Test of Honour Rogues and Ruffians v Samurai

The first game of ToH saw my Rogues and Ruffians take on Simon's Samurai in a small scenario as we were learning the rules.

The opponents move forward by the Tori gate:

The Widow runs forward and in a whirl of blades cuts down the Samurai hero!

Barely pausing for breath she finishes off another Samurai:

The Brute is assailed by Ashigaru:

The rabble take the Brute out:

The Widow, Traveller and Paymaster move up to punish the upstart Ashigaru:

The fight rages on:

The Widow faces up to the last Samurai standing:

Initially she gets the better of the fight:

The Samurai rallies however and cuts her down:

With only a couple of wounded men left the Rogues conceded (the Archer, Drunkard and Witch had been taken out by fire from the Samurai Ashigaru).

Great fun, fairly easy to learn the basics but I suspect with hidden depths especially as we didn't use the honour/dishonour or quest cards and probably didn't make full use of the skills cards.

Next time we play Simon should have his own Samurai painted up and we will probably start a campaign off.

Test of Honour Factions

The first lot of figures I bought for Test of Honour were from Perry Miniatures. I thought they looked nice and painted up a standard Samurai faction.

Hero, Companions and Ashigaru Spearmen:

Ashigaru Archers and Musketeers:

I must admit to being a bit disappointed with these, they don't look great I think and in the end I just quickly finished them off to use them.

Next I got some of the actual ToH miniatures, the 'Rogues and Ruffians' box. Considerably more expensive than the Perry figures but given that you don't need that many figures not that bad (I'd certainly not build an army out of them!).

The 'Widow', the 'Wanderer', the 'Witch' and the 'Bruiser':

The 'Drunkard', the 'Archer', the 'Paymaster' and the 'Signaller':

These are great figures and unlike the Perry ones I'm very pleased with them, they have a lot of character and some fun specific rules for each one. Definitely worth the extra cost!

Finally a few villagers to populate the table, these are from Perry as well:

Enough for a game completed now. I have the ToH Sohei Monks and a generic Samurai box to paint, again while expensive they are really nice figures and should look good when finished.

 

Test of Honour Scenery

Having been inspired by Bill's Samurai game at the Norfolk club I thought I'd invest in some scenery and figures for 'Test of Honour' Originally it was only going to be a few figures and maybe a building or two but then it seems to have expanded somewhat!

A house from Blotz, these are really nice models that come together well and are easy to paint:

Another Blotz house:

A small roadside shrine, again from Blotz:

Two market stalls from Sarissa:

A rice store, again Sarissa:

A small wooden bridge, I think this was Sarissa as well:

A Tori gate from Blotz:

A small thatched house from Sarissa:

A larger version of the thatched house:

I think these came together well and look better than a lot of MDF buildings, which of course encouraged me to buy more! Test of Honour only uses a 3x3 table so that's probably enough buildings, I'm looking to add a few things like a walled Zen garden, a Koi pond and perhaps some walls to the collection. I already have some paddy fields and bamboo patches from my Vietnam stuff I can use as well.

Cold War Commander Warsaw Pact v Chinese

Having become disillusioned with his Americans refusal to obey his orders Simon invested in a Chinese army to rival my 'quantity has a quality all of it's own' Soviets!

For their first run-out we went for the 'Diversionary Attack' where the attacking Chinese have 3000 points, the defending Soviets have 2000 points split into three groups, 1000 points on table and two 500 point reinforcement groups. For a major win the Chinese have to force the Soviets to deploy both reinforcement groups, for a minor win (for both sides!) one group and for a Soviet win none at all in 8 turns.

Looking at what 1000 points gets you this looked like a hard task indeed. I opted for 8 of my trusty BMP-1's with attached infantry for the main force and two groups of reinforcements each 2 T72's and 4 conscript infantry. The only plan I could think of was to hide as far back as possible and hope to not get destroyed quickly.

