Viking Levy for Saga

In keeping with the view in the Rulebook that these troops are drawn from the lowly, insignificant peasants, the poor old levy don't even get a Led Zeppelin quote!

The levy are extremely simple. A pack of Gripping Beast Dark Age warriors will provide everything you need. The rules recommend building levy armed with slings or bows, and the kit provides more than enough sling-equipped hands to do this. For the purposes of Saga, it doesn't make a blind bit of difference whether these men have slings or bows, as the weapons have the same characteristics. Converting the GB warriors to bowmen would take a great deal more effort, but would be possible if you really wanted some variety.

Since levy are dirt-poor, the chances of them having weapons other than their slings (apart perhaps from a knife) are very low, and the chances of them having a helmet is about nil. Therefore, the kit bare heads are all you need, and a bit of greenstuff or spares from the Viking Hirdmen box adds knives easily enough. I didn't give all of them knives - those with them are the ones with aspirations to rise to the dizzy heights of warrior status!

Clothing would all have been dull, natural (ok, grubby) colours, as you would expect for people without two coins to rub together who spent most of their time doing vile, dirty jobs. This is of course nice and easy, and since you can get away with a fairly limited palette, it's also relatively quick.

 Here's a dirty looking bunch...

You could almost feel sorry for this lot. Almost. They're probably aching for a chance to get into a WAB game, where their impact could be greater and their status is less miserably low.

...And they don't look smarter from this side!

The beauty of these is of course that whilst they've been painted up for use as Vikings, they are almost totally ubiquitous. They will slot seamlessly into almost any Northern European army from late Rome to roughly the First Crusade. Which is about as much praise as this lot are going to get!

Merry meet again!

"We also come from the land of the ice and snow" - Viking Warriors for Saga

Ah-ah-ah!

We come from the land of the ice and snow,

From the midnight sun where the hot springs blow.

How soft your fields so green, can whisper tales of gore,

Of how we calmed the tides of war. We are your overlords.

On we sweep with threshing oar, Our only goal will be the western shore.

So now you'd better stop and rebuild all your ruins,

For peace and trust can win the day despite of all your losing.
Led Zeppelin, "Immigrant Song"

The warrior elements are slightly trickier, not in modelling terms, but based on what you actually want. Basically, you can't get what you want out of one box. The majority of Viking warriors are going to be equipped with a spear and other weapons like a saex or handaxe, a shield and most likely a helmet. On the other hand, most of them probably would not have a sword or mail, as these were high-cost, and hence high-status, items. Saying that, the odd one might: the sort of men who were aspiring to join the ranks of leaders or hearthguard.

 One set, one point

So, I made them up with unarmoured Dark Age warrior bodies, but used the spare helmeted heads from the Viking Hirdmen kit. A unit of warriors in Saga is eight men, and I decided one or two per group with a sword might be reasonable, and possibly one with armour, but in his case, no sword. All these chaps got slightly colourful clothes - if they were even a bit successful they ought to be able to afford an odd bit dyed with a brighter colour or something with some embroidery or decoration. I went to town with the shields. Maybe a bit over the top, but they certainly standout.

Second point's worth

Here's the whole two points' worth of warriors. All told, I think these look the part. Lock up your valuables - these lads will half-inch anything that isn't nailed down and red-hot, and clobber anyone that tries to stop them. Alternatively, if you attack them in their homes, anything you come away with will have been pried from their cold, dead hands - assuming you survived trying.

All together - altogether trouble!

Merry meet again!

Beowulf

I first read Beowulf when I was about nine or ten years old. I don't recall who's translation it was - if I had to hazard a guess, I would say it was Rosemary Sutcliff's. It wouldn't be fair to say it was the one book that set me onto the path that has led me here: that honour belongs to The Hobbit, which I read around the same time. But that version of Beowulf was certainly one of the things that led me to other versions of the same work, and then to read The Sagas, the Fight at Finnsburg, Y Gododdin, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the works of Mallory and so many others.

I own what might perhaps be called a Beowulf bore's collection of different versions. I should say at this stage that I am far from being a scholar of Old English. I can pick out words and phrases, and understand how the language was structured, but I cannot claim to be highly qualified to comment on the accuracy of any translation!

William Morris's version has a feel I like, but there are parts where he seems to translate things differently to all the other versions I've read, so it sits uneasily. It has the advantage of being available for free.

Michael Alexander's version is my personal favourite. My copy is dog-eared, heavily overwritten with my own notes and much repaired. I love the feel and tone of it. The alliterative structure Alexander has produced, to me, really drives home the idea that Beowulf was written to be read aloud, recited in front of enthusiastic listeners, rather than pondered over in a quiet corner.

