slingshot – The Wargaming Erratic

On impulse I have gathered a set of figures to build a pictish type army for the british isles dark ages.

So which figures have I chosen?

I looked at the plastic solder review site and did not like any of the pictish figures on offer. So I looked around for something that might work. My main choice has been Orions slavic foot soldiers who would be more used to fighting at Adrianople or in the Balkans against the embryonic East Roman Empire.

The army will use the army choice given in AMW for the Picts – I have added two commands as well

This set was bought for my much stalled stoke field project in 28mm! yes they were too small anyway. I have used some of the javelin and bowmen plus some of the mailed figures for the command bases

These Sarmations were a snap choice when passing through Frome in Somerset. I knew they would come in useful except not for dark age Britain! They provide some mounted troops

Having now bought these figures they are wonderful sculpts. It is unfortunate that the Plastic Soldier Review plays down these figures on account of poor casting and flash. These figures have fantastic detail. They make up my main units for a pictish army

The army will comprise all the options for AMW so thats 12 units but based singley on impetus style 80mm wide bases with no base removal possible.

Neil Thomas and his Ancient and Medieval Warfare (AMW) book has grown on me over the years. At the start I did not think I would like an 8 unit army requiring 32 DBA bases to allow casualty removal. I tried it with single bases and dice and it worked. The breakthrough came with his One Hour Wargames (OHW) using the same technique and reducing the armies to just 6 units but crucially playing many scenarios.

I have played much more of both OHW and AMW than say DBA or my preferred ruleset of Impetus.

I arrived in Neil Thomas’ world by chance. Mike Tittensor wrote an article in Slingshot magazine published by the Society of Ancients (SOA) about bronze age warfare and using Peter Pig’s Bloody Barons ruleset. I bought the rules and these got me into plastics because I wanted a low cost solution. This was my first departure from what had been a preference for 15mm metals DBA gaming on a 600mm square board – an excellent coffee table sized game by the way. By chance I had now the opportunity to return to a dining table or 1800mm x 1200mm type gaming table. I was toying with 28mm but disliked the size of figures from a painting point of view. I had struggled with my Wars of the Roses Perrys figures to get a look I liked.

So it was the peak of the plastics era in the 2000’s and I just bought lots of chariots none of which in the end made it to the painting table – irony in there somewhere.

What I did get was a drift away from DBA gaming, first into Bloody Barons, then Impetus and then Neil Thomas.

Neil Thomas and 1/72 plastics are a perfect way to experiment in wargaming.

Not sure when this army will complete – sunshine and a last push for summer beckons.

Normans in the South Army Lists

Neil Thomas has published quite a few books and initially I ignored them. Some of the reviews objected to their simplicity. And then I read a review in Slingshot, magazine of the Society of Ancients (SOA), which was very positive, extolling the virtues of his simplicity which still provided interesting games.

I have enjoyed his One Hour Wargames book complete with very simple rules for armies of no more than 6 elements. For my current plans I have chosen to take some of his ideas in his 2007 book published by Sutton publishing. It goes by the unoriginal title – Ancient & Medieval Wargaming.

The section that interests me is Dark Age Warfare and specifically Dark Age Armies. His rules limit troop types – in this era just 4 types of infantry and 3 types of cavalry. Some armies fielded Elephants so they are permitted.

The Infantry types are Dark Age Infantry to contrast them with classical Heavy Infantry of say Rome or Greece; Warband; Heavy Archers and Light Infantry.

The Cavalry are the usual Heavy and Light plus Cataphracts.

The period covered is 300-1100 which for some people may stretch the limits of what the Dark Ages means but in terms of fighting styles is fine with me.

His basing assumption is for 28mm – 120mm x 80mm or 4 number 60x40DBX bases grouped together. I am using Impetus 80mm wide bases for 1/72 plastics which vary between 20 and 25 mm high so fit well. I use 60 mm deep bases to allow some diorama type basing – this suits the plastic sets which you buy in bulk in lots of different poses. Typically a Dark Infantry base might have 8 figures on it rising to 10 or 11 if they are the professional guard of the rule or his “hearth” guard or household troops. I like to see some variety and my wargaming approach is that “what you see is sort of what you might get” rather than “WYSIWYG” or what you see is what you get.

A saxon dark age infantry element for IMPETUS. at 80mm wide with here 10 figures it works out a lot cheaper than 4 DBX bases of say 16 number 28mm figures packed together. I like the fact that you don’t get repetition in the figures although if you buy enough boxes you can achieve that look.

The Frankish Armies list comprises

Nobles (Heavy Cavalry) 3 to 6 elements

Retainers (Light Cavalry) 1 to 3 elements

Spearmen (Dark Age Infantry) 1 to 4 elements

Archers (Light Infantry – bow) 0 to 2 elements

His description says this list works for Carolingian, Ottonian and Norman forces. So thats ideal.

Right now I have

4 Heavy Cavalry (need ideally 12)

1 Light Cavalry (need ideally 6)

6 Dark Age Infantry (need ideally 8)

3 Light Infantry (need ideally 4)

Actually to start with I want to use two similar armies for local feuding – hence the numbers shown in brackets above.

I have some more saxons on the go who can at a stretch cover for ottonians and maybe southern normans/lombards? I can soon rustle up some light infantry bow.

So to get this little project to it’s first stage of having two flexible armies, of 8 elements each, i need to get some more cavalry painted.