Saga going German !

Some ground-breaking news at least for the German readers:

The official English Saga Cover.

The Saga ruleset will be published in German very soon !

Mirco Wenning from Stronghold Terrain took the challenge to realize is project and is currently reaching the finish straight. Last weekend on Tactica he spread the excellent news for the first time and since then he's taking pre-orders.The release is in the pipeline and will happen in late March or early April.
The book includes the basic rules with all current additions and errata as well as rules for swords for hire and battleboards for Normans, Vikings, Welsh and Anglo-Danes. Additionally it will be a high quality hardcover rather then a paperback and Mirco included a lot of new (better) photos. The preview prints which he presented in Hamburg were absolutely gorgeous, so I ordered my copy of it right away. The first 200 purchasers will receive an exclusively designed Viking warlord which you can acquire with the pre-order deal only.

The pre-order Viking warlord.

Anyway the book seems to be fairly prized with 32.90 € and in case of success Stronghold will have the supplements published very soon. If you're interested in a more detailed preview, then have a look at Mircos and Elmars Stronghold Terrain shop here (German) or at the corresponding threat in the Sweetwater forum (German as well). 

By the way the boys make excellent houses and other terrain pieces so their shop is worth a look anyway. Especially their kits for medieval and Dark Ages houses are just awesome and closely based on historical examples found in German outdoor museums. Mirco and Elmar are extremely nice people to deal with, offer fair shipping rates and are always helpful if you need some advice concerning their models. So don't hesitate to have a look at their website or their hobby blog if your interested in Dark Ages or simply well-built terrain pieces in general.

Stronghold's excellent Dark Ages cottage which I proudly own by myself. Just my paintjob will not be able to cope with Mirco's gifted work.

 All three pictures above are from Stronghold Terrain and I used them with their kind permission.

Painting Table Saturday #17

Actually I'm rarely painting on Saturdays. Most of them I enjoy with my family and spend some time with our daughter or unburden dear Mrs Monty. In the evening most of the time we're having dates with friends of our living away.

Anyway today I got the chance to spent some time between leaden men and painting pots so I proudly present my first post to this group. This evening on the painting table.... Gripping Beast Vikings for SAGA !

These are eight Viking warriors for my SAGA warband and another eight to be primed soon. Lately I recognized how fast these guys can be painted so they might serve as a little boost for the finishing straight of Curt's painting challenge...

Have a nice Sunday !

Death of Colonel Christian von Ompteda

Last week the next deadline on Curt's painting challenge occured: Casualties.

There are many excellent entries and I cannot encourage you enough to have a look at the dedicated website. My entry was...

The Death of Colonel Christian von Ompteda at Waterloo

Christian Friedrich Wilhelm Freiherr von Ompteda was a Hanoverian officer who served as brigade commander during the battle of Waterloo. He was born in Ahlden an der Alster in Lower Saxonia. After becoming a lieutenant of the Hanoverian foot guards he was badly wounded during the French Revolutionary Wars. When Hannover's army was dissolved after the Convention of Artlenburg he emigrated to England and was one of the first to join the King's German Legion. During the following years Von Ompteda served in several campaigns in Denmark, Spain and France. In 1815 he was colonel and commander of the 2nd Brigade KGL in Charles von Alten's 3rd Infantry Division at Waterloo. He found his heroic death during a daring but desperate attack in line formation with the 5th KGL Line Battalion by the order of the questionable Prince of Orange.

Allessandro Barbero describes Ompteda's final moments as follows in his excellent re-narration of the battle of Waterloo:

"Suddenly, the order came to deploy in line and advance at a walk; when his men were some sixty yards away from the enemy, Ompteda had the bugler sound the charge and urged his horse into the midst of the thick line of French skirmishers. The tirailleurs scattered. [...] Colonel von Ompteda was encircled by enemy infantry, and the French officers, amazed by his courage, shouted to their men to take him alive; but Ompteda, who was by then [...] beside himself, started aiming sabre-strokes at the heads of the men surrounding him, and someone lost patience. When lieutenant Weatherly regained consciousness, the colonel lay dead two steps away from him, with his mouth open and a hole in his throat."