Marc Hudson makes no attempt to create alliteration, but his version is light, accessible and accompanied by a thorough, thought-provoking commentary.

John McNamara's verse translation is unfortunate in that it came out in 2005. By then I was firmly wedded to Alexander's version, but I would recommend McNamara's version without hesitation to any new buyer/reader. The poem text is excellent and benefits from a fantastic set of supporting notes and commentary.

So here's my Beowulf. This is Musketeer Miniatures version of Aelle. Their figures are fantastic sculpts and casts, and the character figures have so much life that I almost regret having built parts of my Anglo-Saxon and Sub-Roman armies with the figures I have, even though at the time I bought them I loved them. I already have an Aelle, so there was an opening for this figure to do something else.

Never have I seen

a greater earl on the earth than one of you,

a man in his war-gear. He is no hall-retainer,

ennobled with weapons, unless his looks belie him,

given his peerless form.

That description was the one given by Hrothgar's coastguard when he first sees Beowulf and his companions arrive. This mini is almost "straight out of the packet". The only difference is that I replaced the shield, with a version made from 10 thou plastic card, engraved and embossed to represent rivetted construction in three bits. When he hears about the dragon, Beowulf orders his armourers to make him a shield of solid iron, as he believes (quite rightly) that a wooden shield will fail against the dragon's fire.

The champion of warriors, the chief of the nobles,

ordered a wondrous war-shield to be made for him,

entirely of iron, since he knew for certain

that a wooden shield could provide no protection,

when fire attacked wood.

The other figure here was sold with the Aelle/Beowulf as a banner-bearer. He gets elevated to the status of a real character: Wiglaf.

This was Wiglaf, Weoxstan's son,

well-loved shieldman, a Scylfing prince

of the stock of Alfhere; 

Wiglaf is the only man among the Geats with the courage to stand with Beowulf when he fights the dragon. All the other members of Beowulf's hearthguard, the toughest of the tough, turn tail and run, and only Wiglaf remains, striking the blow that gives Beowulf the chance to make a killing stroke against the worm.

Here are the two, together, ready to take on anything that threatens the land of the Geats. I put these two on 1p coins as bases, rather than the 2p's I normally use for characters, with the plan that they could be sabot'ed onto a single base as a unit in a game (sort of "kill one, you still have a king" idea).

They killed the enemy, extinguished its life; 

by their courage, the kinsmen, acting as one, 

worked its doom. So should men do when there is need.

Of course, it wouldn't be complete without a couple of shots of the heroes confronting the dragon, so here goes:

Merry Meet Again!

Morgan Le Fay

The perfect spell, you could not resist,

I cast it well, beguiled and bewitched,

The evening fell and knocked like before,

But this time Hell had come to your door!

"Shapeshifter" - Gary Hughes

Here's the latest in the line of occasional non-historic Sub-Roman characters, Morgan Le Fay.

Morgan was Arthur's half-sister, a daughter of Igraine (Arthur's mother) and Gorlois of Cornwall. She was unhappily married to Urien of Rheged and was a student of Merlin. A powerful sorceress, but also a skilled healer, she plotted against Arthur, undermining him, his knights and even his wife, remaining a powerful adversary for many years. At the end, she was reconciled with her half-brother, and was one for the four enchantresses who went with Arthur to Avalon after his wounding at the Battle of Camlann.

The figure is a Julie Guthrie sculpt, sold via Grenadier Miniatures as a female assassin. The date on the bottom of the figure (1987) is slightly earlier than when I got it. I'd bought it and painted it, and had had good service from it in the rolegame days but had mislaid it. I'd been looking for it among the few figures I'd kept from back then, as I thought it was perfect for this purpose. It took me an age to find, and eventually it turned up behind a workbench in my garage during a massive clearout!

A quick clean-up and prime got her ready to paint, and to my mind there's only one example to follow:
Frederick Sandys' painting of Morgan. The original is in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, but this gives you the idea.

It's interesting to note the Pictish symbols on her overskirt. I don't this interpretation can be beaten, and here's my version derived from Sandys' masterpiece. Not a patch on his obviously, but I'm happy enough. The details on the mini are quite soft and subtle compared with today's castings, but at the time, these were pretty "state of the art".

Does the goblet contain some subtle poison, refreshing wine, a healing draught or some hidden spell the long-term effect of which can only be guessed at?

A powerful ally...

