TTS AAR: Fanatic Berber versus Timurid

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Time for another session of To The Strongest against friend Rob. He wanted to use the Timurids, and I chose to get some of my new Arab figures onto the table with a Fanatic Berber army.

I lost the deployment and, as you’ll see in the left-hand picture below, set up with my Arab cavalry (supported by some mercenary Christian knights) on the right, my infantry in the centre, and a weak left flank comprising only of a horde of Berber light horse.

The Timurids deployed weak on their right (which suited me just fine), their infantry to the right of centre, and their main striking force on the left.

First off, I used the This Way Effendi strategem to push Rob’s left back a square, meaning that the heavy cavalry you can see on the right of the right-hand picture below started the game off-table, and Rob was very lucky not to lose them altogether as the first card he drew to activate the lights in that same command was an Ace: had he chosen to try and get his heavies on table before activating the lights, the Ace would have been theirs and they would never have returned!

The refusal of his left hand command to advance meant that Rob couldn’t really take advantage of the initiative winning the scouting had given him, meaning that my Arabs could advance off their start positions before the Timurids could dominate the centre of the table, meaning that I could dictate a strong advance with my right whilst refusing my weak left.

The Timurids, however, quickly got their act together, and soon the right hand axis of the battlefield was crowded with units all desperately trying to break through the enemy line and outflank.

I felt this initial clash went quite well for the Berbers, as I managed to clear away some of the Timurid horse-archers, and although one unit of Arab cavalry was pushed back, disordered, the Black Guard managed to move across to protect them whilst the mercenary Christian Knights broke through and thundered down the right hand side of the table.

Meanwhile, on the left, a combination of infantry bowfire and the javelins of the Berber light horse had driven off more Timurid horse-archers and, as the Timurid heavies hadn’t really moved forward at all, meant that that flank was still nicely secure.

Things seemed to be going rather well for the Berbers. I was something like five coins ahead from killing horse-archers, the left was safe, I was very strong in the centre as the Timurids hadn’t attacked there yet, and the right looked good too.

All this was, however, an illusion.

Yes, I had killed some horse-archers, but the Timurids had lots of them so losing a few wasn’t really a concern, especially as their fresh, veteran heavy cavalry armed with lance, bow, kitchen sink etc now moved forward and attacked my right with a vengeance…even having enough troops to send some back to deal with the now-isolated mercenary Christian knights.

The fighting was fierce, and soon I found myself pushed back into a defensive formation as the Timurid horse (both heavy and more lights…where on earth do they get them from!) started to stream around my flank.

I obviously needed to do something fast, so threw caution to the wind and sent the Berber light horse forward on the left (if they could get past the Timurid heavies there then they could wreak havoc from behind the enemy battle line) and the infantry forward in the centre.

Interestingly, the Timurid centre was held by a couple of units of Kharash slave-driven infantry: raw mobs with three hits each. Killing them wouldn’t give me any victory medals, but I couldn’t apply my superior strength in infantry to kill units that would give me victory medals until I’d dealt with the Kharash: a pain as I now needed to win the game (by taking victory medals) before my right collapsed.

The Berber light horse did a superb job: sneaking past the Timurid heavies on the left and doing what they do best and assault enemy units from the flanks and rear. The Berber infantry did well as well: the combination of the two driving Timurid units from the field.

And not before time, as the Timurids had now managed to get around my right flank, and managed to get some horse-archers (yes, more of them) through to attack my camps. Fortunately Lady Luck chose that moment to intervene on the side of the Arabs, but I really needed to win the game quickly now or I would risk snatching defeat from the jaws of victory!

I’d battered the Timurids down to their last victory medal. One more push and they were done. Luckily, a unit of Black Guard was in just the right spot to charge a bunch of Timurid horse-archers (God knows where they came from: I thought I’d killed them all by now). The charge sent them sprinting off the table, netting me the final medal and the win.

That had been a very close run thing.

It had been a real surprise when, in the middle of the game, I suddenly realised that my apparently superior position was an illusion as I’d been spending a lot of time and effort doing not much at all and suddenly had four units of veteran heavy lancers backed up by horse-archers hitting my now-weakened right. If my Berber light cavalry on the left hadn’t managed to sneak past the Timurids guarding the other flank, and my infantry hadn’t proved so steady, and my camp had fallen…well, it wouldn’t have been the Berbers celebrating the win!

A great game really showcasing why I love To The Strongest so much.

TFL Painting Challenge: Early October Update

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Three weeks since the last Painting Challenge update, and plenty enough entries to justify another.

First up we have Dex, who adds to his collection of 15mm WW2 Japanese troops. I’m loving the coastal defence gun, might have to invest in some of them myself!

Next up we have Carole, with three technically 28mm figures. I say ‘technically’ as they are all of the giant/ogre types so well over 28mm tall. Mind you, with scale creep being what it is, in a few years time, these will probably be seen as “small 28’s”!

Time for Mr Helliwell’s regular monthly entry. Andrew has been chipping away at the base lof his lead mountain, so an eclectic mix of odds and ends plus a unit of 1/72 figures: you don’t see many of them these days.

Mervyn is back to the Napoleonics: more 15mm figures, this time British and Dutch.

And finally we’ll finish on an unlikely pairing: Greek slingers from Stumpy and Agincourt French spearmen from Mr Burt.

A very varied mix of figures taken from all parts of the broad church that we call wargaming!

Keep them coming!

IABSM AAR: Sealion at Bridlington

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Another spectacular I Ain’t Been Shot Mum after action report from Mercian Miniatures taken from the IABSM Facebook Group and featuring miniatures from 1st Corps.

This game in an Operation Sealion encounter at what started off as Bridlington but then became a generic British seasside town. The set up is truly inspirational and well worth a look.

Click on the picture below to see all:

TTS AAR: Colours Game Three: Early Imperial Romans versus Scots/Irish

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My third and final game at the Colours tournament this year was against Rob’s Scots/Irish: a huge army of barbarian infantry that just about stretched in one unbroken line from one end of the table to the other!

