Dacian Wars Project Update

One of the fun aspects of keeping a blog like this going, over time, is that you get to see how projects percolate into fruition as ideas are worked on and refined.

None so than the current project focused on the Dacian Wars of Domitian and Trajan where I posted about ideas to build a collection around back in December 2015 and even constructed a campaign module using the Hail Caesar campaign book scenarios and linked campaign as a basis for that collection.

http://jjwargames.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/ancient-campaign-plans.html

I have that campaign in Cyberboard ready to go and have taken forward the plans around the collection to set up the games involved, as recent posts have illustrated.

http://jjwargames.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/JJ%27s%20Dacian%20Wars

That said, as I have thought about this collection the plan has broadened into a wider scope taking into other Principate campaigns that would be fun to do such as the Year of the Four Emperors in 69 AD and the campaigns of Germanicus into Germainia following the Varian disaster.

The linked scenario, ladder style of campaign battles is great, especially for involving groups of players fighting separate scenarios as part of the greater backdrop and I still intend to develop that plan.

However I was keen to explore the idea of having a campaign where the armies and set ups were entirely in the hands of the players as results of the decisions they took in response to events and circumstances, with armies manoeuvring on a map that encompassed the normal fog of war.

The whole idea being, to create battles that have that all important context behind them and thus give meaning to the result.

The last few weeks I have been bringing those ideas together with the help of other peoples ideas such as James Roach and his great blog and lovely collections over at 

http://olicanalad.blogspot.co.uk

James' collections are an inspiration to the kind of games I plan to develop around this period and he has some great ideas around those I have outlined here.

The map you can see of Dacia and the neighbouring tribal and Roman regions, now hanging in my games room, is my own creation based on those ideas, as are the cards I have put together using a great site highlighted recently on TMP by Anatoli who also has a video clip up on his own blog page on how to produce such cards.

http://anatolisgameroom.blogspot.co.uk/2018/03/make-your-own-unit-cards-tutorial.html

The really cool thing about this system is that armies on the map are in full view of all the players with the fog of war being built into the campaign by the cards and how they are played. Not only that but I now have a system of generating my armies and relating the result of any tabletop battles back to the map in lost strength-points without too much book-keeping and mental stress.

I aim to give the system a stress test using a simple die combat system to replace the figures on the table while they are still being put together, so I'll do a post about that going forward.

Talking about constructing armies for the tabletop also reminds me that I am also in the process of recreating my map world on to the table; and my 15/18mm terrain collection will not be fit for purpose, hence a build project similar to Trajan's own efforts, all be it in a smaller scale, is now going ahead.

This week I finally got some time over the Easter Bank Holiday to get stuck into my Roman buildings that I have been acquiring in the time between now and that post back in 2015.

 
With all the Napoleonic work completed, I now have time to give this part of the project my attention and as you will know, I love the aspect of the hobby that is putting things together.

Like plastic figures, MDF has revolutionised our hobby and I have thoroughly enjoyed constructing my Villa, Temple and Fortress together, not to mention a few wagons and carts.

This lot are now awaiting the addition of roof tiles and then, after sealing with a PVA wash, to have a good lick of paint together with some interior finishing.

In addition to these, I have a Roman marching fort to get done, plus loads of new trees and scatter terrain to build and those river sections will need a bit of tarting up before they can grace the table.

These buildings are just the start as I have to get some appropriate German/Dacian hovels and a Roman Limes tower, as seen above, plus enough wattle fencing to shake a stick at.

All the buildings are from Warbases and the wagons are from 4Ground, that I picked up from Colonel Bill's Store.

Colonel Bill's

My river sections are from Products for Wargamers

Products for Wargamers

Finally thank you to Martin and Diane over at Warbases who sorted out an issue with some pieces on my city gate that was resolved quickly and helpfully.

Maurice - AWI Scenario adapted from Hold the Line

A few weeks ago Steve M and I got together again for an evening of 'Maurice' fun continuing where we left off in our first game in January, playing with the AWI collection and messing about with brigade commanders.

This time we allocated 'Notable' cards to a couple of them, one on each side to see how the command attributes that notables bring could be used with our new level of command.

