The Hirdmen

Rather belatedly, here's the final group (for now) of Vikings for my SAGA Warband. These represent two points worth of Hearthguard - four with the usual sword/axe and shield, and four with Dane axes. Unfortunately, the Viking faction doesn't get any special rules for Dane axes (you have to play as Anglo-Danes for that...) but the figures are too cool not to include. 

As previously stated, the intention with the Hirdmen was to distinguish them from the basic Warriors with their shield designs. These all feature rather more complex freehand designs than the Warriors, mostly utilising raven and serpent designs. I think my favourite though is the blue and white knotwork shield - it looks impressive (I think) but was actually one of the simpler shields to paint!

This fearsome fellow is deputising as my warlord until I paint a couple of proper character figures up. Given his performances in our first set of SAGA games, that will be sooner rather than later!

               

Valhalla Calling...

Here we are then, a little later than planned, the third unit of Warriors for my growing SAGA warband. The shields took a little longer with these because I started out painted some more elaborate designs, only to realise that they looked a bit too elaborate to waste on mere Warriors! Instead I've saved them for my Hirdmen, so you'll see them soon enough.

I'm also happy to announce that our first SAGA game has been arranged and a date has been set! Despite the fact that today is 1st April, this is no April Fools! Easter Sunday will see our warbands take to the field of battle for the first time, and if we're lucky (and remember the rules) we might squeeze a couple of games in...

More Vikings!

Here are the second set of SAGA Viking Warriors. These were painted at the same time as the first unit, but had to wait until last week after WMMS to receive their shields. Again, they're all freehand and so they're all very simple geometric designs. I'm saving the attempts at more sophisticated designs for the Hearthguard, which are currently sitting on the painting table...

There are a few more warriors to show, who are still waiting for their shields. Once they're done, it's the turn of the Hirdmen and Warlord. Stay tuned!

Fury of the Northmen!

Here they are then - the first of my painted Vikings! In truth, these have actually been painted for about a fortnight now, but I've only just gotten round to taking pictures of them. Still, better late than never! 

I'm pretty happy with how they've turned out, although they may be a little *too* grubby after the Agrax Earthshade wash so I may need to go back and add highlights. I've kept the shield designs pretty simple, both to reflect the fact that these are "basic" warriors and also to dumb them down to my painting level! I'm particularly proud of the guy with the raven shield though...

New Toys!

It's another slow month so far and the blogging has fallen behind a bit lately, but I am slowly making progress on a few fronts! The start of our Saga campaign is (hopefully) looming so it's all about Vikings at the moment. As mentioned in the previous post, I spent some money at the recent WMMS show. Possibly for the first time ever, I was extremely focused with my acquisitions as they were all made for a single project - Vikings!

First up, SAGA dice for my Viking warband

No Viking warband would be complete without livestock to steal!

Courtesy of Magister Militum, there are six sheep,
two goats, an ox, a mule, four ducks and four chickens! 

I also picked up a couple of Saxon Houses from Timeline Miniatures

As well as a Great Hall!

Which were all remarkably quick and easy to assemble!

All in all, these should all make some pretty good additions to the Viking games (if we ever get started!)

Malta at WMMS!

As I mentioned, Sunday was the West Midlands Military Show. We took our Malta game along to display, with the improvements we've made since Wargamer in December. The show was a good day overall, it seemed like there was a healthy turnout and there were plenty of traders and games around. To top it off, we also won the Best Terrain award for our game! 

Here's a few shots of the game in its latest guise.

The board with troops deployed

The Ottoman advance begins

The view from the other end!

The street fight begins in earnest

The Turkish galley impatiently waits outside the harbour

Another shot of the board as the Turks assault the boom towers

The North Africans take the boom tower!

Valette looks on from the battlements

A view of the hall on the way to lunch!

The galley finally enters the harbour

The siege tower at the halfway point...

The Manowar, complete with sails!

Our Best Terrain award!

I also got a few shots of the Best Demo Game, an ECW offering from Leamington using the To Defy A King rules. It was a nice looking game overall, but for me personally it was missing that special something that grabbed me.

Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of the other games on offer, but there were several others that looked very nice. Overall, a good day was had by all and much money was spent! More on that later...

WMMS 2015

Just a quick one to say that if you've in the Midlands area, pop down to the West Midlands Military Show tomorrow where we'll be demonstrating our new-and-improved "Mayhem in the Med! Malta c.1565" game all day. We've been busy tinkering since the last outing at Wargamer in December, so the game looks a little different (and hopefully better) now.

If you do manage to make the show, be sure to stop by to say 'Hi!' as we do our best to look like we know what we're doing!