Imperial Guard in action ...

Dozens of pairs of eyes peered into the dawn gloom, watching nervously for signs of the alien invaders.

"Niner this is 10A, over"  a whispered voice over the vox caster.

"Niner over."

"10A, we have movement to our front over."

"Niner, Roger."

This might have been the opening conversation whispered over the command net as the small Cadian Defence Force unit waited in the dawn for first signs of the Tau forces that had been identified landing on the planet. The Guard forces had stolen the initiative from the Tau forces in a Seize and Control mission, and crept forward to set up a fire base. The Guard commander had deployed a unit of veterans to secure his left while pushing his invaluable unit of stormtroopers out onto his right flank, supported by the solitary Guard Leman Rus available to his small detachment.

The Tau commander  pushed his mobile fiorces forward on his right, while holding centre and left with units of Kroot mercenaries.

Fire from the Leman Rus, and the Storm troopers, eliminated the unit of Kroot that had been holding the Tau left flank. The Tau commmander was left on his own holding the flank, although it was a task he was more than up to.

Initial volleys from the Guard fire base inflicted heavy casualties on the first unit of Fire Warriors to deploy to their front, and these troops fell back.

However the Tau mobility allowed the Tau commander to outflank the Cadian flank guard.

The Cadian left was now the scene of heavy action and the Tau Firewarriors won a vicious fire fight.

As the Cadian firebase was neutralised, so the Kroot warriors positioned in the centre pushed off the central feature and towards the Cadian objective.

The Cadian stormtroopers on the Cadian right pushed forward to outflank the Tau left, but were caught in a hail of fire from the Tau battlesuits.

A vain last attempt to advance and flame the Kroot warriors from their position failed, and more Cadian troopers found themselves exposed in the open.

With just one squad of troopers left to him, supported by the Leman Russ, the Cadian commander could see that his inital defensive line was lost, and he ordered his troops to fall back further.

Adrian, Andy and I were trying out 1000 points of Guard against Adrian's Tau. The force is still very imbalanced, and so Adrian opted to take only lighter forces in order to try to balance the game a little more. As I don't yet have the full complement of Guard forces, I used a couple of Rhinos as proxy chimera to transport two Guard squads.

I clearly have a lot to learn about how to fight with Guard (or any 40K forces for that matter). Next time!!!!

The game was a lot of fun; vicious fire fights meant old fashioned 'tit-for-tat' exchange of units. It was the initial destruction of the las gun heavy weapons squad supporting the Cadian left flak, allowing Adrian to assault the Cadian left with his fire warriors, that was the turning point of the game.

Hidden in a box .... another opportunity!!!

I'm in a tidying mood and that's dangerous. I came across this box of WW2 Rusian infantry in 20mm plastics that a good friend had given to me a number of years ago (his signal that he had foresworn figure 'gaming for the time being). He thought that they might be a good supplement to my own collection (which has since been rebased for the Crossfire rules).

However what I did see was an interesting HotT army (inspired by a WW2 German army that colleague Tony created and used a couple of years ago). It would be different from his Germans though, as the Soviet army created HotT images of shooters, hordes, knights and more. So here is the start.

Sub-machinegunnrs based as shooters, and a couple of old T34s for knights. I also thought that given the image I have of the Soviet army of the time, maybe artillery might best be represented as a God, so there will be a base of shell explosions to represent artillery.

The figures were block painted, so there will be some 'tarting up' with a few washes etc to bring out the detail on the figures and improve their overall appearance on the table (I'm not repainting them though, this is all about re-using what I've got).

And, yes, following on from a post last week, I bought another three of those 15mm buildings. Here they are undercoated black, ready for painting. I just have to get the motivation to finish them, but that's the over-riding theme of this holiday break, finishing up projects, using what I have available, without buying anything new... YET!!!

A few extra Dwarfs ... still finishing projects!

Wow!! am I feeling virtuous.. there's still more 'finishing' going on. I recently bought  a few extra Dwarven warriors with which to fil out the units of warriors in the WFB army - building the warrior units up in size.

Here are the extra boys ....

And the warrior units (with a unit of Longbeards in the middle) looking a little more solid than before.

OK.... what's next???

A DBA night!!!

A DBA night with Nick (my son... a wiley 'gamer with more than a few tricks up his sleeve...). We are considering entering the Woolston DBA Challenge, and so it seemed that a little practice was in order. So out came the Book 2 Spanish, and the Ottomans - admittedly Book 4, but so similar to a Book 2 Hunnic army we thought the mis-match was forgiveable.

The set up from the Ottoman side, with the Spanish having set up terrain, with plenty of bad going. Nick forgot the effect of bad terrain on command distances, and deployed his general out on his right, on the other side of a steep hill from his main Warband battle line.