A US brigade holds the defences as the rest of the army defends forward on the ridge line

The scenario Steve chose to set up with was based on a game I ran at the DWG back in 2015 based on a scenario from the board game 'Hold the Line' recreating the Battle of Long Island.

You can find the details of the orders of battle and set up on the link below to the club blog.

https://devonwargames.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/hold-line-maurice.html

General Howe's mighty British army of 1776 looks formidable as it approaches the American held ridge

As you will see the forward American line is pushed forward onto a commanding ridge in front of the American embarkation point and they are tasked with delaying the formidable British force long enough to allow that embarkation to be successful.

American confusion as the line falls back too early

Sad to say, I, commanding the Americans, made the cardinal error of order/counter-order and the inevitable confusion that created by neither defending forward on the ridge and gaining the benefits of it in the subsequent combat and leaving my pull out too late that I was locked into a rolling fight going backwards with little opportunity to break off.

The British don't need to be asked twice and come rolling forward over the ridge

Steve to his credit never let me recover from the error and although burning through his cards often leaving him with just two or three in his hand at a time continued to apply the pressure as the American line fell back.

All the defenders can do is watch the carnage

At the completion of the first deck the Americans had lost three of their conscript battalions and managed to destroy one British unit in return but the Rebel morale card was in a desperate state as my line recoiled back in front of the defences.

American commanders work hard to stem the British advance

Eventually the US troops found themselves trying to get units into the defences whilst forced to leave a rearguard which succumbed to the pressure of the British assaults and broke the army morale.

With three American battalions out of the fight the pressure grows on the left flank

This scenario demands a robust stand by the Americans if they are to make a game of it and even then it is a tough one for the Americans to win, but the challenge of trying to bleed the British force makes it a compelling set up.

That said Steve played a great hand and never let the pressure up once in the driving seat.

It's all over and I can go home and reflect - note the heap of American casualties to the left of picture

Despite getting my rear end handed to me I really enjoyed the fun of managing a desperate situation that had me 'fire-fighting' all through the evening.

The notable card effects didn't really come into play although the brigade command system played its part when we had brigades split apart when units were destroyed which interfered with the Americans pulling out formations in one group which I think replicated the difficulty of retreat in the face of the enemy quite well.

Thanks to Steve for hosting our game and nice to give his new Tiny Wargames mat its first blooding.

Dacian Warband

With all the Xmas Game AWI, Dark Ages and Dad's Army stuff done and out of the way I can now focus on the Dacian Wars and putting the collection together to stage my first game using Augustus to Aurelian.

This is the second Dacian Warband completed to go with my Cap-Wearer boys finished way back in October last year together with my fist cohort of Victrix Legionaries.

http://jjwargames.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/dacian-cap-wearer-warband.html

http://jjwargames.blogspot.co.uk/2017/10/roman-imperial-legionary-cohort.html

Peter Dennis' artwork on the box cover of these Warlord Dacians really captures the ferocity of the Dacian charge and I really think the miniatures achieve a similar portrayal with swords raised and the warriors in full charge ready to slam into that wall of Roman shields.

As I am constructing these units I am constantly thinking about what I want them to represent, and by that I mean what I define as a cap wearer or noble warband or falx armed or medium infantry type.

I am not totally convinced that the Dacians would have organised themselves in that way and however they did organise themselves I am pretty sure the Roman cohort commanders wouldn't have noticed or cared much, with one large bunch of hairy aggressive barbarians looking pretty much like another

However as wargamers we love to differentiate our units and add that variety that is as they say "the spice of life" and so I will have cap wearers, falx and 'vanilla' warbands as options. However only the Dacian commander will know which units are which by the cunning use of numbered bases similar to my approach with my Napoleonics to keep all my historical units from getting mixed one with another.

So where is this project going and how can you expect to see it proceed? That was a slightly rhetorical question by the way, because you will have seen my thoughts on planning this project over the life of the blog.

However plans change on first contact with the enemy and this plan is now in full contact and I am getting my head around lots of new experiences, such as a new palette of colours which I am busy constructing my own set of triad colours and noting them in the JJ master painting notebook.

