The Byzantine Path of GADD

In all my wargaming years, I have to say that GADD (Gamer's Attention Deficit Disorder) is rather common occurrence. By GADD, I mean that I am in the middle of one project only to have my interest piqued by another conflict or period. I then go rushing off into a new project, abandoning the old one.

Well, my latest bout of GADD has to do with this:

Basil II Bulgar Slayer

Yes, I'm on a Byzantine kick now. How did that happen?!

It Started with Armor

As COVID vaccines are rolling out, I have been thinking about returning to my favorite hobby - live action roleplaying (LARP). I've posted before about this hobby (here's a post about my kits over the years). Anyway, I began thinking about armor.

Here is my current set. I love the look, but right now my lower torso is exposed, and the cuirass is difficult to put on by myself.

I also have this faux brigandine made of leather and steel rivets. It is easy to put on, but it is a bit heavier than I like.

I began pondering armor because I have a bunch of these lying around. With 4 cats, I tend to order a lot of pet supplies.

It dawned on me that these boxes would work great for making armor templates. I decided to experiment.

My Armor Experiments

I'm interested in making a brigandine coat with plastic plates. I found a simple pattern and set about doing a test version out of a Chewy box and a t-shirt. It faltered, however, when it came to riveting. I began to look for something easier to make.

This led me to lamellar armor. In this type of armor, the plates are laced together (which is a lot easier than riveting). I decided to try it out and began searching for patterns and instructions.

Historically, lamellar armor was not widely used in western Europe. It was more prevalent in Asia (e.g. samurai armor) and eastern Europe. What intrigued me most was references to Byzantine lamellar armor (kind of like what ol' Basil is wearing above). I was disappointed to learn that Byzantine lamellar was riveted to a leather backing. Oh well, I may try to make some Byzantine-inspired lamellar without the backing.

Which Leads To

Anyway, this has now led me into research on Byzantine military equipment, which has led to research into Byzantine military history, which has inspired an interest in gaming some Byzantine battles.

I have another horse & musket battle to post, but don't be surprised to see some Byzantine battles in the near future.

All Over the Place

GADD is striking hard lately.

Yesterday morning, I completed an air raid campaign. This inspired me to do a little painting.

Biplanes and light bombers

I am painting the biplanes an off white color and will add dashes of red or blue to designate which side they are on. They will represent inferior fighters in my Aetheria campaigns. The light bombers will be silver and can serve on either side.

I also picked up Squad Hammer Core and want to run a game to test the changes between it and original SH.

Recently, fantasy gaming has piqued my interest. I recently ran a simple dungeon crawl and need to plan the sequel. I also picked up Rangers of Shadow Deep. I doubt that I will play the game as written but I am very interested in stealing the scenarios and using my own rules.

Finally, I picked up the December issue Wargames Illustrated on a whim.

As shown in the picture above, the magazine came with 2 miniature ships from the new Cruel Seas game. These ships are what induced me to buy the magazine. Now I must admit that I have never been particularly interested in World War 2 coastal naval warfare nor do I have any intention to  buy Cruel Seas. However, I am considering ginning up a super simple set of rules so that I can pit these 2 vessels against one another.

One of the pleasant surprises about this issue is that it includes a very simple siege campaign for Lion Rampant. I have LR but never played it, and likely never will (some of my reservations are similar to those for Dragon Rampant, which I experimented with last year). Nevertheless, LR has several scenarios and the campaign in the magazine links them together in an interesting narrative. It has me thinking about starting a medieval campaign (although I'm not sure what rules to use).

Anyone, as you can see, my gaming is currently all over the place.

Distracted

It's been over two weeks since my last post. I had planned to try out Dragon Rampant in those two weeks, but other things keep intruding.

Repairs
Things have been breaking around the house, requiring some time to fix them.

• I finally got around to fixing the fence that was damaged during Hurricane Irma
• My car needed some work so I had to take it into the shop
• Ours sliding glass door wasn't sliding properly. We could barely open it. This was a dire emergency because the cats insist on using the patio. I had to arrange for a repair man to come out. Good news - crisis averted and the cats can now sun themselves at their leisure

LARP

My medieval/fantasy live action role playing group has decided to do a feast in early March. I am currently doing some recipe research and experimentation.

My main source has been this book, the official Game of Thrones cookbook:

Some of the recipes are more medieval-ish rather than historically accurate. But that's OK, because my group does fantasy rather than living history.

Anyway, tried out the Tyroshi Honeyfingers yesterday and they were excellent! Can't wait to serve them at the feast! By the way, some recipes can be found at the Inn at the Crossroads.

I spent last Saturday at Triune Shores, the West Palm Beach group. Some good fighting, but of course that meant no gaming.

Sci Fi Skirmish
A couple of weeks ago I did have a spare moment for a game, but I was hit with a bout of GADD (gamer's attention deficit disorder). I had an urge to play a sci fi skirmish game but I did not want to use my rules. My latest iteration uses a die pool mechanism. The combat mechanisms work fine, but I would like it to be more RPG-like and allow for character advancement. I feel that most die pool games have very limited advancement opportunities. So I began to investigate sci fi skirmish / light RPG rules.

I started with Rogue Stars by Osprey.

I purchased it when it first came out but was disappointed. My latest perusal did nothing to dispel that disappointment. I don't like that it used d20 and I find character creation to be too fiddly and detailed.

