Reading list for the cruise

 

Blog will go quiet again as the wife and I sail on the Carnival Mardis Gras for the first time. We cruise a lot, one of the advantages of having an empty nest, and will be spending a lot of that time in the steam room. (If you are a burglar, our kids will be house sitting for us, and my son in law has a Taurus Judge so good luck with that. Unless you are a Hobbit burglar, in which case have at it) 

I am trying to focus my reading for the trip, so will finish 1 fiction and 1 non-fiction work while we are gone.

I will be reading:

The Vikings and Their Enemies: Warfare in Northern Europe 750 - 1100

I am about 25% the way through already, but it is fascinating, and well written. It is a warm up for the Saxons and Vikings I am slowly painting up for my home brewed One Hour Skirmish Wargames Dark Age variant.

I will also finish:

Durandal or a Crusader with the Horde

I read an old paperback copy of Harold Lamb's history of the Crusades when I was 11, and it stoked my love of history even more.  He was a great writer and this is a rollicking story with wonderful historical detail. 

Good gaming to everyone until my return, when I suspect I will pick up OHSW again. 

Making Plans again...

Every few years I go through a cycle of:
A) Selling off a bunch of incomplete projects and simplifying and
B) Then slow accumulating more incomplete projects

Not the first time I have done this, and never successfully, but I am going to try to make a plan.

I have bags of 6mm figures for a 10th / 11th Century project for the Normans in Italy and 1066-ish in Britain (those Normans were everywhere!) Plus some Orcs so I can lure my wife into playing a Lord of the Rings themed game.

My basing scheme is everything goes on an 80mm x 40mm base, except light infantry which gets an 80mm x 20mm base.   I am using Niel Thomas's Ancient and Medieval Wargaming lists as a base for my forces.  This will give an army of 8 bases, which feels like a good size for my playing area and the size of the game I want to play.

Rules will probably be modified One Hour Wargames, but I need to get cracking on the painting.

So, I have made a table where I can track my overall progress

As I finish a base, I will be marking them off in gray.

A couple of points:

• This should allow me to do any combination from the army lists
• Why so many Normans? Well, Normans also had a habit of fighting amongst themselves
• All figures are from Baccus Codes, with some exceptions:
• Byzantines are a combination of late Roman Infantry, Seljuk Lancers, Sassanid heavy Horse Archers, and Roman Cataphracts.  I borrowed the idea from Roll a One
• Orcs are from Microworld Games, I use Hobgoblins
• Lombards?  I need them to fight Byzantines, Saracens, and Normans.  I am using Goth Heavy Cavalry.  Combined with Viking and Anglo-Saxon unarmored spearmen, they should do the trick.  I am assuming they were slower to adopt the kite shield, so will let me easily distinguish them from Normans and they can serve as 9th Century Franks to fend off Viking attacks.

I am home sick today, after going to the doctor I am going to try to knock out a few units.  Let's see how long I can keep my focus!