TTS AAR: Anglo-Normans vs Fanatical Berber

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It was now my turn to play the Anglo-Normans versus the Fanatical Berbers.

My plan was simple: load all my veteran Knights onto the right flank, opposite his heavier cavalry unit, and utterly refuse my left flank. The Knights would then go in and crush all opposition before swinging in behind the enemy line in time to win the day before I was overwhelmed from the left. Simples!

As the game began, my Knights thundered forward, with their Spearmen following, with the Anglo-Saxons hanging back as much as possible.

The right hand unit of Knights forced some Berber light horse back, but the left hand command was temprarily halted as the opposing Jund cavalry proved tougher than expected.

Meanwhile, the Berbers had sent more light cavalry forward on the left at the gallop. This developed into a standoff between a single unit of Fyrd supported bt light archers and two units of enemy light cavalry.

More Berber light cavalry ignored the Fyrd and headed into the centre, threatening the flanks of my advancing line (left hand photo below) but the good news was that the left hand Knights had finally managed to disperse the Knights in front of them, leaving them clear to turn towards the enemy centre (right hand photo below).

The Berber light cavalry were too mobile to be pinned by the Fyrd/lights for long: one unit sneaking through the gap on the Anglo-Norman left.

This pesky unit then made its way down to the flank of the Anglo-Norman camp and (with a bit of help from the cards) charged in, dispersing the defenders and costing me three coins. What had looked a promising situation was now back in the balance!

Worse, the Berber infantry that had been so far excluded from the action out on their left flank had by now managed to move sideways and began to engage the rest of the now-outnumbered Fyrd (left hand picture below).

The Norman Knights needed to win the battle soon, or the left would be overwhelmed by sheer weight of numbers. Fortunately, they were now in a position to turn sideways onto the left flank of the Berbers, and quickly advanced forward to charge position whilst the Norman infantry pinned the oppositino from the front (right hand picture below).

Things quickly became a bit critical on the left: even the Fyrd suffer when faced with over two-to-one odds.

Fortunately the Normans on the right were now in the perfect position to hammer the rest of the Berber infantry.

Although the Berbers turned to face the Knights coming in from the flank - and even Knights don’t like charging formed Spearmen - this allowed the Norman Sergeants to attack their flank, disorder them and make them vulnerable to a charge from the front: the perfect combined arms attack (the top two photos below).

The Knights thundered forward and smashed the disordered Berber Spearmen from the field. So horrible was the carnage that the Berber lights guarding their camp routed from sheer fright!

This obviously left the berber camp unguarded, allowing the other unit of Knights to calmly take possession, taking John’s last three victory medals!

A great game in which my cunning plan to weight the right and refuse the left worked…but only just!

If my final attacks coming in from the right hadn’t succeeded when they did, then I was in real danger of losing the game due to losses on my left, including the fall of my camp. I was very glad of the resilience of the Fyrd even if a lot of Saxons perished whilst the Normans won the battle!

More Space Dwarves for Q13

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With Quadrant 13 being very much in the forefront of my mind (see post from last Wednesday) I fancied a bit of sci-fi painting so decided to move the new space dwarves from Alternative Armies to the the top of the painting queue.

Called the Pertinax, the figures form part of the Ion Age range, and are available individually, in squads or as an Ordos (platoon):

Their legend is as follows:

The Legions of the Shia Khan Empire are the main fighting force of the Empire. Pertinax are better treated than any other client race but not quite as well as Legionaries.  Able to command Maligs, Betrayers and Warlords they service and repair vehicles, weapons and Psycoborgs. Organised into standard Tesserans (8 Troops) and Ordos (32 Troops) they are a flexible and effective fighting force.

Each of the four squads provided has a separate role (Rifle, Assault, Support and Command) and they have an extra Engineer figure free if you buy the whole platoon (£17.50 plus p&p at time of writing). By happy co-incidence, divine intervention or by design, the Engineer figure uses the same overhead mechanical claw design as Onslaught Miniatures’ space dwarf engineer (from the Grudd range), which provides another very pleasing continuity to my space dwarf collection as a whole.

Now I’m not quite as good a painter as the one that AA uses, but here is my effort:

That means that I now have a slightly ridiculous 19 platoons of space dwarves from eight different manufacturers/contingents. You can see the whole lot here, with the photos below showing you the whole collection.

TTS AAR: Fanatical Berber vs Anglo-Normans

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Time for another game of To The Strongest: with the Fanatical Berbers played by me versus John’s Anglo-Normans.

The large numbers of Berber light cavalry meant that I won the scouting and, seeing that the Anglo-Normans had deployed in a compact mass in the centre of the field with Knights on either flank, I decided to shake things up a bit and placed all my cavalry, light and heavy, on my left flank, intending to overwhelm the Knights there and then swing in to take the rest of his army in the side and rear.

As the game began, my horsemen thundered forward, and quickly got behind the Anglo-Norman line.

A unit of Berber light horse charged into the flank of the massed Norman Knights and, with the cards helping me out, sent one fleeing from the field.

