The Rather Large Towton Project

They think it's all over ...

2011-10-20T17:47:00.003+01:00

It is now. I have finally recovered from taking Towton to Derby at the beginning of October. It was a great show and we had loads of positive feedback from people. We were also able to field 18000 figures on the day, which was rather nice. We fought the battle to a conclusion on both days. It looked rather dicey for the Yorkists on the Saturday but they returned to their comfortable wins on the Sunday. So, that is it for this year. We never did manage to get the 25000 figures that was our target onto the table. On that basis, we must account the project a failure! The problem lay in not getting enough support from some people, who dropped out. In the end we only had four people putting the game on and I think we did rather well to achieve 18000 figures without killing ourselves, our enthusiasm or each other.

The game has now been put away, although the figures are likely to see usage in Impetus and possibly Bloody Barons games. We have been asked to take the game to the Baccus Games Day next year. That is a long while away and has been pencilled in to the calendar but a lot could happen between now and then.

On with the eye candy. I did not get much chance for taking photos of the games due to spending all my time talking to people, but there are a few to show you what we did.

The two armies deployed for battle:

Steve checks the rules before the battle begins:

Graham and Steve battling it out as the Lancastrians advance at the double:

The big mistake on the Saturday was putting Steve in charge of the Yorkists! That led to all of their problems!! ;-)

A Rather Small Skirmish Project

2011-06-01T19:54:00.004+01:00

For the Baccus gamesday we are also going to be bringing a change of scale. It'll still be in 6mm, but this time it's a skirmish game. Just as a teaser here's some pictures of the box as it progresses. There is a 6mm dismounted knight and a troll to give an idea of scale. The box is roughly 300mm x 300mm. With a sheet of steel in the top and bottom of the box, covered in sticky back sheets, one granite, the other green velor. The scenery and the figures will all be magentic. Meaning you can change terrain and hopefully terrain and figures won't go flying if knocked.

For the gamesday we'll be using the Broadsword Adventures rules and hopefully I should have 3 or 4 different scenarios which can be played.

Steve

Triples - Day 2

2011-05-22T18:47:00.004+01:00

Day 2 of Triples is over and I am knackered. Still, we had a fantastic day with a lot of positive comments again. It was great to meet all the people that follow the blog and I hope those of you that are pimping 6mm for big battles at your clubs succeed. Now, we need to get our creative hats on and improve the game again for Derby in October. Before that though, there will be a Baccus Games Day on July 17th (the day after the Baccus open day). A smaller version of our Towton game will be there as a participation game for up to six players at a time. Although there will only be about 8000 figures on the table, you too could get a chance to make the critical decisions in this battle.

Many will be asking how the games went. Very well, says I, with my Yorkist hat on. We managed to play the game through to a conclusion on both days, and the Yorkists won on both days. The second day was harder fought and saw leaders fall on both sides. It also saw significant treachery on the part of Northumberland, who decided to change sides with the same alacrity that Steve showed, when I offered to let him take command of the Yorkists late in the day. Steve happily left Graham running the Lancastrians and sped around to join the Earl of March and his compatriots as they routed the enemy.

Anyway, enough rambling. Thank you for coming and seeing us and making our outing to Triples worthwhile. Here are some shots from today's game. My apologies for the quality of my photography.

The Lancastrians advance piecemeal. Their command and control was woefully lacking:

Views from the Yorkist lines:

Bloody Meadow - Lancastrian routers trying to escape as others are cut down:

The melee develops as Norfolk arrives and the Yorkists take advantage of holes in the Lancastrian lines. Fauconberg's command suffers badly from the Lancastrian ambush, but the rest of the Yorkist are busily routing Lancstrians and then turning on the flanks of their neighbours in the battle line before advancing towards the Cock Beck:

Triples - Day 1

2011-05-21T19:01:00.003+01:00

Blimey, I'm exhausted already and there is another day to go. I would just like to say thank you to all of you that dropped by and made positive comments about the game. We had a great day talking to everyone and even managed to complete a game.

About 10am: The troops are all deployed and ready to be moved

We decided not to move them for the first hour or so to give people a chance to see the armies deployed. That went on longer than expected because of the number of people looking and talking to us.

Sometime in the afternoon: The Lancastrians have started moving but two contingents are worried about the plan and awaiting reassurance. They would have changed sides if the enemy had contacted them.

So, as I wrote before, we completed one game, which was more than we expected and rather surprising given how busy we were. It probably helped that in the first melee of the game Steve managed to get Holland and Exeter killed. With the battle effectively headless and its commander's troops fleeing for their lives, Edward was able to turn on the flank of the rest of the battle. It would not be long now before the Lancastrians were fleeing for Bloody Meadow ...

Steve meets a hero!

2011-04-24T20:23:00.004+01:00

As you might have gathered from our jubilation, we received the Most Impressive Troops award at Salute. Here is a rather blurry photo of Steve looking stunned as he meets his hero, Rifleman Harris. Oh yes, and receiving the award, which is clear and therefore not readily visible in the photo.

Salute in Steve's Words

2011-04-19T16:42:00.002+01:00

After what must be 18 months of work, it was good to get the actual game on the road. Although we had the two warm up games last year, Blore Heath at Triples and Northampton at Derby, the full game is on a totally different scale to either of these. So on Friday afternoon I set off towards the capital with the car packed to the gunwales. Even then I had to leave one of the terrain boards behind, so the game was only 16 feet long rather than 18.

After a restful night on the outskirts of London, I arrived at Excel in the morning and, after meeting up with Graham and Leigh at the stand, soon had the game set up. Although for a short while, we did have Fauconberg appearing on both sides of the battle, but with this being The War of the Roses, nobles did like to hedge their bets.

As with anything you’ve worked on there is always the worry of will anyone else like this. We needn’t have worried, the game definitely had the wow factor. The table seemed to permanently have people round it and comments being universally positive. There was the occasional questioning of our sanity, but there have been moments where we have as well. I was amazed at how many people have been following the blog and then came to see the game itself. I can’t think of any negative comments, even the ‘I couldn’t paint anything that small’ brigade seemed to be tongue in cheek. After seeing the game many people were seen heading towards the Baccus stand to check out the figures.

Overall Salute was a very enjoyable event. The game was very well received and, despite Peter’s doom-mongering, we won an award, The Most Impressive Troops.

With our enthusiasm rekindled we shall return at Triples bigger and better, just a few more stands to paint.

Finally! Towton at Salute.

2011-04-19T16:35:00.004+01:00

Here are a few shots of our Towton game at Salute. Thanks to Steve, who took the photos and took most of the stuff down in his car because I could not attend. He, Graham and Leigh displayed the game most excellently by all accounts, and we are all thrilled to little fluffy bits to have won the trophy for Most Impressive Troops.

Because we were short-staffed, we chose to run a scripted demo rather than try to play the game. I sent Steve off with a script for the game and it looks like it worked well, ensuring that the action continued all day and that the situation changed as people returned to see what had happened next.

