Blowing up the House

Hello people,

Something of busy week elsewhere has meant that not a lot of hobby-love has come my way with only a couple of games of Boss Monster to keep me going (cue smallest violin in the world).

I have however previously finished off a scenery project, as a bit of variation to my brush-time. Amongst a group bundle of BA loveliness picked up from Salute was Warlord's Ruined Hamlet set. Feeling the need to do something a little less standard I wanted to put together some bigger pieces than you normally see rather than three generic weekend break chalets.

Now I have to admit that the planning process was based entirely on two bits of random hardboard I and laying around and simply clipping everything off the sprues and seeing what I could do with them. I worked on the two bigger pieces making an effort have internal walls, doors and the like. Nothing on the scale of a manor but something "practical". The remaining odds and sods were inevitably mounted on some plasticard for a weekend break chalet! Coffee stirrer floorboards and the various rubble chunks finished the job.

It tried to keep things natural for the paint scheme and went for plenty of weathering rather than Normandy white to try and extend their use over a number of theatres and eras. The corner pieces feel very European but I'm sure you might find the odd example in North America, the Dutch Quarter perhaps?

Anyway, I'm grabbing 15 Painting Points for this lot and hopefully the Bank holiday will bring a few more :)

Showcase: Star Wars - X Wing

Hello people, the possibly long awaited second installment of the series. 

I'm already diverging a touch as I don't play SW-XW so thus is a relatively second account based on a couple of games that I've sat in on and a few chats about how it differs from STAW, which I do play.

A few weeks ago I went without a game down at the club one Tuesday night and sat on the end of the table as Mr C and Shado tried out an Epic game with the Tantive IV making an appearance.

First off the mechanics of the game are the Flightpath system that features in STAW with the same Action system and stat setup. So far so good and my expectation was that it would be more maneuver with a touch less firepower. Again so far so good.

I've previously commented that I felt STAW has more variation across its five factions and a host of independents but a more abused meta. I recently discovered that SW-XW has even less of an issue as a lot of pilots and upgrades are strictly ship specific. I've come to the conclusion at this makes the SW-XW meta far more stable which would seem to mean that further waves of releases can be developed far more as envisaged rather than being abused to cover the balanced weaknesses. More and more I find myself readign through the latest release fluff.

It is still "just" two factions going at each other and there seems to be far less scenario play, especially at events. I have however noticed a steady schedule of more focused releases and was impressed, when I sat in, by the sheer variety of ships, there seem to be far less obvious choices.

EDIT: Sourcing links I notice the announcement of a third, Scum and Villany faction.

Showcase: Star Wars - X-Wing: (Fantasy Flight)

Fast and visceral, X-Wing puts you in the middle of fierce Star Wars firefights. Use each craft’s unique maneuver dial to secretly plot its movement action for each turn. After each player has locked in his movement decisions, the dials are revealed and ships are moved starting with the lowest skilled pilots. Pepper the enemy with blaster fire as you rush into the dogfight, or move into combat range slowly, attaining deadly target locks before you launch a devastating attack. No matter your plan of attack, you’ll be in total control throughout the tense action.

The Good;

-  FlightPath™ and the wider SW-XW mechanic is a strong, simple one qualifying for the "minutes to learn, a lifetime to master" stamp of approval.
- The IP is very well managed with the character of Star Wars and all your favourite characters and scenes, from the books as well as the films, well represented focusing on the original trilogy.
- The Meta is equally as well managed and far less abusable. Release waves are well balanced introducing new tactics and strategies.
- Epic Play expands the game and brings the big ships into the game in a managable way strengthening the strategic side of the game and fleetbuilding.

The Bad;
- It's still just two sides and surely that has a limited scope, even Scum and Villany can only add so much. Thankfully there are no Gungans just yet :)
- There's somethign of a lack of organised play outside of fan run stuff  with most games and tournaments seemingly straight shoot-ups amongst the asteroid field.
- It's a good touch more expensive than STAW once you start getting into the bigger ships with a Tantive IV RRPing at £75.

My Ugly;
This is the game I rejected to play STAW instead feeling that STAW was more "rounded" as a game. In hindsight I stand by that but now feel that SW-XW is the more balanced game and has developed into a much more complete game.
Sounds like I'm trying to talk myself into it.......would want some scenario play though :)

Nut and BOLTs

Evening All,

This week I have mainly been playing Bolt Action, thinking about Bolt Action variants and playing what we thought was a Bolt Action variant.....but isn't!!

Tuesday night down at Enfield Gamers myself and Ian got in a game of BA with my Commandos taking on his French at the Top Secret scenario. Taking on a more numerous opponent with a pair of artillery pieces, armoured car and light tank was something a bit new so I concentrated on going after the objective.
 Keeping back the carriers for a couple of turns I was forced to make a flanking run with them by Turn 3 but did pretty well with them. Even though they got tonked eventually they let Ponsonby-Smyth almost make off with the objective only to get sniped at which point Spatchcock grabbed it and ran. Rolling for the 7th turn he didn't quite get the chance to make it away but very close.