I lost the scouting, but still entertained a small of hope of being able to use my superior cavalry to get around an enemy flank, but that hope died a death once the Scots/Irish had made their first move: charging forward determined to overwhelm the Romans through sheer weight of numbers.

Although they don’t necessarily look it, all the scots/irish units were deep

At this point in the day, neither Rob nor I were much interested in tactics: and it wasn’t long before the two battle lines came together with a mighty crash, literally lining up unit-on-unit from one side of the table to the other.

It soon became obvious that the Romans were in the fight of their lives: the Scots/Irish were taking hit after hit but, having three lives each, just staying on the table to inflict damage of their own, especially as some of them were fanatics so ignored any penalties from disorder.

That unbroken line of melee rapidly fragmented as successful units on either side pushed forward against retreating opposition, and soon the game consisted of a series of vicious little fights that neither side could afford to lose: getting a unit free to start hitting the flanks of the enemy line would be a game winner for either side.

On the left, although one unit of Roman cavalry broke through the Scots/Irish line, their colleagues were forced to retreat in order to rally, and the situation became very dicey indeed!

Meanwhile, in the centre and centre/right, the Romans, although inflicting terrible casualties on the Scots/Irish, were pushed right back until they were literally fighting from inside the wall of their castrum (or rather castra as I had three camps - thank you, Mr Mackenzie, for making sure I never forgot how to decline bellum!).

It was now a matter of whether the Romans could take the last few Scots/Irish coins before collapsing themselves.

Fortunately, a unit of veteran Legionaries knew their duty, and cut down a final unit of Scots/Irish fanatics, giving me Rob’s last three coins and victory.

It had been a short, sharp and brutal clash that the Romans only managed to win because of the quality of their troops. For once I managed to rally the units I needed to rally without losing too many coins to the rally-on-evens rule…but even with that, if I hadn’t had a fortified camp to fall back on, it could easily have been a very different story indeed.

A great game, though: very exciting and with Rob and I enjoying every moment!

So that had been the inaugral To The Strongest tournament at Colours. With two losses and one win under my belt I think I came 5th or 6th, so better than expected but still pretty unfortunate coming off the back of my win at Britcon.

The Romans will now slip back into their retirement as I continue my quest for a new 28mm tournament army - in between, of course, adding to my main 15mm collection!

TTS AAR: Colours Game Two: Early Imperial Romans versus Samnites

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My second game at this year’s inaugral To The Strongest tournament at the Colours wargaming show was against Sid’s beautifully presented Samnite army.

This would be an interesting encounter: my men were generally better than Sid’s, man for man, but there were more of the Samnites. All I needed to do was to watch my flanks and get all my troops into the battle in one go, and then hopefully watch the Roman mincing machine go to work.

The game began with the Roman cavalry advancing forwards strongly on the left. In retrospect I can see that Sid played this brilliantly: luring my horsemen forwards into the narrow pass between two steep hills and then hitting them with a unit of Lights played from the Ambush strategem card.

I fell right into this trap, with the result that I never really managed to take advantage of the mobility of the veteran Roman cavalry, and ended up tied up in a stalemate that favoured the Samnites for the rest of the game.

On the right flank, a command of Legionaries advanced confidently towards the Samnites, sureof both their superiority and that they had another command of Legionaries to back them up.

Unfortunately, both these confidences were misplaced. These were veteran Samnite troops they were facing and, due to pulling an Ace for a group move three times in succession, the Legionaries that were supposed to be supporting them stayed languishing at the rear of the field, presumably polishing their armour or suchlike.

The advancing legionaries got themselves into a bit of trouble, hit from front and flanks, and it was only with some difficulty that the situation was at least partly rescued.

I was now in a bit of trouble. My cavalry were tied up on the left, my infantry on the right were under some pressure and needed reinforcing…which meant that a large hole was rapidly developing in the centre of my position i.e. right in front of my camps.

Now Sid is a man who is never one to let a large hole remain unfilled, and the Samnites poured into the gap. I had the Praetorian veteran legionaries positioned there to stop the tide, but they were obviously outnumbered and were hit from all sides. This might not have been too much of a problem, as the Praetorians are saving on a very decent 5+, but the cards decided they’d had enough of this game and I was hit twice and failed the save twice…losing the Praetorians (2 coins), their General (2 coins) and the army standard (1 coin) for a total of five very painful coins!

My Lanciarii moved across to intervene, but Horatius was unfortunately not present that day, and before long Sid had taken my camp and the game: a classic “draw the enemy troops off to the flanks then punch straight through the middle” ploy that had worked immaculately.

A beautifully engineered victory for Sid, admittedly helped by some poor activation cards on my part early in the game, but the cards weren’t responsible for me tying up my cavalry on the left! Yes, the Praetorians were unlucky to go down so soon, but the writing was very firmly on the wall by then.

Two games in and two defeats: things were not looking good for the Romans so far!

Back to this game and here’s Sid’s version of events: fortunately close enough to mine to avoid accusations of propaganda rather than reportage!

After the narrow escape of the first game against my nemesis, quality cavalry with lance, the next game was going to be less stressful. I would be facing a familiar opponent in both ways. The Samnites against the old enemy Rome and me against Robert Avery.

It seems that in most tournaments we are inevitably drawn to each other, almost like a gaming version of Tinder. Until BRITCON, I was Rob’s kryptonite and no matter what he did, it always went wrong for him. At BRITCON he managed to break that streak. That time I unfairly blamed my defeat on the fact I forgot to use my stratagem, but to be fair to Rob he played a blinder.

Spookily enough, the stratagems played a massive part in this game.

Being an Ancients only tournament, Rob was reduced to dragging out his Principate Romans, the figures were from his school days, so from the silver age of the hobby and contemporaneous with Donald Featherstone. Most of Rob’s gaming has recently been with his Venetians so we were both using armies we hadn’t fielded in years.

The terrain fell not as I wanted, but the massive hills on my flanks disappeared, leaving only a few steep hills scattered about; not a great start. Rob had some quality cavalry and certainly more than me, even a lance armed unit. However, there was a single hill on my far right and just inside my half of the table. I drew the AMBUSH strategy so thought I could hide a LI unit from my cavalry command there. The plan was to put my cavalry on that right flank but hold back to draw him into the ambush. My elite Linen legion troops would be on my left and my camp and raw command also on my left. I had one of my two strong commands in the centre looking to go where any gaps appeared.

