Wars of Ozz Game Last Weekend

I received an Email recently from Les, who is a fan of Combat Patrol(R) that he was going to be in Florida near where I live for a few days. We took the opportunity for him to come over and try Wars of Ozz for the first time. I had planned on a rather large game including Zoom and in-person players, but a number of people had to cancel at the last minute. We played a two-player Ozz game with Dave playing Nomes and Les playing Munchkins.

Initial setup for the game. The white tags are to help players participating via Zoom.

The scenario involved the Nomes and Munchkins vying for control of a key crossroad. It was a simple scenario to introduce Les to the rules. Each side had 25 points.

The Munchkin force had two Landwehr units in column along the road (M3 and M4), a medium artillery battery (M5), Sourdough’s Regiment (M1), and a regiment of light cavalry.
The Nomes begin to advance. Throughout the game, Dave played the Nomes very aggressively, which may have been his downfall — or maybe it was his dismal dice rolling. The Nomes had two blunderbuss units (N1 at the top of the picture and N2), two axe-armed units (N3 and N4), and a medium artillery battery.

As usual, turn one consisted mostly of both sides maneuvering into contact.

The Munchkins advance toward the crossroads.
… Then it got exciting.

Dave charged with his Nomes and gained some initial success against the Munchkin Landwehr, with their poor Melee attributes. The Landwehr counter attacked against he blunderbuss men. In FIVE consecutive Reaction Tests at close range, Dave’s blunderbuss men never decided to fire. The blunderbusses have an advantage at close range, and Dave’s poor Reaction Tests on his right flank probably contributed most to his eventual defeat.

On the other flank, the Munchkin light cavalry threw back Dave’s other Nome blunderbuss unit. They eventually rallied and took another stab at the cavalry, but not before the horsemen charged and routed the Nome artillery. Dave failed another Reaction Test and did not get of effective artillery fire before the horsemen closed.
A Nome axe unit did manage to route the Munchkin artillery as the center and Nome right got more confused.
This is right before the cavalry charge the defeated the Nome artillery. In the distance you can see the Nome axe unit that routed the Munchkin artillery but never managed to take advantage of the situation to hit either Munchkin infantry unit on the flank.
The Munchkins have driven back the aggressive Nomes and resumed their advance toward the crossroad.
At this point, the Nomes had only one unit left. Although they technically held the crossroads, at the end of turn four, we called the game a Munchkin victory. The Nomes had no hope of holding the crossroad if we had played another turn.

Despite dismal die rolling by Dave, I think that both players had a good time. Les’ dice were about average, some good rolls and some bad. I don’t think Dave rolled less than 9 on a Reaction Test the whole game.

This was Les’ first experience with the rules, and he seemed to like them. He is working on his own rules for the American Revolution. I have sent what I think is the final draft of Wars of Orcs and Dwarves to the publisher for layout. Soon I will begin work on Wars of Eagles and Empires (for black powder era warfare). The initial rules will focus on the Napoleonic Wars, and I’ll be looking for folks to write supplements for other periods, such as the Seven Years War, Jacobite Rebellion, and AWI. I am talking to Les about writing that supplement.

Orcs for Wars of Orcs and Dwarves

Dragonbait pig-faced orcs supported by an orc shaman and an orc hero and backed up by Old Glory giant blood orcs.

Life and work have gotten in the way of blogging for several months. I have been busy painting when I can, but just not blogging.

I have been developing Wars of Orcs and Dwarves, the version of Wars of Ozz for generic, massed-battle fantasy games. Development is well under way. As I embarked on that project I realized that I had very few fantasy figures, except those needed for skirmishes or RPGs. I have been painting hobbits like crazy, and that is about done. Now I have begun to focus on orcs and dwarves.

I recently received my figures from the Dragonbait Kickstarter for pig-faced orcs. I decided to paint their skin in AD&D yellow instead of GW green. I like the way they have turned out.

Progress on Wars of Orcs and Dwarves

I’ve continued to work on WOOD via Zoom games. Development is coming along okay. There is the typical tension between those wanting to complicate to game to account for every nuance of a particular vision of fantasy battles (whatever that means) and trying to keep all the mechanics consistent and streamlines.

The start of a recent WOOD Zoom game in which the undead faces off against humans.

I don’t have my own fantasy armies. In the past any fantasy figures I painted were for role playing games to were instated into GASLIGHT games. So, I have been working to create a hobbit army.

A regiment of hobbit musketeers.
A closer look at the musketeers

These hobbits were 3D printed on my resin printer. I think I prefer metal figures, but printing figures is a cost effective way to build up an army very quickly.

Heavily armored hobbit cavalry.
The whole “brigade” of hobbits: 3D printed hobbit heavy cavalry (top left), old Heritage Lord of the Rings hobbit cavalry (center top), 3D printed hobbit spearmen (top right), and musketeers (center bottom).
A close look at a 3D printed hobbit ranger I am using as my general.
A final look at the hobbit brigade. You can see the paint scheme on the badgers of the 3D printed cavalry.

I am currently working on three regiments of hobbit infantry in Italian Renaissance style dress from The Assault Group.

Munchkin Balloon

The crewmen of the Munchkin balloon. Though it only has three figures, the rules state that it takes five hits like an artillery battery.

The LAST set of Ozz figures I had to paint is this balloon. I am awaiting the dire Lions, Tigers, and Bears, but until they arrive, I am out of Ozz figures. In late Summer I had three linear yards of bags of Ozz figures. I have been knocking out one or two units a week.

A closeup of the balloon
A long shot of the whole balloon and its stand.