With the Arab Jund cavalry and a unit of mercenary Christian Knights on the way into the action on that flank, the situation was only really saved for the Normans by the intervention of the Knights from the other side of the battlefield (along with Bishop Odo and a piece of the True Cross) who had quickly re-deployed across the width of the table.

This meant, however, that the Anglo-Norman left flank was left unguarded and, although a bit slow off the mark, the Berber Black Guard was soon forward and threatening there.

With the Berbers curling in from both sides, the Anglo-Normans desperately sent the Fyrd forward to try and cut through the main enemy line, but although they fought bravely, Berber light horse were all over their right flank/rear and the Norman spearmen who might have turned the battle in their favour were busy trying to hold off the Black Guard on the left.

It all proved too much for the Anglo-Saxon infantry, who were finally broken by more Berber light horse coming in from the rear. The main Anglo-Norman infantry line collapsed and the day was to the Fanatical Berbers!

A cracking game which actually felt a lot closer than the report, above, would suggest. Unit for unit, the Berbers were weaker than the Anglo-Normans, but there were more of them, and once the initial flank manoeuvre on the left had been successful, the Anglo-Normans were very much on the back foot.

Getting the Knights across to defend the right was genius, but that in turn allowed the more numerous Berbers to outflank on the other flank as well, and suddenly the Anglo-Normans were fighting in three directions as once. A gap was bound to appear somewhere, which allowed the Berber light horse to dart into a position where they could attack the rear of the heavily-engaged main Anglo-Norman battle line and that, as they say, was that.

Next game will reverse the sides and we’ll see how that goes…

Quadrant 13 featured in the Tales & Tactics podcast

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Back in 2012, I wrote Quadrant 13, a set of sci-fi wargaming rules that grew out of my love for fast, narrative-driven games.

Q13 uses the same underlying engine as I Ain’t Been Shot, Mum (IABSM) and Charlie Don’t Surf (CDS): an approach that prioritises friction, command uncertainty, and the chaos that makes tabletop battles feel alive.

When I first put Q13 together, it was very much a passion project. I wanted a flexible, hard science-fiction ruleset that could handle any sci-fi milieu or army, and gave a fast-paced “realistic” game. Like most designers, I released it into the wild, hoped people would enjoy it, and then moved on to the next idea.

Which is why I was genuinely surprised—and delighted—when I discovered that Q13 was featured on the Tales & Tactics podcast in November 2025.

Even better, the discussion was largely complimentary. The hosts dug into how the familiar IABSM/CDS engine translates into a sci-fi setting, and they spoke positively about the feel of the game and the design choices behind it. Hearing other gamers engage thoughtfully with something I wrote over a decade ago was both humbling and energising.

It’s a pity they didn’t mention Five Planets, a scenario book for Q13, and the fact that this site contains loads of sample army lists to get over one of the barriers that they mentioned might stop people trying the rules, but you can’t have everything and I’m just glad the review was positive!

It’s a strange and wonderful thing as a designer to see an older project resurface and find a new audience. Q13 may have been written in 2012, but moments like this remind me that good ideas—and good games—can have a much longer shelf life than you expect. I’m still occasionally playing the game, and I hope other people are too.

My thanks to the team at Tales & Tactics for taking the time to play, discuss, and share their thoughts on Q13: hopefully it will enjoy a bit of a resurgence as a result.

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMZULXHsTPQ

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/67wnOWGOQL24biNEnHjbsT

Buy Q13: https://www.vislardica.com/buy-q13-andor-five-planets

 

First Painting Challenge Update for 2026

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Happy New Year again to all, especially as it’s time for the first Painting Challenge update of the year.

First up, we have Carole, with some very nicely painted High Elves from Northstar:

Next we have Dex, who is adding to his already impressive WW2 collection with some 15mm Partisans and a car park full of German armour:

Stumpy has been busy over Christmas: here are some Spanish Lancers and a single Brunswick Lancer needed to complete a unit:

Also busy over the festive period was Mervyn. Here are is superb Scots Greys in 28mm:

And then last, but by no means least, here are some Traitors Gate figures from Mr Burt:

So that’s the first update done for 2026: please visit the individual galleries via the NavBar above to see all the shots that people have sent in. There are all the historical galleries available as well, dating right back to 2014, although there are only a few people who have managed an entry every year.

If you’d like to take part in this year’s Challenge, details are also available in the NavBar, or click here.

Air Support for the Chuhuac

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One of the favourites of my 15mm sci-fi armies are the Chuhuac: dinosaurs with guns from Loud Ninja Games (available from Alternative Armies).

It’s a full range: from basic grunts through to grav bikes, mecha battlesuits, light tanks, APCs, cyberform drones and command figures. The range also includes two forms of air support: light fighters and heavier craft that can be configures as either gunships or transport vehicles.

The only thing missing from my collection were the heavier Charka aircraft: a gap that I filled when Alternative Armies had their usual Christmas sale.

First up, here are a few shots of the Charka Kas gunship in flight:

It’s a good bit of kit that comes as one basic piece with a cornucopia of different weapon options to attach to its various hardpoints. Here, I’ve given the Kas two major forward facing cannon, two forward facing rocket launchers, and (a nice touch) two mini backwards-facing cannon to discourage tail-gating!

