lurking near the crumbling walls of the fortified watchtower.

Here are a couple typical brawls from that game.

And here is Jon's orc warchief, mere moments before he was slain in a cascade of bad rolls that ultimately spelled defeat for Jon and victory for Karl.

Across the way, I sent my undead skeletons creeping into a sparse forest in search of Tyler's dwarven adventurers. The dwarves, for their part, advanced in a stout, bearded line of armor and axes, backed up by the considerable threat provided by a large bear named Rolf (pictured below).

Alas, I overextended with my cool, newly painted skeletal dragon and was punished for it. The dragon was cut down by the stunty dwarves as he smashed into their armored line. In game terms, I forgot that the dwarves had the fearless special ability, which rendered my dragon's terror ability irrelevant!

This would prove to be a theme for the night: send my dragon in to attack, and watch it die horribly. Oh well.

Across the table on the village board, Tim's monster-demon-dudes squared off against Josh's newly painted warband of adventurers. Here's Josh's team -- in true old-school fashion, he has a little bit of everything in here: dog, mouse warrior, elf archer, etc.

Here are Tim's guys in action. The scenario (Tim was defending a pumping station and Josh's guys were crippled by thirst) meant that Josh was on his back almost from the start. Their game was definitely among the first to end.

It didn't help that Josh's adventurers had to face off against THIS THING while scurrying through the streets of the village. (Tim often brings cthuloid monstrosities to the table as part of his SBH warbands, and this evening was no exception.)

After those games concluded, we chatted a bit and swapped seats for a new set of games. Of course, my notes got even sketchier at this point in the evening, so bear with me (Rolf pun).

In the medieval village, Tyler mustered his dwarves to assault Karl's chaos knights. That game ended up lasting for the rest of the evening, and they were still playing it out as we were packing up our models at the end of the night.

Here's a closeup of the fight that was developing in the center of town. It took the dwarves a while to get their (because they move a little slower than their human counterparts) but they arrived in force, and only bear-ly won (another Rolf pun)!

(I didn't get a single photo of Jon and Tim's game in the wooded glade. I think it was over rather soon.)

On the fortress table, Josh and I set up a scenario whereby my undead had captured a border outpost owned by his adventurers, so he was tasked with taking it back by force. I began the game by assembling my skeletons in a shieldwall near the gates of the fort's main yard.

Another team of skeletons ventured out into the burnt-out ruins to try and flank Josh's team. His archers did a good job of keeping them at bay, though, and that darn dog proved to be a capable combatant.

Here's the scene as some more skeletons hasten to join the battle that has been joined just outside the supply depot. Despite my overwhelming numbers (skeletons are cheap, but ineffective in combat) Josh managed to get Roland, his mouse warrior, into contact with one of the creates.

I was ready for this move, though, and my wraith swooped in with his gigantic sickle and lopped off poor Roland's head, thus snatching victory from the jaws of defeat.

We were all very pleased to get back to our roots with some Song of Blades & Heroes. This was also a great chance to take stock of our fantasty terrain and tabletop accessories and see if we need to fill any holes before the campaign starts. I think we discussed making some Mordheim-esque ladders and walkways for our village table so we can add some more tactical options to our games. I've also got some Lemax Christmas Village accessories (walls, fences, etc.) that need to be repainted.

-- Patrick, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Painting up an old-school Chaos fantasy warband

Sometimes a batch of miniatures falls into your lap that really captures your imagination. This occurred at Little Wars, when Patrick and I bought a huge bin of assorted fantasy and historical figures from a vendor. Inside we discovered quite a lot of Grenadier Fantasy Warriors figures, including seven Chaos Knights.

I was immediately taken with these early-90s figures, which portray quite a bit of menace and ill intent without relying on mounds of skulls or obvious evil ornamentation. They arrived at the perfect time. I had been planning a "bad guy" warband for our upcoming Song of Blades and Heroes summer fantasy campaign, but the Reaper Bones Kickstarter containing the figures still hasn't arrived. So for now at least, I've built the warband almost completely using figures taken from the aforementioned bin of lead. Look for more posts as this force comes together.

