Spectacles

 Spectacles were what the events in the arenas/ampitheatres were called by the ancient Romans; everything that hapened in the arena was part of the 'Spectacle', 

The photograph on the right shows the Murmillo that I started way back at the end of April, prior to my unexpected hospital stay. Since returning from hospital, I've endeavoured to get him (and the 'umpire') finished and although it's been a big struggle, he's as finished now as he's ever going to be.

He can, of course, now be considered for any future spectacle in my arena. It was a struggle getting him finished mainly because of the two paintbrush tips I see or the problem I have of getting the paint in the correct place when one of my eyes is shut (stopping the paint-brush tip duality). 

I must have seemed a bit better as my wife booked me in for an opticians oppointment last week and consequently I will be recieving my new spectacles next week, to enable me to carry on with the specatacles in my arena ! (I'll get my coat).

Side view (obviously)

Not the view you want to be showing your opponent

Strange shield but hinted at in manuscripts.

The 'Summa Rudis' - all finished now too

Rear view (obviously padding -Ed.)

"Known for his fairness" (and wonky stick)

Group shot (Can two be a group?)

So that's it then for this week, not a lot, but at least it still counts as a post right ?

Since the optician's examination, I've found out that my 'good eye' (my right one) is now worse than my left one (the bad eye) - not wonder everything is getting blurry ! Hopefully when I can see better (after next week's post) I may have enthusiasm to paint or finish model - who knows?

Thanks for taking the time to visit, hopefully there was something of interest and as always your comments are both welcomed and appreciated.

Space Hulk

 Whilst not having anything to do with wargames or wargamng, after thirty-plus years this is still a great game even if GW did try and break it (IMHO) with the supplements "Genestealers" and "Deathwing" .
For those unfamiliar with this game (is there reallyvanyonevwho hasn't heard of this game?), it consists of  geomorphic tiles as the playing surface for one player to use his marines in completing a task opposed by the other player's "Genestealers". In the box your get ten marines and twenty genestealers. Somehwere down the line I seemed to have gained another set of ten marines.

A game in progress - hence its claim of being '3D' ! (-Doors and figures I guess.)

Initially the game was bought by me to play with my eldest son, as he was into 'Fantasy' and of course he wanted all the pieces to be painted, which I duly did whilst we both learned the rules.
 The game itself I found intriugingly easy to play, but hard to master, the initial mission "Suicide" run was difficult, but not impossible to win as he marines  and it still remains my favourite  scenario to date. 

The new supplements came with new rules, new Marine weapons and new Marine models, most of which I disliked but still made the equivaent conversions with both the original and subsequent models.

Finally I got  a second mortgage and paid for five metal Marine figures with the new kit.

Here's the photographs:

The original plastic Marines - some still with their aerials.

Second style of Marine, wiht home-made 'lightning claws' on the right.

More conversions, gatling cannon thing, chainsaw thing and a sword!

The very superior metal figures, with the new weapons.

A selection of Genestealers, painted in one night iirc, using inks.

All three dozen-plus  marines and two dozen or more genestealers carefully packed away !

So why all this and why now I hear you ask ?

Two things, firstly it shows I do have some fantasty /sci-fi figures and secondly I am getting more and more desperate for things to post about, (these have also been staring at me across the room where we played our gladiator games too !)

 

So that's it then for another week, hopefully there's something of interest in this post and of course, as always your comments are both welcomed and appreciated. 

Wild West - Past Rule Sets.

 Amongst the few papers that I rescued from Bryan's (Vampifan's) collection were several set's of rules, maps and notes from his wn western games. The  rules are date from the 1970's only two of which I recognise. The biggest part of the 'haul' is the (then) well-known Boot Hill, a rpg with several module. The loose covers of the models all have a map (or maps) on the inside which realate to the adventure in the module. Boot Hill 'suffers' from the same feature of a lot of 1970's rule in that it has a mass of detailed statistics in a very  over-complicated (imho) set of rules. 
The second set of rules "Wild West" has a single module, but has two addtional maps with town mps of both the centre of Tombstone and Dpdge City of their reverse.

Finally there ar copies of Book one and two of "The Old West" skirmish rules, in much better states thn my single, coverless, well-worn, earlier edition.

