You got a lotta Gaul there...

 Or perhaps, not so much Gaul after all, certainly not by the miniature counts of many historical wargames.

15mm is probably my favourite scale of miniature, and one of the games I used to play quite a lot in this scale was De Bellus Antiquitatus (DBA for short).

DBA, by the Wargames Research Group, and Phil and Sue Barker, is a game that manages to wrap a relatively simple game system in an ineffable cloud of nigh-impenetrable language. Why make a single statement when a rambling paragraph will contain the clues required to find that statement! Despite this barrier to entry, DBA is a good, simple, and well researched game, that has a good historical feel to it. I have fond memories of playing it. There are some 300+ army lists for this game, dating from around 3000BC to about 1500AD, so plenty of options from all around the world, which is nice.

Getting back into the painting gig this year, and chatting to a guy at our local game store a month or so ago about DBA had me rummaging through my boxes of stuff for 15mm figures I had bought with the intention of painting and playing, but which instead, had sat in a box untouched for nearly seven years. My 15mm Gauls!

I had already done up a couple of bases of Gauls for a game called Sword and Spear, but since I have no intention of going back to that game (despite it being an excellent game), I decided to rebase what I had done for DBA, and paint up all the other bits and pieces I was missing.

All the following miniatures are from Baueda Miniatures, while the shield transfers are from Little Big Men Studios. The models are nicely detailed, and didn't require too much cleaning up. Probably the ones that needed the most work were the cavalry, but even so it was minor, and not really noticeable at this scale. 

The shield transfers are lovely, and really add some nice detail to the miniatures. I thoroughly recommend them, though they can be a little fiddly. One other thing to note is that the transfers worked fine, even after sitting in a box for seven years.

The bases for the Gauls I cut from some 40mm deep MDF bases I had left over from a Kings of War army. They're a little wonky on some edges, but perfectly serviceable.

The first units I finished were 8 elements of Warband. This is the core of the Gaul army. Under the latest iteration of the DBA rules I could base these either with 3 or 4 figures on each base - each representing either 'Fast' or 'Solid' troop types. But to be honest I couldn't be bothered with this. Firstly, I have a physical copy of the 2.0 rules, so if I do play DBA it will likely be with these rules. Secondly, if I do play 3.0, I'll use some tokens or something to represent the difference. I'm not painting up more than double the figures I need. Third and lastly, these figures were re-based from units I had previously painted for Sword and Spear, with some minor touch ups here and there. 

Now we're moving on to units I actually painted recently, 3 elements of Chariots, and 1 element of Psiloi, in this case slingers (and everything that follows).

The chariots were a pain in the arse to assemble, and I painted the charioteers separately, then glued them after everything had been painted and sealed. Despite being annoying to put together, I think they came out well, and look very nice!

Every army in DBA has a base, and this is my Gaulish version. A tent, some tables, a few sacks, and some camp followers, what more could an army on the march require? I think it looks really cool. Pretty happy with how this came out.

The last elements I assembled and painted were the cavalry. I ended up basing them after painting them, because I felt the proximity of the figures to one another would make it difficult to paint. I didn't enjoy doing it in this order, perhaps next time I'll try painting them already based, we'll see.

I had to modify some of the decals for these figures, as the shield sizes didn't match up very well, but the end result was solid I think. I really like how the figures came out.

And that's that, the entirety of my Gaul army. DBA is played with 12 elements (bases) per side, and most armies have some different options (Gauls can take chariots or cavalry for example). I now have all the options for the DBA Gaul army painted, based, and ready to rumble (well, all the options for the version of the rules I have).

I'm really pleased with how they've come together, and what they look like on the table. 15mm has a pleasant balance between aesthetics and scale. The bases have lots of figures, which have a great table presence, they are small enough to paint with relative ease, and still large enough to have some nice detail and definition. I'm looking forward to playing! 

Speaking of table presence, I also made a board for DBA (as seen in the last few images). I'll do a post about making it at some point in the future.

Endies - RPG style

 

The Endies, Endie Endie Yum Yum...

Ok, I stole this from the Lady Tabletop Blog, so here is my version... Not quite awards, but a look back at and brief thoughts about the role playing games I have played or run this year. Here they are, in alphabetical order (fancy), just because that was how my folder sorted them when I went to upload the images.

None of the rambling thoughts that will follow are likely to delve too deeply in analysis or mechanics, or what have you - I'm going to try and focus on what I remember most about the games, and whether I would be happy to run or play them again.

Agon

A role playing game of Greek myth and legend, by the myth and legend himself, John Harper. I'm not sure how many sessions of this we ended up playing, perhaps somewhere between 8 and 12. Agon is quite a system focused game. Normally this might be a bit of a turn off for me, I prefer light games that 'get on with it', but Agon is different. Here the system is carefully designed to reflect the themes and stories the game centers: the epic tales of Greek myth and legend, and as it happens it also does a good job of 'getting on with it', as it were... 