I've dubbed them the Night Herons of The Black Crown. They hail from the far north, where they live well, raise families, fight for their leige lords and lead apparently honorable -- perhaps somewhat indulgent -- lives as knights. However, from time to time they are called away to don the red armor and fight for the Dark Gods to whom they owe their worldly success and standing.

As I mentioned above, these knights are clearly not "good guys," but I appreciate that it's achieved without covering them in skulls and iconography (though a few do have a small human or bird skull pendant). In fact, with a different paint scheme, they might even blend in as regular old armored knights. Though I was able to find seven of these figures in the bin of lead, Grenadier only produced five different sculpts, which is a real shame as I'd love to have more.

This first knight is my favorite of the batch. Maybe it's my affection for vintage "beaky" Space Marines.

The halberdier is nice also. A whole rank of these would look quite imposing.

The morningstar-wielder proved a bit more difficult to photograph.

Here are the Swordsmen. If not for the Games Workshop figure pictured further down, the fellow with the chain around his arm would probably be the leader.

In the depths of my own collection I found a 1989 Games Workshop Chaos Champion to lead them. He has a new plastic shield from my bits box on his left arm, where his earlier weapon was cut away long before I received him. I imagine this fellow is much older than the other knights, and his age and condition is the result of being particularly depraved and dedicated to the Dark Gods. Though not as filigreed as current GW sculpts, it definitely has that Games Workshop feel, with more exaggerated dimensions, some ornamentation on the armor, a massively mutated arm...

...and a nice cancerous tumor on the back.

The painting process was my usual fast tabletop method.

• Black gesso 
• Base colors 
• Drybrush the wolf pelt sections and base 
• Brush-dip with Minwax Polyshades Tudor dip
• Drybrush base again 
• Brush on Golden matte varnish to take away the shine 

For the bases, I tried something new. The integral bases were blended into the plastic bases with premixed fireplace mortar and cement, and then small pieces of pine bark were pressed into the mixture before it dried. (Thanks to "Frankthedm" over at the Reaper forum for the gift of the bark.) I'll be using this setup for all the figures in this faction. I'm pleased with the cement, as it has a nice rough texture to it. I think it will see alot of use in basing and terrain in the future. It's also cheap, and available in small quantities at most home improvement stores. This is a relief, since the premixed concrete patch product I used for a lot of terrain projects seems to have disappeared from stores.

As you can tell, I'm very happy with these miniatures. I've got enough fantasy figures to keep me busy for a while, but it's very likely that I'll acquire some more Grenadier Fantasy Warriors miniatures in the near future. My only regret is that this is the extent of the Chaos Knights line and there are no equivalent sculpts on horseback.

Appendix - Sourcing Grenadier Fantasy Warriors Miniatures
Though the Games Workshop Champion is long out of print, the Grenadier figures are still available from several sources. By far the cheapest is Forlorn Hope Games. They have them grouped in with the "Men" section.

The current state of the entire Grenadier Fantasy Warriors line is a bit more complicated. The rights are currently held by EM-4 Miniatures in England and Mirliton Miniatures in Italy. Though the price and shipping are considerably higher, Mirliton has released the entire line of miniatures, including classic Grenadier Historical lines, which are also compatible.

K-Studio in the USA does quarterly orders from Mirliton to save on shipping, and offers a 10% discount. EM-4, on the other hand, has much lower prices, but a more reduced selection. Forlorn Hope offers the miniatures at a very reasonable price that includes shipping, and if you're buying a fair number of figures, it's probably roughly equivalent to EM-4 prices. According to EM-4 owner Doug, Forlorn Hope Games is able to maintain lower levels of stock and stock a wider variety of Fantasy Warriors miniatures (though not the entire line) than EM-4 itself, which requires a greater stock on hand to meet demand. EM-4 does eventually intend to get the entire line back into production.

-- Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

A Visit to the Gaming Goat in Oak Park

Rejoice, gamers! A new shop has opened up in Oak Park, a suburb just west of Chicago. It is The Gaming Goat, part of a group of game stores that already operate in a few other Chicago suburbs.

