The Kyivan Rus on the M4 road to Reading

 One of the great beauties about L'Art de la Guerre is the way the shorter game time (about 2.5 hours) means you can fit 3 games into a day. It sounds fairly minor, but a 3-round Swiss Draw tournament is just, well, a lot, lot more "meaty" than a 2-round one would be - but without imposing so many games on you that a poor army design could leave you cursing the protracted pain of facing a series of lengthy drawn out defeats either.

The recent Reading-based 1-dayer ticked all of those boxes with a theme of "the World of the Rus and Vikings" - armies with a connection to either of these peoples, in the form of a historical antipathy or conflict, a mention in the army list notes, or an allied contingent of either of the two. 

I however went full Zelensky on this one, and chose a Rus army with no allies at all, a simple list chosen mainly as it was as close as I could get to using all of the lockdown-rebased Rus spearmen I owned all on table together whilst not totally ignoring the "good" options in the overall design.

That did mean a lot of spearmen - an often-unloved troop type who are nevertheless superb in the right circumstances. And, of course, how could I forget, a chance yet again to deploy the age-old groan-inducing Rus Abbot punchline against three unwary opponents!

All three Bella Emberg-free reports from this event are now online as the Rus take on the Carolingians, the Vikings and the Thematic Byzantine Empire in these fully illustrated and statistic rich reports. 

Who's Playing What - the Post-Lockdown Edition.

 It's now been over two years since I last posted a full-year update on who was playing what on the UK Ancients  Competition scene - which is of course hardly surprising given that no-one was able to play anything face to face for much of that time, with various grades of Lockdown running from the start of 2020 until around mid-June 2021. 

Ancients competition wargaming in the UK did however stutter (or in some cases "roar") back to life again in the middle of last year, and so with over 12 months of events to look back on it's probably as good a time as any to start once again having a look at Who's Playing What. 

This set of "post-Lockdown" stats cover the UK "player universe" numbers for competition players across 7 of the most popular Ancients mass-battle rulesets for all events held in the UK in since things started up again at the end of June 2021 that I can find results for. 

Most sets now have a single, comprehensive results or rankings page and I'm therefore indebted to the various people who undertake the thankless task of maintaining these pages. I do also keep a weather eye on various forums and FB groups to make sure I also pick up any "unranked" events, and sometimes extra players who only filled in, or dropped out part way through some events as well - that's why the numbers you'll see here can sometimes be higher than those you'll see on the "official" rankings page.

I've also focused this time exclusively on UK-based players, as overseas travel has not really gotten back to normal and so relatively few overseas players have made it to the UK to play. 

To make comparisons to the pre-Lockdown era I've used the figures for the 2019 calendar year. A handful of events did manage to take place at the start of 2020, but even then attendances were impacted by the looming shadow of Covid to various degrees, so using the clean" 2019 numbers seemed a better benchmark than using Feb 2019-Feb 2020.

Even so, the calendar is still not quite settled yet with some events not yet sitting in their regular calendar slots (Campaign), and others (from last summer) still yet to happen (Britcon), and so I've tried to flag where this may have had an impact on attendance numbers in the commentary.  

So, on with the business...

Total Unique Player Numbers  (2019 calendar year in brackets)

1. ADLG      177 (180)    #1          (L'Art de la Guerre)
2. MeG         66   (62)      #2          (Mortem et Gloriam)
3. DBMM     61   (72)                   (De Bellis Magistorum Militum) 
4. DBA         55   (67)                   (De Bellis Antiquitis) 
5. DBM        40   (44)      #3         (De Bellis Multitudinum) 
6. FoGAM    35  (48)      #4          (Field of Glory Ancient & Medieval)
7. TTS!         28  (64)                    (To The Strongest!)

This shows how many different, UK-based players have taken part in an competition since Lockdown restrictions were eased in summer 2021. 

As of today ADLG enjoys a 38% market share, with almost as many players as the next 3 most widely played sets combined. This small increase in market share for ADLG (up from 35% at the end of 2019) is however largely a mathematical artefact caused by the slower recovery of numbers for several other sets post-Lockdown.

The upshot is that post-Lockdown, total player numbers across all sets still compare very favourably with the 2019 totals - and (as I'll go into in the commentary on each set) even the more notable shortfalls can usually be explained by event scheduling or other issues unrelated to any loss of enthusiasm for face to face gaming in general post-Lockdown

Notes:

# 1 I am aware of four players who played on the ADLG circuit who have sadly passed away since the start of 2019, so have excluded these players from both 2019 and current period counts.

# 2 MeG player numbers at the end of 2019 were at their lowest point that year. The peak, just after Roll Call in April had seen 70 UK-based players entering a MeG event in the previous 12 months. 

#3 One DBA player who appeared in 2019 has sadly passed away and so has been excluded from the stats

#4 FoGAM's rolling 12 month player count was also falling steadily throughout 2019, and ended the year at its lowest total, having started 2019 with 59 "active in the previous 12 months" players.