The marking are all on slightly raised relief on the models, so are very easy to paint.

Next up is the transport version: the Charka Ras. It’s the same basic piece but with the addition of a pod that sits underneath. You also get the same bag of weapon options to attach, although you need less as some of the hardpoints are concealed by the transport pod. I still managed to fit the two forward facing rocket launchers and the rear guns, but used two more mini-cannon to fire forwards: they look as if they could sweep the ground just in front of the landed ship, giving cover to the dismounting troopers.

The transport pod is sculpted to ressemble the sides of the Sirrus APCs, suggesting that the Ras can carry six Chuhuac troopers…although I think that might be a bit of a tight squeeze!

Altogether highly recommended, along with the rest of the Chuhuac range.

PS I’m out of rare earth magnets, which is why the Kas is on a wine glass! This will be remedied after my next visit to a show.

First Painting of 2026

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Well, I’m cheating a little…in that these were started over the Christmas break but only completed in the new year.

Here is another unit of Dragoons for my 17th Century Polish/Lithuanians: the unit mounted, the unit dismounted, and a horseholder marker.

Most of the figures are from By Fire & Sword and are a mix of figures based on their Dragoons box sets augmented by spare Haiduks from another. The foot command figures and the horseholders are from the extensive and ever-dependable Essex range.

All the figures are painted with Contrast Paints, with the red then highlighted with standard acrylics.

2025: A Year in Review

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Time for the annual round-up!

Overall, it’s been a good year for playing games and not such a good year for painting figures.

Gaming

Another record-breaking year, with 78 games played, six more than last year’s previous record total.

By far the most games have been Ancients/Medieval at 61 games, followed by Pike & Shot on ten games, and then a smattering of WW2 (4), Napoleonic (2) and 19th Century (1).

A Magnificent Table for the “Storming the Starmerskaya” Game At This Year’s Operation Market Larden Games Day

As with last year, one of the reasons for the huge number of games played was playing on the To The Strongest tournament circuit - about half the Ancients/Medievals games played were in tournaments - and it tended to be at shows that I played other periods.

One of my resolutions for 2026 will be to play more games from other periods.

Tournaments

I played in eight of the nine “official” To The Strongest tournaments in 2025: all great fun and the usual mixed bag of results.

The only result I was unhappy with was the 19th position at the World’s in February, but my poor Romans had an absolute ‘mare: losing five Legionary units in one turn against the Dacians; and then being up ten coins against the Persians and then suddenly collapsing!

Obviously I was very happy to retain my title at Britcon for the second year in a row: it was hard fought tournament that, after four games, all came down to the fifth and final clash.

Facing the Hoplites in the final, deciding battle at Britcon

Many thanks to all the organisers and my various opponents: all the games I had were played in the very best of spirits, with none of the unpleasantness I’ve sometimes seen at other events. I do remember laughing a lot when playing, always a good sign.

My thanks also to all my opponents throughout the year. Just looking through the AARs has made me realise again how much I enjoyed all the competitions I entered this year, and I would highly recommend the To The Strongest competition circuit to those who fancy a bit of “competitive gaming without numpties”.

Painting

2025 was not a good year for painting: only the second time I have scored under 1,000 points since the Challenge began.

Nearly all my painting time was taken up with creating the various Arabic armies of medieaval times: from the Arab Conquest to Ayyubids to Fanatical Berbers. The vast majority of the figures used were 3D prints from Red Copper and 3D Breed: beautiful figures that paint up really well. Overall I painted 618 Arabic infantry, 122 mounted troops and three camps.

Other than the Arabs, all I painted was a smattering of troops to bulk up existing armies: a few Hittites, some Polish/Lithuanian types and even some more Venetians.

New Year’s resolution number two is to do more painting in 2026.

Shows

A light showing on the show front in 2025, and even those were mostly connected to tournament play. I missed out on Salute and both Partisan shows, but did manage Roll Call, Overlord, Warfare, Colours and Vanquish.

All the shows I went to had an incredibly high standard of demonstration games that really motivated me in a year when I was very busy with work and other real life issues.

I think NYR #3 must therefore be to do more shows in 2026.

Summary

So that was 2025: a good year for games (the best ever so far) but a bit light on the other aspects of wargaming.

Thanks for your continued support to Vis Lardica - over 100 posts in 2026 - and a special thanks to those who have Bought Me A Coffee of two: very much appreciated and you can be sure the money went on more wargaming kit!

I’m very much looking forward to 2026, and hope to see you on the other side of a tabletop sometime in the next twelve months!

All the best

R

TTS AAR: Venice Abroad versus Northern Dynasties Chinese

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Time for a pre-Christmas game of To The Strongest: my Venetians Abroad versus Peter’s Northern Dynasties Chinese.

The Venetians are not know for their scouting, so I was unsurprised when I lost that phase of the game. After deployment, the reltive postions were as follows:

Those of you who have played Peter in the past will know what is going to happen next!

Forced to deploy on a wide frontage to prevent myself being outflanked, Peter has concentrated his army against the left side of my army, meaning that all his force will effectively fight half of mine!