There were a couple of incidents of note though. One eagle-eyed observer spotted that Lord Fauconberg had troops on both sides of the battle. Classic Wars of the Roses strategy that. After all, he wanted to make sure he was on the winning side! We also got a couple of people asking where the other army was once the troops were all engaged in melee. Clearly we need more casualty markers to show the progress of the Lancastrian army. Alternatively, some arrows marking their route might be a good idea.

Thank you to everyone for their positive comments about the game. If you did not get to Salute, our next planned outing is Triples in Sheffield. Hopefully we shall see you there. Please click the photos for larger images.

Better photos of the set-up

2011-03-30T14:01:00.003+01:00

I took some more photos today and these are the least worst of them. There are gaps in both lines because Steve took his figures home, but hopefully they begin to show the impression we hope to create.

550 Today

2011-03-29T18:34:00.005+01:00

There's no way that we could actually play out the battle in the time available to us on this day, so, as a commemmoration of the bloodiest battle on English soil, I set up part of the terrain and put some figures on it. This shot shows a single iteration of the order of battle deployed at the start of the battle (There should be twice as many figures on the table at Salute). The ambush in the far distance has been sprung far too early, while Norfolk has arrived at the beginning rather than lazing in bed until mid morning and then wandering up to help clean up the mess. The Yorkists are on the left of the shot and the Lancastrians on the right. Anyway, this is what 8500 figures on 288 stands looks like.

When we designed the terrain, we took into account the fact that we might not get the full order of battle put together for our earliest games, and that we might want to play a smaller version of the game. Therefore, we constructed the terrain boards so that we could remove some of them and they would still fit together properly. This meant taking some liberties with the contours, but needs must where the devil drives and all that.

Let it snow ...

2011-03-27T21:54:00.004+01:00

Steve and I had a productive day yesterday (Saturday) working on the terrain. We covered the frames for the final two boards in plaster-soaked t-shirts, added green scatter material to the three boards that had only been painted and added snow to the first four boards that we had worked on. It looks like we might actually have a game to put on at Salute after all!

Towton before the snow

2011-03-25T16:04:00.003Z

Big day tomorrow. We are planning to get the majority of the terrain finished or at least into an acceptable state for Salute. Here's part of the terrain looking towards the Cock Beck and where Castle Woods will be.

Countdown to Salute

2011-03-20T13:44:00.003Z

No pictures today. Sorry. We are also too busy to blog regularly at the moment, because we are desperately trying to finish off the last of the figures and terrain so that the game will be displayed in full form at Salute. Eek! Why am I blogging when I should be painting?

Anyway, we hope to meet you all there or at Triples in May and we hope you enjoy our game.

More Lancastrians join the fray

2011-03-01T10:23:00.001Z

This month we have mostly been building terrain for the Towton refight. My target for painting was to add two more contingents to the Lancastrian army, which I have done after a fashion. I did not paint them all myself though. Peter at Baccus kindly lent me his Warmaster Ancients army on condition that I rebased it to the 60mm x 30mm standard bases that he favours. The army was on 40mm x 20mm bases before. So, rather than spending the whole month painting, I have spent a large part of it rebasing stuff. This has actually put me ahead of schedule as I now only need to paint ten more stands to have a complete single iteration of the Lancastrian order of battle, once Steve finishes the contingent he is painting for me. With this done we should be ready to rock at Salute. I shall then get the rest of the figures I was meant to paint myself done so that we can add some extra figures to the battle when we attend Derby in October.

The Yorkist army has also benefitted from Peter's kindness to the tune of one contingent, but I forgot to photograph them when I took these other shots. This leaves just twelve stands of troops remaining for the Yorkist army. Those are currently in the capable hands of my friend John, who has promised them soon.

In addition to these figures, I have included a teaser shot of the Towton terrain at the bottom of this post. As usual click the pics for a larger version.

Here we see the whole Lancastrian command that I am working on(empty bases show what remains to be painted):

This is what I have painted this month:

And here we have some of the figures that I rebased for Peter:

Proto-Towton terrain (everything you need to build Towton properly):

January Update

2011-02-01T15:40:00.002Z

Here is what I painted in January instead of doing anything useful (like my thesis)!

Parts of Exeter's Command slog their way across Towton Dale towards the Yorkist lines. Baccus 6mm figures as usual with a sneak preview of part of the Towton terrain included. Flags are all by Freezywater and bases from East Riding Miniatures.

Starting the terrain

2011-01-26T16:31:00.002Z

Last night, Steve and I began building the terrain for this project. At present it looks like a mess of EPS, newspaper and various odds and ends of rubbish that were lying around the house looking useful. If you are interested, the basic building materials are:

9mm MDF for the baseboards;
EPS for the frames and basic contours;
Any old offcuts of EPS and expanded polystyrene for building up the interior of each board;
Newspaper and various bits from my paper and cardboard recycling bins for building up the contours further;
Some of my older t-shirts that my wife thinks are past their best;
Plaster; and
Sand.

This should give us terrain boards based on the contours on the OS map. We then just have to paint it and add flock to make it look like an English field on a cold day with a scattering of snow on it. The question remains whether we should attempt to simulate the snow by rigging up a snow dispenser over the table too!

There are no photos of beautiful finished terrain yet, but you can expect to see an 18' by 4' (that's 5.4m by 1.2m) table made of recycled rubbish at Salute, which will be our first outing. I plan to give Peter at Baccus a detailed terrain-building description with photos for his site when it is done and also to post some photos of the finished product here, but in the meantime I'm afraid that you will have to use your imaginations. Sorry.

Nano-Towton

2010-12-07T15:06:00.004Z

No time to refight the battle with 20000 or more figures? Not enough space? You need new, improved Nano-Towton(tm)! Nano-Towton uses amazing miniaturised technology to permit you to refight the battle of Towton in an area as small as 2' x 2' (600mm x 600mm). Want to know how to do it? Download the orders of battle and special rules here. You will also need the Basic Impetus rules, which are freely downloadable here.

The idea is that you can have some semblance of a refight using armies of only around ten stands each in a short space of time. I chose to do this with Basic Impetus because they are free and I prefer them to DBA.

Warwick's Completed Contingent

2010-11-17T10:04:00.006Z

Well I've finally finished Lord Ogle and Sir Thomas St.Leger's contingents.
So here is the finished battle.

Cheers

Steve

Progress So Far

2010-11-10T18:19:00.004Z

This is where I'm up to with my second command, Warwick's

Hopefully I should soon have those final 8 levy stands sorted out. Then it's crack on with terrain, so nothing much then.

Cheers

Steve S

Show Diary - see us at Salute

2010-10-31T15:32:00.003Z

Salute - 16th April 2011

The Rather Large Towton Project is now booked in at Salute 2011. We hope that you will be able to come along and see the game (and be impressed). We look forward to talking to any and all while there.

The Worlds at Derby 2010

2010-10-04T12:01:00.006+01:00

Well, Derby has been and gone and we had an excellent weekend. Saturday was fantastically busy with people coming and talking to us constantly, so we only got one game completed, but it was a Yorkist victory, which boded well for the rest of the weekend. We completed three games on the Sunday, which was quieter, with the last game being a surprise Lancastrian victory.

