The Rival Queens

by on May 28, 2018 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

Nancy Goldstone’s The Rival Queens is one part biography of Marguerite de Valois, half a part biography of Catherine de Medici, and half a part outline of the French Religious Wars. Catherine getting first billing the in subtitle, the focus is largely on Margarite.

In one extent, this makes a lot of sense, as she wrote, or at least started, her own memoirs which were heavily sourced for this book. The Rival Queens effectively starts with the marriage of Catherine to Henri II, so the early part of the book naturally focuses on her; but as Margarite grows up, she becomes the focal point of the book, with Catherine becoming part of the surrounding cast.

Overall, it’s a very well done look at the period from the general viewpoint of the French court. There is talk about various towns and forts trading hands (mostly between the French government and the Hugenots), that could have used a few maps for a grasp of the geography involved, but the politics and personal relations are the focus of the book.

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Before the Ice

by on May 24, 2018 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: MMO

Smudge and I recently got through the final two patches worth of A Realm Reborn content, and are now moving on to Heavensward. This took longer than I expected.

Some of that has been spending time on other projects, such as Palace of the Dead. As I had mentioned last time (at the bottom), we were stuck at floor 30 because of disconnects during the boss fight; a fellow guildie looked it up and found that there’s a bug with the five-headed hydra model that makes certain graphics cards roll over and die. Smudge and I put our graphics cards on minimum, and successfully, finally, got through the fight. After that we did the next two sets, and I was surprised (knowing that it goes a lot deeper) that floor 50 was basically the climax of a story line. Even better, it was an afterword/sequel to events that happened in another dungeon entirely. We happened to do that one just before hitting this, so we lucked into some very good timing.


↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Fortifications in Wessex

by on May 20, 2018 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

Osprey’s book on fortifications in the Kingdom of Wessex is a well-done introduction, but didn’t quite dive into some detail I’d like. At the end, Lavelle admits that the book is even more limited in scope than it could be, but it does manage some interesting discussion.

There’s a good map of the known fortified locations from an administrative record known as the Burghal Hidage, and some discussion of the scholarly work on it. A bit more focused discussion of this (it gets spread out a little) would have been nice, and maybe a real breakdown of how many places are well known, how many the place is known, but the layout is questionable, and how many listed burhs are not identified.

But the real focus is on the more practical matters of considering some of the economy around them, and how these sites served as an actual defense of the area, including secondary (generally hilltop) sites, and signalling. There’s some good color illos of ‘typical’ fortifications, including the ‘generic’ burh on the cover, and there’s reconstructions of Winchester and Lydford shown.

I find myself wanting more with this book on almost everything. But at the same time, I don’t know that there’s much more to be done within the page count. Perhaps really focusing on one location and it’s layout would have helped.

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Oath of Fealty

by on May 16, 2018 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

The Paladin’s Legacy series picks up, surprisingly, immediately after the end of the original Paksenarrion trilogy. There are a number of things left unsettled by Duke Phelan’s elevation to king of a different kingdom, and that is pretty much the glue that holds what could be a disjointed book together.

Overall, there’s four different plot threads, with limited mobility between them, and Oath of Fealty swings through the set of them two or three times. The opening concentrates on part of Phelan’s mercenary company, and Arcolin who finds out he is now the pro tem head of the company at the start of the novel. This is the second biggest thread of the novel, and is very well done with the internal workings of the company sliding into the particulars of a contract. This is always a strong point for Moon, and it’s no different here.

The smallest arc deals with Phelan/Kieri himself, and has some very interesting moments, and I expect this will lead into much more important doings in later books. But at the moment, it’s mostly just there. It does spin off the fourth arc of the book, featuring Dorrin and the Verrakai family that has been a source of villains. This gets a lot of attention in the middle, and opens up some new cans of worms before merging with the second arc or the book. “Second” in that it is the second one you encounter reading the book, and deals with doings in the capital of Tsaia, and provides some of the initial ‘push’ of the plot.