Post-Lockdown Growth trends 

This shows the relative growth rates of aggregate players numbers post-Lockdown for the various rulesets, using quarterly measurement dates. Other than for FoGAM (which has largely flattened out post Christmas) player numbers for all sets have continued on an upward curve into 2022. 

As this graph doesn't yet include any impact of players starting to "fall off" the back end of the rolling 12-month count, the next few months will tell whether these growth curves continue, or start to "top-out" for each set.

Notes:

- There are only 3 events providing data points for TTS!, hence the staggered nature of the TTS! line.
- The DBMM numbers are based on 3 data points with intervening dates extrapolated from these, as the DBMM Rankings page does not present data in a way which allows player numbers for the intervening dates to be easily extracted. 

Post-Lockdown %ages for non-returnees (non-returnees & 2019 year-end totals in brackets)

1. TTS!         67%  (48/64)
2. DBA         36%  (24/67)      #1
3. FoGAM    29%  (14/48) 
4. ADLG      29%  (51/180)     #1   
5. MeG         27%  (17/62)       
6. DBM        24%  (11/44) 
7. DBMM    23%  (17/72)

This shows how many UK-based players who appeared on each circuit in 2019 have yet to reappear post-Lockdown. Pretty much every set has seen around 1/4 - 1/3 of their 2019 roster of competition players fail to return to competition play post-Lockdown, with only TTS! an outlier to this norm. 

This level of attrittion is however only a little higher than seen previously in more "normal" year-on-year comparisons, so given these stats cover a period of two and a half years rather than the usual year-on-year view, it's not entirely surprising to see higher attrition. 

Notes

#1 Both figures exclude those players who have sadly passed away.

New players first seen post-Lockdown (entirely new - not lapsed returnees)

1. ADLG      38
2. MeG           20
3. DBA          9
4. TTS!          6
5. DBM        5
6. DBMM    1
7. FoGAM    -

A very healthy total of 79 players entered their first ever event across all rulesets post-Lockdown, suggesting that much rules-reading, army painting and online gaming had been going on when face to face gaming wasm not allowed across the UK. 

More players than usual also moved across or between rulesets in the post-Lockdown period, with ADLG faring best on this measure picking up 9 of its new players from other circuits (some of whom now actively participate in 2 parallel circuits for different Ancients rulesets). Even so, the number of players taking part in multiple circuits remains low.

Ruleset-by-Ruleset Commentary

ADLG  (L'Art de la Guerre)

ADLG has come out of Lockdown as still the most widely played ruleset with an almost unchanged number of active UK-based players compared to the end of 2019. This period also included the release of the V4 rulebook and army lists - both featuring a relatively limited set of updates, the release of which appears to have had no impact either way on player numbers. Whilst shrinkage in other rulesets player poosl means ADLG did again increase its "market share" the run of double-digit &age growth in player numbers (seen every year since its UK debut in 2015) finally came to a halt when faced with the significant hurdle of the Lockdown period.

The 39 1-day and 2-day ADLG events held so far post-Lockdown managed to top the total of 35 held in 2019, with a strong showing of 25/28mm events (10 of these took place) as well as one "100 point" reduced format competition. 6 events were "two scales, one weekend" affairs, and several weekends in the last year also saw multiple events staged in different locations, most recently where 47 players were playing at the same time at two different events held in the geographically diverse locations of Devizes and Glasgow.

This pattern continued across the year with ADLG being played in all corners of the UK, from Inverness to South Devon, Cardiff to York, Bournemouth to Glasgow, giving ADLG once again by far the widest UK geographical coverage of any comparable ruleset.

Attrition was higher than in previous years, with 51 players (27%) from 2019 yet to reappear post Lockdown. With almost half of these 51 non-returnees appearing only on the Scottish ADLG circuit in 2019 it seems likely that geography (the UK's most northerly event in Elgin has yet to take place post-Lockdown) and Scotland's longer-lasting and sometimes more stringent Covid-related restrictions on indoor gatherings may have both played a material role in the incrased level of attrition - and there has been no indication that Scotland's Ancients players have started to adopt any other ruleset in Lockdown. 

Even with this attrition, the return to the ADLG circuit of 10 players who last appeared pre-2019 (a significant difference compared to most other sets, where 'lost' players tend to stay 'lost'), and a further 38 entirely new faces saw overall numbers essentially hold steady.

No doubt also related to the disproportionate attrition amongst Scottish players the proportion of competitors who took part in just one ADLG event dropped significantly compared to 2019, down from 38% to just 23% in the post-Lockdown era - a trend seen in most other sets too, as the keener players were first to return to the tabletop.

Since the first UK ADLG event at Roll Call in April 2015, 295 different UK-based players have entered at least one competition in the UK (although 6 have since passed away), meaning that some 7 years later, 60% of all UK players ever to enter an ADLG event are still entering competitions in the last 12 months.

The most active player managed to take part in 18 events post Lockdown, with just 6 players managing to appear at 1/3 of the events on the circuit - although this rises to 14 (8%) after making allowances for the fact it is impossible (even for Dave Allen!) to play in 2 different events held on the same day. 

