Irregular Wars Wargaming

One of the many, many , things that annoy me, is the appropriation of archaeological terms for new-age, self-help uitschot. The example in question - the so-called palaeo-diet - this strange premise that if we eat as our distant hunter-gatherer ancestors ate, we will live the full lives that they did.  That is to say:  having to kill stuff with your bare hands to live,  no penicillin, high infant mortality, poor life expectancy, spending every spare moment you have crafting tools to eek out your meagre existence,  competition with numerous dangerous creatures for scarce resources,  living constantly on the move as dictated by the weather and said scarce resources,  the constant fear that you have annoyed the sun and it will decide not to rise in the morning... Don't get me wrong, I have nothing but respect for our pre-pottery, pre-agriculture, pre-google ancestors; I just don't particularly want to live the life they had to in the name of a q...

It's been a little while since there has been an Irregular Wars post, but here are a couple of mid-game shots sent to me by Simon. The forces are Cossacks vs Koryaks, using Shahid Dadabhoy's Siberian campaign army lists. Shahid's lists are up on the Mick Yarrow website, where there are also appropriate 15mm ranges.

Along with my Flytrap Factory hunters, I picked up a small herd of mammoths. These mega grazers come in at about 45mm to the hump, just right for the diminutive hunters. In the recent Flytrap Factory Kickstarter they also released a larger mammoth model, to whom these guys could be calves I guess. Here is the herd together, along with a hunter for relative scale. They'll make a great wee feast some day ... and on that note, I wish everyone a merry Christmas and a happy festive season!

Having only recently received my first order from Flytrap Factory , I forged ahead over the last week and painted up my first tribe of prehistoric hunters. Here they are on the glacial landscape of Black Mountain, ready to follow the migrating herds and hunt some mammoth. Bought on a whim, the tribe has already been used in some games of Tusk , and will certainly see use as a Song of Blades and Heroes warband, supported by a mammoth no doubt. Also, because I am an inveterated dabbler and tinkerer, I have started to play around with co-operative hunting rules of my own... I decided that this chap was clearly the head honcho. After all, he's shown explaining some notion to his tribe and he is wearing a tiger skin... This grizzled cavie makes a good second. The sculptor was clearly channeling both Ernest Hemingway and my father when he created this chap. The fire-bearer started life as another spearman, but after a little chopping and some flame sculpting by my mate...

Phase one of my French Indian War project is now finished up. I hope to get a few games of Song of Drums and Tomahawks and Sharp Practice 2  with these chaps in the new year and then get another 16 fusiliers to bring me up to a full force for SP2 . The redcoats are panted up to be from what would have been my local regiment, the 27th Inniskilling Fusiliers. In this uniform they served against the Jacobite uprising (1745-46) and against the French and Spanish in North America and the Caribbean from 1756-1767. They later returned to the colonies to take on the rebels during the American Revolution. Also featured are half a dozen civilians - one with a long barreled hunting rifle - and the dozen Mohawk whom I have shown previously.

The murmillo, Lycus, shifted his grip on the gladius as the humidity of the afternoon made his palms slick with sweat. So far, the bout had gone all his way. His opponent, Satyrus, was new to the arena, unsure of his own abilities, hampered by unfamiliar surroundings and the claustrophobic intensity of a thraex’s elaborate helm in the full heat of the sun. Nevertheless, he moved fast, that thraex. The razor-sharp edge of his wicked, curved, blade had come close lacerating Lycus’ shining torso a number of times. Only the murmillo’s months of drill had allowed him to bring around his mighty shield just in time to save his skin. A lucky jab had allowed Lycus to draw the first blood of the bout. Satyrus was bleeding, but was not so hurt that it would greatly impact the rest of the fight. The crowd were roaring now – cheering Lycus on to continue his attack, driving him, compelling him to stay on the offensive. How long would he be able to keep it up though? How long before Satyr...

I had my first game using Wessex Games' mammoth hunting rules  Tusk  this week, or rather, the wee lad played his first ever wargame this week - he played Tusk with me attempting to guide the game. The game has great potential, and was (almost) easy enough for an (almost) six year old to follow without too much trouble. However... I'm not convinced that the layout of the pdf version of the rules (from Wargame Vault) does the game any favours. There are certainly a few areas that could be written more clearly - the whole fire section for instance. I'm not sure we 'did' fire properly in our game and ended up with quite a conflagration in one corner of the board for a while. I'm honestly not sure whether a single page QRS would solve the few issues, or if it is best just to play house rules/understandings. Having a little bit of experience crafting rules now, it was a struggle to stop my mind racing off thinking about how I might do things differently... ...