The view from the Soviet position, all units are concealed in woods or villages:

The Chinese hordes appear. Simon seems to have mainly gone for tanks which is bad news for the BMP-1's. The enclosed areas are minefields which I hope will slow them down:

The Chinese seem keener to obey orders than the Americans we usually face and push forward rapidly:

The BMP-1's are outnumbered and outclassed:

Assailed on two sides the first two BMP-1's are taken out:

The other two don't last much longer:

The infantry in the forest suspect that they will be next:

The Chinese move on to the next village defended by the BMP-1's. This time the BMP-1's manage to get off some shots:

Three Chinese tanks are suppressed which isn't a bad result all things considered:

Unfortunately they recover and take out two BMP-1's:

Chinese APC's and tanks prepare to assault the woods:

The remaining BMP-1's get off a few more shots to little effect:

Only a single BMP-1 survives plus the commander:

Chinese tanks are everywhere! The Soviets are being overrun:

Surrounded and faced with massive firepower the infantry in the woods are slaughtered:

The lone BMP-1 in the village is still fighting though:

Chinese infantry decant and prepare to rush the woods:

The one remaining Soviet infantry unit yells 'Huzzah!' and assaults the Chinese for the Motherland:

The last BMP-1 is destroyed:

There is no one left in the woods either:

The Soviets have been forced to deploy their first lot of reinforcements. T72's are effective but heavily outnumbered. However, there is only one turn left for the Soviets to survive or the Chinese to gain a major victory:

The only survivors of the initial force hang on in the forest to the right of the village. All the reinforcement conscripts can do is hide in the woods:

The T72's are under heavy pressure:

Just in time the Chinese finish off the remnants of the initial Soviet force giving them a major victory on the last turn:

Much more exciting than I thought it would be with the Soviets almost but not quite holding out. Simon's Chinese were far more numerous and better behaved than his Americans with only one group failing to get into the fight I think.

On reflection I feel my force composition was poor, the BMP-1's are great when supported by tanks but poor alone against tanks. My deployment also left units isolated allowing Simon to pick them off one at a time which didn't help. 

Probably I'd have been better off picking hordes of conscript infantry, stuffing the woods and villages with them and just challenging Simon to kill enough in 8 turns while doing absolutely nothing myself but of course that would have been a dull game for both of us!

The other option might have been to start with just six T72's and hope that by using manoeuvre to pick on one part of the Chinese army and actually destroying units I might have been able to hold out, while I'd only have had 6 tanks they would have been much harder to destroy.

Still greatly enjoying Cold War Commander and looking forward to the next encounter!

Bag the Hun USN v IJN

Jerry and I continued our efforts to become more proficient at Bag the Hun with another Pacific set game. This time I had the USN with 6 Wildcats escorting 3 Devastator torpedo bombers attacking a Japanese battleship. Jerry had 6 defending Zero's.

The American pilots head for the battleship:

Zero's move to intercept:

The Wildcats attempt to head off the Zero's:

More Zero's appear:

The Zero's close with the Devastators:

Planes whirl in all directions:

One Devastator is forced to ditch in the sea, luckily the crew survive:

The other two Devastators though manage to get their torpedoes away!

A Wildcat tails a Zero and shoots it down:

Wildcats and Zero's melee:

Another Zero goes down:

Flak from the battleship downs another Devastator. The crew are not so lucky and don't survive:

One torpedo hits the Japanese battleship! Disaster occurs though as it turns out to be a dud:

Another Zero is shot down:

The fight begins to break up with planes on both sides heading for home:

The Americans manage to catch one last Zero taking their score to 4 with 2 Devastators lost:

We are gradually getting the hang of BtH and adding in the torpedo attack certainly made it more interesting, I was really pleased to launch the torpedoes and really disappointed when one hit and failed to explode!

The rules are very comprehensive and not actually that complicated but there is a lot to remember and again I'm sure we missed a few things. The campaign system looks great fun but unfortunately I'm not sure we will have the time to play one, perhaps something for the future!