The games were characterised by a number of amusing turns of fate. The first game saw most of the battle fought in the sun! We rolled each turn to see if there was a clear spell, during which the Lancastrian guns might fire, and the Lancastrians rolled rather a lot of them during that game. We also rolled to see if Lord Grey would change sides when Edward reached him. The die roll was weighted towards him changing sides, but he only actually did so in one game! He did die rather a lot though. See if you can spot how often he is surrounded in the pictures below.

The comments we received were very supportive and positive, even from the "I could never paint anything that small" brigade, of whom only a very few were present. Thank you to everyone that dropped by and let us talk at them! ;-) It was great to meet up with various friends while we were there, and it was great to meet a whole bunch of new people, whom I only know from the internet.

Here is a selection of shots of the game in case you did not make it to see us. Click the images for larger versions.

Our 'stall':

The Yorkists begin their first advance of the weekend while Steve looks up some rules:

Lord Grey surrounded and about to die heroically:

Leigh contemplates the Lancastrian situation:

The Yorkists swarm the Lancastrian lines:

The view from the Lancastrian lines at the start of the second game:

The second game progresses as the Yorkists advance through the mud:

Crunch!:

Two views of the melee:

The Yorkists gain a foothold in the Lancastrian camp:

While some of their troops rout (look for the two D markers) other Yorkist contingents have gained the camp and turned on the Lancastrian flanks:

Less good times for the Yorkists. Most of their army is routing and the camp seems secure:

The face of a victorious Lancastrian commander:

Just how far do I have to go still?

2010-09-29T17:47:00.002+01:00

In an idle moment (yeah, right, like I have time for idle moments!) I set out my two armies for the Towton project. This was depressing for me in a number of ways! Firstly, the size of the armies did not look that great laid out as they were on a couple of card tables. Secondly, the size of the unpainted elements of my armies looked huge, laid out as they were on a couple of card tables! I also don't actually have enough bases for my armies yet and had to reuse them so that I could show both armies in photos. Time to pop along to Tony at East Riding Miniatures sometime soon. Good job he lives just down the road from me. Fortunately, the Yorkist army is actually further along than it appears, because two friends, John and Brendan, are kindly helping me by painting a contingent each. I hope to con Steve (not Yorkie) into helping with the Lancastrian army, but I suspect that will cost me. Click the pictures below for larger view and remember that each army is set up on a two foot frontage. When we deploy the full size armies for Towton with everyone's contributions, they will be deployed on a frontage of nearly thirteen feet (approximately four metres for the imperially-challenged). The table will be eighteen feet long by four feet wide, although we are debating whether we should make it six feet wide to give a bit more depth for the Lancastrians to rout in.

The Yorkist Army

The Lancastrian Army

Northampton Teaser

2010-09-24T18:18:00.004+01:00

Derby 2010 - The Battle of Northampton 1460
Here is a teaser shot of the Northampton battlefield for our Derby demo. I do not have enough artillery to set up all the Lancastrian artillery on my own, so the extra bits are represented by empty bases. The Lancastrian defences are missing from this photo to give you a reason to actually come and see our game (or they are still being built, whichever excuse you prefer). Click the pic for a larger version.

In this photo the Yorkists are on the left. The hill is more pronounced than the real slope at Northampton, largely to keep it all on one board for ease of construction, but the vertical height difference between left and right is to scale with the figures.

Derby, 2nd/3rd October - Battle of Northampton 10th July 1460

2010-09-20T14:49:00.003+01:00

On a rainy July day, a Yorkist army of around 15000 men caught up with 6000 Lancastrians near Northampton. The rain was heavy enough that the Lancastrian artillery was next to useless, a shame because they appear to have had rather a lot of it. Despite the lack of artillery support, the Yorkists appear to have fared badly in their assault until Lord Grey turned coat. Suddenly his men were helping the Yorkists across the defences and into the artillery park. At this the rest of the Lancastrian army routed and tried to flee. About 400 men appear to have been slain in this rout, among them some notable lords such as Buckingham, while Henry VI was captured in his tent.

This battle features treachery, a fortified position and a whole bunch of artillery. It also features rain and mud, so there are plenty of variables for us to play with, and plenty of opportunities for chaos to occur. We hope you will have time to pop along and see us there.

Apologies for the lack of teaser photos, but we are still making the terrain! As usual, our thanks go to Baccus 6mm and the Lance and Longbow Society for their support with our endeavours.

Yorkist Reinforcements

2010-09-07T16:35:00.003+01:00

Norfolk was not a well man and his sick note permitted him to turn up late to Towton. One facet of the refight will be how we deal with Norfolk's arrival. For the first game we shall probably have him arrive at his scheduled time and see how it all turns out. After that we really need to add an element of randomness to keep the game fresh. Therefore, Norfolk's arrival will be diced for. Will he turn up early or on time? Or, will Edward only receive a sick note sent by messenger? We shall have to wait and see.

Fortunately, Norfolk turned up on time for this photo shoot. Here is Norfolk's whole command, based on a single iteration of the order of battle. Graham has also painted up a version of Norfolk's command. That, combined with this, will form the Yorkist reinforcements. After all the painting, let's hope they turn up early enough to see plenty of usage!

Earl Rivers and Edmund Hampden

2010-08-28T14:14:00.003+01:00

Progress is still being made on my forces, thank goodness, despite my heavy university workload. Here we have Earl Rivers and Edmund Hampden arrayed for the Lancastrian cause:

Lord Fauconberg

2010-07-11T22:53:00.000+01:00

Evening all,

I finished Fauconberg's contingent today, They are already packaged up, and will be in the post along with Maltraver's contingent, first thing in the morning.

Cheers
Steve.

More Yorkists!

2010-07-08T14:52:00.004+01:00

It's been a while since I posted some painted figures. Things are a bit busy for me so I have not devoted enough time to painting recently. I hope to do better as the year progresses, but we shall have to wait and see. I suspect that I shall be painting right up to the morning of our first outing! Anyway, most of these have been painted for a while but have not been aired yet. So, here we go with a Yorkist fashion parade. Don't forget to click the pictures for larger images.

Robert Horne and Thomas Vaughan leading some levy troops (painted by Steve Short)

Mowbray and Lovell arriving late to the battlefield. Mowbray has a sick note.

Cobham and Abergavenny ready to take on all comers (painted by Steve Kelly)

Reinforcements

2010-07-04T17:02:00.001+01:00

I have just acquired a rather nifty 6mm collection of painted WOTR figures. Unfortunately they are based for Armati so I will have to extend the bases and add some extra files and ranks. But I hope yoe will agree its a rather spiffing addition to the collection

Thanks Robbie for the parting of such nice figures.

Sir Thomas Fitzalan, Lord Maltravers

2010-06-27T21:08:00.000+01:00

Evening all,

Another contingent done for the Towton Project, the next one is well underway so they should both be in the post to sunny Yorkshire by the end of the week.