The sheer number of ADLG events now being organised, and the geographical spread across the entire country both work in parallel to ensure that (on this measure) the ADLG circuit continues to offer players the least repetitive mix of potential opponents at each event by quite some margin.

DBMM   (De Bellis Magistorum Militum) 

The number of UK-based DBMM competition players has yet to fully recover to pre-Covid levels, with the UK DBMM circuit a little slower to get back up and running compared to some others, running 16 events in the last year compared to the 19 that ran in 2019. Those events that have been staged have however been well attended, with Warfare in November 2021 in particular seeing the biggest DBMM attendance in recent memory by quite some margin.

This difference - in events, and in players - can pretty clearly be attributed to the non-reappearance of two of the DBMM circuits' traditionally largest events (Guilford and Campaign), neither of which have taken place (as yet) post-Lockdown. Once they both cycle back into the stats there seems no reason to think DBMM numbers should not be back to exactly where they were pre-Lockdown.

17 UK-based DBMM players attended just 1 event in the last year, not a massive change from the 21 who did so in 2019 - a little surprising as normally the one-day events in Milton Keynes and Guildford contribute many of these "one-off" players to the UK pool in prior years.

DBMM staged a mix of 15mm, 25mm and (uniquely) "6mm based on 25mm bases" events throughout the year. The calendar also included a mix of singles, doubles 1-day and 2-day events, with the 1-day smaller-format DBMM 100 event being the latest to take place.

DBMM traditionally sees a fairly low churn rate of players each year with relatively few new faces making a circuit debut, and similarly small numbers dropping off the circuit each year, and with just three new players post-Lockdown that trend has seemingly continued.

The most active DBMM player entered 13 of the 15 events - an impressive 100% attendance record given that two events stage parallel competitions for 15mm and 6mm gaming!  23 players attended 1/3 of the events staged - 38% of the player pool, with the usual DBMM hubs in the South East, Milton Keyers and the Northern League circuit all hosting events in the last year.

DBA (De Bellis Antiquitis) 

DBA has yet to see player numbers recover back up to the level seen in what was a very successful 2019 season, even though the total of 12 events staged since Lockdown ended have has matched the 12 that took place across 2019. 

The difference in player numbers  - as with ADLG and DBMM - may well be attributable in the main to geography, with only one of the regular 3 PAWS events taking place post-Lockdown as well as the Welsh Open also dropping off the DBA calendar entirely as a result of venue issues, making it harder for players from those regions to make an appearance on the circuit post-Lockdown.

18 of the 55 players took part in just one event in the last year, a notable change from 2019 when almost half of the UK pool of DBA players made just a single appearance - again supporting the theory that the loss of a few regional events has a disproportionate impact on the number of "occasional" players.  

The total number of entries made across all DBA events staged post-Lockdown (171) also compares more favourably with 2019's 189 than the reduction in player numbers might suggest, indicating that the enthusiasm of the core group of UK-based DBA players remains undimmed post-Lockdown.

All DBA events are one-day affairs, and two players managed to take part in 11 of the 12 events staged, with 16 (29%) managing to take part in 1/3 of the full calendar. 

MeG   (Mortem et Gloriam)

 The MeG circuit managed to match its pre-Covid scale in the post-Lockdown period, with 18 events (one of which ran across one weekend in 2 locations) taking place, on a par with the 18 that were staged in 2019.

MeG was the only ruleset to record an increase in overall player numbers across the last 12 months compared to the equivalent 2019 year-end figure, however this needs to be set against the 13% fall in players numbers throughout the latter half of 2019 (anecdotally attributed to players waiting for the revised hard copy rulebook and updated army lists to be released) which saw MeG ending 2019 with its lowest rolling 12-month count of active players since late 2018.

Just over a year post-Lockdown, and almost 2 years since the launch of that hard copy rulebook, MeG player numbers still remain a little short of the pre-Lockdown peak, with 20 new UK-based players and one returnee (who's only other circuit appearance was way back in 2016!) offsetting the non-reappearance of 17 players from the 2019 circuit. These in's and out's place MeG's rolling 12-month UK player count in the 60's, a level it first attained in the latter half of 2018.

Of the 17 lapsed MeG players, two have swapped to play on the MeG Renaissance circuit (launched at the start of 2022), although a further 13 current MeG players now also play in Renaissance MeG competitions as well the Ancients ones, forming the great majority of the current 19-player ReG rankings. Around half of MeG's current roster of players are recognisable as having previously taken part in the once-thriving UK FoW-circuit, so it will be interesting to see if a new circuit for WW2 MeG ("Divisions of Steel") mooted for the tail end of this year will prove equally enticing to the former tread-heads currently in the MeG ranks.