The game began with the Chinese advancing forward and putting their plan into action. The picture below shows exactly what this entails: you’ll see that they have managed to concentrate against my left wing and, with a bit of luck with the cards, even start to outflank me there.

I’ve played against Peter before, however, and so was expecting exactly these tactics. I therefore moved the Venetian (well, mercenary “broken lances”) to match the Chinese veteran heavy cavalry, and my mounted crossbowmen to block the outflanking force.

I now needed to get my right flank force across the table as soon as possible. With luck, I might even be able to hit the flank of the Chinese advance before it has time to deploy its extra numbers.

Unfortunately, the cards weren’t with me, and the right flank force spent two (yes, two!) turns refusing to follow orders!

The toher thing that needs to happen to defend against Peter’s favourite tactics is for the Knighst facing the main thrust to hold their ground as, if they go, the successful Chinese cavalry units will flood sideways into the flank of my main line.

On paper, the Knights should have been able to do exactly what was needed: one unit of veteran knights and one unit of later knights are not insignificant when it comes to melee! Again, unfortunately, the cards punished me for some imagined previous infraction, and the veteran knights were smashed from the table by the first Chinese charge, releasing hordes of enemy cavalry to swing sideways.

All was not lost, however.

The right hand knights finally got moving, and the infantry Alabardiers, with the aid of the handgunners, cut through some enemy lancers to dominate the centre of the field.

The Later Knights on the left were, however, now isolated and were unable to stand up to an assault by three Chinese heavy cavalry units supported by lights.

It was now a race to see whether the Chinese cavalry coming in from the left could kill enough of the Venetian infantry defending their camps before the Venetians in the centre (i.e. coming in from the right) could kill enough Chinese there to take the day.

Unfortunately, it was the Chinese who had the initiative and managed to win the game but, after a shaky start, the Venetians almost managed to snatch back victory: if their knights on the right hadn’t delayed getting across for two turns right at the beginning of the game, then things might have been very different.

But they didn’t…and things weren’t…but I was a lot closer to surviving Peter’s “weight one side” tactic than before!

Christmas Eve TFL Painting Challenge Update

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It’s almost Christmas and just time for a Painting Challenge update before Santa arrives to replenish the lead mountain!

Lots of entries this time round, so let’s jump right in…

Sapper is back, with mojo fully re-engaged. Huge amounts of French Napoleonics; some Wars of the Roses infantry; large numbers of Epic English Civil War pike and shot; and then some large scale D&D figurs to finish. Almost 1,000 points in one entry: most impressive!

Mr Helliwell also sends in a large entry: this is the start of an Austrian army in 15mm. These are only some of his pics, so do make sure to check out his gallery, accessed (along with all the others) from the NavBar at the top of the page).

Another big submission is from Nick Cooper: lots more fantasy figures for us all to enjoy. Again, see his main gallery for everything, but here are some highlights:

Mervyn has sent in some mean looking gunfighters and a bit of scrub terrain:

Next up is Mr Burt, with some Swiss, some assassins and some Templars:

Carole has painted some more Romans:

And last, but by no means least, is Ralph, with some more Greek psiloi in 15mm:

A great haul: a positive cornucopia of goodness!

There’s still time to get any last entries in for this year and, of course, the Challenge will be back in 2026!

Happy Christmas everyone, and I hope Santa brings you everything you desire!

TTS AAR: Hittites versus New Kingdom Egyptians

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As Rob had defeated me quite quickly in our game of FK&P, we had time for a quick bout of To The Strongest. Rob wanted to play New Kingdom Egyptians so, after a brief flirtation with fielding an Ancient British army, I decided to get as contemporaneous as possible and play the Hittites.

The New Kingdon Egyptian (NKE)’s main strength is in the devastating amount of arrow fire they can deliver from their massed light chariots, many of them veteran. The Hittite chariots, on the other hand, pack a much better punch in melee, so my plan was to match my chariots commands directly against the NKE chariots, aiming to get into combat as soon as possible.

Does that sound familiar? Was it, in fact, a re-run of my plan for the Polish-Lithuanians to fight the Transylvanians that had cost me so dearly in the last game? Errr…

As battle commenced, therefore, I sent my chariots hurtling forward on the left. It was my two commands of ‘impact’ chariots versus two commands of ‘missile’ chariots, with my Syrian lights trying to get through the Egyptian line on the far left.

I managed to get within charge distance very quickly, and duly thundered forward ready to get amongst the light chariots as soon as I could. Unfortunately, being lights, they evaded easily, meaning that although I was driving them back towards their baseline, I wasn’t closing to melee, and all the time wave upon wave of arrows were heading my way.

Meanwhile, as you can see, the Egyptian infantry was grinding forward, heading for my own infantry contingent, held back guarding the Hittite camps. Worse, the Egyptians had found some more chariots from somewhere, led by Pharoah himself…just what I needed: decent infantry to the front, marauding lights on the flank!

The Hittite chariots were still driving the NKE lights backwards, but the relentless bow fire was having an effect, and I couldn’t bring the full weight of my chariots to bear as some more Egyptian infantry had moved to threaten my chariots’ inner flank.

