first play of saga in at least a year

Not much to say about the game. They were brawls, as Saga games tend to be. Special welcome to Tim, new to the club and reasonably new to gaming in general I believe. I was winning (possibly?) overall, but in our two quick games he killed my warlord both times. Bit of a bummer then if you're the warlord!

Not much to say about the games themselves. No real tactics stood out, almost. 1 thing, I reminded myself that I don't have any (many) spearmen. For an anglo-saxon army?

The only real tactic played during the game was when Tim lined up his archer levy to try and enfilade my troops as they came around the woods. Which meant he exposed their flank to my troops, so I sent a unit of axe-wielding hearthgard through the woods to hit them in the flank. Otherwise, it was mostly me struggling to remember the rules, and Tim politely waiting as I did so...

Pictures for eye candy purposes, don't think I can remember most of where they belong in the two games. I do like the vignettes of Harold Godwinson taking care of his enemies though!

Second run of Horizon Wars

Gary and I played another game of Horizon Wars last night. Reduced the size a little, to 15 points, to make it more managable for an evening game. Also played the reconnaissance mission, which further reduced Gary's force, I think by 3 points, which equated to him taking off 1 heavy tank.

Tyson's Furies! Well most of them at least. Infantry hidden to the rear. Also the large and medium transports in the back were just there for show. To intimidate the enemy of course!

It was a good game, ran about 2 hours, still slowed down a little by my not being entirely familiar with the rules and especially aircraft and scenario rules. I should give them a closer look for next time!

Important lessons; aircraft can be very brittle. Any aircraft with any value needs at least 3 armour. Consider that criticals count twice on aircraft, at shooter's choosing, so assuming both are pinned to armour destroys a 2 armour aircraft.

As we played the recon mission, I was the defender, which -- importantly! -- meant I got to keep all my pieces. (I wanted to play with all my new toys!) And yes, getting the models out on the table matters much more than any thought of tactics or strategy!

Gary's home-made chemicals factory and adjacent toxic waste pond. We played it as dissolve upon entry! Really, Gary is doing some great work with home-made urban terrain -

The recon mission details that the attacker (the recon) is limited with how many units he can bring on at the start and for each turn of the game. As the defender I had a similar limit, but much less so. I did decide to mostly abide by the limited introduction of units, however, as I could place them in various selected spots of my choosing during the game -- having chosen the spots before the game and then announcing which spots they would come in as Gary brought his troops on. It seemed a much more appropriate and faster way to engage his troops, rather than start from my back table edge (which I did at the end of the last turn, but with triple move for aircraft who cares?!?!)

In the end, neither of us won. In theory I might have, as I might have been able to clean up Gary's force once I finally destroyed his hq, which I very luckily did with the very last throw of the dice for the game. 

But it's a maybe to that. In fact, in the spirit of the game, I think it would be much better to say Gary actually won. He would have if I didn't get a very lucky last roll for the game, and, even more importantly, if he didn't remind me of his victory condition to have all or most his starting units on the table once i had all my advance force on the table. 
Thanks Gary!

Other observations - the lucky dice cup was much more average this time than my first engagement. Pooh. Gary's defense die rolling, however, was very strong, canceling many of my would-be hits. This was critical as his HQ, a heavy tank, with spotting ability for his artillery, proved a tough - almost impossible - nut to crack.

The first of Gary's many strong defense rolls, his 11 knocking out my 11 and so canceling what I think was a long-d

I wanted to be sure to take his HQ tank out so my troops didn't keep getting blasted by artillery, but it took all game (approximately 4 turns I think) with all of my units firing on it, till the end of the game, to finally kill it. It's very arguable, maybe obvious, that I should have sacrificed getting hit by Gary's artillery to make sure I killed other units of his. Perhaps, but I'm not convinced that was the right move. Although, assuming Gary was reconnoitering for a superior reserve force, then my objective would have been to stay hidden and my tactics would have been faulty.