All bar one of the MeG events staged were standard "Maximus" format 15mm singles, with only a single 1-day lockdown-dodging outdoor event (which snuck into the calendar early last summer) not following this standard format. The most active MeG player on the circuit took part in an impressive 16 of the 18 MeG events staged, with 32 players turning up for at least 1/3 of the full calendar (47%). 13 UK players took part in just one event - a lower %age than that seen in 2019, in common with the trend seen for other rulesets.  

As is the case with DBMM, DBM and FoG the 18 MeG events held were in the main geographically concentrated - in MeG's case half the calendar took place at a handful of venues all within a few miles of the central stretch of the M1, with a further 4 being held in Greater Manchester.

Since the first UK MeG event held at the BHGS Challenge in June 2016, 121 different UK-based players have entered at least one competition in the UK. 55% of this all-time UK player universe remained active on the MeG circuit by attending events held in the last year.

FoGAM    (Field of Glory Ancient & Medieval)

2019 saw a significant decline in numbers on the AM circuit as those choosing not to move to V3 after playing at the start of 2018 began to drop off the rolling 12-month count of active players. Post -Lockdown that trend has continued, with those who last played FoGAM at a handful of events held at the start of 2019 now also falling out of the stats.

10 FoGAM events were held in the last year (compared with 16 in 2019), only one of which was "north of Watford" as the circuit coalesced around a hub of players mostly based on the South Coast, supplemented by others seemingly more willing to travel to play. The 35 players are however still highly committed with an average attendance at each event equivalent to almost 50% of the entire UK pool - far higher than for any other set out there.

3 players managed to take part in literally every FoG event staged, and a further 8 only missed 1 or 2 events in the year. On a similar note, only 5 players took part in just one event, again a lower %age than any comparable ruleset. 18 of the 35 players took part in more than 1 in 3 events on the circuit - the only circuit to see over half of its' players reach this bar. 

Following the introduction on FoGAM V3 in January 2018, 62 different UK-based players have entered at least one V3 competition in the UK, and 56% of these remained active in the last 12 months. 

With no new players joining the FoG circuit this year and neither of the 2 "new" V3 players from 2019 returning either, every one of the current roster of 35 UK-based FoG players was already playing FoG prior to the launch of V3.

With a "free to download" V4 mooted for later this year, and a number of FoG players now dabbling in other systems in parallel to playing FoGAM it will be interesting to see whether these numbers change either way going forward into 2023. 

TTS! (To The Strongest!)

A relative newcomer to these stats, Simon Miller's TTS! had a record-breaking year in 2019 with five events staged across the country. With only 3 events taking place in the last 12 months (one of which was TTS!'s traditional "big" summertime event at Chalgrove hastily rearranged at short notice for last Autumn, with consequent impact on attendance as a result) it is hardly surprising that the comparative stats for TTS! show a significant dropoff compared to pre-Lockdown numbers.  

In 2019, 24 players who have yet to return appeared only at Chalgrove, with a further 14 non-returnees only having played at a (first time) event held in Glasgow in 2019, which also has yet to take place again post-Lockdown.

TTS! did rather uniquely manage to run online events during Lockdown using the Tabletop Simulator platform, demonstrating that interest is clearly still strong for the system, and the UK circuit is now picking up again with three more events scheduled between now and the end of 2022. 

As such the calendar-year stats at the end of 2022 may well show a more realistic comparison with prior year figures for TTS! attendance than a snapshot at this time is able to deliver.

DBM   (De Bellis Multitudinum) 

Numbers for DBM were relatively stable this year, with a drop of 4 following a rise of, erm, 6 in 2019. That still gave the venerable DBM ruleset a small lead in UK player numbers over the slightly less venerable FoG ruleset for the first time since probably something like back in 2007!

The DBM circuit managed to put out 11 competitions post-Lockdown, one more than the 9 staged in 2019, again concentrated in the same handful of venues as in previous years. This included a mix of 15mm and 25mm events, and both Doubles and Singles format competitions too

DBM's strong showing at the handful of clubs who also stage most events has again meant that this ruleset has managed yet again to pull in almost half a dozen new players to enter events for the first time - often as part of doubles pairings at events where single players and doubles teams can freely mix. 

11 players took part in just one event, as with other sets lower %age than had been typical pre-Lockdown. 

The most active DBM player impressively managed to appear at all 11 events held in the post-Lockdown era, with 17 players (42%) managing to get to at least 1 in 3 of the events held.

The Conclusion

In summary, post-Lockdown the UK has seen pretty much every circuit for the main Ancients rulesets achieving pretty much the same numbers of players as the last full year of events pre-Lockdown, showing that enthusiasm for face-to-face ancients gaming remains undimmed by the events of the past 2 years. 

Even those sets that have seen some shortfalls can almost all point to likely causes involving the phasing or rescheduling of a handful of "key" events, or a truncated calendar in specific geographical regions. 

Revisiting these figures at the end of 2022 should give a more complete picture, with many of these types of one-off effects washing through the stats by then.