Paksenarrion is barely present in this book at all. She does show up, and helps out at some important points, but this is really more of a history of the area that Deed of Paksenarrion takes place in (that is Tsaia, Lyonya, and parts of Aarenis), than any sort of work focused on one person as the original trilogy effectively was. Despite that, it’s tightly written enough to still work, and comes to a satisfactory ending. It has been just long enough since I read the original books that I needed a fair amount of mental prodding to remember many details, and therefore I feel some confidence in saying you can pick up the books at this point, though I definitely recommend reading Deed first.

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Two Rounds of Chaeronea

by on May 12, 2018 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: CC:Ancients

There’s been some delays on getting something bigger going, so Patch and I did another round of Commands & Colors: Ancients a couple weeks ago. This time was the Battle of Chaeronea from Expansion #6. It confirms my comments on the previous battle, as it features an allied Greek army with a good number of MH blocks (with the Sacred Band as a special heavy), while the Macedonians are heavies with good leadership and two units of Companion Cavalry (MC that can ignore one flag and one sword).

I had the Macedonians in the first play, and led with Darken the Sky to kill one unit outright (two hits on the first roll, and a pair of banners, which forced the light to try to retreat through his solid line), while forcing another light back, and doing a block to a third. Patch Ordered Three Right to pull in that flank while I Ordered Light to move up some units and do more ranged fire, which drove back another light. Patch got his lights in motion with Move-Fire-Move which did no damage.

I firmed up my center, and Patch Out Flanked me to bring the Special Band in contact with my skirmishers, who evaded for no damage, while he drove off an Aux on the other flank. I moved up my right twice, while Patch skirmished some more and then used a Line Command to start the real engagement. Patch did two blocks to two heavies, and drove one off the line, but lost a MH outright, and took two blocks on an Aux in return.

I used Inspired Center Leadership to bring in the bulk of my unengaged line, and knocked out a MH and the wounded Aux, while taking two blocks in return (even with a muffed First Strike), while one of my Auxes did nothing and was driven back with one loss. Patch used another Line Command to move up the still-intact right half of the army; an Aux and LC traded blocks, while the Sacred Band did three blocks to a heavy and took two and two banners in return. He failed to take out a 1-block heavy, and lost two in return, and then lost an intact MH after doing one block to another heavy. I used Leadership any Section on my left to surround an isolated Aux and took him out on one hit and two banners. 6-0

For the second game, Patch started with Order Lights to establish a continuous line and knock one of my lights to the baseline on two banners. I Ordered Two Center to close up the gap between my right and center, and Patch moved closer across the front with Line Command. I Counterattacked, moving closer to a collision while linking up with my left flank. Patch rearranged a couple units, and I Out Flanked him, forcing a couple units to evade, and doing a block to a heavy while taking two in return, and doing three blocks to an Aux that knocked my left-flank MH back a hex.

Patch Ordered Mediums to bring up the Companions, knocking the Sacred Band back a hex, and taking out the weakened MH and attached leader. I Ordered Two Left to finish off the Aux, Patch attempted some archery to no effect, and I Ordered Four Left, doing two damage to a heavy, but lost MH completely, and a block on another. Patch Ordered Three Center to engage the center of the lines, knocking out an Aux, doing three hits on an MH and knocking another two hexes back, and taking two hits on each of two heavies in return.

I did a Coordinated Attack to finish off a heavy, do a block to a Companion, and do one hit on a two-block heavy. The battleback did three hits to eliminate the MH, and the leader went with him. 2-6

Afterword

The Macedonian heavies are certainly doing a great job dominating the Greek medium hoplites. It didn’t help that Order Mounted and Mounted Charge did not, for a change, come up in either battle. I had really hot dice in the first game, to knock Patch out before he could get going despite me having some card issues. My dice went cold during the second game, which kept me from taking out a couple more units, but the real problem was the leader losses. Without them, the right flank was still in good shape, and Patch was having trouble in the center, though overall the odds were still with him.

Again, this was a pretty fast pair of fights; most of the terrain just squeezes in the flanks, keeping things straightforward. Though the marshes may have become important if I’d done more on the right.

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