Friday 24 July 2020

Battle of Hastings - Caldbec Hill 1066

This is my 3rd refight on Caldbec hill, rather than Senlac hill. The terrain in my opinion fits the descriptions of the battle better from the books I've read. The 1st battle didn't come to a conclusion due to time. The 2nd battle resulted in a Norman defeat, but I realised that I had read the army lists wrongs and given the Anglo Saxons too many archers. So the opposite occurred to what I expected, with the Anglo Saxons wearing done the Normans before the assault went in. I'd also made the Flemish division too weak.

The 3rd battle was to be a solo game to keep my sanity during the COVID19 lock down. The forces were balanced and my earlier errors corrected,

The battle field:
Normans to the left and Anglo Saxons to the rights on the hill defending the London road.

Gyrths' skirmishers
Gyrths' wing with Danish mercenaries in the second line on the right, supporting Gebir light infantry.
Gyrth and Leofwine's wings were made up of 1x Thegn, 3 x Ceorls, 1 x Gebir and 2 small javelin skirmishers. Harold was the same with the addition of Huscarls and a small unit of archers. The Thegns had the phalanx rule, and I used the rule to uplift a Ceorl unit to Thegn until shaken.
Harold's centre division, with himself under the hoar apple tree.

Leofwines' wing
The Franco Flemish, made up of 2 x Heavy infantry, 2 x small Knights and 1 unit of archers. They are supported here by another unit of archers from Williams battle.
Williams' centre, made up of 4 x heavy infantry and 2 x small heavy infantry, plus 3 x mounted knights.
Another view of Leofwines' troops
 The Bretons were made up of 2 x heavy infantry and 1 x small heavy infantry, plus archers and 1 x mounted knights and 1 x small mounted knights. 

Bretons on the right and view down Williams' 3 lines. In front of the Bretons is a unit of medium archers from Williams' battle.
Leofwine
Harold
William and Odo


Gyrth above, and below Harold wins the initiative!


Friday 17 April 2020

Solo, Rogue One, Rebels, First Order and Resistance



X Wing ships from Rebels, figures sort of related to the cartoon from by childhood collection






Armada ships that appeared in Rebels

Not sure any of these characters appeared in the cartoon but they remind me of ones that did.



Scum and villainy from the films, cartoons and books

The converted storm trooper was my Dad's attempt at Boba Fett to make sure I wasn't disappointed one Christmas. Now the figure reminds of the Mandalorian


Mix of everything 



Great knees. Force Awakens trilogy on the left

Last Millennium Falcon in Rise of Skywalker look to the left of the Falcon from Solo 

I will tidy up the wires, and Rogue one X Wings ships on the right

Tuesday 14 April 2020

The Star Wars collection

I decided to merge my X Wing and Armada collection with my childhood Star Wars figures and display them by film. It's not till I got all the toys out do you realise how much I have.

I have some of the old toy vehicles and ships but there is definitely no room for them when I dig them out of the loft!