Here's the pics:

Boot Hill, rules, referee's screen and sceanrio modules.

 

The slim "Wild West" rules and the single scenario.

Huge, A1 size map for campaigns

Detail from the centre of the coloured, hex map

The reverse of the above map, a fair represernation of the centre of Tombstone

A3, hand-made version of the above map, I suspect for players

Another of "Wild West's" maps, central Texas, with Dodge City on the reverse.

Some of the extra paraphrenalia of gaming.

Hand-written notes of each location on the top map (left) and a campaign journal (right).

Page from a dissertaition on Gunfighters by Bryan

I hope this insight shows just how much of a fan of western games that Bryan was. I must admit it came as quite a surprise to me that we shared such enthusiasm for the wild west era, if only we'd have known this over the ten years or so I knew him!.

That's it then for this week, thanks for taking the time to visit, hopefully it was worth your time.

In other news, I've reverted to my "Firefox" browser to write this post, rather than having to use Microsoft's "Edge", which I don't like.  Hopefully Blogger will behave itself for a while now that the previous problem seems to have been sorted.
 

Until next time then, that's it for this week as always your comments are both welcomed and appreciated.  

A Battered Box of Folders

 This was yet another box that I rescued from Bryan's (Vampifan's) collection - probably rescued from ending up in the local dump. It's a box of ring binders (rather than the folders of the title) that I decided to rescue, largely because they contain many of Bryan's art-work and countless hours of home-made file cards, one for each of his characters for his Western games - another reason to rescue them as it's a gaming period I'm also very interested in !

Each of the nine binders has its content's title on the spine and contains an A5 card with a charcaters information on it, all enclosed in a plastic wallet.

Some titles are readable in the above, but contain "Tong Assassins" too  !(?)

There's a lot of information for each character on their card

The illustrations ae hand-drawn as far as I can tell, and certainly hand coloured

All bear more than a passing likeness for their model - anyone not recognise the old Britain's farmer ?

Along with his fictional characters, he also has real-life ones too!

It begs the question why he included these real-life characters and also a Harry Callaghan! 

This drawing of Geronimo is taken from a well-known photograph of him I reckon.

The binders aren't just any old binders either !

There's at least 25 character cards in each of the binlders and as some of the fictional ones have notes when they 'died', means to me that they were used at some stage in his gaming. I have some ideas of what he did with all these, which I'll get around to next week !

So that's it then for this week, I did have two quick gladiatorial games last week (lost both, but one gladiator survived the wrath of his appeal to the crowd). I also finally finished  the metal gladiator I had started in the back-end of April, before being laid up in hospital. 

Thanks for taking the time to visit, hopefully some of it was interesting and as always your comments are both welcomed and appreciated.

Spartacus, the Board Game

 About a week before I was rushed to hospital, I'd bought the board game "Spartacus, a game of Blood and Spectacle", fairly cheaply (well under £40). The game itself is based on the well-known TV series and simply oozes theme from the box artwork to the contents, with many characters instantly recognisable and just about any named character is represented. Those characters that are not in the game are, of course, represented in either of the two supplements - both of which are sadly not in production and would probably need a second mortgage to purchase.  The supplements, make provision to make the game six players and give additional cards and some figures. The photograph below shows the four figures (tokens) that come with the game and don't relate at all to their gladiatorial purpose, they're merely one for each player.

Not bad minis, l to r, a Retiarius, a Myrmillo, a Dimachaerius and a goodness knows. what

Cards for each player's Ludus, with influence track and special abilities. etc.

The arena playing area, but not where all the action takes place!

The intrigue deck of cards- all 104 of them

Other than some 'housekeeping' needs, the first phase of play is the "Intrigur" phase, were deals are made, schemes are untertaken withor without assistance and general spying and skullduggery can be undertaken. This is an important part of the game, shaping alliance and enemies etc.

The auction is the second major phase of the game and will gain greater importance as the game moves  n, when cash is everything.

The Market cards, slaves, weapons, potential gladiators all up for Auction

Rules, dice, counters (lots) and coins.

The last phase is the Arena phase, bidding to host the games, invite gladiators etc. all with the intention of gaining influence over the others.