Still my chariots ground forward, and still the NKE evaded backwards right up until they had nowhere left to go. Yes, I now had them pinned up against the table’s edge, but the enemy infantry coming in from the inner flank were now starting to cause me real problems.

If I could just force those chariots off the table, all would be well…but what was happening back at the Hittite camp?

Unfortunately, I had underestimated the manoeuvrability of the Pharoah-led Egyptian chariots there, and thrown away the Hittite Royal Guard by leaving them vulnerable to a flank attack.

This let the chariots hit the flank of my camps whilst the main Egyptian infantry contingent assaulted the front, and although my men fought bravely and did some damage to the enemy, it wasn’t very long before my camp and my last few victory medals fell!

I’d like to say that the day had very nearly been mine…that the Egyptian chariotry was about to crumble leaving my own chariotry free to rampage through the enemy camps before driving into the rear of the infantry assaulting my camps, but that really wasn’t the case! The Hittite chariots might well have beaten their light Egyptian counterparts, but the effort had exhausted them, and they were in no fit state to intervene elsewhere on the field.

Not only that, but the Egyptians had infantry protecting their centre, infantry that were also preventing any spare chariots I had from intervening in the fight for my camps.

Could I have held my camps if I hadn’t thrown the Royal Guard away? Perhaps: it would have been four Egyptian infantry units versus three Hittite infantry units plus some lights…but the NKEs were in the ascendant at that point and even a one-for-one exchange of units would have seen an Egyptian victory. All in all, very well played by Rob, and Egypt continues to rule the Delta!

FK&P AAR: Polish-Lithuanians versus Transylvanians

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Time to get my new Winged Hussars onto the table for the first time. I would command the Polish-Lithuanians versus other-Rob’s Transylvanians.

My plan was simple: as I reckoned that my troops were better than his man-for-man, I would advance into contact and defeat each individual enemy unit that my men encountered. There was a little bit of detail involved: I would try and get my German infantry with their pikes into contact with the Transylvanian infantry without pikes; and I would try and loop one command of Hussars around the Transylvanian light cavalry on the far right of my line. Otherwise, it was just forward at the double!

My deployment was not strong, however, and my first few turns were spent trying to sort out my troops and get them where I wanted them. In the picture, below, you’ll see that although my German foot are where I want them, the Hussars are still deploying into a line as huge mass of Transylvanian cavalry head towards them.

Forward at the double!

The two lines came together with an almight crash: toe-to-toe literally right across the battlefield.

My German infantry exchanged a couple of volleys with the various Transylvanian types on the other side, then charged in with their pikes. Unfortunately, despite my strong belief that they should have swept all before them, the Germans soon got bogged down in a protracted melee-come-firefight where neither side could get the advantage.

German foot making no headway!

Likewise with the cavalry. Despite their technical superiority, the Winged Hussars failed to smash straight through the opposition, and a swirling melee broke out, with the Transylvanian Household Cavalry proving their equally elite status to be a match for the Poles.

As for curving round the pesky lights at the end of the line, they evaded backwards from the Hussars’ charge, effectively tying up two of my best units for the rest of the game.

Hussars failing to break through!

Meanwhile, on the left, my Tatar allies, backed up by some Polish Dragoons, were keeping some more Transylvanian lights occupied.

Tatars hold the left

So the Poles were now fully engaged right across the line, not bursting through as I had hoped but perhaps now gaining a slight advantage. What, however, was somewhat worrying was that there seemed to be another line of enemy cavalry and infantry behind the first one, ready to take me on even if I did achieve initial success.

Why do the transylvanians have another line of both infantry and cavalry in reserve!!

Finally the Hussars just right of centre managed to break through the first line of enemy cavalry, but they were quickly engaged by the second line of Transylvanian horse…and apprently taken off guard as they evaporated under attack!

Not only this, but the Hussars driving back the Transylvanian light horse on the far right were now in danger of getting swamped by the nimble lights, who were making the most of their superior numbers!

Meanwhile, on the left, although the Tatars had managed to dispose of the majority of the Transylvanian light horse in front of them, they then had to retreat as the enemy brought up his reserve infantry. This freed the remainder of the enemy light cavalry to hit the Germans in the flank, turning what had been a bloodily inconclusive fight in the center of the field into a rout!

Fortunately I had reserves of my own I could deploy: a squadron of Petyhorsy and a squadron of Pancerni.

These I sent in to support the crumbling Hussars, but unfortunately their initial success was then wiped out by the last uncommitted unit of Transylvanian Household Cavalry, which charged the Petyhorsy at their moment of victory, sending them and any hope I had of victory flying from the table!

So a pretty horrible defeat for the Poles, mainly due to the fact that Rob, my opponent, had a good plan and executed it brilliantly, and I didn’t have any sort of decent plan and even executed that badly as well!

TFL Painting Challenge: Pre-Xmas Round Up

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A quick round up of the latest entries into the challenge just before we get the usual end-of-year, pre-Christmas rush.

First up we have Carole, with a selection of rather lovely figures from Bad Squiddo: Vampire Hunters and, perhaps, the fate that awaits them!

Mr Burt has been busy producing more medieval types. There are some French knights for Agincourt; and some Burgundian handgunners, so sort of French!