Rob had a quality but expensive command, so I hoped to hold his cavalry with the ambush. On my left push hard to draw his troops that way, then hopefully gaps would appear in the centre to enable me to slip units into his large triple camp. The Romans, unlike the Venetians Rob usually used had no crossbows or any other long ranged troops to make a killing zone near the camp and limit my movements. If he held his camp in strength, then I might overwhelm the troops outside his camp. I’m not saying it was a good plan, but it was an actual plan.

Rob deployed more or less as expected with his cavalry on his left and a lot of legions stretched across the table, although there was a gap to his right. His veteran legions were in his centre, with that horrible 5+ save. His camp had a single LI unit, so it looks like he was coming for me.

The game started well with my left advancing and my right holding back. Rob pushed his left forward but his centre command of elite legions did the double ace and stalled. In fact that command stalled for the first three turns much to Robs chagrin and my uncharitable amusement. This gave my left the chance to push forward and I managed to disorder some of his right flank legion and threaten to encircle them. His Praetorians (with the army standard) did push forward in the centre, but their support lagged behind, somewhat isolating them.

Meanwhile on my right the plan actually succeeded, Rob pushed forward against my rubbish cavalry to be surprised by the LI ambush appearing on their flank. My other javelin LI managed to disorder his cavalry closest to the centre. Which means that when one of my javelin units charged them, they bottled it and evaded. This game of ‘catch me, catch me’ went on all game taking both units out of the battle. This was fine by me, as I limited his cavalry threat and opened up a gap between his left and centre.

On my left, although I disordered his legions they managed to fall back to rally and avoid encirclement. To make things worse, I lost my general charging a disordered Roman unit. But I did take out a legion. The threat here meant that Rob was forced to commit his centre command of veteran legions to support his right flank.

All this manoeuvring did mean that I had managed to create gaps between both flanks and the centre with only the Praetorians left to hold the line. If you look at picture number 8, you can see the isolated Praetorians who were forced to turn to stop my units doing a camp run. This unfortunately meant their flank was exposed to one of my units with both a general and a hero. This unit managed to double hit the Praetorians who failed both saves of 5+ losing Rob the points for the unit, the general and the army standard, 6 coins in one fell swoop. This also removed the last obstacle between the hordes of Samnite raw javelinmen and that large juicy camp. It was terrible luck for Rob but that’s what makes TTS so dramatic, anything could happen. It happens to me and makes the game even more exciting for it. In all fairness there were so many units breaking into the centre, it was just a matter of time.

A great game and the ‘quantity has a quality of its own’ aspect of this army worked well for me. Infantry struggle to kill quickly and elite infantry armies can struggle to win frontally before they are flanked and infiltrated.

The yokes were again set up and the Romans forced to pass below them, but not Rob as he has a bad back.

All set up for the final game against the organiser Rob Hilary using an off the wall Nubian army.

TTS AAR: Colours Game One: Early Imperial Romans vs Late Romans

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This year saw the inaugral to The Strongest competition at the Colours wargames show at Newbury Racecourse. Well done to Mr Hilary for organising!

Amazing what you can generate with AI these days!

As the competition was Ancients lists only, I had to rest my Venetians and bring my Early Imperial Romans out of retirement. This army consists of figures that a friend of mine, Fred, painted when we were still at school together, so are well over 40 years old; and figures inherited when a SOGS friend of mine, Trevor, sadly passed away.

Coincidentally, my first opponent on the day was Si, another SOGS member and a regular foe. As Si is always keen to point out, although I’ve beaten him plenty of times, I’ve never actually beaten him in competition: so it was obviously time to put that right!

The view from behind the Late Romans lines at the start of the game

Both sides advanced their infantry on the left and centre forward strongly at the beginning of the game, but on the right the cards decided that I would refuse my cavalry despite their veteran status.

I managed to get a tactical advantage in the first clash - having a few 2:1 melees - but my troops were having a bit of an off day and apart from one push back on the far left, all that happened was that I lost a general!

Once my cavalry did get involved, however, the resultant melee went my way. The problem, now, was how to take advantage given that it had happened a long way away from the main action.

That, incidentally, was not going very well, with the enemy Romans managing to lap around my left flank. This meant that I had to retreat my line to rally and reorganise, unfortunately giving up three coins to the “lose a coin if you rally on an even number rule”…those three coins representing 25% of my total coinage!

My cavalry pushed forward, with some of them then turning left to successfully take the Roman line in the flank, but that initial success was then tempered by the difficulties in getting across the crowded battlefield to attack the rest of the enemy.

I had definitely “won” on the right, and was pushing back into the centre and left, but by this time I had lost another general, so out of my starting thirteen coins I had now lost all but two: four to losing units (acceptable given that I had killed more of his troops) but then seven to the two generals I had lost (annoying) and the three I lost rallying (utterly unacceptable!).

Only having two coins left leaves you very vulnerable and, sure enough, although I stopped Si winning the game by getting his infantry into my camp, and was in a superior tactical position, I only had to lose one more unit to lose the game, which I did and therefore did!

A very frustrating 69-140 loss and leaves Si’s 100% record against me in competition intact!

It was a game that I could so easily have won had I been able to continue: the seven coins lost to the death of the two generals and rallying really hitting me hard. But well done to Si for playing a great game: I might have had some tactical advantages at some stages of the game, but he never let me turn them into a win!

Next up was Sid and his Samnites…

More 15mm Hittites

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Last year I put together a 15mm Hittite army using the excellent Red Copper Miniatures sculpts printed by Baueda in Italy i.e. before it was sold to the UK.

They are lovely figures, full of animation, that take the paint really well. Only two problems: one, Baueda was sold to the UK so no more sculpts easily available; and two, no figures suitable to use as Heroes (give you a combat bonus in To The Strongest, my favoured ruleset for Ancients).