I didn't have much luck with my search, and then other distractions put my investigation on hold.

Some Random Projects

I'm experiencing some GADD (gamer's attention deficit disorder)

More Horse & Musket
While perusing Wargames Vault, I noticed this set of rules.

What struck me was how nice the blocks look, which has rekindled an interest in some generic block armies.

A couple months ago, I read a blog entry where the blogger created a game using colored blocks, like above. Rather than create realistic terrain, he chose to draw it on the board in a way that it looked like a map of the battle. It was really striking. I wish I could find that post again.

Anyway, I'm thinking of doing something similar. I have a Pathfinder battle mat that I might use for my battle board. I have some dry erase pens and can simply draw the terrain.

I just need to make up some blocks, and decide on the rules,

Speaking of rules, I've been jotting down ideas for a set for really quick play battles (15 minutes or so). They are at a high level so each unit is a wing of the army. There will be 3 wings, plus some independent cavalry. I'm leaning toward DBA mechanics. I hope to play test soon.

Machinas
Lately on TMP and the Wargames Website, there have been a surge of posts about post-apocalyptic car battles, which has spurred my interest. Based on a review, I picked up Broken Axles. After reading it, however, I'm not sure if it will work for my small gaming space (it calls for a 48" wide board).

I have been following Kaptain Kobold's experiments with Machinas, by Two Hour Wargames.

I liked that movement in Machinas is somewhat abstracted - cars move respective of each other rather than across a board. The movement system seems more amenable to gaming in small spaces. So I picked up a copy!

I had been hesitant to pick up Machinas because I am not a fan of Two Hour Wargames. I can't really put my finger on it, but for some reason I struggle to understand his rules. However, having read through it last night, I think it will work for me. I like that it is somewhat abstracted. Aside from the movement mechanism I mentioned, it doesn't track every single weapon carried by the vehicle.

Naturally, I don't like the background and plan to develop my own. I am not interested in racing; instead I plan on running chases. I think I'll have the "good guys" be couriers who travel between the scattered pockets of civilization. They must contend with the denizens of the wastelands who try to stop them.

Now I need some cars. I will probably just use some counters. Nice that Machinas comes with some. Anyway, I hope to experiment soon.

Thinking Instead of Playing

I mentioned last week that I am experiencing some GADD (gamer's attention deficit disorder) and want to play some Slipstream. I just don't have figures. While I shrugged off my GADD last week and played a Spandau and Lewis scenario, this week I ended up contemplating game design ( I also spent some time preparing for this month's LARP scenario, but that's another topic).

Anyway, here are some ideas that popped into my head, some of them admittedly crazy.

Very Quick Play
While I already tend to play short games (usually 30 - 45 minutes), sometimes I want something even quicker - say 15 minutes.

Very Quick Set-Up
My experiments with a boxed game (below) have provided a quick set-up.

There are also other steps I can take to expedite set-up (e.g. fewer units and simpler terrain)

Multi-Genre
Sometimes it's frustrating when I have an itch to play a game set in a genre but I don't have minis. Instead, I don't play. I'm thinking of putting together a set with generic tokens that can stand in when I don't have actual miniatures.

Universal Rules System
I want one box that can handle nearly any genre (a tall order, I know). It seems to me that a set of light, universal rules, perhaps along the line of a matrix game or narrative RPG, would work. To this end, I ended up downloading the Freeform Universal (FU, pronounced foo) RPG and have been reading through it.

I have some game ideas running through my head; we'll see where they take me.

Distractions

My fantasy project is coming along well - I now have 2 units of Evil cavalry and an Evil leader painted. I just need to finish the Anarendor cavalry and leader; then I will be able to field 2 armies. Each army consists of 4 levy/horde, 2 cavalry, 2 infantry, and 2 shooters, which allows me to field any random unit selection using the One Hour Wargame rules. I have ideas for additional armies, but I'm putting those on hold for now.

But, as is typical, I find myself getting distracted with other projects. It started when I was cleaning my garage so I could get my patio furniture stored before Hurricane Matthew passed by. My miniatures were scattered in various sized boxes around the garage. I decided to organize them, so after the storm I picked up a set of plastic drawers from Wal Mart.

I also picked up some smaller boxes and moved my miniatures into them.

As I was doing this, I noticed that I never finished my spaceship project. I'd like to add another cruiser and a couple more destroyers per fleet. I also need a red battleship and carrier.

Sci-fi forces
Ground troops in top row
Shops in bottom row (+ a carrier on top of a battleship in the middle)

Then I started thinking of getting my scratch-built, sci-fi ground forces back into action.

Which led me to using my nook to shop for sci-fi rules. I came across, and ultimately purchased, Horizon Wars.

I read some reviews and even checked out this video playthrough. Some of the mechanics are not to my liking, but I am interested in the army set-up - a low number of small-scale figures featuring infantry, tanks, and big, stompy robots. I ended up buying the rules for the army lists / army creation rules. I'm now tempted to order some of the Oddzial Osmy 3mm troops.

To come full circle, I had planned to play a small game this morning using my newly painted Evil cavalry. One of my cats had other ideas. He decided he wanted to nap right next to me. If I got up to prepare a game, it would disturb him. Like many cat guardians, I chose not to move.

Ollie napping
(The picture is from another day. I didn't dare get up today)