Notes

• As always, this only measures "Competition Attendances" at events where results have been posted in the public domain and I've been able to find them - what's played at your local club between consenting adults in private isn't measured by these stats.
• Some players appear in the stats twice because they played two rulesets over the course of the past year - this is essentially discounted for the analysis as numbers are too low to impact the main trends. And it's too much work to de-dupe them by name as well.
• I've had to make educated guesses in a few cases - especially where nicknames have been used in publishing results, or in working out if a player is "overseas" or UK-based.
• As a result of all of the above I make no claim these stats are 100% perfect - but I also don't believe any of them will be out by enough of a margin to change the big picture stuff either
• If I've missed anything - especially any events - please let me know and I'll change it as necessary. 

A Little Fort

At the recent ADLG Worlds in Rome I picked up a little fort from Rafa's stall, to use as a fortified baggage camp for some of my ADLG armies.

I should have had one of these already, as they are made by a guy in Alicante, and were given to all competitors at the event I attended there in January, but somehow I lost mine on the way home and so, given the opportunity, decided that I just had to actually buy one instead!

It is a resin print that fits (just about...) on a standard 80mm x 40mm camp base, so is probably scaled more to 10mm - or perhaps even a smidge smaller - rather than 15mm. 

It is an incredibly simple paint job - I undercoated mine in black, then did successive layers of increasingly "dry" dry-brushed, ever-lighter browns on it. 

I started with Army Painter Oak, then Vallejo Beige Brown (which I use instead of Army Painter Leather if I run out of the Leather), then a bit of Vallejo Ochre Brown for more warmth.

The inside floor was - as usual for my current basing style - builders sand glued in with PVA, stained to a more dark and even colour with Rustins Dark Oak, then drybrushed with Skeleton Bone and then a pale grey

Highlights (especially the pointy bits / tops of the cut trees of the fence) were also the traditional Army Painter Skeleton Bone.

I then finished the whole thing with a very light highlight of Coat d'Arms Horse Tone Grey - my lightest grey paint. 

It now only needs me to start taking well-orgainsed armies with fortified camps to competitions !

 

Italia '22 - The Worlds in Rome

 Yes, competitive international ADLG yet again, this time with a flight rather than a drive (and so a shorter set of reports) as the Khurasanians take another tilt at the World Championships!

See the Persio-Afghani soldiery revel in 6 games of 15mm L'Art de la Guerre, against two sets of Almughavars, a pair of Indians, a Byzantino and the army of Wallander, sorry, Henry V (a lame Kenneth Brannagh joke in case you missed it) with the usual captions, analysis and in-game hints and commentary.

And, of course, being Italy, there are pictures of prosecco instead of beer!

Alicante Ahoy!

Bob Dylan once famously sang " With God On Our Side..."  but he probably wasn't referring to The Peoples Crusade and it's somewhat over-optimistic efforts to secure an unlikely victory by sending a load of inexperienced pasty-faced ill-prepared northern Europeans to the furthermost shores of the Mediterranean.  

But, that description would in fact work perfectly to sum up the latest Madaxeman match reports - as a Early Crusader Peoples Crusade Army sets off for some highly unfeasible combat in the Alicante ADLG competition in a first post-Lockdown overseas trip for the CLWC posse. 

The match reports show the Peoples Crusade - an army made up of mostly poorly armed levies - take on 2 Ghaznavids, Maurice's Byzantines, the Samurai and finally The Vikings in 5 fully religiously inspired and Hermit-endorsed battles. 

There is also plenty of pictures of local feed and drink in various states of consumption, and the usual melange of captions, animations, weird links and strange combat outcomes as a wall of peasantry take on these cinco Dark Age military behemoths 

Peter The Hermit didn't sadly have wifi in his cave, so this is your first ever chance to see an online report of how the Peoples Crusade actually marched, fought and on occasion won as it trampled across Europe on it's way to the Holy Land.

In a new initiative there is also an accompanying Spotify Playlist to go with the reports, ensuring your are listening to suitably religiously inspired music when reading the tale of combat and disaster.

And, in a dubious quality auditory experiment there is also a multi-part podcast that includes several sections which are recorded live from a bar midway through the competition.

 

Its all waiting for you, in all formats. 

If you want to resist, you probably don't really have a prayer - so why not plug in, tune up the hifi and hide away with the army of Peter The Hermit in these latest Match Reports

Hungary for Warfare ?

 Yes, that deeply punnish headline does indeed herald the release of another fistful of competition battle reports, this time from the massive Warfare ADLG event at the end of last year. 

The five reports feature a newly-minted, lockdown-painted 15mm Essex Hungarian Army in action for the first time in a real competition, taking on a range of opponents from across the entire Eurasian landmass (and associated small offshore islands) in Feudal-themed battle.

There are also Goulash recipe videos, a spot of ATOMICS! when the Hungarians hit the desert of Tuaregistan, more flags than you can wave, erm, a flag at and a whole host of inappropriately captioned pictures of 15mm figures in action on the tabletop. 

 

So, stop fiddling with your Rubik's Cube, put down your Biro and shake the paprika out of your hair (eh ?) and settle back gently into 5 packed pages of Hungarian Warfare in these first Madaxeman.com battle reports to hit the internet airwaves in 2022.