(Allessandro Barbero "The Battle", pp. 312 - 313)

I was deeply impressed when I read those lines for the first time and they inspired me for this vignette. It shall represent the fallen colonel dragged away from his fallen horse by a comrade from the 5th Line Battalion KGL. Maybe the scene differs slightly from Barbero’s portrayal but I wanted to have it a bit vivid and the Perrys offer such an amazing British officer casualty. Actually all the figures are from Perry miniatures. Three from the British Napoleonic casualties set and a slightly converted horse which I found on a rummage table at Crisis last year. 

As usual I painted the figures with Vallejo Model Colours and employed different types of foliage, static grass and modelling flowers to add some fauna to the scene. As a little trick I didn’t glue on the single British casualty yet because I’m thinking of replacing him by one or two Frenchmen which Ompteda killed with his final blows.

Sledge for reatreat from Moscow "1812 - White Death"

As one of the final piece for our participation game at Tactica convention in Hamburg I assembled and painted a sledge. It shall represent a sledge which the Grande Armée seized during their retreat from Moscow in 1812. It’s drawn by a single horse and provides enough space for three or four soldiers or some goods. I decided to put a single French soldier in the sledge who is defending its load against some marauding Cossacks. Luckily he has a second loaded musket at his side…

The sledge model itself is a kit from small but excellent Westfalia Miniatures. Kawe and his fellows offer awesome and unique kits and figures for French, British, Russian and Saxon Napoleonic miniatures as well as some fine vehicle kits. The soldier on the coachman’s seat is a conversion from a Victrix plastic Old Guard grenadier. I removed the epaulettes and changed the had to have him represent a simple soldier from a line infantry regiment. The barrels are actually two halves of a Renedra plastic barrel and the blankets are made of soaked tissues. For painting I used Vallejo model colours as usual and prepared the base with corundum sand, some snow covered grass tufts by Mininatur and some cork bits as rocks. I tried to plough the centre of the base a bit to represent the snow well-trodden by the horse.

As special feature I left the load of the sledge unglued and mounted it on a thin base itself. For the future I’m planning to make some substitute loads: wounded French, seated officers or just goods.

Fortunately at Tactica the sledge performed very well. He was part of the retreat column which played a major roll in the scenario I directed during the convention. I didn't finish looking through all the pictures now but during the next days I'll show you some impressions from this nice event.

1812 - White Death on Tactica 2014

Only two days to go... From Friday to Sunday Tactica 2014 takes place in Hamburg at the Wilhelmsdorf Community Centre. It's Germany's largest wargaming fair and there are gathering a lot of clubs, traders and authors from all over country and from our neighbours. Unfortunately the British wargaming society and edpecilly the traders are a bit underrepresented but at least Dave Thomas, Wargames Foundry and Magister  Militum do themselves the honour of appearing. In addition the Perry twins will visit Tactica for the second time after 2013. They'll bring an excellent and exclusive miniatures of Saladin which can only be bought at the event.

More about Tactica on their homepage here.

Anyway our club keeps to the old tradition of presenting a game at Tactica. This year we'll proudly bring a game with us which some guys from the club developed:

White Death is set in Russia 1812. Napoleon failed to overcome Russia and is forced to retreat from the burning city of Moscow. His Grande Armée turned into a ragged crowd of vagabonds seeking their way home. Chased by Russian troops, starving, freezing and at the end of their tether they try to survive Russia's merciless winter, marauding cossacks and other perils...

For this background we created a skirmish game which makes those dangers graspable. It's designed for up to four players and a Game Master. It's his function to direct the scenario and guide the players through the story of the game. White Death has a lot of narrative elements rather known from roleplaying games. It's rather a cooperative game of the players against the game itself than against the Game Master.

After one and a half years of development, pondering, testing and editing we finished a presentable version of the rules. For the Tactica event we prepared around 50 character cards, 150 counters and about 100 playing cards in German and English. Additionally of course all the stuff needed for the gaming boards: Board tiles, figures, buildings, scenery stuff all covered with snow. But most notably we prepared a leaflet to deliver a impression of the game.

In Hamburg we'll be able to offer two scenarios simultaneously for up to three players each. Bernhard the intellectual father of the game and me will serve as Game Masters and several other guys of the club will be there to talk and play with interested visitors.

We hope for many interested wargamers. I any case you'll see a unique board and a unique way of wargaming there.

For further information about White Death or our wargaming club please have a look at the homepage of the Team for historical simulations, the special White Death subcategory, the threat in the Lead Adventure Forum or the related articles here on Monty's Caravan.

See you at Tactica !