HAWKs Friday NASHCON Games Report

This past weekend 6 members of the HAWKs (Harford Area Weekly Kriegspielers) made a road trip down to the NASHCON gaming convention near Nashville, TN, to host over a dozen games.  We were up early Thursday morning to load a 12-passenger van we had rented full of all our gaming equipment and suitcases, and we arrived at the convention hotel late that night after a 12 hour drive from Maryland.  We were up early again Friday to unpack our van and set up for our midday games. I was slated to run "The Battle of Five Armies" using BYV in the first game slot of the con starting Friday at 2:00. You can read a report of that here.

The Battle of Five Armies

 In the same session Duncan Adam was running his homegrown WWII fast play naval rules, combining aspects of the popular fantasy naval rules Uncharted Seas and the Axis an Allies Naval miniatures game.  He has nicely modified and combined these rules into a fun historical naval game.

Charted Seas WWII naval game

On  a nearby table Buck Surdu was running his under-development G.A.M.E.R WWII skirmish rules, in a scenario called "Commandos Strike at Dawn". It involved British commandos striking a German coastal installation to steal an encryption device.  The fast and furious rules are totally card driven and have diceless combat resolution.

G.A.M.E.R WWII skirmish game

In the Friday evening session, Greg Priebe ran a Dr Who Miniatures game which saw the Doctor and his companions landing the TARDIS in the middle of a French and Indian War battle where they sought to undo an ancient curse which lingered in the timeless forest of western PA

Dr Who, and his companions, River, Rory and Amy, make their way through a unit of Rangers unopposed, with the help of  the Doctor's psychic paper

An overview of the Dr Who table

Also in the Friday evening session, Duncan was running a War of 1812 game using Wellington Rules.  The scenario took place a few weeks before the Battle of New Orleans, as Andrew Jackson's forces attempted to repulse the British vanguard in a fierce night battle.

Duncan Adams does a rules briefing prior to the start of his War of 1812 game.

American forces move towards the British encampment in Duncan's War of 1812 game.

GASLIGHT Undersea Extravaganza Game Wins Award at NASHCON

This past weekend the HAWKs (Harford Area Weekly Kriegspielers) made a road trip down to the NASHCON gaming convention near Nashville, TN, to host over a dozen games. The big showcase game on our line-up was a 12 player GASLIGHT Undersea Extravaganza, using figures, vehicles, and beasties from both Buck Surdu's and my collections.  We arrived at the convention hotel late Thursday night after a 12 hour drive from Maryland, and were up early Friday to unpack our van and set up for our midday games.  The Extravaganza was slated to run during the Saturday night game slot.

Buck and I with our award.

   We set up the game with four factions, a human exploration party, Fishmen, Atlanteans, and a "Bad Guy" human party.  Each team had it's own list of objectives such as, Loot the Atlantean Temple, Steal secrets from the crashed submarine, destroy the exploration party's power plant, etc..
  We were pleased to get 10 folks signed up for the game, ranging from young to old.  After Buck gave a rules brief things got underway.  The action was fast and furious, and there was lots of carnage,  and cantankerous vehicles to contend with; and of course, laughter, cheers, and groans of frustration when things didn't go according to plan.   Everyone seemed to have a great time, including Buck and I, and we had many passers-by stop and comment on the uniqueness and coolness of the game.  Most of all, we were pleasantly surprised when the folks from CigarBoxBattle.com awarded us a Superior Game Presentation Award for our time slot.
 Below are some photos of the action.

Buck briefing the rules.

A view of the action early in the game.

A group of divers falls upon some Fishmen who were  in the process of looting the sunken pirate ship.

The Fishmen's Giant Octopus attacks the Atlanteans Underwater Walker.

An Atlantean Ray Lancer attempts to hit one of the Exploration Party's Attack Subs with a spar torpedo.

General chaos ensues around the wrecked submarine.  In the lower left of the photo, you can see that the Octopus has managed to topple the Walker and is now scuffling with a unit of Atlanteans.

Units from the Exploration Party carry valuable artifacts away from the Atlantean Temple.

"Bear Yourselves Valiantly" Demo Games at NASHCON

This past weekend the HAWKs (Harford Area Weekly Kriegspielers) made a road trip down to the NASHCON gaming convention near Nashville, TN, to host over a dozen games.  Featured among these games were four demo games of our upcoming rules for Fantasy, Ancients, and Medieval mass combat, "Bear Yourselves Valiantly" (BYV).
  We arrived at the convention hotel late Thursday night after a 12 hour drive from Maryland, and were up early Friday to unpack our van and set up for our midday games.  I was slated to run "The Battle of Five Armies" using BYV in the first game slot of the con starting Friday at 2:00.