Time to try out a new 3D print sculptor: Scropha Miniatures. These looked to be beautiful figures on a par with Red Copper, and with a slightly different emphasis to their ranges:

  • Mycenaeans

  • Hittites

  • Mitanni

  • Indians / Classical Indians (incl. elephants, cavalry, infantry)

  • Hebrews

  • Ancient Persians

  • Assyrians

The Hittite command group looked to be ideal for what I wanted (see pic, right) but I couldn’t find anyone in the UK who offered them for sale. Step forward Studio Historica in Greece: who have a very wide range of 3D prints for sale.

Unfortunately, the Hittite Command Group in 15mm wasn’t listed, only the 28mm version, but a quick email later confirmed that they could scale them down for me…and they even sent me a picture of a test print that they had done. Price and P&P was not bad, so I ordered the heroes and a mix of Syrian and Hittite archers as I also didn’t have any Hittite bowmen bases.

The figures arrived a couple of weeks later, and did indeed look as good as the pictures:

My favourite is the chap testing the edge on his khopesh sickle-sword, but the two warriors on the left are nice poses as well.

Onto the archers and here, as I said, I used a mixture of Hittite and Syrian bowmen:

Again, some lovely sculpts that really take the paint well.

So Scropha Miniatures are a big “recommended” from me, and Studio Historica proved themselves an excellent supplier.

TTS AAR: Britcon Game Five: Venice Abroad versus Early Hoplites

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And so onto the last battle at Britcon 2025…

As organiser, I was aware of how close the overall rankings were: after four games, as I let everyone know, the scores meant that any of the top four players (and maybe even the top five or six) could win the tournament, and they were all playing each other in the final round. The Venetians and I would take on Sid’s Early Hoplites; Howard and his Carthaginians (whom I’d beaten in game three) would fight Chris’ Bretons (whom I’d lost to in game one). To be sure of total victory, I needed to beat Sid and have Howard beat Chris. Exciting stuff!

Now I’m lucky that Sid is also a regular writer of excellent AARs, and he has kindly given me permission to reproduce his here, taken from the To The Strongest Players Facebook Group.

Day two in the Big Brother Household and my fifth and final game for BRITCON.

After the disaster of game four when my hills and armour had deserted me it was time for the final game before travelling home for tea and medals.

Rob Avery who was the maestro organising and conducting the affair announced that any of four players were up for the final honours and were all playing each other.

It was Howard with his Middle Carthaginians against Chris Cornwall’s Bretons, and I was up against Rob Avery’s Venetians. It was all to play for.

This time the start was much better as my traditional flanking hills stayed on the table, and I won the scouting. Naturally this meant nothing to me and I set up the same way I had done every game of the weekend. The Spartans on the right, the reliable allied contingent on the left and the dross in the middle.

Rob set up as expected with a triple fortified camp fronted by spear and halberds with numerous crossbows and crossbow armed light infantry plus a single handgun unit. He split his knights on either flank. If memory serves his right had a Light Cavalry (LC), a veteran Later Knights unit with army standard and a normal Knight unit. On his left two Knights and another LC.

I had no intention of assaulting a fortified camp into a long-range hail of crossbow bolts. So, my plan was to pinch off his flanks for the points to win. His camp although tempting was in my view a trap, so I intended to stay away. As I advanced, I could not avoid the three box range of the crossbows but I could make sure they didn’t hit anything vital. Hopefully I could use the hils to screen my advance up the flanks and channel his Knights. The Knights really worried me with the save of 4+ on the veterans and 5+ on the others. Being lance-armed they could break through my lines. Then I would be in a similar dire straits to my last game. The good thing was that my stratagem was “Where in Hades did that come from” which could nerf any nasty knightly charges.

Tempting the Knights to Attack

I was aware that my single hit mounted Hoplites were vulnerable and that Rob was aware of this. So, on my left I pushed them forward into the gap between the steep hills and the table edge. Just beyond that was a rocky outcrop of low impassable terrain. The hope was that Rob would see that single hit unit and rush it, that way I would be fighting his Knights from the top of the hill rather than having to pursue him down the length of the table in the open.

In similar vein, I hoped my Spartans would drive up the right side but I could see he might not be so accommodating against my strongest command.

The battle was very intense and on a knife edge at the end, so once again I didn’t take so many pictures. However Rob did take pictures and I sure he will do his normal entertaining Batrep on his blogging site vislardica.com always more thorough than my wittering and self-pitying nonsense.

The Greeks push forward on the Right

My right pushed Rob back as expected and even took out a Light Infantry (LI) unit. One of my Spartan Hoplite units pushed through to the back edge. Meanwhile my right side Hippias single hit unit pushed his LC back.

On my left I lost a couple of LI to those pesky crossbows from the camp but did manage to catch another of his LI to destroy it. As expected, Rob took the bait and rode down my single hit mounted infantry Hoplite unit. This put that unit between the table edge and large steep hill on my left. I managed to get the Arcadian raw Hoplite unit to its front to stop it advancing now it was less of a threat having expended its lance. I managed to get a Hoplite unit on the hill next to him and another one to their left. My unit on the hill turned and was hitting the pinned Knights in the flank but they just would not die! The risk here was presenting my right flank to his unengaged veteran Later Knights unit. Fortunately, it had an activation nightmare buying me a turn. I used this to slip a LI onto the far-left side of the table to engage his LC on the flank.

A Poor Activation Stalls the Hoplite Right

Meanwhile on my right the Spartan unit on the baseline turned right to shut down his LC from evading. However, a very poor activation result stalled this entire command. Unfortunately, Rob did not have that problem and turned a Knights unit around to hit me in the flank. All strikes hit home, and I failed all saves with a veteran Hoplite unit. This was the turning point on a flank I had previously been in control of. At the end of the battle, I realised that I could have played my stratagem which would have saved me as rough terrain would have negated his lance and given me a +1 save v mounted. This is not the first time and likely not the last I got over excited and forgot a stratagem. Rob took advantage of the gap and opportunity to advance his Alabardiers (Billmen unit) from his centre towards my right side against my Peloponnesian Hoplites.

