More Dominion

During March, I took a little detour from the Dominion series, but I'm back.

This latest posting was prompted by another release in the series - Dominion of the Spear and Bayonet.

Needless to day, I purchased it straightaway.

But First, a Pike & Shot Battle

A couple of weeks ago, I played a battle from 36 Renaissance Battles for Dominion of Pike and Shot. I'm just getting around to posting it.

The battle in question is St. Gotthard 1664, featuring the Ottoman Turks (blue) vs. my favored Austrians.

I lost my notes on the tide of the battle and I didn't take many pictures (I don't want to reveal the setup that the author so meticulously prepared). Anyway, you can see it was far from competitive. The Ottoman steamroller just did a number on the Austrians.

But I am glad to see an army list for late Pike & Shot Austrians. I may use this battle as the basis for an Austrians vs. Turks campaign.

On to Dominion of the Spear and Bayonet

As I mentioned, I picked up DotSab right away. Looking through the lists, I was pleased to see some American lists, including ones for Florida! I decided to test the game with a Seminole War battle.

In the initial fray, the US dragoons drove off some of the Seminole ambushers.

But then disaster struck for the American forces. The dragoons got into a firefight with more ambushers. Both sides were rendered hors de combat. In the center, the Seminoles drove off a unit of line infantry,

Note: The trees are just there for looks. They do not impact the battle.

After exchanging losses, it comes down to this. The US line infantry outflanks and attacks the Seminoles. Alas, its attack fails. This allows the Seminoles to descend upon the flanks of the Missouri Volunteers, routing them in the process. This forces the line infantry to withdraw.

The Seminoles win!

Note: I just realized that I have the Seminoles army list wrong. They should have 2 elite units. Well, they still won.

DotSaB for Colonial American Battles?

As the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution approaches, I've been toying the idea of playing some Revolutionary War battles. I wonder if I could use DotSaB for these battles. I may have to experiment.

Give Me Liberty!

To celebrate the upcoming semiquincentennial (250th anniversary) of American independence, I started a new blog.

Over the next year plus, I will periodically post commemorations of major events leading up to the Declaration of Independence. I hope you join me on my journey.

You can find this blog at https://kevinsusa250.blogspot.com/

Tangerines!

Part 1 of an Invasion Florida Campaign

The Campaign

So far, I've dabbled with a couple Cold War games, but I decided to do a mini-campaign.

• This will be a best of 3 scenarios.
• I'm using my MicroBattle rules.
• Scenarios will come from Neil Thomas's One Hour Wargames (OHW)

Background

I'm using the same backstory as before.

This campaign follows a band of American insurgents. Known as the Tangerines for their orange bandanas, these insurgents are behind enemy lines in South Florida, striking at the military forces of the Communist Cuban occupiers.

Defense of Lonely Hill

The Tangerines retreat into the Everglades after hitting a Cuban depot.

They must make it across a canal and hold a defensive position on a lone hill.

This is scenario 20 - Fighting Retreat from OHW.

The Tangerines' light infantry make it across the canal and make for the hill. The heavy infantry units make a stand at the bridges.

The Cuban light armored vehicle wipes out the infantry on the east bridge.

The Tangerines on the west bridge faces long odds. The Cuban armor races toward the hill.

The armor wipes out the hill's defenders. The Tangerines stubbornly holds the west bridge.

I got so caught up in the game I forgot to take more photos! :(

Things look bleak for the Tangerines. The heavy infantry on the bridge gets overwhelmed while the Cuban armor takes the hill.

But then the last remaining Tangerine infantry drives the armor off the hill. Following up, the infantry seizes the hill. This gives the Tangerines the victory.

GAME NOTES

• Campaign score: Tangerines 1, Commies 0
• I was perusing OHW, wondering if I could convert the scenarios to a 3 x 3 type game. Finally, I just decided to play one of the scenarios using MicroBattle.
• Because my units can only take 2 hits before being eliminated, I decided to reduce the number of turns the Tangerines had to hold on. Victory would go to the side holding the hill on turn 10.
• This scenario was cool in that the Tangerines were in it to the end, even though they got shot up pretty bad.
• Kudos to the heavy infantry on the bridge. They really kept the Tangerines in the game by bottling up the bulk of Cuban forces.
• You might notice that the Cubans were short a unit. They also had a helicopter, but I require a 6 on the activation roll for it to come onto the field. It just never happened.

Baseball is Back!

After some consideration, I finalized my plans for a dice baseball league.

The League

I'm calling my league the Roaring 20s Baseball League.

