Healthy Competition

Hello again.

This was going to be a post about my receipt of something I have been looking forward to for a while, but then sort of mutated in my head into a quandary I have yet to resolve.

Being a fan f the SAGA series of games and supplements, I was keen to get my hands on the proposed Arthurian version when it finally arrived. Well, now it is indeed here.

The new SAGA rulebook, with the Romans/ British dice set.

In all its hardbacked glory, it arrived here Chez G on Monday morning. It looks gorgeous, is full of eye candy and will get plenty of outings, I suspect. I had already checked out a couple of reviews (Type SAGA Aetius Arthur into your search engine and you will find many, but I would recommend the run through Wargames Illustrated gives it). The main criticism seems to be that there are numerous references to other titles in the SAGA series, which is problematic if you do not own them. I do own them, having bought into the series in a big way, but I can fully understand that a reference to the effect that "see page x in supplement y" is less than helpful to those who do not have that access. However, what you get is not only good to look at and will probably play well, but is also another six forces to use as well as notes for using other, previously detailed forces too. Of special note to me is the ability to use my Irish as Scotti, which means I only need to paint up one other force to start some games, unless I use the "counts as" line of thought and backdate my Vikings as Saxons or whatever. I would recommend this book heartily, warts and all.

HOWEVER...



Other, more big battle orientated sets I also like the look of.

 



I had in mind some other sets for the period and that is where the quandary arose from.

SAGA is a game for singly-based figures, unlike the two below (though you can do so with Age of Arthur if you want to spend all day setting up and moving).
I have based all my SAGA forces on 25mm round bases (50x25mm for cavalry).
I have a horde of figures for the period, and want to use them all where possible, so mixed basing styles possibly would not suit.
I can use sabot bases, but don't tend to like the look of them and in a WAB game, anything that has a wider frontage per figure tends to lose out.
Dux Bellorum uses whole unit bases, so sabots may work here as with WAB, but there is still the aesthetics to overcome.

I will of course sort these little issues out one way or other.

The main thing is that I now have even more reason to paint all the Saxons and Arthurians I have stashed away. And I even have a box of Huns stowed away somewhere for something slightly different! I may even buy myself a box of Gripping Beasts Late Roman plastics, though, if I stay with SAGA for this period and indeed forego other sets, I no doubt have enough to do a large Late Roman and a British force already.

In the current absence of any defined project for 2018 for a show game or whatever, I hope to get started on this very soon, once reinforcements for my FIW forces have been completed.

Now, how exactly does a wargames magpie solve such conundrums as which project to do next and how to stop buying more stuff???

G