I still had hope on my left. Rob’s Knights came forward and were on the flank of my Hoplites on the hill. I was able in turn, to move forward the Elean raw Hoplite unit onto their flank and hit them causing a disorder. Rob didn’t forget his stratagem and used “Tonight We dine in Hell” to negate that hit. He then turned the Knights to face the flank unit, which gave my unit on the hill a reprieve. To make my position even better my LI javelin unit was able to finally shoot down Rob’s LC on that flank and turn on the rear of the veteran Knights.

The Knights that would not die!

After a long struggle both Knights were disordered and I was looking at four coins of units; the generals, two coins (these were the final units in his command) and the army standard which would give me the win if I could hold my right. But try as I might, they were just not dying. I forget how many attacks hit home but ‘numerous’ would seem to cover it.

Finally on my right, the Alabardiers attacked, failed and got injured. I managed to get two LI on their flanks but again they would not die! If memory serves, when disordered they managed five saves. Although they did kill a general.

My Spartan Hoplites were now surrounded and taking hits from everywhere. My recall of the details of this fight on the right are vague but I lost most of my coins here making me vulnerable to losing. I was trying to hold on, relying on the fighting on my left.

Rob had fed another Spearman unit from the centre to his left and it travelled along the baseline to hit my LI who had driven off his LC. The LI disordered by shooting the Spearmen and my veteran Hippias single hit unit charged in, hit, the disordered spear saved, then hit back killing my Hippias. This was my final opportunity to turn things around on this flank. This left the Spearmen able to move forward and drive the LI off table for my final coin.

It was an intense game, very close and I learned some new words from Rob. The plan to avoid the camp and pinch off the flanks nearly worked but no cigar. It was as always, a great game. Up to now, I had always been Rob’s Kryptonite and he finally managed to break the curse.

My thanks to Rob for setting up a great tournament, I enjoyed every game. BRITCON is unique in being the only two day event on the TTS calendar, so no game feels rushed. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys the game. Everyone played in a friendly manner and there were some interesting armies fielded. I was pleased that an army with no cavalry can still work.

At the end of the day, Rob Avery topped the board, after thumping me; Chris Cornwell just shaved for a second place.As for yours truly, I managed to sneak a third place, which to my mind justifies my unnatural Hoplite obsession.

A great battle report from Sid and, TBH, I’m not sure there’s a lot I can add to it, but here are a few notes.

After I’d seen how Sid deployed, I decided to lure his elite troops forward on the left flank, then move my Knights there into the centre, meaning that his elites then faced nothing but air and my Knights could have a go at hitting his raw Hoplites in the middle of the field. Although that didn’t happen, the whole “elites facing thin air” worked very nicely and, as Sid says, given a crucial poor activation card on his part, even let me hit his elite Hoplites in their inside flank with the Knights from a central position.

Conversely, I did fall into Sid’s trap on my right, and my Knights and Later Knights there then spent the whole game bravely resisting attacks from all sides. It was indeed a miracle both survived, especially as losing both would have given Sid the game. But they are Knights, and those low saves are what you pay the points for…it’s just that I usually pay the points and lose the Knights to poor cards anyway!

Another miracle was the survival of the Alabardiers in the centre of the field. Assailed on all sides and with only a 7+ save, they survived far more hits than they should have.

Finally, Sid mentions being afraid of my Knights: try being mounted troops facing a row of Hoplites in good order or, as happened on my right flank, finding yourself in a situation where your Knights have no choice but to charge up a steep hill into the front of ordered Hoplites…not fun at all!

As Sid says, it was a great and very intense game. I seem to remember getting very over the top at several stages, and did consider myself very lucky to have won the encounter, especially against such a formidable opponent.

Here’s my full gallery of the game:

So that was Britcon 2025. My thanks to all the players and the team at BHGS for making my job as tournament organiser very easy. I was pleased to have held on to my title from last year, but it was a very close run thing. You can find full results at: https://www.vislardica.com/blog/2025/8/25/to-the-strongest-at-britcon-2025

As a final note, if you play TTS, I’d very much encourage you to enter some if not all of the tournaments that are held. They are great fun and always played in the very best of spirits.

TFL Painting Challenge: Mid-September Update

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It’s been a couple of weeks since the last update, so plenty of entries have poured in.

First up is Dex, with some figures that I really like: SMASH aliens (i.e. from the 1970s TV commercials) and supporting vehicles.

These are apparently from a Kickstarter that has now finished: one that I wish I’d seen as I think I would have invested as well.

Next up, we have Coop and his regular monthly entry. Coop is always a month behind, so here are some of his August figures:

Mr Helliwell also sent in his usual monthly entry: more Medievals and more American Wat of Independence, both is more than one scale.

Stumpy has been re-basing like crazy: all Napoelonics, mostly for the war in Spain.

Carole’s painting mojo is back after its summer holiday, and as a result we have some a command stand, an Otyugh, and some entrenchments.

Finally let’s pop a couple of singletons together. On the left we have Mervyn with some little boats - a departure from his usual fare; and on the right is Steve with what he laughingly calls his ‘final’ batch of Agincourt Knights…as nothing, where collecting our little soldiers is concerned, is ever final!

Some lovely work all round there. Keep them coming!

IABSM AAR: Up From Sword Beach

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Here’s a quick After Action Report from Mark Luther. This was a 6mm I Ain't Been Shot Mum game played at GigaBites Cafe in September 2025.

This was a fictitious scenario that was based on some units of the 21st Panzer Division moving closer to the Sword Beach landing area than they did historically on June 6th.

Click on the picture to see all.

TTS AAR: Britcon Game Four: Venice Abroad versus Middle Carthaginians

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Three games down: two wins and one loss. Onto the next: more Carthaginians, this time of the Middle rather than the Late variety and led by that thoroughly nice chap, Mark.

Before I start this report I think it only fair to state two things. The first is that Mark was suffering from the after-effects of a rather nasty shoulder dislocation (no, it wasn’t me): not sleeping and largely unable to use his left arm! And, yes, I did make sure I attacked on the right, shame on me!