To represent the objective we used a Cthulu dice and quickly decided that it was the Necronomicon! This set me to thinking about how easy it would be to twist BA to Wierd War II. Flicking the net the other day I stumbled across a blog detailing a BA version of the Red Skull so pretty easily would be the answer.......interesting!! Possibly a refocus for St Peytersburg??

Moving on, myself and Rich have been trying out the Alpha ruleset for Gates of Anatares. It's taken a few games to start getting a grip on how the game is and more importantly what it isn't. Despite various rumours it's not a return to early versions of 40K and more pertinently it's REALLY not BA re-skinned!

Other than sharing the Order Dice and Pin system a lot of the core mechanics are substantially different.
As an example being in area cover doesn't make it harder to hit the target but makes them more difficult to kill, i.e gives a cover save bolted on top of "toughness" and armour (resilience+armour+cover).
The effect is that you can still hit, and crucially pin, with less chance of a kill aka suppression of the target.

It took me a while to catch on to this whilst also dealing with a D10 system, drones and exotic equipment all within an Alpha ruleset. For a while I was thinking that it was a simple mechanic made fiddly but that was to misunderstand.
The other thing to GoA shares with BA is the necessity to use proper tactics and make co-ordinated use of your force!

Same again Tuesday night!

Burning Down the House!!

Once again last Wednesday was EotE night with another slight change of cast as Sindori emerged from his extra long Bacta-Bath while Agenai got an Obligation related call from his and so was temporarily unavailable for the evening.

So, after last time out the chaps finally got round to letting themselves into Ronsons, which took a little longer than expected....

Rolling round to the back door 7's was already taking an instant dislike to R4-X2, "bucket of bolts" was muttered a few time, demoting their super-hacker droid to gaurd duty and the grunt work. Faced with a rear door and a roller shuttered storage unit 7's  did work out that the door had a holo-shielded panel and even managed to NOT set off the attendant alarms.
Eventually busting into the storage unit, thanks to R4, 7s deactivated the holo-shield and all of the shop's Mag locks. Hacking the lock Sindori took point, checking whether the alarm system had been deactivated, NOPE, and then wandering in anyway!

Sin and Perit got on with a quick bit of "asset liberation" while 7s tried to engage hacker-mode on Jared's workstation, leaving R4 out back on lookout duty. A couple of botched Computer checks later Sindori had noticed heavy footed movement in the lobby and remembered to old War Droid which was now advancing toward the security airlock....which operated on Mag locks.....

Once the lads had R4 re-engage the Mag locks they set to him to work on Jared's workstation while they returned to "asset liberation" and 7s took cover.......behind R4's position. After an ominous set of whirrings War Droid smashed its way through the security screen just as R4 caught a load of feedback and shot backwards from a rapidly forming short circuit.

Everyone paused waiting to see what happened next..........7s, the protocol / medical droid, opened fire on War Droid (set to stun, which apparently makes a difference!)............to quickly catch an enhanced return. It wouldn't have been so bad but he'd already pulled a load of Strain getting in so he hit the floor with a clang. Sin and Perit had meanwhile collected a variety of specialist ammo plus a sniper scope and pistol kit respectively and headed for the back door. leaving 7s to it!

That left just R4 to try and collect 7s on his way out. It didn't look good as he deployed his grapple attachment on the way past.........for a big bunch of Success to send sparks flying as he dragged 7s down the road. Sin and Perit meanwhile tag-teamed War Droid, whilst catching some return Auto-Fire to bring him down and rupture a fuel cell.....adding significant fuel to a recently started fire.

With Tinsons grilling nicely the lads found a backstreet noodle bar to heal up while R4 brought 7's back up online and worked through the data packets he'd downloaded. In short;
- Kanto had been employed by Ronsons to upgrade thier data security
- Jared was the real hacker, Kanto set him hacking "games"
- Kanto found something interesting, "special projects", attempting to blackmail Ronsons
- Kanto was setting up a deal to sell Intel to a local Fixer

So all in all, not too bad a result with at least two out of three of the lads playing to their strengths. I'm sure you can work out the remaining member! So who's a "rusty bucket of bolts" now then ;)

Just In Time

A concept I learnt about at Uni so many years ago when vaguely studying Manufacturing Systems about work-flow and resource management. As I occasionally do I took 10 minutes the other day to scribble down my various projects in an attempt to work out what I've got time for and more specifically what I might invest in. As such;

Current Projects:
Bolt Action Commandos - approx 40 figs

Back Burners:
SAGA Lotr - Troll and some markers
Moderns & Sci Fi- approx 12 figs

Soon to Arrive:
Dreadball S3 (New Year) - feck loads
Warhammer Quest 25 (New Year) - 50+?
Pulp City (New Year?) - 12 figs

Long Term:
AWI Skirmish - approx 50 figs
Zombiecide - fecking feck loads

12mm Modern Russians - can't quite remember

I have to admit that lead mountain has been reduced substantially over the past couple of years but that's still plenty to be getting on with. More to the actual point of this exercise, what can I afford to add, more in terms of time rather than money?