Oh, and along with the usual ascerbic analysis from Hannibal, there's even a bit of Star Trek meme-ery too. Because that is of course the obvious thing to do when looking at the Hungarian army of the late Feudal period. 

Go on... beam yourself up to the Hungarian's debut competition!

 

15mm Corvus Belli (plus others..) Spanish infantry

 I've owned a DBA army pack sized force of Corvus Belli 15mm Ancient Spanish for many years, and they have from time to time served as an allied command to the Carthaginians - but I always harboured an ambition to extend it to a full army.

With the demise of Corvus Belli as a casting company for many years this was never really possible, but recently I managed to pick up a second DBA army box from a clubmate (thanks Mike!), add in a few more figures from the bits box and some odd figures from Clive's collection that didn't really fit into any other armies, and end up with what is hopefully going to be a viable Ancient Spanish army for ADLG.

These are the new guys:

6 bases of Impetuous Medium Swordsmen

The colour scheme is a bit random, but I've generally tried to get a lot of red, white and yellow as the dominant colours to make them look, well, "Spanish"-ish.

The central unit here is mostly Xyston figures, which look way bigger than the CB guys in the metal, but are not so bad when based up like this.

These guys have been based in 5's to represent Javelinmen and differentiate them from the Warband -types

These are the find from Clive's collection - they look like old Donnington figures, from both the Spanish and the (sort of) Etruscan type ranges.  

The shields are great - far better than I could manage these days - so much so that they distract from the rather old school statically posed figures. These will be the Celtiberian Internal Allied Tribe Heavy Infantry Swordsmen. 

 

ADLGv4 Changes - reviewed on Madaxeman.com

With Version 4 of ADLG now hitting doormats across the globe, Herve (the author) has just published a summary of the main changes between v3 and v4 on the ADLG website.

I've therefore taken the liberty of creating my own commentary on the changes - which you can find on my website here

I'm sure this will generate even more activity on the ADLG Facebook Group - it all seems pretty positive so far!

Cooking up ADLG lists for... Fighting 15's

As regular listeners to the Madaxeman.com Podcast will know, Andy of "Podcast Quiz" fame is a longtime friend of Ian at UK manufacturer and retailer Fighting 15's 

(Late Roman Light Horse Bowmen from the Gladiator range)

Through that connection I recently had a request from Ian to see if I could help him in drawing up some ADLG army lists for some of the Gladiator Games range of 15mm ancients figures he now produces, so he could then use those lists as the basis for discounted, ready-made army packs.

The parameters were simple, yet intriguing - construct a viable ADLG list using some of the Gladiator Games ranges using at most 128 "figures" (as in, mounted count as 2 figures, foot count as as 1 each), ... and also make sure that the army featured the right multiples of figures so that they could also work reasonably well as starter packs for unit-based rulesets other than ADLG.

It was an interesting challenge which piqued my curiosity - and if the end result was going to be that ADLG gamers would have an option to buy some decent figures at lower cost and with less wasteage, what was not to like ?! 

In addition to designing these "128" figure lists, Ian then set me the exra challenge of coming up with "Booster" packs to add more options to the baseline starter lists... of course, these also had their own rules, which in this case was that they needed to be 32 "figures" strong.

Over the last couple of weeks therefore I've been playing around with the Online Army Builder to try and conjure up some credible, viable ADLG starter armies that keep to Ian's "128 figures" and "32 figures" parameters - and I'm glad to report that it is possible, and the lists and boosters I've conjured up actually seem perfectly reasonable to boot. 

Ian liked the work I did for him, and has now reorganised some of the Gladiator moulds and been busily casting up new batches of figures such that the first batch of ADLG Ready Made Army Packs have now started to appear on the Fighting 15's Website.

The initial two lists I looked at were Late Romans and Huns, which are now both on sale at £39.95 for around 128 metal figures - incidentally working out at just 31p per figure, one of the best per-figure prices for any current 15mm range (which listeners to the Podcast will know is a hot-button topic for us).

The first two lists to be finished are Hunnic and Late Imperial Roman 

The Huns:

A straightforward list to build to be honest, especially as the figures are extremely interchangeable - I took the view that the LH and MCv can mix figures and weapons with impunity, and as long as the HCv are visibly different to the lighter-equipped horsemen it all kinda works. This is how it all panned out;

• Hunnic list on Army List Builder  
• Hunnic list on the Madaxeman ADLG Wiki   
• Hunning Army Pack & Booster Pack on Fighting 15's Website

The Booster Pack also worked out well within the "32" limit, as that allowed the Gothic Foot option to be added with 4 units of hairy infantry including command figures, and the same pack works with the Late Roman army as well. There are also Herul and Gepid Cavalry in discounted booster pack that works for both armies too.   