As someone who grew up listening to audio books of (Sir) Tony Robinson reading Greek myths, and who has a shelf of such books, the thematic focus of the game, and the clever mechanics designed to bring these to life were a delight. I thoroughly enjoyed Agon, and would be keen to play it again.

Candela Obscura

Candela Obscura, by Darington Press is a sort of steam-punk-ish, Cthulhu-ish, Faerie-ish setting, built around a Forged in the Dark system. We have played maybe 30 sessions of Candela Obscura this year, nearly one a fortnight all this year. The game is good, and I have enjoyed it a lot, despite the horror elements not really being something I am normally drawn to. It helps to have a good GM, and a well crafted and well run campaign. We were lucky enough to have both in Megs, who has run us through a number of Candela campaigns, including the most recent of her own design:

Click above, and find yourself an excellent Candela Obscura game.

Candela Obscura has been a thoroughly enjoyable game to experience, and I'd highly recommend it. I am keen to continue playing (though my character has a habit of straying too close to danger for his own good).

Corsairs

Designed and published by me. I won't go into too much detail here, as it feels self-aggrandizing. Corsairs was the first RPG Zine that I designed and published. This year my game group and I dusted it off, and ran it anew, we've played maybe 20 sessions so far, and have just passed something of a turning point in the campaign. It's been a lot of fun delving back into the world of the floating islands, and I am keen to, at some point, revisit and expand on the system. My first self-published game, and still one my favourite of the games I've designed. 

Death in Space

Published by Free League, Death in Space is a sort of OSR style cosmic horror sci-fi game. I'm not a huge fan of horror, and to be honest I'm not quite sure why this style of unforgiving mechanics combined with a horror tinged setting is so popular, but each to their own. 

I should say off the bat that we only played a few sessions of this. It is not really my style of game or setting; I love sci-fi, but while there seems to be no-end of sci-fi horror, there seems less sci-fi of other varieties. The game itself however, is well written and designed, and contains a fantastic description of the setting, a heap of useful charts, and is very well produced. If this style of game is your thing - I'd recommend it.

Star Wars: Edge of the Empire

Probably my favourite of the Star Wars RPGs that Fantasy Flight released, and a system that gets a lot of love or hate style reactions. It's janky and comes up with some curious results, but I really do enjoy it. We've played nearly 20 sessions of this so far, and it's been a blast.

I started this with the intention of running one of the campaigns that FFG published, and quickly got sidetracked into an Andor style campaign of the first stumbling steps in a larger fight against the expansion and aggression of a fascist regime. 

I really do like this system, despite it's flaws, and have enjoyed running it a lot.

Feng Shui 2

Feng Shui, by Robin D. Laws, and Atlas Games. I was very exited to give this game a go. We played maybe 5-6 sessions of it all told. The game system is very obviously, and very famously, designed to reflect the beats and tone of an action movie, and at this it excels. I don't think I did a very good job of running this game, and in the hands of a different GM, I think it might have worked better. Certainly as the sessions went on we realised various styles of play seemed to work better than others. In the end it's a game I enjoyed, but just fell a little flat. Having said that, the game is hilariously written, and was worth the price tag just for the enjoyment of reading it alone. I might play this game again with a GM who has some experience with the system, no doubt this would alter my perspective, but I'm not rushing to run it again before that revelation occurs.

Torchbearer

I think we played 2-3 sessions of Torchbearer, very early in the year. It's not a game I feel comfortable giving my opinion on. One thing I do hold against it is that I designed a dungeon crawl that I called Torchbearer before I realised that the name was already in use, how dare they (or great minds think alike, it depends on the day - insert suitable emoji so everyone is clear I am not being serious).

From memory this was an unforgiving OSR style system, which I'm learning is not my favourite style of game (when I want horror, failure, and despair, I'll watch the news thank you). But I honestly don't remember enough about Torchbearers to have an actual opinion - so ignore my thoughts on this one.

Vampire

Not a fan of vampires, zombies, and etc. and not sure why I like this game. Oh wait, the answer is because my good friend and prestigious author extraordinaire RinoZ, ran a campaign he set in Melbourne, Australia, with lots of familiar landmarks, references, and tropes. He did a great job running the game, and was generous enough to put up with my bullshit (my character is a musician of rare skill, and either very helpfully plays the background music to the fight scenes he often instigates and leaves the other characters to sort out, or tries to charm his way through social encounters through the medium of song - the sort of character GMs hate, and are justified in doing so).

