Space Truckers

 Last year I started working on some figures to play Stargrave with.  I managed to play one game before things started getting all lock-downy again.  With extra time at home I got interested in running a (then) new RPG called Those Dark Places which a rules-light industrial sci-fi game and thought these figures would be perfect, so I kept working on them.  After spending months slowly picking away at these figures the company that produced them are now releasing a game called Violent Dark that these will be folded into.

Okay.  So a lot of vague 'maybe this, maybe that' allusions to what I might want to use these figures for but why should you care about a theoretically random collection of figures?  Well.....

The crew of the Nostromo

Dallas and Kane

Brett and Parker

Ash and Lambert

Ripley and Jonesy

(I finally have a space cat in my collection!)

I would say if you're a fan of sci-fi horror (or just sci-fi....or just horror) you should definitely check out Black Site Studios collections.  They are very much a 21st century miniatures company as you have the option to either buy physical models from them, or STL files for those of you with 3D printers.

There is definitely a lot more Black Site Studios figures in my near future.  Keep watching this space, where incidentally; no one can hear you scream.

-Jay

Battle In Balin's Tomb - Team Evil

One of the interesting ideas that Games Workshop has been exploring in the past few years is producing hybrid board/miniature games using pre-existing models in smaller packaging at a lower price point.  To be honest most of those hybrid games haven't really appealed to me because I'm not their target audience (they're really designed to introduce non-gamers to hobby gaming) and if I was excited about the miniatures those games contain I would already own them.  The break in that trend and the game that finally drew me in was Battle In Balin's Tomb.  Lord Of The Rings was one of Games Workshop's biggest sellers during my time in the company and to be honest in the early 2000's it was my favourite GW rules system.  It's one of the few GW games I've kept up with consistently since leaving the company, and I still semi-regularly play Legends Of The Old West which uses the Lord Of The Rings core mechanics.  But I digress...

Battle In Balin's Tomb is the third box game to use the Moria Goblin plastics (one of the first Lord Of The Rings releases in 2000), and the second box game to use the highly underrated Fellowship Of The Rings plastic models.  The game itself is extremely basic, using a Heroquest-esque combat dice mechanic to play a 12 turn skirmish on a board largely devoid of features.  If you're new to hobby games or a big Lord Of The Rings fan and you want a simple introductory game with a fantastic selection of models this game is a great choice, if you're looking for an engaging strategy game that's honestly not what this is here for.

I'm looking forward to playing some games of Battle In Balin's Tomb with my daughter and possibly my niece over the Christmas season.  They are both squarely in the wheelhouse of the target audience for the game, both big fantasy movie fans, both like miniatures, and neither are interested in a complex game system.  I decided to start off by painting team Evil;  12 Moria Goblins, and the amazing and underrated Cave Troll model.

Moria Goblins with shields

Moria Goblins with spears

Moria Goblins with bows

Cave Troll

Team Evil!

That's basically half the box painted, I'm hoping to paint the Fellowship by Wednesday.

I'll show some more new/old models later this week and hopefully have a game to tell you about next week!

Battle In Balin's Tomb should be available now from your FLGS

-Jay

Review - The Stennard Courier Vol. 1

 Today I'm looking at the newest release from Nick Baran at Breaker Press Games; The Stennard Courier Vol. 1.

The Stennard Courier is a 'zine that continues to flesh out Breaker Press' grim and grimy fantasy setting for Dungeon Crawl Classics.  The 'zine describes the town of Stennard one of the principal early locations of a current ongoing series of adventures and campaign materials in what feels like a very old-school fantasy setting.  For adventurers playing in Breaker Press' game world Stennard is likely to be their first base of operations, and a likely starting location with all the features a low-level party will need between adventures.

The Stennard Courier itself is a 40 page 'zine that is absolutely PACKED with; NPCs, rumours, adventure hooks, world building, and commerce.  It's the exact kind of campaign starting point that every RPG box set or GM guide should include to give players and game masters the kind of world that feels full and lived-in to establish the tone of the game.  Within it's 40 pages the Stennard Courier gives 11 detailed locations (with additional allusions to other areas), 11 detailed NPCs (again with more from other Breaker Press products alluded to), as well as 12 separate lists of rumours (enough for an entire campaign), and price lists for 3 local businesses.  As I mentioned before this is the exact kind of supplement that a GM needs to make their game world feel more 'real' and less like a series of disconnected quests or missions.  The overall quality of the writing is outstanding with rich full descriptions of NPCs and their locations laid out in a clear easy to understand format that will make the material extremely easy for a GM to integrate into their own campaign.  The artwork has an old-school aesthetic to it that immediately puts me in the mind of the original Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

Overall the Stennard Courier is a must-have for anyone looking for a starting/home location for a low-level fantasy RPG, as well as being an excellent reference for anyone looking to create their own small town in terms of what both completeness and utility should look like.