Ill update the blog again in a few days.

Cheers

Steve.

Progress to Date

2010-05-05T14:48:00.005+01:00

Progress to date (Click for a larger version):

This is based on the information passed back to me and may be out of date now if Graham's enthusiasm has carried him away! This lot amounts to 5238 figures painted and based. In theory we could stop and put on the game in another 3000 or so figures, but where would the fun be in that? Come on, lads, keep painting. If we can fill all of these boxes then we shall field over 25,000 figures on the table. Of course, what we really need is a totaliser to keep track of it all.

Northumberland's Command

2010-05-05T14:23:00.004+01:00

Well, it's been a while since I posted much of anything, so here is Northumberland's command all painted, based and deployed on part of our Blore Heath terrain. I was languishing in the painting doldrums a bit before Triples, as well as being distracted by terrain building. After Triples I suddenly found myself all enthusiastic for painting and managed to get 20 stands painted to complete this command. Woohoo! Click the pictures for larger images.

That gives me two commands completed and four left to do. One of those commands has been farmed out to volunteers, which leaves me three to paint myself. I had better get on with it, eh. Next up will be Norfolk's reinforcements followed by Devon's command. After that it will be back to that nice Mr Baccus for even more figures. The flags that the Lance and Longbow Society have donated are a real godsend too, but I still find myself making scads of livery flags and company flags to bulk out the rest of the troops. I really need to consolidate the ones I have already done and stick them into a single file instead of scattering them around my laptop as I have!

Warwicks Battle, Triples and other ramblings

2010-04-21T18:51:00.001+01:00

At last the first wave Battle aka Warwick is finished, 24 bases painted in the week up to Triples in a burst of enthusiasm, shame and other emotions. I have to say it was geat fun getting them finished even if they didn't perform that well on the Saturday at the Triples, ( I blame Stanley).

I also have to congratulate Ruarigh and Steve on making some first class terrain for Blore Heath, a great info board ( who mentioned wonky?) and great company. The games played were all good fun and the only reason I took over from my son was because I needed to taste victory having been on the losing side consistently over the two days ( there's nothing wrong with my Generalship)!!!

As you can see from the above I even managed to get Warwick himself finished. The weekends gaming enthused me enough to come home an undercoat all of Norfolks contingent and upon my return from Scotland this weekend the brush will be out!!!

As to the rules - Poleaxes 2 worked extremely well and I was suitably impressed and look forward to using them for Towton.

So once again thanks Gents for a great weekend, thanks to Pete for his support and faith ! in us and to the Lance and Longbow Society for those damned little banners etc. Roll on Towton!!!.

Blore Heath at Triples

2010-04-20T12:58:00.004+01:00

We took our Blore Heath set-up to Triples last weekend. The purpose of the game was:

to give us a bit of experience working together at a demo;
to help us learn the rules properly; and
to play with our newly painted toy soldiers and motivate us to paint more.

It was a grand weekend out that was made particularly good by the number of people that dropped by and expressed their interest in the project. I was quite surprised by how many of you had actually read the blog too. Thank you to all of you. I also apologise to any of you that I did not get to talk to, although you may well sigh with relief at being spared this.

Unfortunately I was very busy with talking to people, especially on the Saturday, so I did not get much time for taking photos. A selection of those I did take are presented below for your pleasure and delectation. Despite being this busy with talking, we still managed to get six games in over the weekend, which is a testament to the ease of play of the Poleaxed 2 rules. You might have thought that a rules set that required you to roll for the movement of each unit would be slow to play but that proved not to be the case so we are very happy to take them on to do Towton.

Saturday April 17th

We arrived bright and early to set up our game with its rickety display board. We do promise to improve the display board in the future but it sufficed for our purposes on the day. One person actually complimented us on having a display board that made it clear what we were up to, which was great. A lot of the games did not have display boards and it was not immediately obvious what they were doing. Kudos to our team, even if we did have to tape the board back to the frame a couple of times!

Graham was already present when we arrived. Rhys, Leigh and John had made their excuses for the day and had sick notes, so it was a pleasant surprise when John dropped by part-way through the day. (as usual click the pictures for larger versions)

Set up for the action at the start of the day

The picture above shows the initial set-up with the Yorkists on the left of the picture and Lancastrians on the right.

Graham (left) and Steve (right) do battle. I can't help wondering what is so funny. Is my fly down?

The games on the Saturday were characterised by Lancastrian victories! Boo!! In every game the Lancastrian cavalry managed to drive off the baggage guard and roll up the flanks of the Yorkist line.

A bad day to be a Yorkist

Many of the Yorkists clearly decided that joining Stanley in the pub at Blore was a better idea than fighting the Lancastrians. Interestingly, Stanley's retinue were present at the show doing their own demonstrations and popped round to see our game. Most of them only really wanted to know which building in our small village was actually the pub. They also wanted to know why we did not have a small figure of Stanley with tankard in hand outside the pub. Perhaps Peter at Baccus will produce a Stanley at Blore character figure if we all nag him enough! It could go in a pack with Warwick killing his horse and Dacre with an arrow through his neck.

Bugger this for a game of soldiers. I'm off to the pub (most of the Yorkists have left already)

Despite the appallingly unhistorical results of the games played on the Saturday, we had a fantastic time. The day finished with the Lancastrians up 2-0.

Sunday 18th April

With renewed resolve, the Yorkists arrived bright and early on the Sunday morning having read the rules! This was to prove a turning point in their fortunes. Apparently Graham spent the entire night in his hotel room reading the rules. Better yet, he brought his son along to support the Yorkists.

An action shot! (Steve measures something)

The first game of the day saw the Yorkists returning to form in grand style. The Lancastrian cavalry charged eagerly forward, keen to see off the baggage guard yet again, but this time the shooting was much more effective. Although the Lancastrian cavalry did manage to charge the wagon laager, they were driven off. So enthusiastic were the archers in the laager that they immediately set off in pursuit of the routing knights. The rules probably include something that says that troops in that sort of defensive position do not test for pursuit but we rolled, it happened and it was too funny not to permit it.

In the meantime, the Yorkist line had wheeled to face the remaining knights and saw them off, while fending off the remnants of the Lancastrian centre. The game was a resounding Yorkist victory.

Come back, I've still got some arrows for you!

By midday we were well into the second game of the day. Graham's son was trouncing his dad in good style but then he had to leave. Having manoeuvred the Lancastrians into an untenable position, Graham promptly relinquished command to Steve and, in an act of treachery worthy of any 15th century English lord, immediately picked up the reins of command in the Yorkist army. Some have suggested that he had pre-arranged with Lord Salisbury to do this. The Lancastrians were enraged but could do little about it. With half their army routing in frustration at Graham's treacherousness, they were soon unable to continue the assault and were pursued from the field by their erstwhile ally. Still, this did return the score to 2-2.

