Archive for the ‘ 10mm soldiers ’ Category

I’m following the Anticamente ruleset since its initial development. I read the raw rules in Word format and I won the first Italian championship in 2010. Fabio, the man behind Anticamente, is a good mate and he borrow armies to play at tournaments. I was waiting for the realise of a Roman army, so when the pieces were ready, I bought them. They are beautiful 10mm pieces, too small for my father’s eyes (I wish to remember you that my official painter is my father). So I have them made ​​paint by a friend of mine who lives in Terni: he needs money to pay for drugs, namely more little friends made of lead.

I asked for a “wargame” painting style because I can’t claim to have fabulous miniatures: they are so small (really small indeed, in the first line of the photo the miniature seems a 28mm one, but it is smaller, it is only 1cm high!) and detailed that for large amounts that you have to lose your eyes to paint them. Best is the sense of mass that these troops can give. And the distance form the table where you play to your head is such that you can hardly see the details. We are not speaking about 54mm… Indeed, if you want to see these pieces in a perfect state you have to see the website of the producer: TBLine.

To store my miniatures I choose to adapt some Betacam SP L boxes that I found, but you can use VHS plastic boxes too. I put a steel sheet on the inner surface of the box and a magnetic base to miniatures based on forex squares. For cavalry I had a problem with lances (too high), so I had to built a magnetised frame structure to store that type of miniatures. I have a lot of empty space to put some Italic reinforcements. In the next Autumn we will have a couple of Anticamente tournaments, so I’m ready with my troops!

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TB Line exclusive 10mm preview !

Again and again on Hellana, where I could see a preview of the new 10mm miniature set from TB Line about armies for Punic Wars. This time was the turn of hoplites from Italy, useful for both the sides, the good and right one (Roma) and the bad one (Chartage). So you will have an army with Italian vests, different from the three orders army typical of Republican Romans or the Greeks.

Here you can see the general of the army. It is so good that I couldn’t keep my enthusiasm. It is part of a command with a bearer and a horn player. The army is not still complete. That day the sculptor (Cosimo Auricchio) presented to Fabio, my friend and owner of TB Line, the fresh fusions of the cavalry of this army. The hoplites are still under sculpting. Cosimo is very very slow with sculpting, but the results are great!

I wanted to emphasize the beauty of this little metal piece, putting it in comparison with other things as an attach or my fingers, because if you see it only on a screen, you can think it is a very good 28mm piece. Instead it is only 1cm high! It is a real miniature! The painting is great too. The eyes and the hands of the painter are phenomenal. These photos are take with my mobile camera (it is a Samsung GT-S8500 Wave) in free hand mode with natural light inside a gym…

The last photo is for the scenario at Hellana by TB Line, a horde of Mongols versus Rus. It think it was the best table at the convention. They were playing Anticamente rules. Obviously with 10mm miniatures.

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Anticamente in Rome

The Anticamente tournament in Rome at last! The date was past Sunday in the glorious Miles Glorious club, a huge space for gamers here in Rome. If you don’t know what is Anticamente (a game for ancient and medieval periods based on area movement), you can go to the link on the right column.

I passed a lot of hours (and an entire day off work) to structure a scheme to sum the rules in a easy way to remind them, but something were out as I expected. I always make schemes because I have a visual memory, and with this form of study I took my university degree. So now I have this help to play, and another time I can spend less energy on the understanding of the rules.

Fabio, the mind after Anticamente, lent us his armies because there are always new players who haven’t the pieces to play. I haven’t an army too, so I took a feudal one, a heavy army, but at the end I don’t liked its composition. So at the start I didn’t understand what I could do with some pieces and I wasted them with bad moves. Gasbarri, the evil one who wins all tournaments, instead built his army with his soldiers. So, not only he is a great gamer, he has got even a tested army. The same day I bought from Fabio the rough pieces (his TB Line produces them in 10mm) for a Roman army, so the next year I will have got my army. And I’m thinking about a medieval army too. However the pieces are too small for my father painting skills, so I will give them to a friend.