(Hunnic command from the Gladiator range)

The Late Romans:

There are lots of ways to build a LIR list, some more unusual than others, but as a baseline starter army I thought that having a mix of Legions & Auxilia plus a decent mounted wing was probably the way to go. This was what I ended up with;

• Late Roman List on Army List Builder 
• Late Roman list on the Madaxeman ADLG Wiki
• Late Roman Army Pack & Boosters Pack on Fighting 15's Website 

The mounted wing is arguably a smidge over-sized, but is still a legitimate way to build out an army. Ian's requirement to also try and keep to multiples of figure types that wouldn't be too out of place in other unit-based rulesets is what drove the call on this front, however having a Roman list which isn't all Legions and Auxilia does make it a bit more interesting to play with so that's not a bad outcome anyway I suspect. 

The army list is written in a way which makes "32"-strong booster packs really easy however, so there is an option for 32 Gothic Foederate foot, and then another pack with a couple of extra units of Auxilia and Legions too. 

(Late Roman Legionary from the Gladiator range)

Meso-Americans are now also available I understand, and we're planning a podcast on some of the lists as well in the next couple of weeks - so watch out for those too! 

It's A Battle Report !

OK, it's a video of a battle played online on Tabletop Simulator... but in this world of global gaming Lockdown I'm afraid this may be as good as it gets for a while longer!

So, for those of you missing the clatter of dice on cloth-covered chipboard here is a game of L'Art de la Guerre played on Tabletop Simulator between two very different Justinian Byzantine armies, both previously featured in the Madaxeman Justinian Byzantine List Building Podcast.

Thankfully (as anyone who's actually watched any tabletop wargame before will know) the gameplay has been speeded up significantly such that the whole battle plays out in only about 20 minutes of onscreen time. 

As well as all the action (hah!) the video also features a running commentary provided by me and Dave (the players) in which we attempt to explain what is happening, and to provide our respective hastily constructed post-hoc justifications for what we thought we were trying to achieve at the time.

Finally, to round things off there's a short discussion of the lists being used and a mercifully brief post-match chat as well where we deconstruct all of the "tactics" and gameplay.

You can watch the original podcast in which these two lists were put forward on the Madaxeman YouTube channel where you can also watch this video on YouTube as well as embedded here on the Madaxeman website / Blogger site.  

You can also replay the game yourself, as the two armies have been set up on a virtual tabletop as a Steam Workshop Item for Tabletop Simulator.

ADLG Army List Podcasts

The Madaxeman.com Podcast has covered the vexed topic of list design for quite a number of L'Art de la Guerre army lists in it's time, and, after a suggestion from a listener I've now pulled a set of links to all of these list-specific discussions together onto one page.

This listing includes both "dedicated" list-specific podcasts, and also the "Lockdown" series of podcasts where individual lists were compared and evaluated by the team.

The "Lockdown" Podcasts sometimes stretched to over 2 hours, and covered a lot more than just ADLG army lists, so for those just interested in the lists I've included approximate timings for when in each podcast the list-related discussions start, so you can skip straight to the list chat if you so wish.

Lists covered include: Late Imperial Roman, Uratu, Ugaritic, Later Byzantine, French Ordonnance, Achaemenid Persian, Later Assyrian & Sargonid, Ottoman Empire, Medieval Scandinavian, Late Imperial Roman, Fatimid Egyptian, Nikephorian Byzantine, Jurchen Ch'in, Later Carthaginian, New Kingdom Egyptian, Lydian, T'ang Chinese, Yuan Chinese, Venetian Condotta, Ghaznavid and Sassanid Persian.

Rome vs Phyrrus Battle Reports - from every angle!

As we all know, in the real world the winner is the one who writes the history after the event, but in the world of wargaming it's simply the gamer with the fastest-published blog site who usually gets to spin their side of the story.

Well... that has always been true... up until now..

That's because, in a brand new innovative international experimental virtual online collaboration (apologies if this is now starting to sound like a tiresome Zoom conference you've had to endure at work...) both  Madaxeman.com and the fabulous Phil on Ancients Blog have gotten together to roll some Tabletop Simulator dice in a textbook Classical battle featuring Phyrrus vs Rome... and both generals have created mirror-image battle reports of the same game!

The Madaxeman Video Report is on YouTube on The Madaxeman Channel 

Phil's blogger-format report is online on his Blog 

Then... in a ridiculously recursive and self-absorbed development both of us discuss the game in a totally separate video where we compare both written (or recorded) match reports.

Yes, your chance to watch and read about the same battle, played between the same two people, in THREE vaguely different formats - what more could a wargamer want to help get themselves through the latest iteration of Lockdown?!  

Hungary vs Spain in Medieval Tabletop Simulator action

 Another Tabletop Simulator battle report, this time in full HD with a 200 point L'Art de la Guerre matchup featuring List 238 Medieval Hungarian vs List 228 Medieval Spanish is now on my YouTube channel. 

The gameplay has been speeded up around 8-fold to allow the whole battle to be watched in just over 20 minutes, and includes a running commentary describing the action from the Hungarian sides' point of view. 