But if the contents of the wine-cup fail, then the dagger in her other hand will serve. I think Aelle is right to be wary of this strange lady.

...But a bad enemy

Marry Meet Again!

"We come from the land of the ice and snow" - Viking Hearthguard for Saga

Ah-ah-ah!
We come from the land of the ice and snow,

From the midnight sun where the hot springs flow.

The hammer of the gods will drive our ships to new lands,

To fight the horde, singing and crying: Valhalla, I am coming!

On we sweep with threshing oar, Our only goal will be the western shore.

Led Zeppelin, "Immigrant Song"

Whilst I could scratch up a Viking force from existing figures I have, it wouldn't be terribly authentic, and anyway, where's the fun in that? Based on very favourable experience with them, I decided to build my Viking army as far as possible using Gripping Beast plastics. As all Saga-ites know, a warband consists of three types of troops, hearthguard, warriors and levy plus the warlord.

Two and a half points of Hearthguard

The Hearthguard are successful professional warriors, who would be expected to be well equipped, so these are all fully armoured and heavily armed, with sword, axe and spear, and dressed in (for the time) colourful clothing. Two units of hearthguard requires eight Viking figures, but in the first instance, I did a sprue-full.

First point...

A single sprue from the Viking Hirdmen box contains ten armoured bodies, all without heads. Some have the shield arm moulded in place, some are separate. This allows double-armed men to be built very easily. Each sprue gives you shields, fourteen heads, numerous spare arms and a slew of extra weapons to use where you like.

Second point...

The sculpting is as usual for GB - crisp and clean, with deep cut detail. Anatomy is good, and these are solid, strongly built men, reflecting their status (and hence access to the best grub!).

Moulding is good, in the usual hardish Renedra plastic. Mould seams are minimal and easily removed. In one or two places, there is evidence of some flash appearing - hope the moulds aren't wearing out!

Last few.

Assembly is easy, and all parts fit well, and allow for plenty of variation. I have to say that one or two of the poses you can come up with are not entirely convincing, so playing about and doing lots of dry runs (old modellers' term there!) before reaching for the glue is definitely worthwhile. Blu-tak is your friend in this.

These chaps get relatively brightly coloured clothing - reds, greens, yellows, even a bit of blue. The shades are slightly muted, since these were vegetable dyes, but certainly a bit more eyecatching than the usual variety of greyish browns and brownish greys! The clothing is further jazzed up with details on collars, cuffs and hems. Bright, contrasting colours work well here, and would appear to be historically correct.

Fighting to the last

The final step of course is shields. These are not the sort who are going to enter a fight with a plain white, black or grey battle-board. These need a variety of colourful backgrounds with bright, vibrant designs on top. Home-made decals were my solution, as freehanding the whole lot is a bit too much like hard work!

So, I now have two and a half points worth of troops. I'll do a couple more at some point and round out the hearthguard to three points. But next, some rank and file!

  

Closeup view - might be the last sight you ever have!

 Merry Meet Again!

Yan Tyan Tethera - Strathclyde Welsh Cavalry

“Yan tyan tethera” means “one two three”, in the Cumbric language once spoken across a wide tract of the north-west of England and south-west Scotland. The language now survives in some place names, and a few vestigial bits of dialect like this, used by farmers to count.

This was the language of a country, variously called Ystrad Clud or Alclud, Rheged or Strathcylde, that once stretched from Loch Lomond in the north to Rochdale in the south.

This part of Britain is generally not a soft, comfortable landscape. Anyone who has not visited it can get a fantastically evocative and extremely accurate view of it by reading George MacDonald Fraser's excellent "The Steel Bonnets". Whilst the main subject of this book is the later Border Reivers, the geography that forms the backdrop is unchanged. Much of the country is bleak, formed of bare, stony fells and harsh-carved hills. In many other, gentler, parts there is only a thin layer of poor soil laying over the same rocks just below. Outside of the coastal plains, this makes for poor farmland, hard to plough and harvest. If it is hard to plough now, how much harder would it have been with an ox-drawn ard plough? The land does, however, provide adequate grazing, for cattle lower down, and tough sheep on the higher slopes.

This hard land has always bred hard people. Apart from Cornwall, this was the last part of England that retained its Celtic language. Long before the Angles arrived, the people of Strathclyde had already spent centuries fighting off the Picts and Scoti, and having resisted them quite successfully they went on to resist Northumbrian dominance longer than anywhere else in the North. The northernmost part remained a semi-autonomous area even later, allied to but separate from, the Kingdom of Scotland. 