My landspeeder (light cav) shooting at Gary's tanks. A single 1 wasn't going to get it very far!

My attack aircraft make an appearance

Gary shoots down one of the attack aircraft in its first engagement! Brittle they prove!

No distinction between soft cover and hard cover for woods. Deploying my heavy tanks in the woods for a +3 cover bonus would have been, and was tough, on Gary for trying to hit them.

I'm still not clear on disembarking airborne troops. And, now that we've begun to use aircraft, mine were rotary, which means they can hover, but how does that effect movement and especially altitude changes? That's not addressed in the rules, which otherwise state for aircraft generally rules for 1 or 2 step altitude changes, assuming forward/turning movement etc. But if a rotary aircraft can hover, then it should also be able to change altitude more easily?

My airborne troops arrive to save the day! Literally! They fly in from my table edge, land in the crater, disembark their troops, who then spend their next action to scoot and shoot Gary's HQ tank. Both score hits from almost point blank, and the die roll shows the luck on the second! I needed a 5 to hit, with a single 5 (the kill) backed up by 2 1's! Talk about cutting it close!

the unfortunate history of tyson's furies

Why Tyson's Furies?

Or the whole Major Mike Tyson thing?

Well, this is the internet, and we are talking about thumb-sized science fiction miniature wargaming. So the rule as it seems to be tends toward the ridiculous.
I am a Mike, one of the 2,351,691,914 or so on the planet (I completely made that number up...)
So I needed something to go with Mike, a name for what will hopefully be a hard hitting series of little miniatures campaigns, not just science fiction although that is the current flavor.

As I am a child of the 80s, who could possibly provide better inspiration than Mike Tyson? Remember by definition we are talking about the ridiculous. I make no pretense as to defending Mike Tyson as an individual etc or admiring him as a person.

Imagine my further entertainment after reflecting on Tyson Fury. Talk about colorful characters! Again, no comment regarding him as an individual.

That's the background for the naming of Tyson's Furies.

But wait, there is further color to this story, literally.

As I'm painting up my latest batch of minis, basically aircraft (transports and attack aircraft) and a few mechs, with a couple of wheeled armored command vehicles thrown in, I wanted to go for a very neutral color scheme. Think camouflage, so olive drab or what have you. Except in the sci fi realm, we have no idea where these troops will be showing up. What planet? what part of what planet?

Grey seemed the best solution. suitably drab no matter where they land. preferably a darker grey, but not so far as charcoal/slate. I found that color and was very happy with it - field gray.

Heaven forbid but after painting them up, I learned the Tamiya field gray I was using was basically German gray during the war. So as a Jewish guy I've just painted up my sci fi minis in German field gray from the war. Not appropriate at all!

I did try to minimize the field gray on some of the minis after the horrible realization, by painting over them with a lighter gray. 2-color scheme camouflage. I think that works reasonably well, at least until someone points out matching patterns of German armor from the war!

Other notes re the minis. The large freighter (had been intended as an airborne command vehicle, like an AWACS, but apparently not allowed in Horizon Wars), the Kirin combat walkers (not pictured at present but likely to surface in future games), and strike fighter (not picture at present) are from Brigade models. Very happy with the level of detail and design of these minis.

The rest of the minis, at least the aircraft, are from ground zero games. The AV9 VTOL gunship, and troop/medium transports.

The cockpit glass is black with a little silver/metal mixed in to give a shine effect. it looked really good after painting, but the dull/flat coat i sprayed has toned it down too much. Gary liked it though! And the engine exhaust from the large freighter/airborne command is orange (actually yellow and red mixed) with a little bronze thrown in. I thought the bronze effect would add nicely to the color mix, but also again give it a little metallic shine like the glow of an engine. pretty pleased with that i was.

Note the color coding, little flashes of color discreetly painted on to panels of any duplicate models. As there is some amount of record keeping for Horizon Wars, I wanted a way to tell the individual models apart. Hence now I can actually have a "gold leader" leading my attack wing for science fiction minis!