The arch-traitor himself in his new role as Yorkist commander

The final game of the day saw me as the Yorkists pitching up against Steve as the Lancastrians. It was a close run battle. The Lancastrian cavalry routed and returned several times and the bow fire from the wagon laager proved insufficient to deter them. Fortunately the Lancastrian centre fared less well and did rather more routing than the cavalry.

See those big holes in the Lancastrian line? That's because they don't like it up 'em.

The game saw the baggage guard rout off in the end, but once more the centre was able to wheel in time to fend off assaults from the remaining cavalry. Final result for the weekend was 3-2 to the Yorkists. Huzzah!

Conclusion

The games went very well. We had a lot of interest and had a great time talking to loads of people. Blore Heath as a scenario proved to be very well balanced and interesting to play as either side, although it really seemed to hinge on how well the cavalry did versus the baggage guard in the end. We are all now thoroughly motivated to carry on and have been asked to take Blore Heath to the Baccus games day in July, which we shall do. Our next show will probably be Derby in October and we are debating whether to do Northampton or Wakefield for that one. We shall see.

Sir Edward Neville of Birling, 1st Lord Abergavenny

2010-04-17T15:42:00.001+01:00

Hello all,

My small contributions continue, another contingent painted for Ruarigh. This time its Sir Edward Neville of Birling, 1st Lord Abervagenny.

Well, thats 2 contingents done, which will be in the post first thing monday morning.

Cheers

Steve

Blore Heath Test Game

2010-04-10T20:15:00.006+01:00

Next week we shall be presenting our Blore Heath game at Triples in Sheffield. This is part of our programme of morale-boosting games to keep us on track for a fine Towton game in 2011. Steve and I played it through today and had a great time. So, for your viewing pleasure, I present some photos of the game. As you can see, we still have a little work to do before next weekend. (Click the pics for larger images)

The Start of the Battle

The game progressed largely as expected. The Yorkists shot arrows at the Lancastrians and caused a few casualties. The Yorkist artillery was fairly rubbish and did little damage, while the Lancastrian archery was excessively effective but still failed to daunt the Yorkists, who passed every morale test with flying colours.

The Lancastrians advance

The Lancastrian cavalry charged enthusiastically forward, got shot up and then two-thirds of it routed from the baggage guard.

The Lancastrian cavalry enthusiastically charge

The remaining unit assaulted the baggage guard but was driven off, although this assault did also cause the baggage guard to say they were fed up, so they routed too.

The Lancastrian Cavalry enthusiastically routs

With the cavalry out of the way and the arrows exhausted, the Yorkists surged forwards from their defences and down the hill towards the Lancastrians.

The Yorkists surge forwards

The began to push the Lancastrians back and pretty soon the show was over. Dudley lay dead on the ground, Exeter had fled and Audley was looking rather sorry for himself with all those holes in him. The Lancastrians surrendered. A great game that was closer than I expected.

Please come along and see the game in the flesh at Triples if you are around Sheffield at the weekend. Feel free to introduce yourself and have a chat. We like chatting!

Blore Heath - The Cavalry Command

2010-03-09T14:58:00.007Z

We shall be putting on a small game of Blore Heath at Triples in April. Please come along and say hello if you are there. The Lancastrian army at Blore Heath had a cavalry wing. Blore Heath was one of the few Wars of the Roses battles to feature cavalry so it is fun to play it out. Here we see the whole of that cavalry wing, in this picture led by Exeter. Click the picture for a larger image.

I can't wait to see these guys thundering across the battlefield and then getting shot down by the heroic Yorkists! ;-)

You have seen the knights in a previous post of mine, so here are the men-at-arms on their own:

As usual, all the figures are by Baccus. The banners are by Freezywater and the company flags on the men-at-arms are by Baccus.

The Duke of Exeter's Command

2010-02-14T20:25:00.002Z

Well I've finally completed the Duke of Exeter's Command, with the exception of his command base itself. So that's 1404 figures painted and ready for battle. Hopefully that can be completed this week.

Left to Right: SirLionel Welles of Welles, 6th Lord of Welles; Henry Lord Grey of Codnor; Sir Robert Holland; Sir Richard Welles of Welles, 7th Lord of Welles and Willoughby; Sir William Beaumont of Stowe Bardolf, 2nd Viscount Beaumont.

I'm currently painting the wagons required for Blore Heath, which as Ruarigh has said we are putting on at Triples this year.

Cheers

Steve

Lancastrian Knights for Blore Heath

2010-02-10T20:46:00.003Z

For a bit of a change and as part of my plan for keeping myself interested, I have painted these knights for our Blore Heath show game at Triples. Click the photo for a large image.

RLTP does Blore Heath

2010-02-10T20:33:00.004Z

As practice for our big game and also to allow us to play with our newly painted toys, we shall be putting on a refight of Blore Heath at Triples in Sheffield on April 17th and 18th. Please come along and see us. We still have a bit of work to do though. Eek! I suppose we have a couple of months left to finish it all and build some terrain, so it is not impossible that we might manage something vaguely appealing.

The picture below shows the basic orders of battle with the Yorkists at the top and the Lancastrians below. The empty stands represent command stands that we still need to paint and base (small 40mm x 30mm stands), while the empty 60mm x 30mm stands on the right of the Lancastrian line are awaiting a consignment of light cavalry to support the knights in front. The wagon laager on the Yorkist left flank still needs a bit of work though! (click the picture for a larger image)

The battle will be refought using the Poleaxed rules and will feature 2148 infantry, 108 cavalry and 4 artillery pieces plus crew. It certainly does not look like that many figures in the picture to me, so maybe I did the maths wrong!

Lord Percy Percy of Percy?

2010-02-10T20:28:00.004Z

I have now completed another contingent for the Lancastrians. It has gone slowly because of various viruses and a holiday, but there they are. Henry Percy and his men on the left (cue Blackadder jokes) and the ill-fated Randolph Dacre on the right. (click the pic for a larger image)

The badge flags are my own creation while the heraldic flags are from Freezywater. Figures are Baccus as usual.

Work starts on second batch!

2010-02-05T21:44:00.000Z

Hello.

Last summer, when on the baccus forum, Ruriagh announced the Towton project. I was very keen to get involved, initially planning to add a contingent of my own to this great project, until i checked the dates.....

Unfortunately, being in Germany and with a very busy year in 2011, i realised i wouldnt be able to attend. I did however offer to paint some of his "soon to be" massive collection.

So far ive painted two contingents for him, which can be viewed here on this blog. I started painting the next batch today, after getting into the period itself and reading up on the battle.

So, a couple of weeks ago i recieved another parcel, containing a small lead mountain, seen here on the left.

4 contingents in all, each containing 4 units. I hope to have them painted fairly soon, but with a trip to the falklands and some time in wales coming up, it may take longer than id hoped.

I made a start today, and in the space of a mere 3 hours managed to get a complete contingent painted!!

Sir Edward Brooke of Holditch, 6th Lord Cobham, and his men.

I will post updates as and when i can, and as soon as they are all done, they will be in the post to sunny Yorkshire. For banners and basing, thats Ruariagh's job!

