The Glambriatic War on Fortress Diken

The Glambriatic League, consisting for the moment of Glambria and Leuwenthaal, are fed up with Pasha Aga Ali's piratical enterprises on the northern Barfrican coast. It is time for an organized effort to reduce the Barbary pirates to ruin.

Of course the Leuwenthaal admirals remember (and not so fondly) the events during the previous Fortress War between the two nations, and are not so keen on cooperating...

This is an escalation campaign that begins with a series of naval battles, and culminates in an amphibious assault and siege of the aforementioned pirate stronghold.

I started a Fortress Diken campaign in Cossacks a while back, but did not return to it in a while.

Scenarios:

1. Depredation

A galley fleet attempts to overtake a Leuwenthaal convoy. Galleys & Galleons, about five ships per side.

2. A Chance Well Met

Kumis Ali Bey's pirate galiots are bottled up in a bay along the Formaggian coastline by a storm, and a Glambrian squadron is sent to deal with them. Kumis Ali however erects fortifications and builds floating batteries. G&G with four to five ships per side.

3. The Battleline

Pasha Aga Ali converts his plundered vessels to a makeshift warfleet to prevent the League's advance. 

Fighting Sail with six to ten ships per side.

4. Just Deserts

The League army makes an opposed landing near Fortress Diken. G&G and mixed rules for land combat (Kiss Me Hardy or my own rules).

5. The Siege

Will Fortress Diken finally fall to the attackers? Maurice using my block armies, with ships present as mobile artillery units.

Block Galleys Banner and Decorative Cloth Templates

I use these templates for my 1/350 scale galley models. Here's how to use them (just as the sails):

• Save a local file of the image and paste it in Word.
• Resize the image to your desired size and colour print it.
• Cut out along the black outline (for the awning over the aft of the ship, just take some measurements, cut out a piece and fold it double).
• Fold along the center line and glue sides together.

If you look at paintings or scale models, the banners hung at the end of the lateen yards were quite large. For my standard galleys I use a 3cm long banner, so the image should be 6cm wide O/A. The awning patterns I printed at 9cm wide per piece.

Of course you can decorate the sides of your ship similarly if you lack time or don't wish to paint them.

Block Galleys Sail Templates

I use these sail templates for my 1/350 scale galley models. Here's how to use them:

• Save a local file of the image and paste it in Word.
• Resize the image to your desired size and colour print it.
• Cut out along the black outline.
• Fold along the line and glue sides together (applicable for lateen sails).

For my standard galleys I use a trinquet sail that is 3 or 4cm wide, and a mainsail that is 5,5cm wide (measured along the edge and NOT from opposite corners of the lateen sail.)

Pirates in the Yellow Isles

(Updated 03.28.)

My next plan is a series of unconnected skirmishes featuring a small Jackewlinese pirate crew and their ship in the Yellow Isles. I already ordered the next batch of Frostgrave: Ghost Archipelago crewmen for just that purpose.

This is a rather unexplored part of the world of Dorfainen, full of many dangers, so it's got a lot of storytelling potential.

The crew would gather resources, avoid military vessels and try to put their hands on long lost booty, combating rival pirate gangs, tribal islanders and nature itself.

Inter Arma 2.1., my homebrew ruleset has all the necessary elements to run such a campaign, basically I draft a scenario, play it, see who survives and who gets some experience, then carry on.

Perhaps in the end the captain of the crew could become Pirate Queen/King? (or just lie dead in the sand at some forgotten place, the way pirates do.)

The thing I mostly need now is ample figures on clear acrylic bases for both naval and land-based actions - and the bases themselves, but they're not a strain on my budget. I'm not really that much into pirate swashbuckling, but I needed something to get me out of hobby fatigue, so hopefully this project will just be the right cure.

Also I'll build some pirate ships out of trash.

Rules to be used:

- an abstract scenario-based IA2.1. campaign system for the long game

- IA2.1. for medium sized skirmishes

-IA2.1. or Flashing Steel for small skirmishes

- a Block Galleys variant for naval combat, perhaps only the ship vs. ship aspect, the crews could fight it out based on IA2.1.: the turn starts with a ship movement and cannonade phase, then individual crew vs. crew combat, and then determining the ship's hull status

- larger ship vs. ship actions in Galleys &Galleons, it's fun and very random (thank you brain, now I need to get more Zvezda 1/350 scale ships)

A four-gun ship could house about ten to a dozen crew members, and could be built to be rather compact in size.

