Odd Times

Something unusual is going on. It has been kind of a weird day and I'm in a weird mood this evening. I haven't done any painting today as well. Maybe I'll still do some tonight but who knows. Whatever, I'm taking it easy right now and not stressing it. I've got one more chapter to go in the FoG book and think I have a good understanding of how the overall game functions. Field of Glory has a lot of novel ideas and mechanisms that I haven't seen before in other games. Knowing myself, I believe that at some point I'll probably start collecting and painting figures for such an army but for now I think I will be happy sticking with DBA. I don't really foresee that many opportunities to play FoG, but then again it's not like I play a lot of games of DBA either. There's no point in worrying about it now as I've got at least another five or six armies for DBA already purchased and which I am excited about painting. As unlikely as it may seem, I'm actually showing quite a bit of restraint in not getting even further ahead of myself!

The Old Glory Experiment

I didn't read as much of the FoG book as I had wanted to today, but I did take a four hour nap right in the middle of the day which was nice. I've been working my way through the movement and maneuver rules which at first have come across as a bit cumbersome to me. I do see however the potential for these rules to feel comfortable and intuitive with some practice and experience. I've never been happy with the way Roman Republican armies of the Punic Wars are represented in DBA so right now I think maybe collecting them and a Carthaginian army would be a good idea for my foray into FoG. The armies of Alexander and Darius are also really appealing to me but I'm generally satisfied with how they work in DBA.

The number of figures required for FoG has tempted me into trying out Old Glory miniatures. Their prices are good but not quite the great deal that I had associated with them. Perhaps as long ago as a decade or more I ordered a few bags of 15mm guys from them and at the time I think they were packaging them at 50 per bag. I really don't remember much about Old Glory from back then but I must not have been that impressed if it's been this many years since I last purchased from them. That might be though because of the extra expense involved in using their miniatures for DBA. It's frustrating to have to buy 24 slingers when you only need two!

Despite this I decided yesterday that I would give them another look and ordered five bags from their Dark Ages range of Andalusian Arabs. I'm going to start off using them to make an all-option DBA army (III/34ab). If they're decent enough figures, I will most likely place an order for some Carolingian Franks so that I could put together a historically matched pair of armies. After that, because of the number of miniatures in each bag, I would only need a few more in order to be able to put together Big Battle DBA versions of the army. But considering the rate at which I am currently painting, I think such plans would be pretty far off. Especially since my initial purpose was to just get a sample of Old Glory's stuff. It would even be satisfying for me to finally have a couple of armies from Book Three of DBA's army lists. Anything more than that might be asking too much of this painter.

It Could Be Good

Today I read the first 50 pages of the Field of Glory rulebook. So far I'm surprised by how much more I'm enjoying the book this time around and the rules system is genuinely intriguing. Although I haven't gotten to the combat mechanics, it seems to me that FoG may be the game that I had wanted DBM to be. I think it could be a lot of fun but I'm still not sure if I would want to commit myself to collecting these sized armies. However I can see how the collecting and army lists aspects of the game appeal to that area of wargaming that has so occupied me in the past with Warhammer and WH40K. If FoG helps permanently wean me off of Games Workshop then I think that would be a significant net positive.

I was on duty as parent for much of the day and the baby was intent on having lots of fun time with daddy. There's not much painting to report although I did get the base skin tone completed on the billmen. If I have extra time tomorrow I'd rather read more of the FoG book so I don't expect to do much painting, but of course I never seem to know.

Possible FoG Warning

I've become increasingly interested in the game Field of Glory since it's release a year or two ago. I bought a copy of the rules a year ago but set them aside in fairly short order. I couldn't bring myself to read through the book and that was it for some time. Since then I have noticed more and more references to it and decided to give the game another look. I've spent some time now looking through the various companion books that I've purchased and I feel like I should really make an effort to read the rules. I realized today that I've become so accustomed to the simplicty of DBA that the FoG book itself was a turn off. But then it occured to me that I should instead try to think about it as more like Warhammer or Warhammer Ancients rather than comparing it to DBA or even DBM, despite their shared basing conventions.

It has a chunky and somewhat lavish feel and is a very well illustrated rulebook, it is an Osprey product afterall, with a bunch of related period-themed army books. The army lists used are based on a point value system and they seem to allow for a decent amount of flexibility in the compostion and organization of one's chosen army. So given that adjustment to my thinking, I am once again going to see if there's enough there to sustain my interest over the amount of time I know it would take me to paint even just one army. Even though I think it could be a lot of fun and the usage of battle groups reminds me of the old Armati rules, I am just not sure if it would be worth it since one FoG starter army uses the same number of figures as five or six armies for DBA. To justify that, it seems like it had better be a very fun game.

As for the here and now, today I finished painting the 25mm knight and glued him to his base. I am no however planning on completing the base until I'm working on the bases of the archers and billmen as well. This afternoon I sprayed the primer coat of paint onto the billmen and mounted them on their temporary stands. I'm excited about being ready to begin painting them as they are some of my favorite miniatures in this range. It's too late for me to get started on them tonight but I'm content to wait until tomorrow as I can in the meantime start reading the FoG book. Hopefully it will be good enough that I have something positive to report.