Cheers

Steve

My first Lancastrians

2010-01-13T13:39:00.002Z

I have painted my first Lancastrians. To be honest, I had painted them by the end of last year but was waiting to get the flags before I posted them. This contingent of Northern spears supported by archers is led by Sir John Heron of the Ford, ably assisted by Sir John Crackenthorpe, and is part of Northumberland's command. According to one source on the Lance and Longbow Society mailing list (now defunct), Northern spears appear to have been an invention of WRG rather than a reality, but the order of battle we are using calls for them and I like how they look, so I shall use them in at least one incarnation of our Towton refights.

(click the picture for a larger version)

I'm not dead yet! (More Yorkists)

2010-01-13T13:22:00.005Z

Well, it has been some months since last I posted here. This does not mean the project is dead though. Instead, I have been busy with a variety of real life things, as well as this project. In this time, we have received a whole host of flags from Freezywater Publications / Lance and Longbow Society (see the sidebar for links). They have very kindly supported us by resizing a number of their flagsheets to suit our needs. I have now added some of those flags to my units, while also making a few livery badge flags and company flags for my troops, to add variety. I have also used some flags provided by David Rayner, who specialises in researching heraldry, to enhance my troops. First up for display is a contingent painted for me by Steve Kelly of steve's blog.

Sir John Conyers on the left and Sir Reginald Grey of Wilton on the right (click the pictures for larger versions). I could find no mention of what badge Grey used, nor did his heraldic banner have anything suitable on it to use. I did find a reference to his family using a gray or badger as a crest, so I opted for that as a badge and made the livery badge flags with that image on it. John Conyers's livery badge flags were easier because I could find suitable references for them. The heraldic banners are from Freezywater as mentioned above.

Here we see levy troops commanded by Sir Edmund Grey of Ruthyn on the left and Sir John Astley on the right. The livery badge flags are from Freezywater and the company flags are my own creation.

Edward IV exhorts his cavalry to do their utmost before the battle. I am not happy with my attempt at a white rose on Edward's horse and may try to redo that later. For the time being I need to crack on with the remaining figures. This is one of the command stands for the game. I chose to depict Edward and his followers as mounted because one of the descriptions of the battle that I read described him giving a pre-battle speech to his cavalry. The standard is another Freezywater creation.

Edward IV's command at Towton all liveried and flagged up. This is one third of the Yorkist army.

Duke of Exeter's Battle Update

2010-01-10T17:33:00.004Z

Progessing along reasonably well. I now have Sir Robert Holland's, Richard Welles' and Henry Lord Grey of Codnor's contingents finished and am well on the way with Sir Lionel Welles'.

Sir Lionel Welles and Henry Lord Grey of Codnor's contingents.

How the full battle will eventually look.

Steve S

Duke of Exeter's Battle

2009-10-05T12:22:00.004+01:00

Well it's taken me a while to get started, but I finally have Sir Robert Hollands contingent finished and Sir Lionel Welles contingent started.
Holland's Billmen (Back 2 Left), Dismounted Knights (Back 2 Right) and Archers (Front 2)

Holland's Billmen (Back 2 Left), Archers (Front 2) and Welles' Dismounted Knights (Back 2 Right).

It hasn't been as bad as I thought painting all these and I should have Sir Lionel Welles' contingent finished in the next couple of weeks. Then just Sir Richard Welles, Lord Grey and Sir William Beaummont's to do to finish my first battle.

Steve S

The Earl of Suffolk's Contingent

2009-09-29T12:27:00.004+01:00

I have now completed four out of five contingents for Edward's command at Towton. I had actually finished these last week but my wife unreasonably demanded my attention over the weekend so I could not get them photographed and blogged until today. The final contingent is being painted for me by Steve of steves blog, so I shall be turning my attention to Northumberland's command next. But first, here is the Earl of Suffolk's contingent.

Suffolk's Knights

(Click all pictures for larger images)

Suffolk's Billmen

Suffolk's Archers

Suffolk's Whole Contingent

Edward's Command (missing troops represented by blank bases)

Almost There

2009-09-29T11:17:00.002+01:00

What happened to September? Following my return from France at the end of August life has interfered dramatically with my time. I've been away on business on average 2-3 days per week. However the second contingent is almost complete and should appear in their finished form this weekend. The 2 bases of archers have taken almost two weeks to complete which in terms of my painting schedule is a disaster.

However I'm hopefull that October will provide some light at the end of the tunnel and that the third contingent will be completed in a far quicker time slot.

Edmund Lord Grey of Ruthyn's Contingent

2009-09-19T18:55:00.007+01:00

Poleaxed gives Sir Edmund Grey of Ruthin a contingent of levy archers and levy billmen. I chose to use the Baccus Longbowmen in Jack (WOR1) for the archers and Billmen in Jack (WOR3) for the billmen to differentiate the levy quality troops from the retinue quality troops. To further create the impression of irregular levies I used several different colours for the jacks rather than giving them livery jackets. I am unsure just how true this is to life, but it should give a reasonable impression on the table. The stands do not have flags yet, but they will do shortly. I just wanted to get pictures on the blog now and could not wait to get the flags sorted!

As usual, click the pictures for a larger version.

Levy Archers

Levy Billmen

The Whole Contingent

That's another 8 stands done and just leaves me 16 more stands to complete Edward's command, 112 stands to complete the Yorkist army and 240 stands to complete the whole order of battle. By my reckoning, that means I need to paint 3.5 stands per week up to the end of next year. Better get cracking then! No time to blog, I have figures to paint ...

My First Lancastrians

2009-09-01T09:53:00.005+01:00

I painted my first Lancastrians over the weekend. So that I could get to use my figures sooner rather than later, I added some figures I already owned to the painting pile to make up Basic Impetus armies, as recorded on The Ooh Shiny Complex. The Lancastrian Basic Impetus army has two stands of Welsh or Border foot. I found that I had just enough spearmen in the lead pile to make up those two stands. These guys will fight in Northumberland's command at Towton. Only four more stands of them for me to paint. I had better order some more spearmen so that I can get on with the job.

Sir John Heron of the Ford leads some of Northumberland's spears:
(click for a larger version)

Lord Fitzwarin's contingent completed

2009-08-28T15:34:00.006+01:00

I have just completed and varnished my second contingent for Edward IV's command at Towton. This consisted of retinues from Lord Hastings and Lord Fitzwarin. I have also made flags for all of my stands to date. These should suffice until we get the official ones through. Personally, I think that they do not look bad at all and I would like to thank David Rayner for providing me with the heraldic banners, which I have rescaled to suit my figures.

This means I have now painted 522 figures out of a planned personal total of 8334 figures (i.e. one full set of the order of battle) or 18 stands out of a total of 288. That means I only have 270 stands / 7812 figures left to paint and base. It'll be a breeze!