There are also photos of the 15mm Essex Miniatures Hungarian army I painted during lockdown, and a review of both army lists being used as well. 

Video walkthrough : Vikings vs Carolingians on TTS for L' Art de la Guerre

My second video walk-through of a 200 point game of L'Art de la Guerre played on Tabletop Simulator has just gone live on the Madaxeman.com YouTube channel, this time featuring the Carolingians of Charlemagne vs one of their main historical foes, the Vikings.

The video includes some snippets of "real-figures" eye candy and also a brief demonstration (at the start - you don't need to watch the whole thing!) of how you can very easily customize existing units in TTS.

Lockdown Podcast #10

With a frightening lurch into double figures (or a proper round dozen if paintbrushes and glue are your thing) the Lockdown team from Madaxeman.com are back yet again with the weekly soundtrack to a weekend of painting and avoiding household chores. 

As usual the podcast is available on Podbean, iTunes, Spotify and YouTube as well as other platforms where you find your pods.

Hot topics for tepid discussion this week include whether the best yellow paint is in fact Plague Brown, the Tau of Fire Hydrant Numerology, whether there was an aftermarket for refitting Egyptian chariots with go faster stripes and pumping stereos, how posh would a Samurai leader need to be in order to qualify for a self flushing toilet, whether Sisyphus would have been daft enough to start painting 28 bases of horses and how many arms per man do you need to make Fireforge's box of Mongol infantry.

The regular feature on ADLG List Building this week covers the Nikephorian Byzantines (in all its various modes of spelling), Andy's Quiz of course returns to help us all disco-down into the weekend, we talk in more depth about playing actual games on Tabletop Simulator, and a new feature is born in the shape (and theme tune) of Teaching Timmy About Napoleon, an idiot's guide to the Napoleonic Wars

A Flurry of Podcasts

Over the last couple of weeks I've been busy chatting online with some of my CLWC cubmates, and the result is a positive flurry of podcasts which are all now available on Podbean, on iTunes and now also on Spotify to be background chatter to yoru weekend of painting. 

First up is a one-off special ADLG 'cast looking at some of the ways to design a New Kingdom Egyptian army list to get the best out of this historically popular, but hard to run army. The 'pod had input from Richard Case, who's previous podcast on the Sassanid Persian army proved very popular.  This podcast is also available to watch and listen to on YouTube with some pictures of NKE figures and match report photos as well.

There are also now two special bonus episodes of the Madaxeman Podcast online, each addressing a very specific topics. The first bonus episode on the vexed subject of how to choose a paintbrush (and how much to spend on it) has been out for a week or so already and has been downloaded almost 100 times so far. A follow-up episode in which the subject of different types of Glue is discussed was also released earlier this week.

Finally, just in time for your weekend of painting the 8th "Lockdown Special" has been released today covering a broad range of important yet strangely rarely discussed topics such as what colour should rigging be on a 1/240th scale 19th Century Ironclad, do Gnomes still have a place in modern warfare, can a camel get a tan if it stands out in the desert too long, is the Austrian army a painters dream or simply a signifier of laziness, if a Grenzer joined the cast of Eastenders would he become a Geezer, is it still legal to resist buying 10mm Napoleonics and does getting your children to paint Perry plastics fall under the remit of the Modern Day Slavery act?

There is also a phenomenally long discussion on how to assemble and use Hannibals Carthaginian army under ADLG (and instructions on how to skip over it if you're not interested in ADLG list building), and a new feature on what games we have actually played in the last week. Oh, and Andy's Quiz returns - cue the music!  

These and all previous episodes are now available on Podbean, on iTunes and now also on Spotify

Lockdown Podcast VII now out

The 7th Lockdown Podcast (and 3oth all-time Madaxeman Podcast) has now been published on Podbean and iTunes, and is already picking up a steady stream of listeners and regular subscribers on both platforms. It's ideal bank holiday listening for your weekend painting or legally permitted outdoor exercise session. 

This week the team discuss their latest painting haul, chat at some length about airbrushing, take an in-depth look at the Lydian army in ADLG and endure another week of Andy's Quiz Music wrapped around the far more acceptable Andy's Quiz.

Watch out later this week for a special one-off edition covering Paintbrushes !

 

  

Newline Assyrian Chariots - the army is complete!

Finally, in this three part 28mm Biblical special, the Chariotry - the strike force of the army weighing in at a very reasonable ₤22/each.

I'd picked up four chariots, as that's the maximum number allowed in the ADLG Assyrian & Sargonid list. As you'll see here I used the near-revolutionary (yet still blindingly obvious when you think of) it technique of printing off some pictures from the internet and wallpapering the designs onto the big slab sides of the chariot boxes.

The four crew have plenty of room to walk around in the cab, so they four chariots could be posed in a variety of different ways - they sure aren't any sort of tight fitting jigsaw puzzle that only goes together in one formation, allowing you to put even more variety into the army by varying the poses.

There are loads more images on the main website of these chariots, together with the Infantry and Cavalry which you can reach via this link