The Stennard Courier Vol. 1 is currently available directly from Breaker Press Games at: https://breakerpress.storenvy.com/products/34299427-the-stennard-courier-vol-1-pdf

As well as via DriveThruRPG at: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/378456/The-Stennard-Courier-Vol-1--BPGDCZ004?term=stennard

For a small indie business that already has a track record of outstanding releases this might just be their best and most useful yet!

-Jay

Shadow Throne

 The invasion has already begun....

After a few years of not playing any of Games Workshop's 'core' games my buddy Ash has decided to pull me back in.  It's been a while since I collected anything new for 40K but as staunchly Imperial player for my 30ish years in the game I figured a new collection of the Imperium's finest citizens on Earth was the perfect place to start.  What's great is (based on my understanding) the figures on the new Shadow Throne box set will also make an excellent starting force if I want to play Necromunda or Kill Team as well.  Such is the glory of humanity's great Four-Armed Emperor!  Praise be to him!

I started off by painting the 10 loyal Imperial citizens working in the mines.

These brave souls have picked up their mining implements as well as some light weapons left behind by the local PDF to arm themselves to see off any threats to the great Emperor.  Praise be to him!

Next is a leader.  We call him the foreman but for some reason we have heard the forces of the oppressor refer to him as a Primus.

If you can't already tell we are truly blessed in the holy light of The Emperor.  Many non-believers suffer from pale pallid flesh but those of us who reside in the graces of the one true Emperor of mankind maintain our healthy pink skin even after generations working underground in the hive mines.

The Four-Armed Emperor has also seen fit to send up a true prophet, one who can work great miracles in the Emperor's name.  Behold the glory of our good and fair Magus.

The Magus shares his many gifts with us.  And as he is truly touched and blessed by the Emperor he has gifts so share with even non-believers.

To aid in our clearing of the mines a new friend has joined our ranks.  Her job is to reduce the rocks and debris that stand between us and the Emperor's bounty, though the oppressors call her Reductus Saboteur.

Her third arm must truly be a sign that she is growing closer to our great Four-Armed Emperor.  Oh praise be to him!

And finally unlike the forces of the false Emperor who claim to worship a desiccated husk on a golden throne our TRUE Four-Armed Emperor appears before us and joins us when we face troubles.

BASK IN HIS MAGNIFICENT BEAUTY!

We have already begun spreading the joy and love of our Emperor throughout the homeworld.  We look forward to welcoming all of you into the flock soon.

To join our flock please contact your FLGS where Shadow Throne will be available for sale this coming Saturday.

-Neophyte Brother Jay

 

Is this a new genre or am I just late to the party?

 Generally speaking if I get interested in a new style or genre or gaming it was an intentional choice.  I don't usually find I'm suddenly playing a genre of game that I hadn't consciously chosen.  Having said that in the midst of playing a bunch of fantasy miniature and role-playing games I realized that without trying or planning I'm suddenly playing and prepping for a bunch of fantasy games with one linking thread; they are all reimaginings of historic periods rather than being entirely fictional constructs.

I started off with my friend Ash getting me to work on a force for Sludge, a full game featured in Blaster Magazine #3.

Sludge is a black powder based fantasy miniature game (somewhat in scale between a battle game and a skirmish game) set in a dark alternate time and place heavily influenced by the art and imagery focussed on the horrors of early modern warfare.  Sludge is great because it pretty much lets any gamer collect and paint a selection of historic miniatures from different periods mixing and matching figures without necessarily having to worry about historic accuracy.

After I'd started building and painting my Sludge models (literally before I'd finished a single figure) two of my friends completely separate from each other started texting me and asked me if I'd heard of Osprey Games upcoming game; The Silver Bayonet.

The Silver Bayonet is set in Europe during the Napoleonic era and features soldiers of the area hunting down and fighting supernatural creatures.  The Silver Bayonet is both a quick simple skirmish game, and a fairly thorough campaign game.  As a role-player one part of the appeal of The Silver Bayonet for me was that in addition to a small warband each player paints and collects a small collection of supernatural creatures.  If that wasn't enough the game also includes a small solo campaign, I haven't traditionally played many solo miniature games but with an increasingly erratic work schedule that makes it hard to get together with friends the solo element really appeals to me.

But this trend didn't stop at miniature games.  I've been playing a lot of D&D over the past few years and when I reached out to some friends for suggestions for cool adventures from publishers my players might be less familiar with one of them suggested the line of adventures published by Lamentations Of The Flame Princess.  I had some exposure to LotFP a few years ago and I had had mixed feelings about what I'd read at the time, but when I picked up No Rest For The Wicked I was super impressed and ready to take another crack at some of their offerings.  I've since ordered England Upturned thinking it looks like it would fit with No Rest For The Wicked and might be a great jumping off point for a new campaign.

While going through the RPG posts floating around Twitter I also stumbled across a really cool looking Indiegogo for an adventure that combined a number of factors that appealed to me; D&D compatible, urban based, undead monsters, and that historic fantasy feel I suddenly seem interested in.  Wightchester Prison City Of The Damned by Postmortem Studios.