I had Microsoft Copilot create a logo. Not bad, but some obvious flaws.

The Teams

I devised an 8-team league drawn from some of the top major league baseball teams of the 1920s. These are the teams I chose.

• 1929 Chicago Cubs (98 wins, National League champions)
• 1920 Cleveland Indians (98 wins, World Series champions)
• 1923 New York Giants (95 wins, National League champions)
• 1927 New York Yankees (110 wins, World Series champions)
• 1929 Philadelphia Athletics (104 wins, World Series champions)
• 1925 Pittsburgh Pirates (95 wins, World Series champions)
• 1928 St. Louis Cardinals (95 wins, National League champions)
• 1925 Washington Senators (96 wins, American League champions)

Note: I originally chose these for the initial iteration of the R20BL, which never completed play.

The Schedule

I went around and around about how many games to play and how to format it. I finally decided

• Each team will play 14 games (2 vs each other team).
• Teams play home and away against each other
• The top American League team will then play the top National League team for the R20 championship.
• I don't have a set schedule when I will play the games. I'll just do it when I feel like it. I hope to finish by the real World Series in October, but we'll see.

Initial Games

The league is under way.

Series 1 - Chicago Cubs vs Washington Senators

• Game 1 - Chicago 6 - Washington 4
• What a game! The Cubs raced out to an early 3-0 lead. Cleveland scored 2 in the middle innings. Late in the game, the Cubs scored 1 on a home run. Then Cleveland's #7 hitter, Doc Johnston, belted a 2-run homer to tie the score.
• In extra innings, the Cubs had bases loaded and their slugger Hack Wilson up. Cleveland's relief walked him, bringing in the winning run,
• Game 2 - Chicago 4 - Washington 0
• Pitchers Guy Bush and Art Nehf combined for a shutout and the Cubs scored 4 in the middle innings to win easily.

Series 2 - Cleveland Indians vs. St. Louis Cardinals

• Game 1 - St Louis 2 - Cleveland 1
• The Cardinals scored 2 runs early on a homer by cleanup hitter Chick Hafey. Cleveland got 1 on a triple by Ray Chapman. The next batter grounded out to end the game.
• Game 2 - St Louis 4 - Cleveland 1
• Midgame, the Cardinals score 4 runs on 4 doubles. They breeze to an easy victory

Pyrrhus in Italy (Dominion Style)

I was getting a little tired of the 36 battles so I decided to do something different with Dominion of the Spear (DotS). I previously ran a Pyrrhus in Italy campaign using MicroBattle. Let's see how he does with DotS.

Notes:

• I used the Epirus Pyrrhus and Tullian Roman lists as the basis for the armies but added allied spears to both for 14 point armies. Otherwise, Pyrrhus was a little thin.
• I used the Tullians because the Polybian list has elite legions. I'm not sure that quite applies to Rome yet.
• I used the terrain generation rules from the 3 x 3 Portable Wargame. I haven't totally figured out how terrain will affect the battles. For Heraclea, I rolled a river but I ignored it. Then I rolled no terrain for the second battle. So it was a moot point.

Heraclea

King Pyrrhus lands in Italy and advances to Heraclea to confront a Roman army threatening the Greek colonies.

Here are the initial dispositions.

• Rome (red) - armored legions on flanks with new recruits in center. Javelins (using LI counter but counts as Melee Infantry), cavalry, and Italian allied spears in reserve.
• Pyrrhus - From L to R, elephants, archers, and Pyrrhus with his elite cavalry. Phalanx and Greek allies in reserve

The new legionaries charge Pyrrhus's archers and wipe them out. Meanwhile, there is a brutal melee between Pyrrhus's elephants and one of the veteran legions. In the end, both are rendered hors de combat.

Pyrrhus leads his cavalry against the veteran legion (R). HIs charge breaks the legion, but his cavalry is blown. Meanwhile, the Greek allies hold off a charge by the Roman cavalry.

Pyrrhus sends his phalanx against the Roman recruits in the center. Pyrrhus is confident. But the recruits put up stiff resistance. They finally break, but the phalanx is spent.

Pyrrhus realizes that he cannot win the day. He calls retreat.

Note that I did not eliminate Pyrrhus even though his unit was destroyed. I'd like to think that he would at least stick around for the rest of the battle. The counter is just there for window dressing, however.

The Pyrrhic army withdraw back towards the Greek city-state of Tarentum.

Tarentum
The Romans pursue Pyrrhus back to Tarentum. Just outside the city, Pyrrhus makes a stand.

Same army compositions as Heraclea. I made a roll to see if either side lost points but both passed.

