Saga: Age of Magic - The Challenge (1)

1. Initial Thoughts

Saga: Age of Magic

Having picked up my copy of Saga Age of Magic at Salute and read it through several times (and even had a couple of practice games using proxy figures) I am extremely impressed with all the good work that has obviously been put into creating this new universe. It's inspired me to sort out some of those old fantasy figures collected years ago and put them to good use. 

So the first thing was to see what armies I could make up, without having to spend too much on buying new figures.

After a thorough sort out I thought that without too much effort I could have a crack at five of the six factions. Not bad at all!  And although I had an eminently suitable sorcerer figure it was clear that l wasn't going to be able to put together an army for the Otherworld faction without some significant outlay or a surge of creativity with the Milliput. Maybe that will be a project for the future.

Each faction in Age of Magic has a Sacred Ground unique to them, so I would have a crack at making these as well. 

So the challenge I set myself was to get an army done for each of these factions and have some games with them as soon as I can. How long will it take me to get five armies ready? That's the first question. And the second question is given my tendency to start projects off and lose interest in them before they're finished, would I actually complete any of these armies?

But I have a head start with most of them, so it's not as if I will be working completely from scratch, and some of the armies should therefore be easier to do than others. Here are my initial thoughts on each of them:

L-R: Black Knight, Behemoth, Necromancer, rebased for Saga

The Undead Legions

I'm starting here because I thought it would be easy to repurpose my Revenants for Age of Magic (after all, they were bought for Saga!) I was wrong - unless I want loads of units of Mindless. Never mind.

So here's the list I came up with:

Necromancer

Black Knight

1 x 20 Mindless

2 x 11 Warriors

2 x 11 Warriors (bow)

1 x Behemoth

I would need to touch up the Black Knight and Behemoth (a giant mummy), and buy the Warriors (I am taken by the Warlords of Erehwon skeletons). The Necromancer and Mindless are ready. But then I found a better Necromancer figure, so I've added him to the army.

After much thinking, I decided the base sizes I would use for my Saga: Age of Magic figures would be as follows. These are consistent with the base sizes I have used for other Saga figures:
Hearthguard, Warriors and Levy on foot - 25mm round
Hearthguard, Warriors and Levy mounted - 20mm x 50mm rectangle
Heroes - 40mm round
Creatures - 60mm round
Monsters - 75mm round

The crypt for the undead would be made from some graveyard terrain I have lying around somewhere.

Overall I would need:

2 figs rebase/touch up

44 figs from scratch

1 crypt to assemble and paint.

Not quite as simple as I had originally thought!

The Horde, newly based for Saga

The Horde

A sort through some old D&D figures came up with the following:

Warlord

Sorcerer (unpainted)

Champion

16 x goblins [warriors] (6 unpainted)

8 x orcs [hearthguard] (unpainted)

3 x minotaurs [creatures]

1 x chimera [scourge] (unpainted)

Most figures needed to be rebased.

I'd scratch build the sacred stone from, well, a stone.

Masters of the Underearth - i.e. Dwarves

Masters of the Underearth

It seems I have quite a lot of dwarf figures. Sorting these out I came up with this list:

Warlord (unpainted)

Sorcerer

2 x 6 hearthguard

2 x 6 hearthguard (heavy weapon)

1 x manticore [scourge] (unpainted)

I admit this is a small army and not a great list, but it will do for the time being.

I would have a go at building the mine shafts for this faction's sacred ground from scratch.

Sorcerer and Dragon (scourge)

Great Kingdoms

As I was beginning to realise that this project was going to be a bit more daunting than I had originally thought, it was good to find a faction that would be a much quicker build. Essentially, this would be a conventional Saga army with added fantasy elements. I would base the army on my Eastern Princes:

Warlord

Sorcerer (needs basing and touch up)

Champion

Paladin

3 x 4 hearthguard

2 x 12 levy (bow)

1 x dragon [scourge] (unpainted)

I'd need to buy figures to suit for the Champion and Paladin as I wanted these on flying mounts. And this list was good to have an excuse to use an old dragon figure!

I'd scratch build a statue/monument of some kind for the sacred ground.

A Lamia and some dinosaurs

Lords of the Wild

I love the idea of a lizardman force, and I had several dinosaurs already painted and based (with a game of 7TV2 in mind) that I could use. I came across a rather nice medusa/lamia figure that I would like to use as a sorcerer after a bit of simple conversion. The list that naturally came to mind was therefore:

Warlord (would need to buy)

Sorcerer (unpainted) 

3 x 8 warrior lizardmen [bow] (to buy)

6 x dinosaurs [creatures]

1 x dinosaur [titan]

I like the look of the North Star snake men (for Ghost Archipelago) for these figures.

I'd scratch build the primitive totem for the sacred ground.

However, when I play tested these lists out using proxy figures I realised that if I used my Skraelings for this army the only figure I would actually need was the sorcerer. (This assuming that dinosaurs and red indians go together). It's OK for the time being, but ultimately I think I will go down the snake man route.

Otherworld

The faction that is unlikely to be done. But at least I have a suitable sorcerer!