Secondly, those of you who follow this blog will know that I am usually plagued by terrible cards. Well, not today. All my terrible cards found their way into Mark’s deck: I’ve only ever seen such a collection of Aces before on my side of the table!

Anyway, with those opening statements out of the way, on to the action.

The Carthaginians outscouted and, after deployment, advanced forward confidently.

On the Carthaginian left was their cavalry: a mass of veteran heavies and lights. My first action was to essay a shot at the lead unit of enemy horse with my crossbowmen and light crossbowmen. Quarrels (the word comes from Old French quarrel (from carré, “square”), referring to the bolt’s square-shaped head) flew across the battlefield and, much to both our surprises, slammed into the enemy unit and cut them down to a man, including their general. The shock of seeing their comrades slain was then too much for the surrounding light cavalry units, who fled the field to bring tales of woe and impending disaster to anyone who would listen!

I’d played four cards and taken six coins…all which I would obviously be paying to my mercenary crossbowmen!

Worse, for Mark, was the fact that my Knights then charged forward (“what’s that coming over the hill…is it a monster?” “No, worse: it’s the Venetian knights!”) and thundered into the remaining enemy horse, lances poised for carnage!

Meanwhile, on the other side of the table, my other Knights were watching the enemy elephants stomp slowly forwards accompanied by the Carthaginian heavy infantry.

My plan was now to avoid fighting on the left until my right hand Knights could turn and roll up the enemy line, and I also moved my main infantry force in the centre forward in order to pin some advancing Celtiberians in place until the Knights were ready.

I needed to keep the Carthaginian right focussed forward as opposed to allowing them to turn to reinforce the centre and left, so was forced to make my Knights a threat even if I wanted them nowhere near the advancing enemy nellies.

This led to some dicey moments for the left hand Knights as Mark’s clever use of the Someone has Blundered card along with my only bad luck of the game left them vulnerable but, for once, they had remembered to put on their proper as opposed to cardboard armour, and they were able to retreat out of danger having done exactly what they were supposed to do.

Meanwhile, my Knights on the right had sorted themselves out and proceeded to carry out the other part of the plan: curling round to hit the Carthaginians’ Celtiberian allies in the flank.

Aided by my infantry advancing out from the camp, it took only a turn or two to take Mark’s remaining coins.

Well that had, from the canal-dweller point of view, been a cracking game!

Mark was so unlucky in that first turn to lose half his cavalry like that, and even more so as that perfectly opened up his flank to my Knights. He might have been able to compensate on the right but, again, just didn’t get the cards to get his men forward fast enough.

As for the Venetians: it was on to the final game and, with three wins out of four, the same as the other leading contenders, a chance for overall victory!

TTS AAR: Britcon Game Three: Venice Abroad versus Later Carthaginians

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My final game of day one of this year’s Britcon To The Strongest tournament was against Howard and his Later Carthaginians.

I’d faced these lads before, and they have always been a tough nut to crack, especially with Howard’s propensity to put loads of steep hills onto the tabletop and then hide his light infantry on them: very difficult to winkle out!

I lost the scouting again, so set up in a tight formation weighted towards my left flank, but a slow Carthaginian start gave me the time to readjust for their deployment and establish a more central position as the game began. My plan was to defeat the Carthaginians on the left with most of my army, before turning right to finish off the remainder.

The action duly began on my left flank, where I had rapidly advanced my Knights in an attempt to knock out the Carthaginian and Numidian cavalty there before heading into the centre behind the enemy line.

My first charges were very successful: knocking the Numidians and a unit of cavalry off the table. Unfortunately, I didn’t manage to exploit this initial success, and the Carthaginians were able to bring across reinforcements and stabilise the situation.

This pattern then repeated itself as again my Knights successfully charged forward only to fail to finish the job and let the Carthaginians back into the game…so much so that it looked as if I was about to lose that flank entirely.

Fortunately I managed to bring some reinforcements of my own across and, by the end of the game, the left flank was very much in a tied position, both sides too exhausted to do much more than glare at each other!

Note that that initial unit of veteran Carthaginian legionaries was still standing, as were my Knights on that side: some units prove just impossible to kill!

Meanwhile, on the other side of the table, fearsome amounts of Carthaginians were heading towards my lone command there.

Very quickly, the Carthagians managed to get their cavalry right down onto my baseline, and I now faced the classic problem of trying to defend both front and flank at the same time.

The Venetian Knights are, however, very tough (when, that is, they remember not to put on their cardboard armour!) and that initial flanking position was defended successfully and all seemed to be stabilised on the right, especially as the main body of Carthaginian infantry (nasty veteran javelinmen types) hung back in relative safety on the steep hills that scattered that side of the table.

This couldn’t last for long and, as Howard realised that his right wasn’t going to win the battle on its own, he send the infantry forward, and the situation on my left suddenly got a whole lot more critical.

Althoug helped by a bit of bad luck on Howard’s part, my troops on the right soon found themselves pushed right back to my camp and under extreme potentially game-losing pressure!

All was not lost, however: fighting from behind the walls of my fortified camps (the rather infamous barbed wire!) gives you a major advantage, and my camps remained inviolate.

Both sides were now on their last legs, but the cards were smiling on me for a change and, as both Howard and I ruefully checked how many coins we each had left, my veteran Later Knights (with two heroes from the Tonight We Dine In Hell card I’d played earlier) swung into action and, with a cry of “Venice Forever, whilst they keep paying my wages” they charged forward against the two units of Carthaginian cavalry in front of them.

It’s the Knights on the right that you need to be looking at!

It was, quite frankly, glorious: with both enemy units being dashed from the table along with their accompanying general to give me victory!

These ones!

Well that had been a very close run thing!

If the Knights hadn’t charged when they did, and if my cards hadn’t been good and Howard’s bad, then I doubt that I could have held my camp for that much longer. But they did, and they were, so the game was mine - just!

All my games with Howard were good, but this was particularly so, and a great way of finishing day one of the tournament.

Figures packed away, we headed out to sample the delights of Leicester’s nightlife…

Colours 2025

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This weekend it was off to Newbury Racecourse for the Colours wargaming show.