Not only that but plastics offer the wargamer loads of opportunity to build unique looking units that metals don't offer. I know some wargamers don't like that choice, but as a plastic modeller in my youth I love the flexibility and chance to scratch build and adapt, adopt and improve on the original figures.

However learning what you can and can't do with figures takes time that works its way into the project as a whole and I like to know how long it will take to bring a Roman Cohort or Dacian Warband to the table which at the moment is taking a week and just over two weeks respectively.

Knowing the time-line for unit construction then leads to the next part of the plan which is to play games as the collection grows.

I now have a scenario and selection of units in mind that is aimed at getting these chaps on the table in September which will see another four warbands added to the two already completed plus some Roman cohorts and a selection of smaller light infantry and cavalry units.

Not only that but I also need to put together my collection of 28mm terrain items ready to create the stage for the actors to play upon.

So that's where things are at in March 2018 and the third warband is on the desk primed and ready to go but I had great fun putting these cameo shots together depicting this second warband going up against my Victrix Romans.

Just multiply each side in this lot by about ten with other assorted stuff running around the table and it should give you an idea of the look of these future games.

So for those about to ask what figures and other stuff am I looking at here, The Dacians are from Warlord Games box set, the Romans are from Victrix and my new mat is from Tiny Wargames

Next up Roman Villas and English Civil War battles in the Cotswolds and me getting another drubbing at Maurice.

Belas Knap Long Barrow - Cotswolds 2018

Long before the Romans arrived in the Cotswolds, the native population had their own civilisation established and evidence of these earlier people has been left on the landscape by several massive whale shaped, long barrow chambered, burial tombs.

These Neolithic structures such as Belas Knap pictured here and other similar ones such as Hetty Pegler's Tump and Stoney Littleton have common attributes not just associated with their size and shape but also their positions atop high hills with commanding views over the neighbouring countryside. Not only that but they all seem to enjoy the most peculiar names.

http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/uley-long-barrow-hetty-peglers-tump/
http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/stoney-littleton-long-barrow/

The dominant placement of these long barrows would suggest an expression of power or dominance by the families that built them as monuments and shrines and the resources in time, effort and manpower needed to construct them at that time has been likened to the effort expended long afterwards in Egypt and the construction of the pyramids.

As well as position and design other aspects have been discovered that link these long barrows with the excavation work done on them in recent centuries revealing variations on the layout but generally having a lengthways chamber where remains of burials were deposited together with other smaller crypts.

Outside is a forecourt close to one of the main entrances which is often a false one, but where it is thought rituals involving fire, feasting, dancing and perhaps sacrifices were conducted. This false entrance is the one pictured above, and in the sketch from the original excavation in 1863-5.

Belas Knapp, whose name means 'Beacon Mound' is about 174 feet long, 60 feet wide and 13 feet high, orientated north-south and surrounded by a revetted dry stone wall.

The entrance to chamber C indicated on the diagram above

The remains of over thirty people have been found inside the tomb with some of them showing signs of having received a heavy blow to the back of the head before or just after death.

The entrances to each of the chambers are now open to view but would have originally been sealed off.

The picture below shows the interior of chamber C with Carolyn at the entrance showing how low and narrow this, the higher of the three chambers is.

The chamber entrances become lower and narrower as you move towards the southern end with chambers B and E pictured below respectively.

Chamber B

Chamber E at the the southern end of the mound

The final chamber, pictured below, is Chamber D where fourteen skeletons of varying ages were found including that of a woman and child showing fatal head injuries.

Belas Knap is, as mentioned in the start to this post, one of group of such burial tombs in Gloucestershire and is part of of an ancient landscape that includes other sites from the period such as sacred and complex stone circles together with later examples of hillforts.

Perhaps one of the best ways to experience these sites and the accompanying countryside is by walking the Cotswold Way, part of which can be seen below pictured from the tomb site.

https://www.nationaltrail.co.uk/cotswold-way

Mr Steve and I are planning to walk part of the Ridgeway later this year and having been to Belas Knap I think the Cotswolds might be one we might like to include on the list for future expeditions.

The Cotswold Way leading up to Belas Knap

The walk up to Belas Knap soon revealed how it got its name, and as well as getting the cardio-vascular system working at maximum we were rewarded with some stunning views of Gloucestershire from the top.