Turn Summary card

So how does it play out ? Well, I  don't know, the chance of getting four willing participants is currently not on the horizon, but I can sit in hope - and the game does look good !

 Well that's it for another week where I probably pushed myself far too much and regretted it very quickly so this week I'm taking it far easier.

Thanks for taking the time to visit, hopefully there was something of interest and as always your comments are welcomed and truly appreciated.

To the Death ? (-Not Quite)

 After a few days doing some important sitting , resting and recuperation and very little else I had three friends around to help me play-test version 1.3 of Frank Sultan's gladiator combat game Blood on the Sands. .Luckily, given the chance to playtest these rules.I've managed to have six friends give their all in several games  - all of which (even given the many mistakes we made) were very enjoyable affairs.

So this week I had one of my two original playtesters and a husband and wife that had never played before.

As we explained how to play the game, we all rolled six characters to facilitate the start of an attempt at a campaign.

My longtime tester, Bilius (not his real name) andmyself were to play the first game, as a learning experience for the two Tyros (newbs).

My Thraex (in the foreground of the photograph on the right) was randomly drawn against Bilius' Hoplomachus. 

The fact that I only took one photograph of this bout and nearly two dozen of the second bout speaks volumes of the two fights.

My bout lasted about four to six turns, I think I may have scratched my opponent, whilst he laid into my Thraex, giving him a deep cut to an arm and then another wound to the same arm, ending the match. My Thraex managed his appeal to the crowd.

Three hexes apart at the start

The second fight saw a Retiarius (played by Benoic's  wife - not his real name) because she liked the model (?), using a net and trident This left Benoic playing the part of chaser - a Secutor.

Each turn an initiative die is thrown, winner getting the hoice tto move first or second, The Retiarius had the trait 'cunning' meaning he added '1' to his initiative roll, but in reality it meant Benoic's Secutor won the intiative twice over the course of about two dozen turns.

Once initiative dice are rolled, six Action Dice (all d6s) determine whether you move (a '1'), attack (a '4') or make a special attack (a '5'). Spec and attacks ial attacks are what they say, they give different advantages.

The retiarius; weapon is a Trident, good for defending and attacking at distance (like the Hoplomachus' spear above).

Given the starting distance between the two gladiators at the start of this match the retiarius could strike with his trident or throw his net without moving (and given the right action dice).

Here's the photographic evidence of the debacle that followed:

A successful net throw, followed up by a quick attack...

...and the secutor is driven back (most attacks make a defender withdraw

One of the few attacks the Secutor landed, knocking the Retiarius over

In no time, back on his feet, the Retiarius makes the Secutor drop his shield

The retiarius has backed off, the Secutor is booed for not landing a blow!

The Retiarius attack once more, occupying the Secortor's shield hex

Once more, the Secutor is forced back again

It was about this time in the match that a deep wound was inflicted on the Secutor, the effect of which would speed up his fatigue level until he eventually dropped. - Time was definetly against the Secutor.

No matter how hard he tried the Secutor, couldn't land a blow !

The Retiarius is disarmed, but quickly draws his back-up weapon, a pugio (a knife)

Toe to toe and still no blood !

(obligatory blurred photograph)

Dance aound the Trident

The Secutor, not giving up as he bleeds out

The Retiarius, despite the presenceof his opponent picks his Trident up...

...and backs off, the Secutor has three fatigue points left and is losing two a turn!

His next (and last) Action dice roll - no movement possible 

The Retiarius gives the initiative to the Secutor, whom given the roll above can't make any headway towards his opponent. At this stage of the game, he is still covered in the Retiarius' net (he needed a Six to remove it and hadn;t thrown more than one other since the start. It may have been a tactic to lose an action die for being entangled and thereby not allowing the retiarius the use of his net!

The final turn and the Secutor drops of exhaustion.

Benoics appeal to the crowdu is successful even given his two disfavour token and much hilarity ensue as one spouse berated the other!  The biout took aout an hour and a half (some of which was due to the two particpants having never played before), but was well worth it imo.

I'm hopefully playing again this week, with the same ecellent company and I'll let you know the outcome next week.

That's it though for another week; thanks for taking the itme to visit and as always your comments are both welcomed and appreciated.