Raiding along the British shore

A Dark Age game fought between a Viking raiding party and the local Saxons.

Hard to tell from the photos, but mist covered the land and this reduced the vision of the Vikings. This resulted in terrain being placed as the Vikings moved forward.

 The Vikings left their longboats and headed inland. They had been lead to believe that there was a village not too far away. 

 A couple of villagers were spotted but ran off as the Vikings approached. The Vikings followed and.....

 ....then the village came into view and the Vikings began to rush forward to loot whatever they could.

 As the Vikings reached the edge of the village the local Saxons appeared, keen to defend their livestock and homes.

 No fried chicken for these Vikings tonight as the Saxons began to escape with whatever they could.

 Saxon cavalry appeared and charged into the Vikings that were about to grab some pigs.

 The Vikings did manage to get some cattle and sheep and these were herded back to the waiting ships.

The old guy with the sheep managed to fend off several attacks from well equipped Vikings until he was finally killed.

 The Saxons managed to get a lot of their stock away to safety but the Vikings searched the buildings and got away with a bit of gold and silver.

A costly battle for the Warlords involved, all but one were killed. The Viking warlord above was attacked by two Saxons. To kill the warlord the unarmoured Saxon need to roll "6" and the armoured a "5" or "6". Slim odds but it was achieved!

Great game with the lads.

Thanks to Brad for organising the game.

We used our modified LotR rules.

Port Republic in 15mm

This game with the boys was based on the Battle of Port Republic. Fought during Stonewall Jackson's campaign in the Shenandoah Valley.

 The Union formed up  awaiting the attack from Jackson's Rebels.

 With the advanced brigade of Rebels seriously outnumbered there was little they could do until more Confederates arrived.

 The Union artillery opened up on the Rebel line as soon as they were within range.

 Finally more Confederates started to enter the battle. The Rebels began to push forward centring their attack on the road,

 The Rebel artillery is off to the left and has opened up on the Union guns. Having inflicted a fair amount of damage on the Union guns the Rebels kept their advance going toward the Union lines.

 Finally the two lines met, the result of which was carnage on both sides.

 The Rebels were having some success but with the Union lads now attacking the Confederate flank it was important for the Rebels to make a breakthrough.

 The Rebel flank began to disintegrate. Not all bad though as the Confederate 3rd Brigade was about to enter the field and fall on the now exposed Union flank.

Unfortunately time was up just as things were about to get interesting. We called it a draw but you have to wonder how it would have looked if we had been able to play out all the moves.

Very enjoyable night non the less.

The rules we used were Fire & Fury regimental.