The balloon kit comes with the lucite rod. One of the things I like about this kit is that the rod goes up through the gondola to the balloon. The gondola is actually suspended from the balloon by the lines (wire). I have built other airships over the years where the base is connected to the gondola and then the lines actually hold up the balloon. The Old Glory balloon seems more stable. The gas bag is made of a very light foamy resin. This reduced the weight on the end of the moment arm. I glued the base that came with the kit to an old CD, which provides enough stability.

New Figures for Ozz and WOOD

The Summoning Bell for Ozz

I have been working hard to finish the last of my Wars of Ozz figures. If we are ever allowed to peacefully assemble again, I want to have every Ozz figure painted to use in demonstration / participation games at conventions. A few months ago, I had three linear yards of Ozz figures to paint. The last of them are the summoning bell (pictured above) and the Munchkin balloon, which I hope to complete later today.

I have also recently completed a few other Ozz figures to get to this point.

Impkin Infantry Regiment
Impkin artillery battery
Gnomes. This is a faction that will be released later in the year and is not available to the public yet.
A final unit of Winkie cavalry, mounted on Zilks
Gillikin infantry fighting giants of the Albine mountains.

In addition ot figures of Wars of Ozz, I am painting up a couple of fantasy armies for Wars of Orcs and Dwarves (WOOD). WOOD is an adaptation of Wars of Ozz (WOZZ) for general, massed-battle, fantasy games. I haven’t traditionally done much fantasy gaming. As we were testing Bear Yourselves Valiantly, I relied on Chris Palmer and Dave Wood to provide figures for the play tests. I used to think I had a lot of fantasy figures “back in the day.” In getting ready for WOOD games at conventions, I realized that I only had enough figures to make three units, hardly enough for a massed-battle game. Most of my fantasy figures were individuals for role-playing games or G.A.S.L.I.G.H.T. So, I have started to assemble six players worth of figures.

Roomans. These are old Ral Partha figures from the late 1970s or early 1980s. I really like these figures, but they are out of production, and they were only made in two poses of pikemen.
Ductaurs: I ordered some plastic centaurs. When they arrived, though advertised as 28mm, the seems a little small to me. I had some extra duck heads from Star Hat Miniatures, so I did a quick head swap. I am happy with the results, but I fear the plastic weapons are going to be too fragile for gaming.

So far, for WOOD, I have a very complex spreadsheet that can be used to “stat out” units for WOOD. The idea is that players can bring whatever armies they have. (Apparently a large number of gamers were orphaned when GW discontinued Warhammer in favor of Age of Sigmar. So WOOD has not back story or lore. This means instead of providing pre-approved army lists, I need to provide a mechanism for players to determine the costs of the units they want to use. In addition, my friends have been creating army lists with WOOD stats for armies from other gaming systems.

Recently Completed Ozz Figures — Just in the Nick of Time

During the development of Wars of Ozz, I was getting figures from Old Glory as they became available. During most of the development, I didn’t have the mounted leaders and substituted other figures for testing. A month or so prior to Kickstarter fulfillment, I received a huge box full of lead. I have been working diligently since August to get all the Ozz figures painted (minus the few packs I don’t have yet) by Christmas. There is nothing special about getting them done by Christmas other than I want to have everything ready to go so that I can run demonstration/participation games if and when we are ever allowed to peacefully assemble again. This morning, I completed a bunch of figures that I will show.

Zoraster, the Wizard
Glenda, an ally of the Wizard and ruler of the Quadlings
The VonGuffling brothers who lead the Quadling armies
Three more mounted Quadling leaders

I also completed a bunch of Munchkin mounted leaders to put in front of various Munchkin regiments and to be used as brigade commanders. Munchkins are known for the horses of a different color.

Toward the end of development, I added four “personality” figures, a Kansas farm girl, a scarecrow, a tin man, and a lion.

Finally, I completed the pack of lesser witches.

I like the big crystal ball on the table.

Enjoy!

Fearsome Scarecrows (and some other stuff)

As promised, I am posting some pictures of the Wars of Ozz Fearsome Scarecrows pack. These took a little longer to paint than other units, because I wanted them to have a lot of variation in colors for that scruffy look.

Once I finished all the base colors I had a little fun with dots and stripes on some of them. I really like the variety of weapons. I think my favorite are the ones with rakes.

Here is a sneak preview for you! The Land of Harvest, as it grows into its own faction, will have a unit of corn people. I only have one from the master mold. These are not yet in production molds.

I plan to get two units. I’ll paint one as yellow corn, like this one. I plan to paint the other as Indian corn.

I also completed some Quadling officers.

Finally, my friend Mark sent me these two figures that I couldn’t resist painting before Christmas.

Enjoy!

Professor Nit-Pik and his Mechanical Tin Axemen

This weekend, amid lots of other activities, including a Zoom-based Feudal Patrol(TM) game testing Greg’s upcoming Viking supplement, I managed to complete this unit of mechanic tin men as well as nearly finish the Scarecrows and a few other figures (for a future post).

These are a pretty fast paint. I primed them black, dry brushed them with gunmetal, dry brushed them a gain more lightly with silver, and then added some Vellejo rust.

Professor Nit-Pick and his oil can.

As this figure was being developed, I asked Russ to make sure he was holding an oil can.

Gillikins and Gorillas

Gillikin infantry

This weekend, amid Christmas decorating, I completed my last unit of Gillikin infantry and a unit of lesser apes.

We normally decorate on Black Friday, but we spent Thanksgiving with my son at Ft. Rucker this year. So, we decorated the following weekend — without the added hands of two kids. This was made a little more difficult because we are in a new house and didn’t have habitual locations of our various decorations. But, I usually wake up very, very early, and so I managed to finish two units I had started last week along with some additional Gillikin leader figures.

Lesser apes
Some assorted Gillkin leaders to be inserted into the Sally 4th leader bases for Wars of Ozz

Next up in the painting queue are Fearsome Scarecrows and Professor NitPick and his mechanical tin men.