We played three games. The first one was against Gasbarri. In the beginning I almost won, but I hadn’t the forces to give the last shot. So, with my army scattered around, this devil under man appearance, kill my pieces one by one. He plagued the loo too, because he is really a demon. The second game was against Paolo “Ronin Clan” with Mongols. I waited a lot to move my heavy cavalry while his light cavalry harassed my troops. I sweared a lot because of my bad dices. At the end Paolo thrown away his cavalry against mine and there was no story: I won.

Here you can see Bizio, the other man after Anticamente. He is under the curse of the creator of a game: he write the rules but he cannot win! And this was true even this time, with the last position of the day. He played a great game but my army was too hard to scratch under clouds of arrows, so I waited until the end to strike back. My victory was little because the time was finished, but I had all my tough troops available so I could do anything.

Here you can see a human figure compared to a Zen Garden board. I showed my game to Bizio. He promised me to do some graphics for the game. Instead Fabio forgot to take me some quartz dust for the boards I’m producing. Shame on him!

Fabio and Bizio came in Rome Saturday. We made a walk in the centre and ate traditional food. Sunday we all ate other traditional food for lunch in a restaurant near Miles Glorious. I even met a Frenchman who is looking for other players. I passed two days of carefree. I like tournaments with friends, I like those moments.

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Play Modena 2011: the day after

The fair is ended. Like all finished parties, the mood is a little bad. The other days the hotel was full of people and friends (and late night games were setted in the hall), this morning we are alone in the breakfast room. I see the desk and only 7 keys aren’t in position on 114 rooms. Mondays are always empty of holidays mood.

We want some souvenir of Modena’s food so we find a local supermarket and spent 150 euros in aceto, gnocchi fritti and other cholesterol sources.

On the road to home there is Bologna and the Museo Memoriale della Libertà (Memoir of Liberty Museum). It is a place with a private collection of vehicles like this Sherman (it is still in order) that you maybe watched in “La vita è bella” flick.
There is even a place with sequential rooms where was in action animated scenes about WWII in Bologna. Very suggestive and with real deactivated weapons.
The museum was closed but it opened for us. The guardian is a picturesque ex soldier of fortune of Algeria and Indochina wars. We woke him after a night shift…
More here

Near the museum there is Fabio and his headquarters.

I took some pictures in his office. Instead of the real work about software and pharmacology you can see little soldiers everywhere. And some previews about his TB Line. They are real photos, the office is invaded by these little things.

And here there is my viaduct, blocked. Too many things to do in these days. I told it goodbye, I will see you in the following months.

After this visit, Fabio offered us a heavy dinner on the hills around Bologna. I ate crescentine until my stomach permitted it. Thanks Fabio!

Five hours after I was at home, a little tired… next stop is for Agliana, next Sunday!

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Anticamente (in the ancient times)

paolo is studing

A couple of word on Anticamente. This is a project of a crazy man from Bologna, the tortellini & mortadella country.
When he was a child he was always sawing an hexagon on the top of the house door and thought: “this can mean something”. A lot of year after he created a game based on hexagons, or rather a game based on areas instead of measurement. So you haven’t inch or cm to measure, you have got an area with a limit of troops that it can contain, and with troops in battle array along a direction of the six on the angles of the hexagon. An interesting approach for a new type of game without rulers.

snow

This man is crazy, and I told you this. Well, he without thinking about his wife and two little children began to produce hexagons at home to sell it to other people lightened on the way to the hexagon. Now he has got an industrial (!) production of polystyrene hexagonal bricks to permit you build your terrain, with flock to bring it to life. He is a maniac, so he built terrific things with his hobby knife…

late romans

He still had money in his pockets so dilapidated it in 10mm soldiers, charging a sculptor to make various ranges of lead men (and horses and elephants). With good results indeed (even if in the upper photo you can see only Pendraken pieces). But now his house is full of lead and polystyrene.

blisters

Here you can see something brought to sell at the tournament before all were sold out! Blisters about the new Roman & Celt ranges and some hexagon pillars.

armylists

And this is a preview: the new army lists for Anticamente, based on a system of composed cards. Very beautiful and smart!

two chaps

These aren’t two alcohol addicted but (on the left) Fabio, the man of hexagons, and (on the right) Bizzio, the graphic designer of the ruleset, while they were eating in Rome.

If you want to know more this is the website: https://www.tridentebologna.it
In the near future there will be the free rules in English language.

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