A view of my Battle of Five Armies table.

  I had a nice turn out of players, and Dave Wood kindly offered to assist me in my gamemaster duties.  After a rules briefing, we got down to playing the game. We had one player commanding the Elves, another the Men and Dwarves, and two more taking charge of the Goblin and Warg forces.

Dave explains a fine point of closing into combat to one of the Goblin/Warg players  as the Elven player watches.

  The Goblins and Wargs rushed forward as the Allies formed up and moved to meet their attackers.

The other Goblin/Warg player advances a unit of Wargs towrds the Men of Laketown.

The Goblin and Warg forces pressed hard, and despite many losses were deemed to be the victors at games end, having critically damaged the Allied contingents.  Unfortunately, we had to end the game right before the arrival of the Giant Eagles due to time constraints.

Gandalf puts a spell on two of the Warg units causing them to quarrel amongst themselves and attack each other.

Saturday morning I ran the Battle of Five Armies game again for another four players, and once again Dave Wood kindly offered to assist in the gamemastering.

A view early in the game on Saturday morning.

  In this running the Allies were able to stiffen their defenses and the Goblins and Wargs on the right had trouble coordinating their attacks. So in the end, with the Goblins and Warg armies badly damaged, the Allies were determined to be the winners.

The Elves defend at the base of one of the mountain's arms as the Goblins and Wargs move to find a weak spot

Saturday afternoon Dave Wood ran a game of BYV using his collection of 25mm fantasy troops.  The scenario, called "Rescue the Prince", involved an Elvish force tasked with rescuing a Elf Prince and his retinue who have gotten themselves trapped behind enemy lines.  Their way is barred by a forces of Ratlings, Goblins, Bugbears and Skeletons.

Dave's 25mm fantasy troops based on magnetic stands for BYV.  Goblins and Elves battle at the rivers edge.

  At games end the "bad guy" side was determined to be the victor, as the Elves' forces were not able to break through to the prince.

Dave watches as a player rolls his dice to determine if his unit stands to receive a charge

Saturday evening Dave ran a similar scenario, called "Rescue the Legate", this time featuring Romans and Germanic Barbarians.

25mm Germanic Barbarians defend the river line.

     Unfortunately, I was running a GASLIGHT game at the same time, so don't know the details of the battle, but was able to hop over to Dave's table and snap some pictures of what looked like a hard fought battle.

Dave explaining the rules at the beginning of the game.

Romans and Barbarians clash along the river line.

We were very pleased with the way our BYV games went, and had a great time at the convention in general.  The players seemed to really enjoy the rules, some coming back to play in more than one of our games.  Many of the participants were eager to know when the rules would be available, and we were happy to tell them it wouldn't be long now as we plan to have them released for Historicon in July.

"Bear Yourselves Valiantly" Rules Update

I just wanted give everyone an update on our progress with our mass combat fantasy, medievals and ancients rules, "Bear Yourselves Valiantly".    We are very pleased to reveal the final cover for the rules:

Also, we spent last weekend doing a lot of the photography for the many examples of play throughout the book.

James "Tank" Nickle, Dave Wood, and Buck Surdu working on photos for the rules.

We were pleased to arrange with Magister Militum to have many of their upcoming new range of Fantasy figures featured in the photos in our rules.

  

Magister Militum American Indians riding Giant Eagles

Magister Militum Ents

Magister Militum High Elf Cavalry

Magister Militum High Elf Mounted Archers

Magister Militum High Elves with Swords

Magister Militum Wood Elves wit Swords

Magister Militum Large Water Elemental

 It looks like we are on track for a publication date to coincide with Historicon this July.   We are making final edits, adding photos, and compiling example army lists as we head towards our final deadline before sending the book off to our publisher, On Military Matters.

BYV Game at Last Year's Historicon

Be sure to check the BYV website for updates and more information:
http://www.bucksurdu.com/Buck_Surdu/LSNC__FAM.html

10mm War of the Roses Project

At the end of last year I started a 10mm War of the Roses project so I would have a historical set of armies to run games with our soon-to-be-released rules for mass fantasy, medieval and ancient combat, entitled; "Bear Yourselves Valiantly".  I thought I would take this opportunity to post some example pictures of a few of the units I've completed so far.