As previously mentioned Infinity: Op Icestorm is proving somewhat alluring. I've also just pre-ordered Tank War with myself and Rich looking to move to 15mm for it as well as larger games of general Bolt Action.

So...Two projects, that I've sold to myself on various levels of current multi use, with comparative levels of investment. £60 gets me Icestorm or a British tank company (Plastic Soldier Company) with the opportunity to expand at my deluded leisure.

Time wise I reckon I've got until the New Year we feels like it should accommodate both projects...... 

Decisions ;)

PULPed

Evening All,

Myself and Rich have got a decent amount of gaming in this weekend. Firefly, Boss Monster and our most recent kick, Pulp Alley.

After having a run out with some Star Wars figures the other week we tried out the campaign rules with a couple of linked scenarios and our own fully fleshed out "leagues".
For myself I went with the White Russians, that I've had knocking around for quite sometime. Running through the league generation process there are a LOT of different options, which gives you an awful lot of scope, to fill your Ten "Slots". Your Leader is free, a Sidekick 3 slots, an Ally 2 slots and a follower 1 slot.

As I often do I started with the figures I fancied and fitted the rule to well er....fit!

This is with the new phone camera. Pretty good!!

From the left;
Baron von Blut - Leader - 4 extra Slots
Anastasia - Sidekick - Femme Fetale
Boris "The Bull" - Sidekick - Retains stats despite injuries
Anna - Ally - Daredevil
Sergei - Ally - Sniper skill
Dawidowksi - Follower - Rugged Yak handler
Oleg - Follower - Rampant Yak

Rich has typed all of our recent exploits, complete with dodgy accents and obvious catchprases, over on his Blog so I don't have to! But then, he does it so very very well. Take a look and give it a try :)

The Path Less Trodden

Hello people, 

Last Wednesday night we got back to EotE with three of the group in attendance. Our rule of thumb is that we'll go one man down but one of our number has had to drop out for a while so we've lost Kardosh MIA. Sindori also required a longer soak in Bata juice than most.

As such it was Agenai, Perit and 7-UP-0 who faced a fairly scathing debrief with Sgt Chung as they assessed their planning effected their ultimate performance. A fair few frank one-way exchanges later there was no doubt as to their position with HI-HI........ Moving on they did get some credit for capturing a couple of "live" leads, and even some XP to spend, who were currently being "processed" for Intel.

Given that Kardosh was MIA the lads also got the loan of an Intel sliced DROID, cunningly disguised as a battered Rd, named R4-X2, who also provides a live feed back to HI-HI........

Recapping mission objectives it was decided that Kanto was still priority one along with Jared Tinson, the apparent Slicer brain behind Kanto's throne. Assessing the apparent leads the lads came up with the following options;
1. Head back to Ronsons (quickly vetoed by Chung)
2. Search Tinsons Tech for leads
3. Follow Kardosh's comms signal
4. Head back to the scrapyard and search Kanto's speeder again

Plumping for Option 2 the lads trundled off to Tinsons only to find it closed up. Going for the regular MO of a Perception check Agenai went big with a couple of Triumph to not only work out every minor crack in the storefront but also realise that the street vendor across the road might "know something"!

After a minor tiff with Perit, Agenai was originally going to take 7s with him until Perit informed him that HIS people were rather secular and unlikely to respond to silver-rod, the fleshy pair of the party approached the "meat on a stick" stall. There was a lovely display of crab juice ;)

Chucking up yet another Triumph Perit need not have worried as his fellow wanderer took to Agenai, digging him out a big stick with extra "sauce". He also informed them that the shop had been closed for almost a week and that the locals were worried for Jared especially after Oskar the tramp who lived in the alley had been found dead a few nights ago.

So helpful was the vendor that he even provided an introduction to the butcher keeping Oskar's body before Resyk collection which 7s was able to examine. Unfortunately it soon became clear that Agenai had stolen his die-fu as he spent all night rolling chod! As a result the top screen was somewhat indeterminate.

Further given the descriptions of the two local cantina patrons that had found Oskar the lads moved on. Strolling in Agenai made another Triumphant Perception check for anyone looking "shady". I cut it down to the two inebriated Samaritans and a particularly watchful Rodian at the back of the bar.

7s trundled up to the bar and started plying the good samaritans with the local brew to discover that they had almost literally tripped over Oskar one of them vaguely remembering some form of shadowy cloaked figure who may have been stood over him, a burst of darkness and the figure "flying off".....spooky!

Meanwhile Agenai managed to have a weird semi-coded conversation with the Rodian about needing to pick up a "package" from Tinsons with the Rodian telling Agenai that he definitely wasn't going to leave and meet him in the alley in ten minutes......

Ten minutes later Agenai edged into the alley with Perit covering him from a local vantage point and met the Rodian at the back of his running speeder........to discover that he's a gun dealer looking to move in on Tinson's recent closure.

So.....maybe nothing too much to write home about BUT a few leads picked up to develop further. More importantly the group as was on the night played to their strengths, using tech and soft skills to gather Intel, rather than finding a firefight they couldn't win (most of them!).

How's that for spending your XP? ;)