I was competing in the To The Strongest competition there, so needed to be in position to play well before the doors officially opened…which meant an early breakfast somewhere. I had done a bit of Google research and found a cafe that opened at 7.30am on Newbury High Street. That was a little late, but I thought I’d go for it anyway: I can always eat quickly.

I got to the designated location at about 7.15am, to find my original destination was unsurprisingly still closed…but there was another cafe, King’s Cafe, not only open but with a row of empty parking spaces right outside. Excellent news: and the breakfast (the “King’s Breakfast”) was absolutely lovely. So a “highly recommended” for King’ Cafe: set me up nicely for the day.

Being there early also gave me the chance to see the “Lust for Glory” table all set up and ready to be played without hundreds of people surrounding it. LFG is the new set of rules from the TTS camp designed for the late 16th and early 17th century wargaming. It’s still in playtesting, and Simon and co. had done a great job with the table.

I was busy competing when the show actually opened (more on the TTS competition when I come to write the battle reports) but I did get plenty of time to walk around later on.

First impressions were that it was as excellent as ever. Let’s tick off what I like about it:

  • relatively easy to get to, and without passing any speed cameras (if you know, you know!)

  • plentiful free parking

  • huge numbers of trade stands

  • good catering, although the queues can be quite long at lunchtime

  • plenty of places to sit outside if you fancy a bit of fresh air

This year was also nicely busy without being insanely crowded, which meant that it wasn’t as close and hot as it has been in the past. I also think that the visitors were more spread out between the floors than before: mainly, I think, because the standard of exhibition games was the highest I have ever seen it.

In the past, Colours has had the some good games on show, but this year I really felt that everyone had excelled themselves. I certainly spent a lot longer than usual looking at the game, and you can see from the photos how spectacular some of them were.

So an excellent event made even better by a higher-than-usual standard of demo game, plus the TTS competition of course. Definitely in the diary for next year, and well done to Jon H for sorting the TTS event: another in 2026 please!

TTS AAR: Britcon Game Two: Venice Abroad versus Imperial Macedonian

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My second game at this year’s Britcon tournament was against Adrian’s Imperial Macedonians: not the ideal army for me to face as I didn’t have much that could beat the pikes head-on, and those Companion cavalry are very nasty!

As is now becoming usual, I lost the scouting, so set up traditionally with my knights on the wings and my infantry in the centre.

Looking at the Macedonian deployment, it looked very weighted towards my left flank, so I determined to refuse my troops there and try and hit the left end of his line (i.e. on my right) as hard and fast as possible, hoping to get around the side of his Pike and Hoplites before they connected with my Spearmen in the centre.

That meant wending my way Knights through the rough ground in front of my right whilst I kept his Companions (already in wedge formation) at bay in the centre.

The cards really helped me out here, as Adrian’s men advanced forward then stopped dead, letting me take the initiative. The Companions also failed to make any real headway against the Venetian Spearmen they had charged, allowing the infantry to retreat back to the comparative safety of the hill in front of their camp.

This let my Knights on the right charge home secure in the knowledge that the line behind them was secure, sending some veteran Macedonian infantry fleeing from the field before turning to face the enemy flank.

It has to be said that Adrian was suffering from the same sort of luck that I usually enjoy: he couldn’t pull an activation or save card to, er, save his life!

Back to the action…in the centre, the Macedonian Pike had finally got moving again, only to be disordered by handgun fire from my Armati di schioppo and then double-disordered as the Alabardieri (halberdiers) joined in the fun.

Meanwhile, on my left, my other Knights had calmly been waiting for the right moment to get stuck into the battle. This came as the Macedonian right flank finally got its act together and advanced forward.

Before the Macedonian right could properly make their presence felt, however, a series of good activation cards for me and poor saves for Adrian saw the Macedonian left flank collapse: large amounts of coins lost as the Venetian Knights and Alabardiers really got stuck in to the cavalry and pikemen in front of them.

The end came quickly after that. My outflanking Knights chased the last bit of Macedonian cavalry across the field before riding them down as they turned to fight and, at the same time, more Knights finished off some Hoplites from the flank, despite being disordered themselves.

It had been a glorious victory for the Venetians: I had only lost two coins (both units of mounted light crossbowmen) so scored a great 14-2 win. As mentioned above, however, Adrian suffered from the most appalling luck throughout the game, so I’m not sure that much of my triumph was down to superior tactics or suchlike on my part!

On to game three…

Reinforcements for the Venetians

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Friend Nigel often fields some kind of Condotta army at the tournaments we both attend, and one troop type that usually causes his opponents all sorts of annoyance are the Rotularii or “sword & buckler men”.

I’ve faced these a couple of times, and can attest to their effectiveness, so I thought it was about time I reinforced my 28mm Venetians with some Rotularii of my own.

Now I finished the Venetians as a project some time ago so, aside from wanting to make a couple of coolio camps (canals, piazzas, gondoliers or something like that!), up to now I’ve had no intention of adding more units…which meant that if I wanted to field some more infantry, they were going to have to come from the bits box as I wasn’t going to buy any new figures just to get four light infantry types onto the table.

Not sure how historically accurate they are, and they are a real Frankinstein collection of odd bits and pieces (knights, foot soldiers, even light cavalry) but they look suitably ferocious to me!

And talking of finishing projects, here’s the last of the Arabs that I’m planning to add to the collection: a couple of units of Javelinmen just in case the ground is very rough!

These are 3D Breed sculpts of 15mm Moorish Warriors printed by Geek Villain. They are very nicely detailed figures that take the paint very well.

Again, however, there were some problems in getting the models to stand up without support: not as bad as the Moorish cavalry from the same source, but not as good as the Red Copper prints I’ve been using previously.

I particularly like the way the shields have turned out.

So that’s hopefully the last of the Arabs I’ll need to paint: a quick look at the my Painting Challenge gallery for 2025 shows that Arabs are almost all that I’ve painted this year. Not sure what’s next, but they won’t be wearing mostly white!