Thematically Wightchester looks like a D&D horror version of Escape From New York set in the 1600s.  Sometimes you see an indie project and without knowing a ton about it you still know it speaks to you, this is definitely one of those for me.

So...this means I'm going to need a bunch of historic miniatures, and a bunch of historic miniatures converted into weird fantasy creatures and monsters.  Luckily there is no shortage of great companies making amazing plastic black powder era figures, unluckily I live in Canada and it seems no one domestically is carrying very much of this stuff to there's a lot of international shipping in my near future.

If you also find this genre interesting keep watching this space.  This looks like what I should be working on for most/all of December.

-Jay

Eridani Light Horse: Odds and ends

 Today will be my wrap up for the Eridani Light Horse (for now at least).  My original plan was a company, then it was a reinforced company, then I realized I had painted four extra mechs (for two different reasons) so I'm finishing up just four mechs away from two full companies.

Before I settled on the Marauder I was originally thinking of having my Captain mounted in a Battle Master.

Ever since the release of Sorenson's Sabres, and the mech bays portrayed on the cover the Battle Master has been one of my favourite mechs.  As great as this figure is, and I am super happy with it, this is one of the few mechs I really wish I had one of the original plastics or metals for as I really enjoy the slightly more squat design and I really dig the side-by-side PPC cannon.

At the same time while I was contemplating my force composition I was seriously considering having two Wolverines in my force.  To that end I had painted an additional Wolverine.

I touched on why I like the Wolverine in my previous post, but suffice to say the main reason I was considering multiple Wolverines was due to their low cost and flexibility.

My last additional mech may or may not (at the time of writing I honestly don't know) be added to my force at some point today; the Awesome.

In my current campaign my opponent's force of Taurian Concordats is led by an Awesome.  I'm hoping to kill his commander and capture his mech, in which case this fig will be joining my force.  On that note you might notice that the Awesome's armour is a slightly different green hue than the rest of my force.  That's because although I used the same colour scheme I used on the rest of my Light Horse I painted it over a reddish-brown base to simulate the Light Horse quickly painting over top of the existing Taurian paint job.

So between these three additions and my captured Thug I have a fifth lance worth of mechs to add to the Light Horse.  

If I circle back to the Light Horse at some point in the near future I'm going to go all light and medium mechs to offset all the heavies and assault mechs I added through these last two irregular lances.

I'll be taking a break from BattleTech for a little bit after this to move into a different genre for a bit but I've got a bunch more mechs for when we pick the game back up again.

I got most of my mechs (and all of what you'll start seeing later this week) from my FLGS.  You should check out your FLGS to see what cool games and figures they have for you.

-Jay

Eridani Light Horse: Reserves and first mech taken as a prize!

Yesterday I finished up my look at the 'regular' company of Crunch's Cavalry.  Having said that though in the campaign I'm currently playing in I actually have a reinforced company of four lances.

My final lance is not in fact organized as a lance of any particular type and instead I have been drawing mechs from it to supplement my force in other missions.

First up is the Archer.

The Archer is a really durable long range platform in Alpha Strike and in my last game really benefitted from using my Locust as a spotter.

Next is the Rifleman.

I have used the Rifleman in 1 Alpha Strike game so far and I have to say I found it a bit underwhelming.  It's not bad or an underperformer in any way but there's just nothing particularly exciting about it compared to some of the other mechs.

 Next comes the Wolverine.

My opinion of the Wolverine is shaped really heavily by my early BattleTech experiences.  Back in the day I played a lot of CityTech and in that environment decently armoured medium mechs that could jump were king.  In my Alpha Strike games so far the Wolverine has been well worth it's points and seems pretty flexible.

And finally the Blackjack.

This is a bit of a funny one for me as my history with it is the opposite of the Wolverine.  I was never a fan of the Blackjack when I first started playing.  It seemed like the low damage output, low armour, and risk of ammo explosion weren't worth the risk.  In Alpha Strike it's an inexpensive mech that is reasonably mobile, so although it hasn't done much for me yet I'm excited to see what it can contribute.

The unexpected bonus of the Thug.

During the campaign that I'm currently playing one of the post-game outcomes is finding a mech worth up to 40 points.  This basically allows you to bolster your force for free.  After picking through the options available I went with a Thug as it carried a lot more armour than most of my mechs and felt like it would give me a decent bodyguard option for Capt Crunch's Marauder.  I'm very much looking forward to seeing how it preforms in it's first game in a couple of days.

Originally this was my plan to conclude my Eridani Light Horse force, but two stragglers, and hopefully 1 more prize will make an appearance tomorrow.

I hope some of you have enjoyed checking out this reinforced company of mechs as much as I've enjoyed scratching a 30+ year old gaming itch by painting them.  And I hope you'll also support your friendly local game store!

-Jay