Lord Fitzwarin's retinue (click the photos for larger versions)

Lord Hastings' Retinue

Fitzwarin's Contingent

Progress So Far

Next up will be Lord Grey of Ruthin's levies; 4 stands each of levy archers and levy billmen. In a bid to maintain my own interest in the project and to use the figures as early on as possible, I am also putting together the additional elements I need to field a couple of Basic Impetus armies. I have completed a couple of stands of mounted knights, two stands of artillery and one of handgunners so far. Currently on the painting table are two stands of spearmen (also part of Northumberland's command in the Towton game), a stand of crossbowmen and a stand of pikemen. That should help keep things fresh.

On a side note, I realised that if I paint everything I need for my personal target then I shall be the proud owner of four 800 point Field of Glory armies too. I reckon that means that sometime around summer next year I shall be able to try FoG too, assuming I can ever manage to read the rules. Ah well, variety will help keep me moving on this project.

Better Pics.

2009-08-24T17:44:00.003+01:00

Didn't realise the pics looked so bad, so whilst my gorgeous lady is getting ready to go out snook some more which are better.

First Contingent

2009-08-24T17:05:00.005+01:00

With just 14 hours to go before I wizz off to France for a bit of 'bunker busting' with some colleagues I managed to get the first contingent finished. Sorry for the oicture quality but I guess I've rushed as my good lady would like me to take her out for tea before I disappear and can't understand the urgency to post!

Even though the pics aren't the best it gives a good impression of what everything will look like. I've put banners and standards on to try and start and get an idea of what looks right on the figures. I quite like the Neville set up compared to Scrope, i.e. the small swallow tail with the archers, the badge banner with the bills and the large standard with the men at arms?

They will easily be replaced when the time comes but for now at least it gives an idea what it will look like. Any way first contingent done, 6 days in France and then start on the second with a fury!!.

First bases

2009-08-12T19:57:00.006+01:00

Well my first three bases are complete, 1 man at arms and two long bow the billmen will be finished tonight and that will give me half of the first contingent. I have had a go at making my own banners/standards for now and will replace with appropriate freezywater flags when they arrive, however they do not do badge banners and do not do all the livery banners hence my own attempt at Scropes.

I don't think they've come out so bad and I would hope to give all the archer bases the small badge standard and all men at arms/billmen (retinue) the livery banner. Not certain yet about Levy troops. Will be another week or so till I catchup with Ruarigh and have the first contingent complete. But we're off. In terms of the painting whilst I don't normaly use the army painter I have in this case. The figures have been brushed over with army painter and then sprayed with anti shine. I think it will strengthen them and creates a not bad effect. As usual figures are by Baccus and bases by ERM

My First Contingent

2009-08-10T12:37:00.003+01:00

I completed my first contingent over the weekend. Only four more to go and I shall have completed my first command. This contingent comprises ten stands, which means that I only have 278 stands to go to complete my personal target for the project. So, enough rambling, here are some pictures of the contingent, which consists of Edward IV's retinue and Sir Henry Bouchier's retinue. This contingent contains 294 figures and would probably be represented by a mere 40 figures in 15mm or larger scales.

The figures are all Baccus 6mm, based on mdf bases from East Riding Miniatures using the Baccus Basing System. We are awaiting the arrival of flags, so they have no banners or standards yet, but I look forward to remedying that when Freezywater/The Lance and Longbow Society send them through (it's a bit of a job sorting out all the flags we need for our refight).

Looking again at these pictures, I realise that I should have straightened a few of the bills. That is one problem with 6mm figures; pole weapons bend easily. Still, I reckon that even with these few figures, the sense of mass ought to come through.

The whole contingent arrayed for battle with the archers in the front:

The archers:

Dismounted knights:

The billmen:

They're here!

2009-08-05T20:24:00.002+01:00

Good kind posty delivered two boxes of goodies. The first phase is here and thanks go to Pete and Igor for pulling the stops out and turning the order round so quick. Lots and lots and lots of figures.
No pics but I'm off now to stick the first contingent on the painting sticks and then into the garage for an undercoat.
Tomorrow the start !!!!!

Patiently Waiting

2009-08-03T21:59:00.003+01:00

Without wishing this to sound like 'Wargamers Annonymous' - I'm Graham and I collect toy soldiers, I live in Redcar on the North East coast and am 52 years of age. I have more than enough figures to paint to see me through the next twenty years!!! So why get involved in this?
Together with other colleagues I've put on demonstration games at shows since the early 80's, always using 28mm and I still mainly game in that scale.

However last year after a visit to the Baccus open day I found myself collecting 6mm Franco-Prussians and starting to look at disposing my large lead mountain and replacing it with a smaller one! But I found the figures are great, paint well and en masse look damn impressive.

The WOTR is one of my favourite periods and I had disposed of my 28mm collection some years ago, however as we gamers do I was contemplating a return but undecided where to start, then came this years Baccus open day, a bit of pixie dust, some talk in the pub and Ruarigh's damn invititation to participate in the biggest battle on English soil. Too much!!! I succumbed so easily, the imagination of those 25,000 or is it 33,000 now little warrriors on good looking terrain just proved too much, so I signed up.

The first figures have been sold on ebay to fund this, the order has been placed and I wait patiently for the Post Man to arrive with my new army. Hopefully by Wednesday they will be here, by Thursday undercoated and by the weekend who knows.

Wargaming is wonderful hobby!!!!

Watch this space.

About Me

2009-08-03T20:01:00.003+01:00

Hi, I'm Keith. I currently live in Nottingham where I am studying for a BA in archaeology. History and archaeology are my life, and I have had a long interest in the Wars of the Roses, so much so that five years ago I started write a book on the battles of Tewkesbury and Barnet which has seen me travelling all over the country collecting every scrap of information. Little did I know what I was getting myself into!

My passion for all things history has resulted in me working for a short time with the National Trust and now in the armoury at the Wallace Collection in London where I assist in the conservation of arms and armour and undertake my own research for yet another book!

As soon as I read about the Towton project I knew I had to get involved, so here I am. My interest in Towton was first sparked when the mass grave was discovered back in 1996, and since then the battle and the period have become a real passion. I couldn't begin to count the number of books, papers and other bits and pieces I have amassed relating to the Wars of the Roses, but all I do know is that I'm in danger of being buried alive.

Further interest developed when I found out I was a descendant of a number of individuals who fought in the wars, not least the Bourchiers who fought at Towton.

Anyway, enough for now. I will add more posts as I begin work on the figures. So off to do some research......

More About My Elephant's Ear

2009-08-01T12:32:00.005+01:00

As promised, here are some pictures with a little explanatory text and rather too many statistics. First, my elephant's ear, Edward IV's command as it arrived yesterday from Baccus(Click pics for larger versions):

Everything was very well packed and all the figures were in bags marked with what they contained. Peter had acceded to my demands for a non-standard mix of ordinary troops and command strips (the minis come on strips of four figures) and had marked on the bags how many of each was in each bag.

With the shiny new figures in my grubby mitts, I set to and sorted out what I needed for Edward IV's command. There are a few figures left over because the commands do not conform exactly to the packs of 24 strips (96 figures each). These will be put towards the next command I produce.