TTS AAR: Britcon Game One: Venice Abroad versus Bretons

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My first game proper at this year’s Britcon tournament was against Chris’ Bretons i.e. lots of cavalry and light cavalry!

Unsurprisingly, I lost the scouting, so set up in a largely defensive position in the centre of the table. I did have one unit of Knights off-table to begin with: they were carrying out a flank march on the right and were designed to be my battle-winning trump card, arriving just in time to roll up the Breton flank!

Unfortunately, Chris got some pretty decent cards on his first turn and, almost before I knew what was going on, the Bretons were all over me, especially on my left flank, the one that was weakened by the absence of the flanking Knights.

Worse, the Later Knights who were on that side of the table seemed to have put their ceremonial cardboard armour on that morning, so that rather than runnng rough-shod over the opposition, any initial success that they had was soon wiped out as the Bretons in front of them evaded and those to the side flank-charged them off the table!

That’s what happens when you pull six Aces in one turn, two of them doubles!

In a tournament as well!

I was now pretty beleagured on the left side of my camps, and it looked as if the game could be over very quickly.

Fortunately, my off-table flanking force chose that moment to arrive, and did exactly what they were supposed to do: driving into the left flank of the Bretons and starting to roll them up.

At the same time, the troops on the left of my line suddenly remembered how to fight, and the situation around that end of my camps stabilised.

The game could now go either way. We each had eight coins remaining, but whilst I had begun on 14 coins, Chris had begun on 11, so all I needed to do to win the game was to take out 1½ of his units…and I could see two clear opportunities to do so.

Unfortunately, both these opportunities slipped through my fingers - a combination of more poor cards and some excellently slippery tactics from Chris - and the initiative passed to the Bretons without me having been able to firmly put them to bed!

Chris, too, could see an opportunity to take the last of my coins and, without hesitation, he swept a unit of light cavalry into two of my now undefended camps (we were busy trying to stabilise the other end!) taking the last six of my coins and the game for a 14-8 victory!

Excellently played by Chris, but highly annoying for the Venetians. If you look at the picture above, you can see a unit of light infantry handgunners on the flank of some Breton horse. If those handgunners had managed to step back into the camp (anything but an Ace!) then Chris would only have been able to take one camp and I’d have had another chance to win myself.

So that was two defeats in a row for the Venetians (the warm up game and game one) and with a result that somewhat belied the actual situation on the tabletop. All credit to Chris for taking full advantage of the opportunity on my left and his super evading tactics (which made it very difficult to kill the Bretons as they retreated and were then recycled back into the action) and I had better pull my finger out for the next four games if I was to have any chance of holding on to my title!

TFL Painting Challenge: Quick End August Update

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Exactly what it says on the tin: a quick end of August update to the Painting Challenge.

First up is Mr Burt with the last of his Traitor’s Toll figures and a return to his Agincourt Knights.

Next we have Mervyn with a couple of Darkest Africa entries: British Naval types and Askaris.

Also sending in a brace of entries is Stumpy, with some casualty markers for Sharp Practice and some British Light Dragoons.

Finally we have Mr Helliwell with his usual cornucopia of entries. This time it’s mostly medieval with just a hint of the AWI.

Loving the shields on the last two!

That’s it for this time: just a quick one as I said.

Keep them coming!

TTS AAR: Britcon Warm-Up Game: Venice Abroad versus Later Achaemenid Persians

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Friday late afternoon at this year’s Britcon saw an opportunity for a warm-up game where my Venetians (Abroad) would flex their muscles against Richard’s Later Achaemenid Persians.

The Venetians lost the scouting, with the Persians taking full advantage to load their cavalry onto my open right flank whilst countering the Knights on my left with their mercenary Hoplites.

A Potentially Unfortunate Deployment for the Venetians

As the game began, I advanced forward rapidly on the flanks, determined to use my Knights to smash through his first line of cavalry on the right whilst attempting to slip around the Hoplite flank on the left.

On the left, my plan initially succeeded, with one unit of Knights getting well behind the enemy line, poised to turn and go crashing into the rear of the enemy infantry. Unfortunately, the Knights then decided that what they had achieved was quite enough, thank you, and decided to stop for lunch: refusing to turn and charge the Hoplite rear for a couple of turns.

This then allowed some Persian javelinmen to get into the rough ground anchoring the Achaemenid flank and, for some reason (probably incompetance) I allowed myself to get tangled up in dealing with them rather than focussing on smashing the Greek heavy infantry. You’ll also see, in the photos below, how my other unit of Knights has got itself trapped on the sideline: more stupidity on my part!

As the very promising situation on the left now looked like a pile of poop, it was time to focus on the right!

Here my Knights had sallied forth determined to kick some Achaemenid butt: we might be outnumbered at the moment, but smash a couple of units from the field with your first charge and the numbers start to make sense!

Unfortunately, although I disordered both units of veteran enemy cavalry on first contact, I didn’t break them, meaning that they had the opportunity to pull back and rally.

This also allowed the rest of the Persian cavalry to break off from that melee and hit my units in the centre: the result, combined with some devilish missile fire from some Persian Lights, being the loss of two units (the militia spearmen and the crossbowmen) and a hole the size of the Blackwall Tunnel right in the middle of my line and, more worryingly, in front of my camps!

The Persians promptly poured some light infantry and their “spare” cavalry into the gap, and suddenly what had looked like a great position on both flanks now looked like Armageddon in the centre!

I desperately needed to free up my units stuck on the left, but an unwise decision not to lead with the Knights bit me firmly on the derriere when my Balestrieri montati (mounted crossbowmen) failed to activate on an Ace and so condemned their entire command to sit there doing nothing for another turn.

All was not lost, however: all I needed was the Alabardieri (halberdiers) to charge back into my camp, disperse the enemy Lights there, and thus rescue three coins and the battle from disaster.

All I needed…

Now the initiative passed to the Richard and the Persians, who clinically finished me off by hitting a unit of Venetian Knights in the flank and front with the cavalry whom I’d failed to destroy in the first melee of the game. He didn’t even need his Lights in the camp to move sideways and take another three coins!

It had been a great game that had started so well for the Venetians. Just a pity that it ended so badly!