I went out to their grand opening yesterday to scope out the scene. I'm particularly excited for the Goat because I work a mere four (4!!) blocks away from the shop in Oak Park. For the last year I've been making a pretty epic trek to the Dice Dojo to play Magic, so it would be just fantastic to have a shop that supports Magic located nearby. I live just a short 15-minute drive from this Goat location, so it's a win-win all around for me.

I can report that the Goat is deeeeep into Magic, both selling and buying. They've got plans to support draft, Standard and EDH/Commander (my format of choice).

But you didn't come here to read about Magic! Let's get to the action! The other reason for my visit was to scope out the minis gaming potential at the Goat. As you can see in the background of these photos, the store is planning to support Warmachine in a big way. Staff mentioned that they were stocking the entire line of both Warmachine and Hordes. That's a big investment, so it makes sense that they'll be looking to attract a regular group of players for these games each week.

They had a Privateer Press Ganger running Warmachine demos at their grand opening event.

The Goat also seems keen on Heroclix, a game I played many years ago but don't currently play (except for once or twice a year, as a beer-and-pretzels game, with my high school buddies).

And there's a decent stock of popular board games on their shelves, as well as a small area with opened games that you can pull off the shelf and play. Game space is divided among three distinct areas. The first, located near the big windows overlooking Ridgeland Avenue in Oak Park, has one table and seems ideal for "premier" games that might attract passers-by. Another area is just past the main retail room and has room for 4-6 tables.

Quick sidenote: One of the highlights of the day for me was a visit by Jim Pavelec, a fantasy illustrator who has done work for a bunch of Magic cards! I picked up a few artist proofs (preview cards provided to Jim before a Magic card is sent to the printer) which are super cool and very collectible. Here he is working on a sketch.

The third and perhaps most exciting gaming area is located in the basement. Yes, I said basement! Every gamer probably has memories of gaming in someone's basement. Now you can recreate those memories at the Goat! First, light a torch and venture down these steps....

Then you'll find yourself in the Temple of Elemental Evil -- er, I mean, the basement. When I visited the basement was clean, but fairly spartan...just a bunch of tables, chairs and some overhead lighting. Get some posters on those walls, gents! Here's a peek at the main room -- BEFORE it filled up with gamers.

I didn't see a whole lot of available terrain for wargaming, so I'm betting game groups will need to bring their own terrain and table coverings, at least initially. And while the Privateer Press games don't hold a ton of appeal for CSW members (except Josh, the newest Cygnar recruit), I got the distinct feeling that we'd have a warm welcome if we wanted to play some of our non-commercial, PDF-rules-only games.

When I left Saturday afternoon, after hanging out, gaming and shopping for a couple hours, the basement had filled up with gamers of all varieties. One group had a game of EDH going...another group was puzzling through a board game...and another group of younger kids were having a fun-filled game of multiplayer Magic. Overall it seems like the Goat seemed poised to attract a diverse group of clientele: younger kids from Oak Park's neighborhoods (did I mention there is a middle school located one block away?), casual gamers who might dabble in board games like Settlers of Catan, and adult gamers (like me) who appreciate a clean, friendly game store setting to shop and play.

It was great to meet co-franchisers Ross and Charlie. They have a nice location and seem very dedicated to gaming in general. By the time I left, they knew me by name -- that's the sign of a superb game shop! And Jeff, the company owner, also plans to play an active role in developing the gaming community in Oak Park. Jeff's done great things out in Elgin and Schaumburg, so I'm looking forward to watching the Oak Park Goat grow and prosper.

-- Patrick, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Post-apocalyptic campaign finale

Last week we played through the finale of our post-apocalyptic campaign. As you might recall, we were using the still-under-development "This is Not a Test" ruleset from World's End Publishing. I wanted to make it a special event, so I organized a four-player scenario.

In the center of the table, the brave defenders gather in an abandoned factory to make their last stand against the marauding hordes. Pat's tribe of technology-worshipping primitives had come to an alliance of sorts with Josh's Preservationists.

Advancing from either side of the battlefield came Jon's raiders and Tim's mutants, bent on ruling the ruins of the old world and acquiring the artifacts that the defenders have accumulated. The objectives for each side were fairly straightforward.

