Bit of a mixed bag

The last few weeks have been super busy, and it shows no sign of slowing down until Christmas! Fortunately, there have been a few bright spots of gaming goodness in amongst all the grey of everyday life. Though to be fair, there has not been much grey in anything, but who wouldn't want more time to get their hobby on?

I got another game of Basic Impetus in, alas, the result was another inglorious defeat. However, like all great generals throughout the ages, I had a co-general I can shift the blame onto... Well, I could if he hadn't been absolutely amazing at rolling hits on his dice- turning some of the weakest units in my army into some of the best! So it's back to the drawing board, again...

The moment before my circling manoeuvre went pear-shaped

This week saw me use up another of my birthdays, (hopefully there are still plenty more left in the bag!) and as a treat I picked up a copy of Frostgrave. The initial intention was to be able to use all my existing Warhammer minis and not need to buy anything else. Of course, it is never that simple, and I can foresee a few (this could be a little optimistic) single monsters and animals being added to my collection to let me play out all the encounters. We'll have to see how the first few games play out.

Finally I will leave with you the only minis I have managed to paint up. These are for a Star Wars: Imperial Assault campaign I have been running. Fortunately, the recent appearance of Lord Vader in a game helped to briefly balance the ledger, though those darn Rebels keep bouncing back!

Lessons were learnt...

My troops at the start - confident and shouting lots of  'helpful advice' at the enemy

Had my first outing with my new Carthaginian army and my first play through of the Basic Impetus rules on Wednesday. Thoroughly enjoyed the game and the army despite receiving a hiding. 

The Basic Impetus rules offered more depth than I thought they would. I was originally dubious about needing a '6' or double '5' to score a hit - but seeing how quickly units could disappear on a damage/save roll, it balanced out. My units could hit hard, but if the Roman heavy infantry could absorb the initial blow, they were able to grind out the combats, which I felt reflected the flavour of the armies we were using. 

Have to learn to use these guys better...

Because they and my General were all I had left at the end

In fact, I was so pleased with the rules that on the drive home I just kept churning through all the other periods it would be cool to play with these smaller Basic Impetus armies (until a look at my painting inbox sobered me up).

I'm certainly keen to paint up more units and have another crack at Rome, I'll definitely try some tactics more advanced than "charge", now that I have a better understanding of the rules.

The view when two bloggers clash

Everyone has to start somewhere.

And so it begins...

Having played only GW games for many, many years I have returned to where I started - Historical Gaming. My first big project is teaming up with a mate (Dux Homunculorum) to re-fight some of the great battles between Republican Rome and Carthage (I wonder what the score stands at among gamers over the years). I've loved getting back into a project like this and am looking forward to rolling some dice. 

Here is the army in all its glory using the Basic Impetus army list. Still working on how to take better photos, on which the internet is fortunately full of helpful advice. Shields are mostly transfers by LBM studios.

Next up for the project are some Italian Allies and hopefully a victory or two! We will be initially trying out the Basic Impetus rules and hopefully will get to give Sword and Spear a run later on down the road.