The Last Knight - A Campaign from the Times of the Martian Rebellion

Prelude

Sometimes, well before the Jazygian Empire took to space, Mankind began the colonization of the Solar System, with sub-FTL ships. They mined the inner and outer planets for resources, and terraformed a great swath of Mars and its moons.

As the richness of Earth grew, soon a unified Earth Government (EarthGov) was established. However, they excluded the Martian colonists from most of their decisions, and had the Martians pay exorbitant taxes when dealing within the inner Solar System. Then the colonists created the Martian Sphere, an exclusive trading zone, prohibiting Earth ships to mine the outer planets.

Things soon came to blows, at first with armed ore carrier and other merchant vessels, but both factions soon developed their own navies.

Italian Wars - KiK Block Army

I wrote about using cheap wooden blocks as stand-ins for my WSS/Rákóczi Rebellion armies here.

That project is currently sidelined as I've got some more figures to paint, including SYW types, which sort of fill the need.

Now I've been thinking about finding other uses to the wooden blocks, and I came to the decision that I would glue two blocks together to make them bulkier, and use them for my Italian Wars project. It was rather easy to grab some sprites off Junior General and create various troop types, all I currently need are light cavalry and artillery. The blocks this way are wide enough to show the faction and troop type on the top, so I should be able to colour print the layout of each block in a single piece, then bend it in an U-shape and glue it on.

With these I can easily run the abstract campaign system I devised here on this blog, so I can play a few battles without amassing the 900+ 28mm figures planned for my big Italian Wars project.

Once the Baccus 6mm Italian Wars range gets going, I should be able to purchase some proper figs as well. Or if I win the lottery, I can buy all the Warlord, TAG etc. renaissance figures I need.

The Siege of Floyet Manor (Mini-Campaign)

Floyet Manor is ruled by Lady Obchanna, Countess áchv Floyye taq-Moledurssan, a recently widowed Jackewlinese noblewoman. A group of Dorroseani Reavers, thinking the estate an easy prey, launch an assault on her land, which triggers a short and bloody 'small war' on the borderland.

This is an Inter Arma 2.1. mini campaign with five games, the final comprising two alternative scenarios. If the units are re-statted, it could work with other skirmish rulesets as well.

The overarching narrative of the mini-campaign is that the outcome of each encounter has a sort of cascading effect on the following ones.

After some deliberation, I chose not to include my usual schematic drawings for each scenario, leaving the terrain mostly to the players' imagination and the limits of their available pieces of scenery.

The campaign consists of the following battles and skirmishes:

Dark Nights in Trashburgh - the things required

Buildings - the intention is to have at least one civilian building paired with each public one.

Currently built:

Guardhouse (playable interior, no lighting)

Tiny Monkey Inn (no interior, has lighting)

In the works:

Customs house or other misc. public building (single Pringle can - originally I wanted it to be a walled gatehouse, but it's too small and I want towers with a broad base and narrower tops) - only lighting

Floyet Manor house with LED and interior

Floyet Tower (large pringle can?)

Huts and outbuildings

Planned:

Small civilian house (single storey) - only lighting

Civilian house with small garden - only lighting

Rich civilian house (two-storey) - only lighting

The Jazygian embassy (Chateaux Magnutörk) - playable interior and lighting

Stockade (interior and lighting)

Old Gate Fort (interior and lighting)

Roman Church (lighting only)

A windmill and/or water mill

The question of lighting

What I mainly need now is micro LEDs and power sources. I think one or two circuits are enough for a building, with a single hidden switch per circuit. These can be sourced from Temu or other Chinese retailers.

Update: scored a few lengths of micro LEDs, now all I need is extra wire, batteries and switches, which can be sourced locally.

Banners for Gudugan Pudugan

These are sample banners to discern Banar in my Ancient era wargaming rules, Gudugan Pudugan. I plan on placing a small pole on the base of my 6mm figures with a bead, and these can then be attached and switched with the help of a wire loop glued to the top side of the banner. 

As you can see there are some for city states and others for mercenary companies. Most of them are fit for historical Ancient armies as well.

Each banner is a 200x200px template (of course one can resize the basic template or include a forked end and whatnot). They can also be pasted and mirrored for a flag with two sides.

Adopting Space Battles in Space by Spacecraft to a non-gridded version

I've run a few playtests with the aforementioned rules and they work pretty fine. However, I don't have a gridded tabletop, especially not a hex grid big enough to house ships the sizes I'm working with (although I remember seeing a manufacturer offering space-themed gaming mats with a hex grid overlay).