Halbardiers

Dismounted knights

Longbowman

Command stand

"Look, Sarge, No Charts" Rules Author Team Hosts Army SLDP

Last Thursday the author team of the "Look, Sarge, No Charts" series of miniatures wargaming rulebooks, Buck Surdu, Dave Wood, and myself,  helped lead a Senior Leader Development Program (SLDP) for a US Army unit, using three of the LSNC series of rulebooks: "Fate of Battle" (Napoleonic), "A Union So Tested" (Civil War) and the original "Look, Sarge, No Charts: WWII" rules.   Joining us in game-mastering the event were members of the HAWKs wargaming club,  Ed Duffy, Sam Fusion, and Eric Schlegel.  Sam was also the mastermind behind the event, and can be credited with putting the whole thing together. 

A look at the map, and a part of the Order of Battle for the Civil War version of the game.

   The idea behind this year's event was to fight a battle from three different eras, Napoleonic, American Civil War, and WWII, on the same same battlefield using the same order of battle and initial deployment.  The battle we chose was the Battle of Laon, a Napoleonic engagement from the 1814 campaign.  For the WWII version, cavalry units were replaced with armor units.

Dave Wood (in blue shirt leaning over table), who co-gamemastered the Napoleonic game with Buck Surdu, discusses an aspect of the rules with one of the players, while Buck (in blue shirt on left) looks on.

 This is the sixth time we have run a wargaming event for this unit, and it has become very popular.  In fact there was such an overflow of folks who wanted to take part, that Ed, was called upon to run a fourth game using his home-brew modern skirmish rules. 

Same Fuson (in cap), who was the gamemaster on the WWII table, helps a player with moving his units

Approximately 12 Officers, NCOs, and Senior Civilian Staff took part in each game; with the goals of team building, problem solving, and learning a bit about the nature of warfare in the  historic period in which their game was set.

Eric Schlegel (in cap), who was the gamemaster on the Civil War table along with me, listens as a player asks a question.

While many of the participants had never played a miniature wargame before, the players were quick to pick up the rules, and really got into the games. There was frequent cheering, or groaning, as player's fortunes rose and fell.  And, of course, plenty of friendly trash-talking among opponents. Everyone involved seemed to have a great time. And we, the authors, had a blast running the games. 

Ed Duffy (in green sweater), gamemastering his modern skirmish game set in Afghanistan.

After the games concluded, Buck Surdu conducted a debriefing session where those playing the roles of the senior commanders on each table got a chance to explain the goals they had hoped to achieve and how they had hoped to achieve them, as well as discuss some of the realizations they had had about the nature of warfare in the period in which their battle had been set.   Also discussed was how each of the battles were different or were the same given the different natures of the armies that fought on the terrain in each historic period. 

Buck (in blue shirt), leading the after-action report on the WWII table.

As usual, we had a great time and look forward to coming back and doing this again.

War Horse IV Con Gaming Day

Two Saturdays ago, a bunch of the HAWKs went up to War Horse Con, a gaming day hosted by Sam and Kathy Fuson at their place near Gettyburg, PA.  Sam invited a bunch of his friends over, and along with a crew from the HAWKs, we had a fun day of gaming.  This time we had four games in Sam's spacious basement; in the morning Sam's friend Ed Duffy ran a modern skirmish featuring US forces vs Terrorists using his own homegrown rules (unfortunately I didn't get any photos of it), while in the next room, Dave Wood and Buck Surdu ran a Napoleonic game using "Fate of Battle" rules on a large "L" shaped table. This game was a scenario of the Battle of La Rotheire in February of 1814, and was a playtest of a game they were going to do at Cold Wars.

Buck and Dave setting up their Napoleonic game.

A shot of the French defenders on the right end of the line.

A look at the left wing of the battle

After a quick lunch break, we reconvened for the afternoon session.  Sam ran a fun Sherlock Holmes inspired GASLIGHT game that had some cool innovations in it; such as searching for, and finding "clues" that were either Scrabble tiles or puzzle pieces. The players then had to assemble the tiles into correct words or assemble the puzzle pieces to reveal messages written on the back.  This was his first time GM-ing a GASLIGHT game, and he did great.
    In the other room, Duncan Adams ran a WWI Look, Sarge, No Charts game.

Sherlock Holmes investigates the Castle door, while his associates wait nearby.  Meanwhile the gangsters in castle open fire.

An overview of the table.

The Baker Street Gang interrogates some of the locals.

The Villain makes his escape.

Here's some shots of the WWI game.

Duncan's WWI game.  German defenders dug in on the outskirts of a town.

An overview of the WWI battle

French forces advance towards the town at the top of the picture.

All in all it was a fun day of gaming, and I look forward to the next one!