Travelling to Hamburg is always a pleasure… for me at least. It means a weekend of gaming and camaraderie. This year we’d decided we’d visit the Dark Ages and would play some Saga. Irish, Anglo Saxons, Anglo Danes and Vikings descended on a region northwest of Hamburg across the Elbe river to once again wage war on each other. Each of us prepared models for the journey. My Dark Age Irish had been painted in 2022/2023, but had never seen the tabletop. I totted up the points (not a hard task when playing Saga) and realised that I could do with a few more units. I’d also need some Objective markers and Baggage. Thankfully the painting wasn’t too frenetic and with relatively little effort the force game together. I decided I’d transport them in an A4 Really Useful Box with a magnetised base. I’d added a magnet (or two) to each model, so along with my passport and tickets, I was ready to travel.
I also brought two of the Undaunted games, the North Africa and Battle of Britain variants, as the other lads hadn’t tried the system and wanted to give it a go. My luggage was mostly bits and bobs for gaming!
The Games
I’m not going into the details of each game other than to say that each was great fun. I love the Saga system. It has its quirks (movement system – I’m looking at you), but it plays very well and I’ve always thought the battleboard mechanic to be neatly implemented. The fact that it incorporates the attrition of the force, through the loss of Saga dice means that you get an increasing feeling, as the game progresses, that each Saga dice placed is meaningful! Anyway here are some photos…
As you can see, the terrain is top notch. Wargaming is an aesthetic hobby and thankfully all of the lads are into that idea. A beautifully presented game is a joy to play.
Here are the standard bearers for each force. They look excellent and typified the effort everyone put in to their warbands.
The Irish
So, how did the Irish fare (No – not me and Phil, my chosen war and!)? Pretty well actually. I lost both games against Phil’s Anglo-Saxons. They’re a strong faction and he played them well. To be fair, he did a lot of the work in terrain placement. I did poorly with this in those games and paid for it. Still… they were close run things. The Irish had the measure of the Vikings and Anglo-Danes. Both Dan and Steve gave them too much respect and were made to pay at the sharp end of javelins… so many javelins.
I really enjoyed using the Irish. They’re not a beginner friendly faction as you have to balance the use of your Curaidhs (Irish specific heroes – the word means champion) for buffing and aggression. I don’t think I fully nailed this, struggling at times with their placement. Having a Levy heavy war and is a little odd, but the Irish warriors are a poor choice, I think. I included the Gael Gadhil for most of my games and while they’re limited, they’re such a potent melee force, they complement the ranged-heavy Irish game nicely. I got use out of most battleboard abilities, so I think the Irish have some interesting depth.
Food and Drink
It wouldn’t be the Geekend without good food and drink. I imported about 2kg of pig into Germany in the form of white pudding and smoked rashers. These were to supplement the ample breakfasts. Every other meal was excellent… as were the drinks. Phil’s Irish Coffees were stunningly good!
Undaunted
This was a hit! Phil had picked up the futuristic variant of the game, but found the rules tricky to decipher, particularly when the solo element was layered in. This is fair – they’re games with a lot going on! They’ve quite a variety of mechanics. I’ve played several variants and had wrapped my head around the solo rules when they were released. We set up North Africa and Battle of Britain after dinner on two nights and we got to it. It was my first time with the aircraft version and I like it (apart from the stacking of aircraft on hexes). I need to play it more, but it adds an interesting element to the stable. The North Africa version is still a stand out for me. It’s elegant and I find the scale just makes sense.
When we got back to Phil’s we broke out NNNN (because we hadn’t had enough of gaming) and it’s a lovely game. It has a log going on… with asymmetric forces and Mechs! I enjoyed it… so much so, Santa might bring it to me this Christmas!
Epilogue…
We’re already making plans for 2025! Maybe Silver Bayonet… I could even be talked into painting a small skirmish Napoleonic force! This is how it begins… no wonder I’m running out of storage space!
Until next time,
Owen