Andrew Helliwell sends in his usual substantive entry: huge numbers of 28mm foor for the Wars of the Roses, and more American War of Independence types in 15mm - separated in the gallery below so they don’t fight each other whilst you’re trying to admire them!

Stumpy has submitted a mixture of painted and re-based figures…remember: you get half points for any re-basing you do. I’ve only shown a couple below, so make sure you check out his gallery for more.

Next a couple of names we haven’t seen for a bit of time. First up is Mervyn, with a a couple of nice-looking entries featuring Vikings (you can never have too many Vikings!) and some figures for a French game called Forager.

And last, but by no means least, is Ralph and some great-looking 15mm Greek cavalry,

Last few weeks of this year’s Challenge now upon us, so let’s get those last bits of painting for 2025 done…and then it’s on to 2026!

TTS AAR: Warfare Game Four: Venetians Abroad versus Timurids

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My fourth and final game of To The Strongest at the 2025 Warfare tournament was against Peter and his Timurids.

This was one of those frustrating games when I could see exactly what was going to happen…and it did!

Unsurpringly, the Timurids won the scouting, forcing me to deploy in a line to protect my flanks whilst they, as you can see in the picture above, could concentrate their efforts on one side of the battlefield.

With the first move advantage as well, that meant that Peter could get his light cavalry down my right flank before I had a chance to move to counter the manoeuvre: very frustrating and next time we meet under similar circumstances, I think I will ignore his set up and deploy in a block on one side of the field as well, and see what happens!

The first couple of turns were spent with me rushing my troops on the left over to the right, and the Timurids thundering forward, especially down my right flank.

The fighting on the centre-right got intense very quickly as I tried to stop Peter overwhelming my troops there before my reinforcements could arrive from the left.

I lost my veteran later knights and army standard, but managed to take out a unit of Timurid heavy cavalry in return, but by this stage the Timurids had managed to properly get around my right flank and the writing was on the wall!

Meanwhile, although some of the troops from my left had made it over to the centre to bolster my defence there, far too many of them were forced into action to deal with the threat from Peter’s “throwaway” troops: flaming camels, kharash driven slaves etc.

I did manage to get some mounted light crossbowmen out and around Peter’s right flank, but this was too little too late, and eventually my last coins went as the Timurids managed to get some light cavalry into one of my camps.

I rather miserable 2-12 loss to finish off my 2025 competition season, with a 9th place achieved overall at Warfare.

Still, a great day overall, with some goodies bought for future armies, plenty of great chats with people and, of course, fun games of TTS as well. On to 2026 now!

TTS AAR: Warfare Game Three: Venetians Abroad versus Later Romans

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My third game at this year’s To The Strongest tournament at Warfare was against Si and his Later Romans.

This was not an encounter I was particularly looking forward to: not because Si isn’t a nice chap, quite the opposite, but because, as he was happy to remind me, although I’d beaten him a few times in friendlies, I’d never beaten him in competition, with these Later Romans often proving my Nemesis!

Looking at the table after deployment, I decided that, as with the last game, my plan had to be to take the fight to the enemy.

Two reasons for this: the first was that the Romans had deployed an isolated command of two legionary and one light units on the right who looked ripe for overwhelming with a combination of Knights and lights of my own; and second that I had to make sure that under no circumstances could I allow his veteran cavalry facing my left, including some lights that had proved very pesky in the past, through to threaten my flanks and rear.

As the game began, I therefore attempted to advance forward strongly on each wing: successfully on the left, less so on the right.

To continue the story of the right flank, I did indeed eventually engage and overwhelm the two enemy legionary units there with my Knights and lights, but the resilience of the Romans meant that even though I eventually knocked out both units, I effectively tied up just about the same amount of points to do so. Plenty of coins in due course: but a lot of time and some of my best troops used to get them!

Back to the rest of the table, where the wide gap I had left between my advancing-quickly left flank and my advancing-slowly centre had given Si an opportunity to shift troops from his centre to threaten the right flank of my left flank force (if you see what I mean!).

This was quite a crisis, only just averted my managing to get my centre forward to ZOC the Romans’ ally-cataphracts.

I then withdrew the Knights on the left flank, pulling them back two squares: something that seemed to surprise Si, presumably because he felt that two units of Knights were sufficient to take on anything he had there, and that I was therefore ceding ground unnecessarily.

Well, yes, technically perhaps so…but I had good reasons for doing so.

Firstly, I knew that I currently had an advantage in the centre and on the right, so I wanted to win those battles, reaping as many coins as possible to set me up nicely for a climactic fight on the left from a position of power.

Secondly, Si is a canny player, and I was a bit overexposed on the left (hence the cataphract crisis), with three of my units facing six of his. I’ve been caught by that before: seemingly winning the battle to suddenly find one of my flanks collapsing and losing the game before I quite realised what was going on!

Finally, I was ceding ground for time - time for my right to wipe out the legionaries there and perhaps get back into the centre to smash the Romans from the right (didn’t happen, as we’ve seen above) - and forcing the situation where, for a short time at any rate, six of his units faced empty air whilst my withdrawing Knights would hopefully contribute to the fight in the centre.

