Things can only get better?

For the first post of 2025 I find myself needing to report on the last game played here in GHQ in 2024, a Punic War three hander with William and Phil leading the Republican Romans and the Allied Etruscans respectively, leaving me to lead the Carthaginian army once again. A few pictures I managed to take during the hurly burley of the battle which hope will give a sense of how the game played out. Rules were Hail Caesar of course! On to the action ~

Viewing the field of battle from behind the Roman lines, Republican Romans on the left, Allied Etruscans on the right, Carthaginians in the distance.

The Carthaginian centre comprised the elephants, Celtiberian warbands, Numidian skirmishers backed by Haztrubal Bicca's veteran Heavy Infantry.

On the Roman left flank Billius Secundus deployed his Medium Cavalry screened by many Small Units of Cretan archers.

The Roman centre comprised two Legions with their Velites ready to skirmish with the elephants and their screening Numidian Light Infantry.

Both armies hurried to close with each other. Velites and Numidians exchanged volleys of javelins and casualties mounted along with Disorder on the Carthaginians.

Spanish Light and Medium Cavalry on Haztrubal's left find themselves facing a storm of arrows and slingshot from the Allied Etruscans' right.

On Haztrubal's right his Celtiberian Heavy Cavalry clash with Secundus's Mediums and come off second best.

Loosing the Hand-to-Hand combat results in a Morale Test. With two 1's the result, they Break!

The second group of Celtiberian Heavy Cavalry fare better in the early exchanges, the Romans are Shaken but survive to fight on!

The Numidian Light Cavalry supporting the struggling Celtiberians are thrown forward against the victorious Romans. Haztrubal's attack is coming unravelled all too quickly.

The Numidians suffer the same fate as the Celtiberians at the hands of the Roman Medium Cavalry! Haztrubal's right is Broken and his centre is stalled by widespread Disorder. 

The Spanish Cavalry on Haztrubal's left are Broken by missile fire and an Etruscan cavalry charge. The victorious Romans sweep behind his centre and take the Allied Greek infantry in the flank! It's all up for Haztrubal's cause, again! He can only watch the destruction from alongside his veterans who Blundered off the table in Turn 2 and struggled to get back in time.

Billius Secundus enjoying his victory over Grandad Haztrubal Bicca!

You may have noticed that Phil has made some very Old School movement and range sticks. In practice so much less fuss to use than a tape measure twinned with Arkwright's Till!

I can only trust that in the coming year those capricious 'dice gods' will show some favour on my dice throws. They most definitely didn't favour me in this game at all! Next week, Lurgi permitting, we are planning a SYW game here in GHQ.

Forward March!

Well, it's that time in the yearly cycle once more when bloggers old and new attempt a review of their year on the hobby front and look forward to the coming campaign year. Here at Tales From GHQ things are no different, so without too much blathering on here are my reflections on the past campaigning year and my 'Vague Aspirations' in regard to the coming year.

Beginning as ever with games played my records show I played in a total of 50 games over the year, both here in GHQ and over at Phil's Olaf's HQ in 'Darkest Rawnsley'. I failed to shake off my less than mediocre record throughout the year, winning only 20 and loosing 27! For long spells it seemed that those capricious 'dice gods' really did have it in for me! While I hope for an improvement next year experience tells me that I may be whistling in the wind in that respect. As tabletop generals go I am distinctly average, but I do put on a nice show I think by way of compensation.

Turning to painting next, records in my desk diary show that this past year I have just managed to achieve my modest target of two figures painted a day! I've completed 740 figures over the year, all in glorious 28mm size! Of course I recognise that even after fifty years of practice I am still really only a journeyman painter but I'm gratified that so many folk enjoy my modest efforts and take the trouble to say so. At the year's conclusion I can reflect on the undoubted pleasure painting still brings me, as well as the concomitant contribution to maintaining my mental health mostly in a good place... mostly.