As mentioned before, I also received a large bag full of pre-cut 60x30mm mdf bases from East Riding Miniatures. I immediately sorted out what I needed for Edward's command and laid them out on the table. You can see the pile of additional stands in the corner. I have enough for about 2/3 of the Yorkist army. This picture shows Edward's command as it would be deployed, but sans figures. How depressing to see so many empty stands! The 30x40mm stand in front of the battle will be Edward's command stand. I plan to make it a little diorama but am unsure just what to put on it yet.

Our basic core army will consist of six commands like this one and once painted will contain 8514 figures. This command alone will contain 1212 figures. However, me being me, I had to lay out our ultimate goal too. This picture shows Edward's battle at triple size (The rule in the front of the picture is 1' or 30cm long).

If we succeed in fielding the armies at triple size, as we hope to, then we shall field 25470 figures in the whole army and Edward's command will contain 7242 figures. After laying out the triple size army, I suddenly thought about expanding the game further. What if we could do the game at quadruple size? I did not have enough stands to lay out Edward's whole command at quadruple size, so I have done a rather simplistic and not very competent photoshop job on what I did have to give an idea of how it might look.

Each of the contingents in this command has a frontage of 24cm or 9.5". The whole command would have a frontage on the table of 1.2m or 4'. Now that's more like it! The whole army in this case would consist of 33948 figures, with Edward's battle containing 9654 figures. Oh yes, now that's what I call a game!

Right, enough blogging, I have figures to prepare and undercoat, while I also need to clear my painting table so that I can crack on with the Towton project. Wish me luck, I am going in!

How do you eat an elephant?

2009-07-31T22:27:00.005+01:00

Answer: One bite at a time.

Who am I?
This is my first diary entry of the project. As you will find, I am somewhat prolix and can write lots about virtually nothing. I am Ruarigh. I live near Hull in East Yorkshire and am an archaeologist by profession. I have worked in archaeology in various capacities for the past twenty years. I specialise in Anglo-Saxon and Viking Age archaeology, language, literature, history and culture and embrace a fully multi-disciplinary approach. Currently I am also studying for a part-time PhD in Viking Age warfare, which will see me becoming the world expert on berserkerology if I ever complete it, at least until the next person comes along and advances study of the subject beyond what I have done. My approach has been described as textual archaeology, but it has a strong cognitive element, or, as Neil Price puts it, it is the 'archaeology of the odd'. But that is probably more than you really wish to know about me.

What am I doing?
I received an elephant ear in the post today. The figures I need for Edward IV's command in our basic order of battle arrived from Baccus Miniatures. I ordered them only a day or so ago, so the turnaround has been really quick despite the fact that Pete was busily preparing to go to Claymore at the time. I also received the 2.5mm thick MDF bases that I ordered from Tony Barr at East Riding Miniatures. I ordered those on Thursday and they arrived on Friday. That's pretty good turnaround in anybody's book. I know Tony and like him, so I am pleased to be able to directly support him in this.

So, I have enough figures and bases to put together my first command of the army. The next step is to prep and undercoat the figures, then I need to get them painted. By my reckoning I need to paint one command every two months to meet the project goals.

I plan to build one set of the whole basic order of battle as my contribution to this project. Pete Berry at Baccus is offering a generous discount to the project team to help us achieve our goals. This has made buying the whole order of battle achievable for me.I just need to have a bit of a clear out and sell some stuff on eBay so that I can raise the money for it, because I am currently 'resting' between jobs thanks to my very kind former employers. Still, it gives me time to pursue my PhD in more detail and to get on with this project. Gotta look on the bright side.

Pictures to follow tomorrow.

Introduction

2009-07-28T11:46:00.007+01:00

I blame Pete Berry. He sits there on my shoulder, whispering into my ear like a cartoon devil. This time it was a comment about the battle of Towton.

"I know you cannot afford to stage the game yourself, but why don't you project manage it?" He said to me. The man is made of pure evil. I tried to ignore his simple question. I tried to go to sleep and forget about it, but the possibilities kept rising up into my dreams. I dreamt of a game in which the Battle of Towton was refought using large armies that gave a proper impression of the numbers at the battle. It was too tempting. I posted an enquiry on the Baccus forum to see if there would be any interest. There was. Clearly Pete has been visiting various members of the forum at night and whispering evil plans into their ears too.

So, four of us have got together to put on a demo game of the Battle of Towton. Rhys is in London. Steve and I are in Hull. Graham is in Redcar. Apart from Steve and I, we have never met except online. Yet we are planning a wargamers' co-operative. Each of us will paint part of the army for this battle and we shall each bring our efforts to the table at shows in 2011. Why 2011? Well, it is the 550th anniversary of the largest and bloodiest battle in England.

On Palm Sunday 1461, around 70,000 men met in battle near Towton. The battle was fought in a raging snow storm between the House of Lancaster and the House of York and at the end of it an estimated 28,000 men lay dead. Who knows how many more died later of their wounds? It has been estimated that 2% of the population of England were involved in this battle and that the number of dead was around 1% of the English population at that time. That is rather a lot of people. Worse yet, no quarter was given. There was no call to "spare the commons". About half the dead appear to have been casualties during the battle. The rest seem to have died in the rout with most dying in Bloody Meadow.

Our goal is to model this battle at a suitable ratio of men per figure so that the sheer mass of the battle can be seen on the table. I would love to field all 70,000 figures, but I believe that number is beyond our reach at the moment. We are adopting a staged approach to producing figures for the game. Our first tranche of figures will be the 8,500 figures we need to do for the basic refight. With those under our belt, and if all has gone well, we plan to produce an additional 4,250 figures to expand the size of the armies, followed by the same again to double the initial army size. Depending upon time and support for the project, we hope to be able to add an additional 8,500 figures to the armies after that. With those added, we could field over 25,000 figures on the table at a figure:man ratio of 1:3. That ought to look moderately impressive.

We shall be using Baccus 6mm figures for the armies, all based on 60mm*30mm elements. The Lance and Longbow Society/Freezywater have promised to produce suitable 6mm flags for us; their range of material for this period is excellent and generally very well researched. For the refight we plan to use Poleaxed 2 as our main rules system, which are also available from the Lance and Longbow Society. We may instead use this opportunity to playtest to destruction the forthcoming Poleaxed 3 rules, which are a revision of Poleaxed 2, but such decisions will be based on the playtesting of the scenario.

Along the way and to keep our sense of progress up, we plan to put on some of the battles that were fought in 1460. These were much smaller affairs so we can use some of our newly painted figures more quickly to help keep us enthused.

There are only four of us involved in the project directly at the moment. If you feel that you would like to join in, please drop us a line. It would be useful to have an additional four team members to help with buying and painting the armies, and with running the game at shows. Even if you do not wish to take part in producing the game, I hope you will come and admire the game once it is done. There may be space for you to take command of a battle for a while too, to relive the events of that bloody Sunday, albeit in a safer environment.

We hope you enjoy watching our progress on this project and that it inspires you to try something of your own.