And boy, was I right to do so!

Si slammed his right-centre (facing my left) forward, and I was soon facing a major assault across my left-centre that I only managed to withstand with the help of the Knights from the left that, had I not withdrawn them, would have been stuck embroiled with Si’s veteran light cavalry somewhere up on the far left side of the table.

Luckily, by this stage, my right flank force had eventually beaten the legionaries they had chased back to the Roman baseline, giving me six coins (two units, one general) and bringing me to the edge of victory.

I must confess that I can’t remember what gave me the final coins I needed to win, but I must have broken one more of Si’s units which, combined with coins from Si successfully rallying on an even card (the boot, or rather caligulae, were on the other feet in this game: one of the reasons for my defeat in our last encounter was me losing four coins to rallying…Si lost at least two the same way this game) and the odd light killed gave me the victory.

And, when it came down to it, it was a good victory: 12-2 in my favour but, as you can see from the photos above, it was actually much more of a close-run thing than the result would suggest…at the end here I am effectively fighting with my back against the wall, enough units already disordered that my whole position could have collapsed at any moment.

So an epic game (at least from my point of view!) and one that set me right back into the running for a decent placing in the tournament as a whole.

Polish Dragoons

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Now that I had most of the pure cavalry that I needed for my 17th Century Poles, it was time to attend to the rest of the army. I’d already painted a unit of Haiduks (q.v.) so now needed to sort some Dragoons: a mainstay of any Polish force.

The boxed set of Polish Dragoons from By Fire & Sword was just what I needed in terms of mounted figures (the box comes with nine: just the right amount for my basing system) but light on foot: my Dragoon bases have seventeen figures on them rather than the nine provided.

Luckily, I had enough Haiduks left over (that box came with more than I needed!) to make up the numbers, although I did need to add a command set from the ever-reliable Essex Miniatures as well. As I wanted two units of Dragoons I therefore bought two boxed sets of Dragoons from By Fire & Sword, and then two sets of command figures and horseholders from Essex.

First up are the mounted Dragoons. These are okay figures but, as is now usual with the By Fire & Sword range, provided with plastic horses and metal men.

Firstly, let me say that the plastic horses are a million times better than the disasters that were the horses provided with the Winged Hussars from the same manufacturer. These horses were crisp and clean, no imperfections: lovely.

I still think it’s a bit weird to have metal figures on plastic horses - seems somewhat top heavy to me - but, as you can see, they paint up well…particularly as I was back to using Contrast Paints after an unfortunate attempt at a return to black undercoat and layering with the aforementioned Haiduks.

The foot Dragoons also came out nicely, particularly the command figure from Essex (even if you can’t see him very well in the photo) and the horseholders.

So that’s one unit of Dragoons done, with one more to go.

TTS AAR: Warfare Game Two: Venetians versus Thematic Byzantines

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My second game at this year’s Warfare tournament was against Nick and his Thematic Byzantines.

Chatting before we began, Nick mentioned that although he himself was a novice at To The Strongest (this being only his eighth ever game of TTS) his figures were about forty years old and veterans of many a tabletop encounter dating back to the days of WRG 5th or 6th. This made me wish that I’d been using my Early Imperials, also about forty years old, and reflect on all the changes there have been to this hobby of ours since I first started playing as a child, particularly as the Venetians are multi-part plastics less than three years old.

Anyhow, on to the game…

Quite unusually, I won the scouting, so decided to take the fight to the Byzantines, advancing forward strongly right across the battlefield.

My plan was to use my Knights, supported by infantry, to overwhelm the Byzantine cavalry on the left and right whilst avoiding the scutatoi in the centre.

On the right, my initial charge was the usual mix of positive and negative: one unit of Knights doing its job and disordering the enemy, the other getting disordered themselves and needing to be pulled back to recover. What was slightly different about this game, though, was the fact that I had brought my infantry right up with the Knights, so the foot could intervene and make up for the faltering unit of Knights.

On the left, the Knights did exactly what they were supposed to do: smashing a Byzantine cavalry unit from the table and giving me the opportunity to get my lights around behind the Byzantine line.

With the right flank locked into a combat that seemed to be going nowhere, I decided to now focus on the left, where my initial success was beginning to overstretch the Byzantine line, leaving a gap that I could perhaps exploit.

I had a “spare” unit of Knights on the left which I then sent back into the centre, right into the gap that I mentioned above. This worked very nicely, as I had also brought up my crossbow-armed infantry and was peppering the skutatoi with bolts.

With the skutatoi pinned in place, my Knights were able to turn onto their flank: setting the scene for what promised to be a very painful episode for the Byzantine infantry.

Before that could happen, however, the Byzantine right suddenly gave way, leaving the Venetians victorius!

So a 12-2 win that neatly cancelled out my 2-12 loss in the first round. On to game three…

TTS AAR: Warfare Game One: Venetians Abroad versus Parthians

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My first game at this year’s Warfare To The Strongest tournament was against Tim’s Parthians.

The action began on the right flank, when two units of my Knights advanced forward to take on a couple of Parthian Cataphracts. Mixed results for this initial clash, with one disorder inflicted and one disorder received despite having the first charge advantage.