With Every Fibre

A game I designed and self-published as a zine. This is a fantasy game, with a system that I think works really well (not biased at all). It hasn't sold as well as most of my other games, partly perhaps because there are many fantasy games, partly perhaps because I did all the art myself for this one, and partly perhaps because I am a fool and the game actually isn't very good... no, not the last one, can't be the last one. Seriously though, I do like this system, and it's one I would definitely revisit.

Fin.

So that's it, a round up of the role playing games I have run or played this year. Probably the favourite of the games I have played were Agon and Candela Obscura, with Agon taking the prize for the game with the mechanics best designed to capture their theme. 

Of the games I have run, I think I have enjoyed running Star Wars: Edge of the Empire, and Corsairs the most, with Star Wars taking the prize as it's not a game I designed, and because the gritty nature of the Andor style campaign has been a great variation to an otherwise well-trod setting.

Perhaps at some point soon I'll do a blog post of the games I would like to run in the future...

Painting Oak and Iron

I've had Oak and Iron sitting on my shelf since I backed it when it was first on Kickstarter. As I've started to return to painting and playing miniatures games I was roundly infected with the desire to get this out, blow off the layer of dust, and see about painting the ships and playing the game.

Oak and Iron - First Edition Boxed Set

The ships are multi-part models, that push together. One part is the hull of the ship, and then all of the sails push into their little slots. This has the advantage of making the models easy to set up and play with - you could put them together straight after opening the box, and play it within a couple of minutes. With the hulls in brown plastic, and the sails in a white plastic, they look good enough for a sort of board game/miniatures game hybrid model.

Some of the models from the base game.

Whatever advantages are gained by making the ship models like this, the flip side is that they lack some refinement in terms of their detail. However, at the scale of the models, and how good they look once painted on the table, I don't think it really matters - they are table quality models, and a good paint job really does make them pop.

The base game box includes six ships, and I had to use the handy PDF on the Firelock Games website to help me work out which was the brigantine, and which was the frigate, and so on. I decided to work through the base box, hopefully play a game or two, and then decide whether to continue with the other couple of boxes I've got for the game.

I have played a couple of games now, and I started on the Men of War box (includes 3 more ship models). Two of these are painted in the photos below. I'll review the game another day, but for now, here are all the painted ships...

The first model I painted was the sloop...

The Brigantine and the Corvette were next

Brigantine

Corvette

The Fluyt

The Petite Fregate

The Light Galleon

All six ships from the core box

The 6th Rate, from the 'Men of War' box

The 5th Rate, from the 'Men of War' box

Oak and Iron ships on my sea board, and with some terrain I had originally built for Dystopian Wars:

Full Circle - and Necromunda

It's been a hot minute since I posted to this site. In actual fact, it's been a hot seven years. In the intervening time I've changed careers, run eight successful Kickstarters, had nearly half a million words published by various game companies around the world, and self-published 7 RPG zines (see more on the Caradoc Games link at the top of the page).

The last few months though I've taken a hiatus from game design, and have been getting out the paints and brushes, dusting off miniature games I haven't played in some time, and generally doing other hobby things. It's been nice to come back to that side of the gaming hobby, and more and more I've felt like blogging about it. So here we are, full circle.

What got me back into miniatures gaming? A bit of uncertainty around what I was going to do next with Caradoc Games, and a desire to take some time. A good friend of mine had finished running a Necromunda campaign, and was talking about running another campaign later in the year. He asked if I wanted to join in; the bastard knew exactly what he was doing.

After some umming and ahhing, I finally gave in and thought to myself, 'yes, just a gang for Necromunda, that will be a nice distraction from my studies this year'. Six months later and I have a painted Necromunda gang, a fleet for Oak and Iron, a Gallic DBA army, and I have Bloodbowl sitting on a table nearby... I should have known this was how it would go.

Looking at the gangs that our local group had, and which miniatures I liked the look of, I ended up getting an Ash Wastes Nomad gang (cue the It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia theme tune, and an episode titled: The Gang Does the Ash Wastes).

I don't think I've bought anything from Games Workshop since the late 90s. The model sprues were good quality, and the figures went together easily. I rather like these models, but boy are there a lot of layers, with bits of cloth and cowl hanging over parts of the figures here and there, chains, and cannisters and all manner of other details, which look wonderful once painted, but are sometimes tricky to get a brush to. If I had my time again, I'd almost elect to paint them on the sprues, but then again, just typing that gives me the shudders, so maybe not.

I was really happy with how these figures came out, the models are well posed and detailed, and I am pleased with the final product. According to my extensive research and exacting sources, most of dyes available in the Ashen Wastes are various shades of brown, so that's what I went with... 

My gang for Necromunda - The Ash Waste Nomads

The campaign started a couple of weeks ago, but I'll save posting about it for another day. So far it's been a lot of fun, and unusually for me, I'm actually playing with painted miniatures!