My Ottomans went for the jugular, eyeing up the Warband battle line, leaving three light horse to hold up the Spanish General.

The Warband soon found light horse around their left flank, while the Ottoman General hit the Warband line frontally - a calculated risk on my part.

The Spanish left flank fell, but the general failed to punch through, and so found himself in a precarious position.

Nick was quick to take advantage - this might not go too well for the Ottomans.

Fortunately I threw high and Nick threw low, and my Ottoman general lived!!!

I wasn't one to let an opportunity go by, and pushed around the very open Spanish flank, hitting warband front and rear.

The Spanish line crumbled, and victory went to the Ottomans.

We played a second game which I didn't record. The Ottomans won a second time, but the battle went down to the wire.... it was a VERY close run thing.

The Undead version of Carruthers' great victory

Nick wrote up his own version of Major General Carruthers' great victory, in two parts:

Part 1

Part 2

And here are a few other random photos from the game..  can you put them into the chronologcal context of the game? Major Gneeral Carruthers would be most greatful, as everything is currently blurred by a strange alcoholic fog.. poor chap!!!!

Enjoy

Carruthers at your service Ma'am!!

Nick Grant and I have talked for quite some time about playing a Big Battle HotT game. We both have a British VSF army, and an army of the Undead, so the plan was to fight a double sized game with the two VSF armies arrayed against the forces of the Undead.

Who was sought out to command the forces of the British Army but Major General Carruthers, encouraged out obscurity and the clutches of numerous 'Mayfair Ladies' by offers which included a bin load of cash (and the chance to redeem his honour - after all only the previous evening one of those ladies had offered her honour, and he had honoured her offer, so all night long it was .... but that's a different story ..).

So Carruthers lead his forces, a vast array with a great aerial armada deployed on his left, and clanking steam powered behemoths scatterd amongst the troops.

Carruthers began by sending the aerial forces on his left to attack the right flank of the Undead.  The airboat accompanied by two smaller flyers lead out.

After much 'argy bargy' and general pushing and shoving (something decidedly un-British) the aerial battle had been pretty much won by the Undead dragon that had swooped out of the skies, leaving the entire British aviation service a series of wrecks littering the ground. Meantime a hideous UNdead God had appeard on the Undead left flank, but had apparently not liked the look of the British forces facing the remainder of the Undead hordes, and had frankly decided to leave them to it!!

The British left would have to be held by the British riflemen supported by the fiendish scientific magician and his Zap gun, and a clanking steam tank.

Carruthers pushed his right wing forward, expecting his riflemen, supported by groups of bayonet wielding Welshmen issuing blood curdling screams, his massed artillery, and a clanking robot, to win the day for him.

In the middle they were confronted by hordes of skeletons and spiders.. uurrrggghhhhhh!!!!

But these were stout men!!

The cursed dragon, fresh from its victories over the British aerial flotilla, soared over the heads of the British troops, but was brought down by a devastating salvo from the mad scientifist and his fiendish Zap gun!!

Meanwhile the Undead chariots advanced on the Undead left, but the British riflemen were waiting, shooting the chariots and their ghostly masters away!!

This demoralised the Undead left flank.

The Undead hero finally advanced on the Undead right, supported by his Grim Reaper minions, carving their way through the British riflemen, and demoralising the British left, so the score was even again!!!!

The Welshmen continued their relentless advance ... the sounds of sharpening steels scraping on bayonets could clearly be heard across the din of the battlefield (actually the clink of coffee cups, and slurping of Christmas mince pies, but you get the idea!!!!).

Back at the Undead Stronghold magicians were furiously trying to raise more Undead hordes to take to the battlefield.

The British set up devastating barrages of rifle and artillery fire, but twice the Undead Hero shrugged off the effects of the British bullets and shells (i.e. he threw a 6 to the British 1 two turns in a row - drats cried the British commander, Yay!! cried the Undead Hero!!!!).

Finally however the Undead hero fell beneath the hail of fire, as the terrifying Welshmen issued forth their blood curdling battle cry, plunging bayonets into the  ghostly skeletal forms of Undead magicians desperately trying to cast hideous spells of curruscating energy upon the daemon-like Welshmen!!

Finally the Undead minions fled the battlefield. Carruthers sat down amongts the piles of bones, pondering the good broth that his army cooks would brew this day from the battlefield spoils, dreaming of  honours and wealth untold, and a life of influence amongst the 'Mayfair Ladies'. His name would once more be spoken with awe and respect in Horse Guards!!

I'd have to say that doubling the size of the game, and playing on a 6'x4' table (bigger than we should have, according to the rules) made this a very different game from the traditional HotT games. It would have been even more spectacular had we played the full triple sized (72 army point) game that is Big Battle HotT. The game was thoroughly enjoyable, a great way to fill a holiday afternoon, and we'll be playing games of this size again!!!!!