• The defenders needed to keep the attackers out of the warehouse and away from the two relics, each represented by a crate on a cart.
• The attackers needed to gain access to the factory and steal the relics, killing as many defenders as possible. 

Those inside the factory were given improved defenses, and there were only two official points of entry into the factory -- no climbing up wall or through windows. Defenders were also allowed to secretly booby-trap two pieces of terrain each. The attackers were each given another 100 or so points to their force. To keep things interesting, I gave each player a secret objective. Completing their secret objective would boost their chances of winning. Here are the secret objectives for each faction.

• Thieving buggers that they are, the raiders wanted to acquire both relics for themselves. 
• The mutants have reached grown tired of enduring constant discrimination and scorn. They have decided to wipe the earth clean of their oppressors and are trying to have the highest kill count even if that means turning on the raiders once the building is breached. 
• The Preservationists are normally helpful, but can't allow the tribals to share the knowledge contained in the artifacts with Raiders or Mutants. They aim have the highest kill count even if that means turning on the tribals if the building is breached. 
• The tribals are a bit skittish of everyone. Their secondary objective is to save their own skins by getting at least half their number off the board edge if the factory is breached. To aid in this, they were allowed to enter the sewers underneath the factory and reappear across the board near a decrepit power station. 

Here's the initial setup. The Mutants are on the left and a couple of raiders are visible in the lower right.

It very quickly became apparent that this game would be focused on shooting...

The Raiders began taking casualties fast and were slow to activate, perhaps not expecting such a barrage of fire from the old factory.

The Preservationists also took hits, but their brain-in-a-jar medic quickly began returning the wounded to action.

The Mutants advanced toward the factory under a hail of mostly ineffective fire.

A few of the raiders neared the factory, while some took up firing positions in a derelict mining structure.

As the forces drew nearer, the Tribals got concerned and began taking to the sewers.

The first of the raiders breached the factory but were incinerated by a Preservationist flamethrower. A tribal was "accidentally" caught in the crossfire, and the defenders' fragile alliance began to deteriorate.

At the other side of the factory, the mutants also breached the defenses and entered the factory.

Surprisingly, the Preservationists' treachery did not cause the tribals to flee. Those who had just exited the sewers at the power station turned back to help their fellows, attempting to blast their way through the mutants at the building's entrance. One mutant chupacabra went down, but the sudden flurry of action attracted the attention of a grazing Brahmin-deux.

Brahmin-deux tolerate gunfire and other loud animals, but not the invading their sacred personal space. The two-headed cow monster promptly attacked, but was driven back by the furious tribal firepower. The assault on the factory proved too much for the raiders. Having taken serious losses, they broke off their attack. Even the corrupted minds of the mutants realized that the Preservationists' positions were too entrenched to defeat. The tribals returned to their retreat, and the battle was over.

The clear winner was Josh the Preservationist player, who ended the game with the factory secure, the artifacts still inside and the highest kill count. The raiders were too battered to contest, and the tribals hadn't yet managed their retreat. We wrapped up the game at 5 turns. Had we continued, the tribals may have been able to get half their warband off the table, and maybe the mutants (whose strongest units were still outside the factory) would have been able to tear into the Preservationists, but we'll never know....

Final Thoughts & Observations
All in all it seemed to be a good game. I do wish I'd put just a bit more terrain out, started the attackers a bit closer to the factory and not increased the defense bonus that the factory gave the attackers. Firepower really seemed to rule the day in this game -- melee combat was entirely nonexistent. And the increased numbers of the attackers didn't quite give them the edge I thought it would. On the other hand, I was really pleased with the way the secret objectives functioned. Secret objectives will definitely feature in future games of all types.

"This is Not a Test" has served us well as a post-apocalyptic gaming system, and the campaign mechanics made it possible for our warbands to advance, sometimes in surprising ways. Many thanks to author Joey McGuire of World's End Publishing who allowed us to play game even though it was still under development. At last report, the final version (edited by CSW's own Patrick) is nearing layout and completion.

Hope you all enjoyed our campaign. We're going to take a few weeks to play some other games before launching into our summer fantasy campaign, which is going to have more than a few surprises of it's own. Stay tuned!

-- Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member