The other day, I decided it was time to get a suitably old school ground cloth form my fantasy figures. A few moments on the web, and a few days wait, and voila - a 36" square piece of felt in "sand".
Of course, I couldn't wait for the folds to work themselves out of the felt. Instead, I shoved the clutter that had piled up on the folding table out of my way and set up a game. With 36" width, 9-12 element armies sounded reasonable. I used a deck of cards to determine army composition.
I randomly rolled Scenario 2 from One Hour Wargames - it's not one of my favorites, but I really just wanted to push figures around on the new felt.
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| The foliage has no effect other than aesthetic. |
The lizard army, who I've renamed the Tolokok, had:
- 4 units of Warband (they use the OHW Dark Age warband rules)
- 1 unit of Skirmishers (OHW Ancients skirmisher)
- 3 units of Archers (OHW Ancients archers)
- 1 Beast
- 1 Hero
The Tanitians fielded:
- 2 units of Heavy Infantry (OHW Ancients infantry)
- 4 units of Skirmishers (OHW Ancients skirmisher)
- 1 Beast
- 2 Heroes
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| Heroes and Beasts both get bonuses on their attacks and 1/2 damage received. So, it's not as unbalanced as this looks. |
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| A hero and two Heavy Infantry units dominated the lizard beast and warbands |
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| Small but mighty. He would slay the beast. |
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| The Tantians pushed their heavy infantry to take the hill while the skirmishers were left to hold the crossroads. Meanwhile the lizard skirmishers and remaining archers attacked the crossroads. When the battle ended, the Tanitians held the hill and the Tokolok held the crossroads. A tie. |
Random unit generation makes for interesting games.
ReplyDeleteIt does indeed. It works less well, I suppose, for competitive gamers, but as I play solo and am more interested in the emergent story, it's not an issue.
DeleteLooks like it was a lot of fun - the larger armies are a nice idea
ReplyDeleteThanks, Maudlin Jack! Despite my "meh"-ness towards the scenario, it was a fun game that came down to the last turns. The larger armies tend to result in more units left on the table at game's end, which I find my brain prefers.
DeleteHaving fought OHW games down to almost the last man I have to agree
DeleteLooks good to me! New cloth passes muster and the bases work well with it!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Ross! The felt is a *little* thinner than I'd like - in the right light, you can see a touch of the black surface beneath. I think I may take advantage of that and put a brown felt beneath it.
DeleteThe ground cloth looks great John, a solid investment! The game was exciting to the end, you can't ask for more than that!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Brad!
DeleteCloths are great for cheap battle mats. Besides when folded they takes up less space than a thicker battle mat.
ReplyDeleteI've also used a sand-colored cloth for my games, and I dabbed some cheap craft acrylics with a sponge to add some variety to it.
Thanks, Roger! I was thinking of maybe hitting it with some darker sand color paint that I have. Need to pick up some sponges!
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