'Back in the day' as the saying has it Phil and I would have attended anything up to twenty odd wargames shows in a year up and down the country. I've even attended two Historicons and two Cold Wars in the USA in days gone by. Since the Plague's malign effects contributing to the demise of many shows and in respect of advancing age taking its toll that total has sadly diminished drastically. This year I visited just four: WMMS, Hammerhead, Partizan and The Other Partizan. My experience at the latter brought home forcibly to me that I'm no longer as young and fit as I'd like to think and that I must plan my time more carefully at future events with that in mind. Sadly time marches on for us all!

As to hobby purchases, well as is usual I'd have to confess that it's been too much of course! Most recently these have been of Matt's ranges for Footsore Miniatures in the shape of his Dark Ages Welsh and his super successful Vikings Kickstarter. In addition I've an Aventine Miniatures Pyrrhic army lurking in the Lead Pimple, as well as a small Warlord Epic range Punic War collection. As I shall {DV} turn 75 in May next year a part of me marvels at the optimism - or stupidity - that all those suggest, while another part wonders at the pointless addition of even more stuff in GHQ! As well as all those, lurking in the Lead Pimple are French Guard infantry and Roosian Cossacks for the Crimean War project, ACW infantry units, Wars of the French Revolution Austrians Uhlans, Saxons/Goths for my Late Roman project and so on...

One unexpected purchase was a set of rules, the new much hyped Midgard. I got my copy from Caliver Books, along with the Wargamers' Annual, as a present to myself. It was slightly cheaper from them and I baulked at £10 for some coloured in MDF tokens. My reasoning was that I'd only play with Phil and he has the full monty as the picture suggests! Cheapskate or what?

Turning finally then to my 'Vague Aspirations' for the coming year I must start with painting the bulk of those! Easy to say that, but much more daunting in the execution I fear. We shall have to see where that takes us, but firstly I need to paint the last of the Late Romans I bought at The Other Partizan and the two Saxon/Goth infantry units! Other than that, health and circumstances permitting, I'd like to visit more Wargames Shows if I can: they give me a hobby buzz like nothing else really, meeting up with friends, chewing the hobby fat and seeing myriads of inspirational games staged by much more talented, and younger, folk! The life blood of the hobby alongside games with my friends! Of course I'd like to win a few more of those than I have this year as well! But, most of all, I'd like to see William continue to expand his interest in our wonderful hobby!

In our family we don't give Christmas gifts for Sue and me beyond chocolate and such. But each year I get a small box from John Aston with a few books he's sourced over the year and thinks I might enjoy. The prize find this year was this ~

That's it, really, thankfully just another typical year here for me and my fellow GHQ Irregulars! I do hope that you got to the end of all this blather without snoozing off! So, it just remains for me to wish you all 

A Happy New Year!

A Howling Addition!

My pre-Christmas order to North Star included a pack of Wolves from the North Star Menagerie range. Having experienced a tad of painters block in the run up to all the Christmas malarkey, while working through the Latest Roman Legion I showed in the previous blog entry, I found it useful to paint the five wolves and unblock my painting mojo! Here they are ~

Foundry Granite Shade washed with Black Armour Wash and successively dry brushed with the Granite Triad, finally lightly dry brushing the heads and chests with Boneyard Light. All that effort and they just look black, so Hel's Wolves perhaps? The same basing process as with the rest of the figures for The Saga of Bicca Biccasson project. Along with the rest of the project they may make an appearance in a future 2025 issue of Wargames Illustrated as I'm off to WI HQ in the middle of  next month for a photoshoot, having submitted a Quick Fire! piece about the project.

Next up though on Tales From GHQ the usual end of year blathering. Then hopefully more Late Romans as I struggle towards achieving my modest 'two figures a day' painting target!

More Late Romans

As an antidote to all the Christmas malarkey ~

In amongst the inevitably busy run up to Christmas I managed to find some time to complete the painting of the latest addition to my Late Roman collection in the shape of another Legion for Pompus Minimaximus' army. As you'd expect they are the Perry sculpted figures from Wargames Foundry's venerable range. The shield transfers are from LBMS as was, now Victrix I understand, and the bases from Warbases as usual ~

With the newer additional elements, as with the rebasing of the rump collection, I tried to give the main base elements an obvious command figure and where possible a Vexillia or Draco. This enables them to serve as individual units in a game where necessary. This should be particularly useful if we extend the use of Midgard into this collection occasionally in a more Arthurian setting ~

Just before the festive season overtook GHQ the whole collection had it's last run out of 2024 when Phil came over for our weekly game. No blow by blow account this time, just a few in game pictures which I'd like you to think of as a kind of belated Christmas present from GHQ ~

The army of Pompus Minimaximus, the rightful Emperor.

