Back on the Brush

Hello people,

 

It may not have escaped your notice that I haven't painted anything in a while. There are a number of reasons including time but mainly it's been opportunity and inclination. In short I haven't needed to be painting anything up for anything that I've been playing for a while and I've rather got out of the habit.

For a while I haven't really missed it but I'm getting the itch again and having been looking to get myself organised. This has been a pincer attack on two fronts to decide what I'm going to playing and as such painting for the foreseeable.

X-Wing is a given but I want to vary myself here. I've got a pair of TIEs, a pair of Scum Y-Wings and a quad of Z95s "earnt" but it's not as simple as that. I want to be playing what I'm painting and vice versa. Bolt Action needs to hit the table, while some 10mm Dacians need to catch some paint.

Pulpy goodness......

As a longer term prestige project Pulp City fits the bill particularly well. They're lovely "proper" figures that I can put some real time and effort into. Infinity could also have hit that mark but PC is already with me and my real limit is time, mainly to play rather than anything else.

Very tempting....but no ;]

So as much as I've had an enjoyable day playing Attack Wing and a first game of Armada they aren't going to be mainstream for me. The odd bit of time spent on them but no money.

That's the plan..... Deja Vu? ;)

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 :)

Suped Up

Hello people,

This Tuesday down at Enfield Gamers Jon was good enough to run me through a game of Pulp City. He's a major fan and I'm a minor KS backer so all good.

Tempted in to a Necroplane faction box and Powerhouse (big lad) the deciding factor was that I knew I could get in some games. Jon even managed to lend me most of my faction, beautifully painted, to bound across his custom terrain. All I had to do was turn up :)

Playing through what was basically a big boy intro game it took a couple of turns to get the mechanic settled in but nothing more. Alternative activation, action points and resource management are nothing new in modern skirmish and creates a flexible game engine without being too fiddly. Doing things and activating abilities is as easy as rolling a number of D6 and adding your highest result to your ability score against either an opposed roll by your target or a simple target number.

As you would hope the game is all about Super Powers and more importantly their tactical use. Your Supremes each have a number of Trump abilities which activate when rolling a 5 or 6 against said Trump ability. By doing so you can deal additional effects / damage.

Much as with many Superhero teams you have a leader, some heavily themed chaps and a number of support characters chucking out buffs to the big boys and / or disrupting the other side. This is where the real tactical cut and thrust is found. Do you buff before you bash or make sure you get your strike in first? I quickly worked out that I was playing a skirmish game with plenty of depth and variation as well as the expected CRASH!, BANG! and KAPOW!!

Jon and his dice were good enough to let me have the win. Looking forward to returning the favour :)

Toys R Me

Steve + TOYs = HAPPY

Okay, yesterday's domestication got a bit big on me but I did get lots of STUFF done. I then got in some sofa time with the cricket and spent the evening communing with the x-box.

Gears of War is an old one but a bloody good one, emphasis on the bloody! Very slick given the visual "chunky" feel and a subtlelty of mission variation that I hadn't expected. Top Marks.

I then had a quick go with Fable II, until about half two this morning, starting a new "evil" character to continue my recent anti-hero theme. Due to the awesome scope of the game i've quickly established a cross-dressing goff boy with pig tails and an apparant Adam Ant fetish!

Awesome, awsome game. By taking a few different turns this time round i've already seen substanatial differences within the game. Who needs WoW....... not me!!

Actually, I do have a missus but she's away for the weekend so i've been unsupervised :)

Today has actually involved little men, in between the GP and the test.
I've finally set up my work area and got hold of my new camera:

I've also dug my 'waggid White Russians out of thier case and checked them over in preparation for some PULP style back of beyond games with the Ambush Alley rules that Rich J has been involved with.
Here's thier site http://www.ambushalleygames.com/ and here's the figures:

The glorious leadership of Baron Vladimski, Olga and Yuri "the Bear".

The ladies, "The White Doves".

In the rear, with the gear, "The White Warriors". Soap optional.

Anyway, back to the test. It's got very tense all of a sudden. A draw for England is as good as a win today!