This time Pyrrhus puts his phalanx in the front. The battle starts off well when Pyrrhus leads his cavalry in a charge that rides over a legion. But his elephants fare poorly against the armored legion on the other flank.

Pyrrhus's archers fill in the gap left by the elephants. The legion blocks the archers' hail of arrows on its shields. Then the legion charges and routs the archers.

But the charge leaves the legion disordered. Pyrrhus's Greek allies pounce, and drive off the legion. On the right, their is a brutal cavalry scrum, knocking both sides out of the action.

Pyrrhus is wounded in the fray so he retires from the field.

I rolled to see what would happen to Pyrrhus. I rolled a 1, which I would normally interpret as death. But he's the star of the show. Instead, I decided he was gravely wounded and could not remain with the army. That's why you don't see his counter in the next picture.

His infantry holds out. But the Roman javelins (R) come up to the phalanx's flank and pepper it. This forces the phalanx to retire.

Pyrrhus's army retreats into Tarentum. The Tarentines, however, have little interest in sustaining a siege. Faced with the city elders' grumblings, Pyrrhus decides to leave the Greek colonists to their fate. He packs his army into his fleet and sails away.

Finis

Campaign Notes

I chose to repeat Pyrrhus's adventures in Italy, a campaign I originally completed using my MicroBattle rules. Using DotS, I was able to complete the campaign in one morning.

I had planned to play Pyrrhus's Sicily campaign using MicroBattle, but put that on hold after discovering DotS. Now I think I will run the Sicily campaign using DotS.

Spring Is Here and Other Musings

In my usual GADD (Gamer's Attention Deficit Disorder) fashion, I find myself searching out a change of pace. I put the Dominion of series to the side for now.

But there is a DoTS game report coming up this weekend. Stay tuned!

Fantasy Awakens

It's been a couple of months since I did anything fantasy related. Over the weekend, I completed another quest in Demonslayer. This has awakened my interest in fantasy, and now I'm looking at a solo RPG.

When last we left my solo RPG campaign, my hero Ser Killian finished the Dragon of Icespire Keep adventure. I did it using Micro Dungeon, my quick play dungeon crawl rules. 

What next for Ser Killian? I debated retiring him and experimenting with Micro Dungeon using low level characters. Recently, I came to a decision. I will continue his adventures with the Storm Lord's Wrath. These D&D adventures require a bit of modification for Micro Dungeon, but I prepped the first encounter. I should play it soon.

The Pitfalls of Blogging

I really enjoy blogging, writing the narratives of the games I play. But sometimes it can hold me back. When I do play something, I want to photograph it for posterity.

Sometimes I just want to roll dice, but I don't want to spend time recording the results. When this happens, I usually do nothing. It would be nice to have a game that does not require a lot of record-keeping.

In the Spring an Old Man's Fancy Lightly Turns to

Baseball! At least here in the States.

Back in 2022 I devised a fairly simple baseball dice game. I planned to play out a full league schedule. Naturally, GADD struck and I abandoned the campaign after a few games.

This struck me as an answer to my blogging dilemma. With quick play baseball, I don't have to write full reports for every game and I don't have to photograph. Instead, I could just keep the box scores and then post periodic league updates.

There are some drawbacks to this approach, however.

• I lack the discipline to maintain a long campaign.
• I need to investigate ways to streamline the game. If I recall, my biggest issue was prepping the scoresheets. Can I make this process easier?

So now I am pondering a return to baseball. Stay tuned!

Zo Long, Zorrak.

Sir Roderick has defeated another demon lord.

It's been 2 months since Roderick's last victory. Over that time, I've mostly played Dominion of the Spear, but I decided to try a little adventuring using Demonslayer.

Here is the map of Roderick's wanderings. He started at the star and ended at the shield.

Here is his diary of encounters.

When he found the Demon's Mark, he was able to use his clues to summon his next enemy, Zorrak the World Eater.

The two combatants circle each other, looking for an opening. Roderick dodges under the demon lord's claws. Using his knowledge learned from a wizard, our hero knows exactly where to strike. His magic sword bites deep. Zorrak howls in rage.

The demon slashes with his claws. Roderick does not move and the claws rend deep into his flesh. But Roderick is within reach of Zorrak's weak spot and he does not want to give up his advantage. He stabs again, deep into Zorrak's vitals. The demon howls and claws madly. Roderick takes another brutal wound but he holds his ground. With a mighty slash, Roderick splits open the demon's belly. Black ichor spills over the warrior.

Zorrak collapses and his body disintegrates.

Roderick is victorious! Only one demon lord left!