The army of Baldinus the Usurper!

Things not going well for Pompus Minimaximus' cavalry Division.

Not on the other flank either, his Heavy Cavalry failing to defeat some Light Infantry and throwing two 1's in the Break Test!

Some success against Baldinus' Medium Infantry, but it didn't last...

Two Broken Divisions leading to the defeat of Pompus Minimaximus who escapes with his life...just!

Finally, if you are not a subscriber to the leading hobby publication {which is of course the excellent Wargames Illustrated} then do rush out and buy the new January addition where over five pages you will find my latest contribution in a piece on my Crimean War project. As a bonus there's even a picture of your host in GHQ, useful for scaring off Jehovah's Witnesses and other unwanted door to door callers!

🎼🎵🎶 'Tis the Season...

...to be Jolly! Well, perhaps not, but at the very least to be content to have made it to another Christmas spent with family and friends. So I'd just like to wish my followers and friends all the very best for...

A Merry Christmas and a Happy and Peaceful New Year!

As to the Late Roman Legion, the End of Year review and my Vague Aspirations for 2025 we will probably all have to wait for the period of renewed hobby activity after the Christmas celebrations. Meanwhile, stay safe and well and have the very best Christmas your circumstances permit!

Heads Up?

Here are two recent additions to the pool of possible encounters with 'bad things' in The Saga of Bicca Biccasson. Firstly, the Lambton Wyrm, a legendary monster from the North East of England. The figure is from the Crucible Crush Flint & Feather range via North Star ~

In games I see it as having attributes similar to a flightless dragon. In the legend it seems that bits hacked off were reattached or regenerated, which seems it might be a useful attribute if it looks like it may die too easily?

The second addition and inspiration for this blog title is from the same source, catalogued as the Monstrous Flying Head. I thought it would make a splendid marker to put down in games when a Spell was cast. After all, if magic does exist it must consist of fooling the senses or muddling the mind of it's victim(s)? I chose to match the colour scheme on this piece with my Shaman seen earlier in the project, using Foundry's Moss Mid shade as the base, followed by the Raw Linen triad. See if you think it has worked ~

The final additions to the possible encounters pile are a pack of Wolves from North Star's Menagerie range. They are ready to base up now, so there will be more on them as and when...

Too many Generals?

Well, of course not; though I concede that it is a matter of budget, space and opinion that we can agree to disagree on. Being a typical wargamer though I do so hate seeing surplus figures going to waste, something which seldom happened in the good old days of buying figures individually rather than by the blister or bag! Sorting out my purchases from both Colonel Bill's and from Wargames Foundry's stand at The Other Partizan I found two mounted figures which although they didn't fit easily into unit bases did make a reasonably satisfactory vignette for a command base. I have painted them up now and in my organisation designated them as a sub command base for my expanded Goth/Saxon/Frank contingent ~

They are from Foundry's Commanders and one of the Heavy Cavalry packs respectively. Currently my Goth/Saxon/Frank element only consists of three bases of Heavy Infantry in mail and two bases of Light Infantry skirmishers. There are two more bases of figures in the Lead Pimple, although I need shield transfers before I will start them, and that awaits the reopening of LBMS under the Victrix umbrella. He might have waited until after Christmas to announce the move and not put me and others to such inconvenience, but such is life. Hardly a life changing difficulty after all.

While on the subject of the Late Roman collection though I am progressing the next Legion allocated to the army of Pompus Minimaximus. Two bases are now completed with the third underway as I type this entry. I hope 🤞🏻 they will appear here by the end of the week. That will leave just two more units to paint: twenty unarmoured levy infantry, from Foundry's Arthurian range, and seven more Heavy Cavalry from Foundry again.