this and that

whoah

Last night sat down with the guys for a little Pulp City three-way dance. We may have been doing a little playtesting, so I won't be doing a full writeup. Did a modified quest scenario, objectives were breaking off alien crystals from three set locations and earning points for eliminating rivals. Eight levels. I brought Necroplane, Aaron brought the heroes, and Maurice did Ulthar. Fun! It'd been a while since I played, but it remains a top game for me. Jade Hawk completely tied up a lot of my team for by far too many turns, which wasn't pleasant. I did make up for it by rampaging Super Zed around, however, which was a moral victory.

Off for a couple days, then hopefully to sneak in some painting this week. Probably heroes and Gruntz figs. Also have some Malifaux to assemble and base. Work is cut out for me.

Trying out Gruntz

Last week, sat down for a little gaming with the local crew. They were just back from Gencon, and eager to pass over the loot they picked up for me, and regale me with their tales of gaming and plans for the near future.

We also sat down to run through Gruntz. I'd liked the looks of the rules, and wanted to see how they played out. There was a little flipping back and forth in the book, as expected, but as we sorted through how things worked, playtime sped up nicely. The rules seem comprehensive and flexible. Looking forward to playing with them more. Next time, will make sure I have 6 pairs of d6s on hand, because that makes logical sense. Mech was dramatic and cinematic. Melee was unforgiving. Grenades seemed... highly effective, but I suspect we were doing something wrong there. Will research over the weekend.

Aaron ran with the Khurasan ARC Troopers. I was using mostly Blue Moon, with some other odds and ends, to represent my Xeno Legion mercenaries.

Picture kept small to hide embarrassingly unpainted minis.

In the pic above, my troops are advancing from the south. Aaron's dropship has toasted my APC (center-left, next to the solar panels.) My other APC has deployed the Velon Skirmishbots to take on his ARC Troops who have taken position behind the refinery depot.

Picture taken with the camera-phone at Dream Wizards, the local haunt near my house. The store terrain isn't great, but it's functional.Geared mostly for 28mm, though, so will need to cart along more 15mm options next time.

son of a...

So, a few months back the gaming crew and I started putting together 15mm scifi armies (that's actually been one of the factors going in to me putting together this blog.) It is, as they say, the new thing.

Rooting around for an army to collect, I decide to put together a mercenary force based off the old Alien Legion comics. They'd be a force composed of various alien squads tossed together and sent to far-off planets and hostile environments. This would allow me to pick up cool minis from the various manufacturers that I like and use them together.

And along comes Khurasan, one of the top producers of 15mm scifi figs out there. They announce their new Jasmine Throne Foreign Battalions. And hell if that isn't exactly what I was going for in the first place.

Games I Play: Pulp City

One of the miniatures games I play the most these days is Pulp City. A superhero combat game set in the 1980s in a fictional city in California, the game has a lot of flavor and fun. Early reviewers weren't fans of the fact that you couldn't make your own supers*. However, I was won over by the flavor and the rules. The background is a loving tribute to the genre, and has a lot of personality and charm (also, giant robot monkeys.) 

The rules really blew me away, though. I've played a lot of minis games over the years, and these took a couple games to get my mind around, but once I got it, man. It hinges on a very smooth and tactical action management method. And much like another favorite, it isn't based on a points-value system. Quality gameflow with a lot of interesting design options and rewarding tactics. Great stuff. You only need a handful of models to play.

Here's a link to a good battle report. Plus a review from last year. The first book was just released. A (long-ish) demo game is here, if you like listening to Maciej talk.

* - Word on the street is, this is coming out in the first expansion.