The view from the top also gave a birds-eye look at Sudeley Castle former home to Katherine Parr, the last of Henry VIII's wives and one who managed to survive him by his timely demise. In addition the castle also served as a headquarters building for King Charles I and his nephew Prince Rupert during the Civil War, causing the building to be slighted by Oliver Cromwell at the end of the war.

https://www.sudeleycastle.co.uk

Sudeley Castle

All Creatures Great and Small, Tawny Owl and Orb Spider - Devon Wildlife

Often heard but rarely seen, the Tawny Owl or Brown Owl is common to Devon and the rest of the UK, but interestingly, not found in Ireland.

This beautiful Owl, Latin name, Strix aluco, is most often heard on an Autumn evening as the light starts to fade and frequents woodland and urban copses, feeding on insects and small mammals.

You can hear the sound of the owl hooting on this link

Tawny Owl

As a young lad I would very often find pellets deposited by these birds, little grey fur sacks of regurgitated skin and bone all neatly wrapped up and left on the ground after the bird had enjoyed a feast of vole or field-mouse.

Taking a razor blade to the pellet would reveal the grizzly remains of the poor creature feasted upon.

These birds are perfected for hunting at night with their eyes so positioned to give a forward arc monocular view of the world below rather than the typical restricted binocular view of most other birds.

That disc shaped face, typical of all owls, is designed to act as a sound director, just like the WWII bomber sound directors, reflecting the slightest sound of a creature scrabbling around on the ground into the ears at each side of the facial disc.

Finally the feathers on owls are very soft and downy designed to minimise the noise of their flight and thus allow them to stealthily attack prey on the ground without any warning sound of their approach.

This particular bird was on the glove of a local enthusiast who rescues injured birds for release back into the wild as well as organising bird handling experiences for interested people and happened to be out on my favourite cycling route flying this hand reared young male bird.

On my way back from my regular cycling expedition I couldn't help noticing a somewhat frantic buzzing sound as I looked for my door key only to eventually find the source coming from a struggling large house-fly or stable-fly snared on the typical sticky capture spiral associated with the web of the British Garden Orb Spider.

The fly in its death struggle as the Garden Orb Spider maintains a firm grip with its fangs

Apparently the family of Orb spiders is the third largest genus of spider in the world with varieties in many countries, some a lot more fearsome than our British varieties, which are only about 2 cms in length and are harmless creatures except to flies.

Only the female builds the classic spider web for catching flying insects and the abdomen seen in the picture shows how this species got such an apt name with its orb shaped body.

When I took this picture the spider had a firm grip on its prey that was putting up a tremendous fight by attempting to break free with frantic buzzing of its wings, gradually becoming less animated as the spider venom took effect to subdue it - nature red in tooth and claw as they say.

Here in my garden in Devon, these spiders are a common site particularly in the autumn when they are mating and laying eggs but also erecting their webs in the most unlikely places such as the gap between wing mirror and car door, finding the space behind a heated wing mirror a great place to set up home.

The appearance in numbers of these creatures in autumn also corresponds to the annual hatching of Crane Flies from the garden lawn which mate and die rapidly but provide a bonanza feast for spiders and birds alike.

I have a strong affection for the Orb Spider as I recollect a presentation, I attended, years ago, talking about the hazards of using certain old drugs in paediatric medicine. During the talk the speaker referred, light heartedly, to the drug experiments carried out by NASA in the 70's in space on the Space-lab to look at various drug effects on concentration, this being a major concern in children of school age.

What better creature to use to model concentration than the Orb Spider and to remind everyone how a concentrating spider builds its classic web, we had a picture to look at.

Then followed a series of pictures illustrating various drugs from LSD, marijuana to caffeine and the effects on web building for these unfortunate spiders, posing the question, what likely effects, if any, on human concentration?

Spider on caffeine to the right

All a bit tongue in cheek stuff with the usual caveats about animal to human modelling, but interesting none the less.

Anyway I really appreciate the Orb Web Spider in helping to keep my kitchen clear of flies and long may they go on concentrating.

I hope you enjoyed this little diversion from military history into natural history. We will be back to the military stuff in the next post.