Referred to in Saga as “Strathclyde Welsh”, these men, used to a mobile life following their herds, fight mainly as cavalry. Riding men, armed with spears and raiding indiscriminately, were of course a feature of this area even later. In a sense, these cavalry seem the direct ancestors of the later Border Reivers.

Here are the first of my Strathclyde cavalry warriors. These are all built using Wargames Factory Ancient Germanic Cavalry, with some weapon arms taken from Gripping Beast Dark Age Warriors, and a selection of GB Saxon thegn and West Wind Sub-Roman heads.

The only, very slight, issue is that the men with the shield arm held close to the body are problematic in terms of what shields to use. These figures are obviously designed to work with the elongated hexagonal shields in the kit, and the round shields simply do not fit convincingly, and nor did any others that I had in the spares box. A quick measure up gave me a figure for the maximum diameter I could use. A swift rifle through the workshop turned up a length of steel tube of this diameter, which was sharpened to make a disc punch. I used this to chop out a series of discs from a sheet of planked plastic card. A bead of thick cyanoacrylate added around the circumference, allowed to dry and sanded slightly flat formed the shield rim, and the boss was a small disc of plastic card, punched out, with a drop of CA in the centre. Lovely!

In order to get these finished, I built the horses "out of the box". The next ones will get a little more work, to make them more like Fell ponies. It won't be a lot - WF have done a good job with the sculpting, so a bit of feathering on the hooves and a longer mane will do it.

This first set are conveniently numbered yan tyan tethera (from left to right). Yan has a GB Saxon head and upright spear arm, tyan has a West Wind Sub-Roman head, while tethera has GB head. In the last two, the arms ars from the original kit.

Yan, tyan, tethera... 

A 28mm cavalry figure on the table for just over a pound is a really bargain, and with the tiny bit of work I've done I'd say these stand up well against figures I've paid a good deal more for. For those prepared to make the small changes required, I would recommend these without hesitation. As well asSaga, these will give good service as British light cavalry in Dux Brit or Dux Bell, which makes them even better value.

And again!

Comparisons are sometimes helpful, so here's one for you. From left to right we have a  Gripping Beast late Roman on a Conquest horse,  the three WF Strathclyde Welsh and a Newline Design Pict,.

Unlikely looking allies!

Here they are again, side on. I don't know if this matchup is any more plausible!

Let's do it!

Merry meet again!

Bors - A Small Present

This is Bors, one of Musketeer Miniatures' fantastic Sub-Roman/Arthurian character figures.

I couldn't have been happier with this figure. The pose, anatomy and sculpting are all first-rate. The mould lines are minimal and flash is absolutely non-existent.

This was painted up as a gift/thank you for a colleague.  I've painted up minis in the past for my colleagues who have helped me out with their mass spectrometry skills. I've tried to find figures with quirks that reflect the job or in jokes. This one has been a while coming. I had struggled to find a figure that called out to me that it suited this particular colleague, but finally, Bors did it.

Well here he is - hope my colleague likes him. If not,  I'll have him back!

I used a fairly dark, quite limited palette, with just a few bright colours to catch and match the green dragon on the shield (this to reflect my colleague's large collection of green dragons on his desk...). The base is a 2p piece, and the helm is from the GB Saxon Thegns, with the head itself ground out. Bors can grab it in a hurry and be fully armoured.

There's something I noticed painting this guy. It's really, really satisfying to work on an individual mini, compared to the batch production approach needed to get an army on the table reasonably quickly. Luckily, I've got a few other "specials" to enjoy!

Wagons Roll! Part 3, Beasts and Men

With the wagons assembled, it's time to make them mobile.

Here are the yokes, with the cattle. The yokes were made by laminating two layers of 40 thou styrene sheet and filing/carving out the shape. Two pairs of holes were drilled, and neck holder were made up from soft wire to fix the oxen to the yoke. The yoke was attached to the shaft with a chain on the real thing.

One final thing. A two-wheeled cart is normally "driven" by having someone walk alongside the ox and guide it. A four-wheeler actually needs someone sitting on the seat yelling and using a stick. My drivers were converted from Gripping Beast Dark Age warriors. These two photos show the original figures and how the changes will be done.

These next two show the results of the cutting and grinding. I've put them on the carts to make sure they fit. It's a trial and error process.

Here are both drivers, assembled, green-stuffed to bung up the gaps/re-texture where necessary, and given a coat of primer. 

So, here's the two wagons, painted, hitched and based, just awaiting their drivers. The basework is some flock from Treemendus. It's fantastic stuff, totally awesome to work with, totally different to the "normal" flock I'm used to. Highly recommended.

