This and that

There has been some movement in the wargaming room since Easter, including some painting, which has been a welcome development. The day job's intensity has recently risen and as a way to declutter the mind before sleep my better half suggested I paint some of those figures taking up space in all the nooks and crannies of the house. Very thoughtful of her!

Mind you, this painting did not happen immediately. First I had to reorganise my storage by buying stackable plastic containers. One for figures primed in bags, one for figures primed and on temporary bases, one for figures half done, one for all the elephants I bought late one night from Potbelly Miniatures, and so on.

I then had a 'some of these boardgames on the shelves should really be played' fit and after a week of picking boxes up and then putting them down I finally settled on GMT's Fields of Fire. It was the third time I have set out to learn this highly-regarded solitaire system. Over the next week or so I spent about ten hours on it before packing it up and putting it away again. The third time was not the charm.

Alongside this I watched the entire series of the Japanese anime Attack on Titan. Also at the instigation of my wife. She is a fan of the series (as are two of my children) and convinced me to watch an English subtitled version through Crunchyroll. This took us about four weeks. Anime's not my usual sort of thing but it grabbed the interest and it's always a plus to have something to watch with the beloved. 

And so, by roundabout ways, and having exhausted all other options, I came at last to painting. 

It has been quite good. The figures are Xyston Theban hoplites that any other right-thinking ancients enthusiast would have finished ten years ago, but which I have not. Helping me through are podcasts on Napoleon. I'm not quite sure why Napoleon became the subject, but he has done the job. 

I'm on the home stretch with this batch of figures and was planning to get another couple of hours in last night, but got distracted by a link to an Armchair Dragoons review of the Phil Sabin introductory wargame Take That Hill. Originally found in the Simulating War book, this game has now been spruced up and printed by Fight Club International. It is free to download and print from the website. The target audience is people who have not played wargames before, especially those in the armed forces or defence industry. 

Also linked there is a Connections Online webinar on the game presented by Phil and three other affiliated persons, which I started watching and couldn't stop. If you are interested in Phil Sabin's designs and design philosophy at all it is worth a look.

The simplicity of Take That Hill is certainly in contrast to the fiddliness of Fields of Fire.

Anyway, time to go back to the painting desk. It's been six months since I last finished off some figures. If I keep going at this rate the unpainted lead will outlast me!

Notions of (Phil Sabin's) Empire

Faced tonight with a sudden hankering to play a game, I trotted downstairs, surveyed the shelves, and settled upon Phil Sabin's Empire. As something that takes an epic subject, could be set up without too much rules review and can be got through in an hour, it was the obvious choice.

Covering the period 350-150 BC, the game takes in the Mediterranean world (stretching as far east as India) and its Persian, Macedonian, Carthaginian and Roman inhabitants. Each of the twenty game turns starts with a rebellion roll which turns one occupied territory neutral, and then the four powers get to take a turn attempting to expand. Usually a power gets one attack per turn, but in a great captain turn they will get five (so they best make the most of it).

There is not a lot to the game tactically: you are pretty much at the mercy of the dice. To successfully conquer a territory on Empire's point-to-point game map a power needs to roll 4 or better on a d6. There are modifiers at play, and with certain territories worth more for victory point purposes, it is usually clear what the best attack is, and then you have to hope the die (or dice when attacking across a sea route) will cooperate.

It's all very straightforward - even bearing in mind a couple of special rules - and with two victory turns (VPs are counted on turns ten and twenty), everyone knows what they are aiming at.

Opening situation: Carthage blue (3 territories), Rome red (1 territory), Macedon yellow (1 territory) Persia green (8 territories).

In our game Macedonia started gloriously, winning Graecia on turn one and then watching Alexander wreak absolute havoc on turns two and three, wiping out the Persians and being on the doorsteps of both India and Aegyptus.

Alexander's conquests.

Neither Carthage nor Rome could make much headway in the first century of play, but Persia / Parthia reclaimed its homeland just before the first victory turn was up, and with both Carthage and Persia receiving handicap assistance, the scores at 250 BC were recorded as Rome 5, Macedon 13, Persia 14 and Carthage 16.

Carthage and Rome squabbled over Gallia until Hannibal's entrance saw Rome's influence temporarily squashed. Two turns of great captains for Rome began promisingly, but perverse sea assault rolls and some untimely revolts meant Roman expansion was stopped at Sicily, Iberia and Macedonia. 

All game Alexander's successors held on grimly to his conquests in Asia, but the Parthians (the Persian replacements) began to reclaim some of the eastern territories. 

Parthians reconquer some of the ancestral homelands.

Carthage and Rome continued to squabble ineffectually over Iberia, and at game end, the points were tallied thus: Rome 12, Persia / Parthia 20, and Carthage and Macedon tied for first place on 21. 

Board at game end, 150BC.

It was a nice little historical interlude, and left me with one or two ideas for future play.

New Phil Sabin Website

Since Phil Sabin (of Lost Battles and Simulating War fame) retired from Kings College, he has not had a web presence to disseminate his games. He has however just announced one now: the page, Philip Sabin's Wargame Designs, is here. Interestingly, Phil states that he has been "designing ‘total conversions’ which build on the components and data from existing games to give owners of those games a different dimension to explore."

More information is on the website of course, so please check it out if you are interested in accessing Phil's designs. It is good to see him back with a web presence again.