It's rather simple as all I need is to convert 1 hex = 2" and 1 point of turning = 60° to work with my existing few models (two Hot Wheels ST Enterprises which could be large cruisers, and some other scratchbuilt bits).

Firing arcs are calculated from the broadest dimension of the ship, at about 30°offset:

It would also be easy to produce some templates.

I've joined a few scratchbuilding FB groups and the spaceships I see there kind of give me inspiration to run a series of battles or a sandbox exploration campaign similar to the CITAW one, set in the Contested Zone of my Llamamen vs. Squirrelmen universe.

Italian Wars rehash

I think my previous campaign idea got off on the wrong footing, and that caused it to stall. I'd rather use a political/narrative method this time instead of a strictly area-based one.

Perhaps each faction could have a central zone and a few border zones, but campaign-wise there should be less emphasis on the battles than the positioning of armies, maintaning fickle alliances and scheming.

So here's my draft for the new campaign idea:

Mordavian Tank Ideas and Military Doctrine

The Mordavians currently have two types of tank:

Sanktos Amenigastos P-869 - T-18 type with modified turret

Sanktos Amenogogos P-763 - Large multi-turret heavy tank (perhaps on a tadpole hull)

Their artillery train is way worse, they mostly only have mountain guns.

Tanks are attached to infantry battalions, a single P-763 and a pair of P-869 are available for the battalion staff.

Mordavian infantry is organized much the same way as Jazygians, except they have battalions as the main level of organization instead of regiments.

Infantry brigade - two battalions

battalion - four to five companies

Company - three to four platoons of 4x10-men squads

Mordavian brigade commanders are expressly prohibited from concentrating their armor, as they are intended as a mainly infantry support weapon. A tank is only allowed to be risked in battle if it has ample infantry support available.

The Mordavian Air Corps has three fighter-bombers of WW1 vintage, looted from a far off field.

Jazygian Army OOB 1919-1938

 1st Ebhardu Cavalry Brigade (Independent)

I Bertoldu Armored Battalion 

I/1 Company - 4x Renault FT

I/2 Company - 4x Kontot Kombatot

I/3 Company - 4x Kontot Kombatot

II Magnuburg Armored Battalion

II/1 Company - 3x Panzer 35t (planned)

II/2 Company - 4x Renault UE

II/3 Company - 4x Carro Veloce L33

Anti-Armor Division

4x 37mm German AT guns

Support Division

3 companies of trucks, horse teams and repairmen

1st Baliul Magnutörk XVI Infantry Division

Jazygian Home Guards Infantry Brigade

1st Guard Infantry Regiment

3 battle companies

3 platoons

each platoon 4x10 men squads 

support squad under the company staff

1x grenade launcher or infantry gun

2x HMG

1x medium mortar

1x flamethrower team

Reserve company (without support squad)

2nd Magnutörkia Infantry Regiment

4+1 companies with the same constituents

3rd Otkroton Pejpub Artillery Regiment

I/Heavy Battalion

4x2 155mm howitzers

1x 305mm Skoda heavy howitzer

II/Medium Battalion

3 companies of 5 guns each

Support Company

Reservists, convicts to carry ammunition, horse teams, 

repairshops etc.

Székelyföld AT Defense Force Division

Székely Border Guards Battalions I-II

4th Székölyvár Infantry Regiment

standard unit of 3+1 companies

5th Székölyvári Kő Máté Hussar Regiment

1x armored company 4x Kontot Kombatot

3x Hussar companies of 3x40 men squadrons each

Reserve Division

1st Reserve Regiment “Kinignü Kingu”

3x reserve companies of 2x30 platoons each

Regimental Heavy Support: 2x Maxim HMG squads

2nd Reserve Regiment “Mostoba Magnuburg”

3x reserve companies of 2x30 platoons each

Reserve Horse Regiment “Nod Dolog”

3x reserve companies of 2x20 rider platoons each

Regimental Heavy Support: 2x Maxim horse-drawn tachankas

Independent Volunteer Battalion “Jazygia Tagnu”

2x reserve infantry companies with 2x20 platoons each

1x reserve horse company with 2x20 platoons

Reservist Armored Battalion

2x Mark IV Male tanks

Magnutörkü Flying Corps

Whatever planes they can find

(Vad Magnüborg II fighter, Irgalom Udüt IV bomber)

Transport Division

Mostly donkeys