After getting the drivers painted and mounted up, all I needed was a bit of static grass to get them on the table. Here's a quick closeup of the drivers. I think the conversions have worked well enough.

Rough looking pair! 

So, time for a couple of shots of the finished articles. These two, with the two-wheeler I built here, give me enough transport for the wagon train scenarios in both the Dux Brit and Saga rulebooks. Tons of fun!

Like Arthurian Britain's answer to Eddie Stobart!

Merry meet again!

I got all livestock, I got all livestock!

In the words of the "Rock Island Line", I got all livestock.

The chaps at Irregular Miniatures are good for 28mm livestock. Have a root around on their stall, it's almost always worth it. One word of advice - there's always an odd item with more than its fair share of flash, so if that's what comes out, surruptiously put it back and get another one.

First up, pigs. I bought three and there really was very little to do on them. All the modelling I did was to add tusks to one (after all, you need a boar!) and prick up their ears (a few moments with the jewellers' saw and a smear of green stuff).

 Bacon!

They are (arguably) a bit fat and short-snouted for Dark Age pigs, but I'm happy. I haven't been able to find much evidence of what pre-modern pigs looked like. My guess would be they tend toward the appearance of wild boar, a bit fatter and a bit less hairy (after all if you cross a modern pig with a wild boar what you get looks very wild boar-like indeed!). So, the colour scheme is derived from the Tamworth - a very ancient and equally excellent breed!

Tasty!

Putting them in the pigsty I built here, which was the most difficult part. Cutting into the terrain and removing parts of the pig bases without damaging either was a bit tricky. Luckily, a bit of blending in and everything was fine

Next up, sheep. The assumption is that Dark Ages sheep are all, invariably, Soay clones. The (limited) evidence doesn't seem to totally support this. Also, sheep resembling "modern" breeds are well attested by the twelfth century, so I'm not too bothered.

Easier than mowing the grass yourself!

 I added horns, of varying length, to four out of the five, to give the sense of a variety of ages. A single base like this is just right as a target/objective in a raiding game.

Plenty of wool here

The inspiration for these is Cheviot or (especially) Faeroes - the latter are known for fleeces in a variety of colours (white, grey, light red, dark red, chestnut brown, through to black).

Finally, cattle. More or less everything about them is here, based on the last set I got. These will make a further (future) appearance with the four-wheel carts I'm making.

All-round view.

Given they are going to end up permanently attached to a couple of wagons, there's no point in messing about with any sort of clever basework at this stage.

Ten thousand beef and onion pies on the hoof!

Merry meet again!

Sub-Roman Hearthguard - More Knights

When I built my Sub-Roman hearthguard for my Dux Brit army, they came from a pack of West Wind minis, with a total of 20 figures in it. Having built ten as the hearthguard and as the command section, I was left with ten more figures. Well and good, but those ten were all in only two different poses. I really can't handle the idea of Dark Age warbands having this level of uniformity, so it was out with jewellers' saw and bench peg, to start changing the look.

Various arms were cut off, re-posed and pinned in place, with hands moved and angled. One slight problem was that the arms on the cloaked figures didn't really lend themselves to much re-posing. Solution? I've got a boxful of arms with spears, swords and axes left over from the Gripping Beast plastics, and a bit of filing, fitting and fettling soon sorted out the problem. Greenstuff solved the inevitable slight mis-matches, mended lost bits of cloaks and replaced missing chainmail.

The results of the sculpting/modelmaking gave me this lot:

Ready for paint

Prime and paint came up a treat (I thought). I went with nice solid colours (actual dyed colours, rather than various shades of dirt) as befitting a paid, retained warband. The different clothing colours were so that if I had more than one hearthguard unit (cough Saga cough...) there is some distinction. As usual I made up my own shield decals. 

Fighting wedge

For Dux Brit, I don't actually need another ten armoured hearthguard. However, I'm not one to throw anything away (no surprises, eh?) and so here we are. They'd obviously make (all together) a smashing elite unit for WAB (Age of Arthur is a favourite of mine), or three to four points of elite troops ready for the day when Gripping Beast get round to producing an Arthurian supplement for Saga!

Single point Saga units.

Painting these was caught up in the delay caused by my chest infection, plus the fact I had run out of bases! I was only a week away from Vapnartak, so I decided to pick up some from Warbases when I was there and save myself the postage, but the sight of the figures sat there unbased was driving me mad. Made the bases up from plastic card and got them finished, just in time to get a start on the new projects I've bought at Vapnartak!

Merry Meet Again!