I then made a devastatingly stupid decision to ignore “Trevor’s Rule” and decided to try and activate some mounted crossbowmen for a cheeky shot before the main action.

I was duly punished by the cards for my temerity but, in my defence, if the ballistieri had managed to knock out the disordered cataphracts, my veteran Knights would have been able to intervene to help the disordered Later Knights to their left, and there’s only a 10% chance of an Ace appearing…

But a post match analysis does show this to be an incredibly stupid thing to do and, no lie, this probably lost me the game, as you just can’t afford to make a mistake like this against a player of Tim’s calibre: on his next turn he finished off the Later Knights with a unit led by a general (no similar error on his part!), which meant all I could do was try and retreat my veteran Knights before they also were annihilated…

Okay, so that one was down to the cards…but it was still my initial error that caused the situation to arise in the first place!

Meanwhile, on the left hand side of the battlefield, more of my Knights had advanced against similar numbers of enemy cataphracts. Unfortunately, one of those units was a camelry unit that, try as I might, I just couldn’t shift from the field: the smell of these curious beasts making the steeds my Knights rode reluctant to close to melee properly.

I did eventually gain some advantage here, but only by committing my Alabardiers unit in support, and not to a battle-winning degree.

Which meant, of course, that things would be finally decided in the centre.

Here, the defeat of my Knights on the right had freed up a couple of Parthian heavy horse units to attack my Crossbowmen: hardly the best unit to withstand charging cavalry, especially when pulling an Ace to activate the turn before!

Withstand the charge they did, however, and I was even able to slide a unit of spearmen sideways to protect them from future depredations: slightly gamey, I know, but allowed within the rules.

More enemy Cataphracts were on the way in, however, and I was still drawing Aces to activate any defensive shooting!

The Venetians weren’t beaten yet, however, and managed to not only defend their camps against the furious Parthian frontal assault, but even drive their cavalry backwards.

The Venetians might even have knocked a couple of enemy units off the table as well…but the cards intervened again…

Now those of you who have been paying attention will remember that I said that my decision to lead with the mounted crossbowmen on the right, drawing an Ace for activation and thus ending my turn instead of having a possible replay if I had opened the batting with the general-led Knights, had lost me the game…well that moment was now upon us and the chickens firmly came home to roost as unopposed Parthian horse, heavy and light, swarmed down the right flank and hit my camps - the camps that had just repelled a frontal assault - in the flank.

The militia spearmen there just didn’t have the time to turn to face this new threat and, despite the barbed wire (okay, fortifications) protecting them, gave way, costing me five victory medals and the game!

A great performance from Tim and the Parthians, a less than stellar piece of decision-making on my part, and I was the loser 2 points to 12!

So let that be a salutory lesson for all you TTS players out there: obey Trevor’s Rule and always lead with your general’s unit!

TFL Painting Challenge: Mid-November Update

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Frost on the car this morning for the first time this winter, decorations and Christmas songs everywhere: must be almost the end of the year and the climax of the 2025 TFL Painting Challenge!

Lots of entries in this batch. First up we have Carole, and a lovely set of general Dungeons and Dragons types from Bad Squiddo:

Next we have Andrew and some more medievals: this time a mixture of 28’s and 15’s, all mostly from Mirliton:

The painting fairy has visited Stumpy, so lots of re-based figures from him. You still get half points for re-basing, so always worth sending them in:

Nick has been very busy: a huge entry of some very nice 28mm fantasy figures and a couple of outriders in a larger scale.

Dex has also been hard at it, sending in an ersatz German late WW2 Volksturm platoon for Chain of Command 2:

And last, but by no means least, here’s some of Mr Luther’s 6mm orchards along with Steve’s French knights from Agincourt:

Still plenty of time to get your entries for this year in: the Challenge doesn’t close until midnight on 31st December.

Keep them coming!

Warfare 2025

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This year’s Warfare show was once again held at the Farnborough International Exhibition Centre. I was there on the Saturday mainly because I was competing in the To The Strongest competition there - posts about which will follow in due course.

At least half the show is dedicated to the various competitions taking place: below is a shot taken from one corner of the competition area, with tradestands and demonstration/participation games shown in the background.

With four games to play in one day, I didn’t have a lot of time to spend on the show itself, but I did manage to wander around the demonstration/participation games and was generally very impressed: they were certainly big enough, with most tables packed full of hundreds of figures and/or some stunning terrain.

Not a bad selection of trade stands as well: most of the big manufacturers were represented in some way, shape or form, and there were a nice selection of smaller suppliers present as well. There seemed to be a lot of space devoted to the tools and equipment you need to actually paint and mount the figures as well as the figures themselves: all very useful in terms of a re-stock.

A good Bring & Buy as well - I was almost tempted by a couple of things - but in the end opted for some Victrix plastics to paint. More on them later.

I’d have said that the show was busier than normal: there was certainly a real buzz around the place although, it being Farnborough, it never seemed too crowded.

I’d have been happy to have attended even if I wasn’t competing, so I’d recommend you add the 2026 show to your wargaming calendar.

Here are some shots of the larger demonstration/participation games: