04/02/2008

Vapanartak 2008 (1)

It was a long day yesterday, all the way to York and back leaving home at 7am and returned at 6pm. It was my first visit to the current racecourse venue and I was very impressed. The last time I visited was in the dim and distant past when it was held in the confines of the Merchant Venturers Hall in York.

I was involved with the Lance and Longbow Society and playing the demonstration game. This time it was Vikings v's Picts played to WHAB rules, which I hadn't played before, but part of the warhammer suite of rules so they became familiar as we played. Below the obligatory tea break and discussions.

The Vikings (myself) had to get their pillage from the left to the right side of the board, presumably back to our ships, while the picts on the far side of the table tried to prevent this and recover their stolen goods.
The crunch point, the wagons coming from the right had to keepto the road, which involved passing the junction next to the ford. Above pictish cavalry have just attacked the viking archers who had not yet got into position to cover the crossing/junction. They didn't shoot well enough and were only saved by a counterattack from a viking unit just off to the left. In the centre the pictish skirmishers are crossing the river to attack the wagon train (they nearly succeeded but a couple of beserkers saw them and caused major damage. Further to the right the picts are starting to move on the viking left. The beserks are a vicious single shot weapon in WHAB, once they make their attack they die.

Overall a hard fought game with a marginal victory for the Vikings.

4 comments:

MiniWargamer said...

I think Westwind was going go be there demonstrating their SOTR game. Just wondering if you had the chance to see it?

Fire at Will said...

Yes, Westwind were very near our stand, but I didn't get chance to have a proper look at what was happening. A lot of people sohould have as it was on the way to the B&B.

Steve-the-Wargamer said...

Even if you hadn't said - that pile of dice in the second picture is sure give-away! :o))

Nice looking game - the colour of the base cloth is atypical but it works well...

Fire at Will said...

The base cloth was an accident, there should have been a proper terrain cloth, but something went wrong between the two organisers. Given the mass of "last valley" terrain the cloth didn't look too unusual.