xmas haul

My gaming-related haul from the family for Xmas this year. The Valve Presents graphic novel collection, including the excellent "Lab Rat" comic for Portal 2. Upper right is the Plasticville "Hobo Jungle" set, which I will be using as terrain for Malifaux and Pulp City. And lower right is a Walthers "National Oil Company" set I intend to sci-fi-up for 15mm scifi gaming, space port storage system or the like. Great stuff.

Control!

Placed an order for my amigo Imam from the GZG December sale. And this is what I got in exchange.

The boys in blue.

And the close-up.

I'd been eyeing the Khurasan Control Battalions for a while. He'd initially picked these up for near-future UN figs to fight zombie hordes, but ended up not wanting them. Whereas not only is it right up my alley, but it's already assembled and partially painted. Even the vehicles, which are usually a sticking point for me. Sold.

Empire vs. Azur

My Azur foes (also, best painted team winner from Gencon '11)

Before sitting down for the second game for the Anima campaign, had to roll for injuries from the last game. Daniella came out fine, but Claire was wounded. Funk. Swapped her out for this battle with an Imperial Agent (with one extra action point a turn, rolling a second die for Master Attack, and a speed of 8/12. Really just going to be a fill-in for wounded characters. Used a proxy of a Crab Clan Berserker from Clan Wars.) We also rolled for Aaron's ultimate goal for the campaign: "We Must not Let Them Succeed." Fair enough.

Tonight's battle, a 200 point clash. We roll on the chart, and get 'Albidion.' Which is a nifty scenario, except the Church Inquisitor shows up when a magic ability is used. And I had, uh, no magic abilities. And for my opponent, the Colonel had one. Which he didn't use. So, yeah.

As last time, I brought Kronen, Daniella Meris, the aforementioned Agent, and Tiamat. Aaron brought Azur, consisting of Maximo Ligori, Kyler, Kirsten, and the Colonel. He brought the Power Source, which combined with his orders meant he was never really short on actions. He also brought some Piercing Weapons, knowing that I would be running with the Imperial Armor.

Terrain was a few ruined buildings, but the majority of the action centered around the one in the middle, which was a conveniently large line-of-sight blocker we converged on quickly. First turn, primarily maneuvering and moving up.

Bad moon on the rise.

Turns two and three, dice start getting thrown in earnest. Daniella pops around a corner, throws an arrow at Kirsten, missing wildly. Kirsten returns the favor, poisoning poor Daniella (a trend that will last the rest of the game.) Kronen stakes a solid position in the middle, and solidly fails to seek any Prowlers nearby. I completely botch my sequence, through, and move up Tiamat to back up Kronen... forgetting I had already moved Kronen that turn, and thusly he can't intercept to protect the boss. Ligori makes sure Tiamat doesn't forget that lesson. The Colonel follows up, and Tiamat is off the table.

Turn four, the Agent tries to teach Ligori how the Master Attack really rocks, but no, another big miss. Ligori tries to return the favor, with a Raxxor Slayer, but duplicates the miss. Kronen throws a critical hit on Kyler, and Kyler is hurting bad. Daniella tries to conserve actions, only dodging while hoping to drain the poison, but is creeping down to three health at this point. The Colonel clears out the Agent with a Hephastios Crest. And, at the end of the turn, I concede, hoping to save my remaining characters from further insult and injuries.

Post-battle sequence, no new wounded characters. Aaron rolls for his reward, and lands "Curse," which is really one of the better ones.

derailed

As noted elsewhere, I enjoy painting miniatures, but I'm really not that great at it. My best work matches up to a lot of people's version of table-ready. A lot of it is my lack of patience for doing details (because detailing is hard.) And while I can put in the effort and churn out something decent, it doesn't happen often enough.

Last night, I had a couple hours to myself, so I sat down to get started painting my sefadu for Mercs. I had a decent concept in mind. Khaki uniforms, with the armor painted black and white, in the style of Zulu shields. Red highlights. Some tribal-ish personalization between the figs, etc. 

(Sidenote: Mercs has an interesting background, where conflicts between megacorps are fought solely between very small units, in an almost formalized fashion. This lends me to think of sports teams more than anything else, and IMHO strong personalities would want to personalize their gear and style even more. And sefadu could definitely lean towards a little flashy. They're not going to be hiding in camouflage and stealthing around, they want you to see it coming. Anyways.)

So, yes. Great plans for these figs. Sit down to paint, and... man, once I get the brush to the fig, they really have a lot more uniform than I was expecting, and a lot less armor than I was expecting. Like, I seriously don't think my hamfisted attempts to mimic a Zulu shield will come across, at all. Now, we rethink the paint scheme. Will have to tone down the khaki, since it covers a lot more of the fig than I expected. White will look good on what armor they have, and will show off personalized details too. For me, I can think about colors I want to use ahead of time, but it's not until I pick up the fig and start painting that I really decide how to make it work, and that often means some left turns like this.

Matchbox for 15mm scifi

Pics taken for a discussion elsewhere. Plotting to use these for 15mm armies.

Matchbox HEMTT.

Pictured with HOF Octopod, Rebel Home Guard, and Khurasan Crab Dude Plutonian.

The container comes off the back, too. So bonus terrain!

And avec Matchbox Buffalo.

Blasters & Bulkheads: the easy sell

Classic cinema.

I picked up the new Blasters & Bulkheads from Mr. Pyle recently. Finally got it printed, so I have been reading through it. Looks good! Will definitely be a go-to game for not-Star-Wars gaming, IMHO. That being said, I had one important question: how does it handle doors?


The backstory: when the Star Wars CMG was in its heyday, there was a little commentary that, used properly, proper opening and closing of doors could be a strategic advantage, to the point of people joking it was a game about, you know, doors. And then someone went through the six movies and compiled a list of, well, plot points and scenes where doors were actually pretty important. Think about it! Good stuff.


So I crack open the new game, and, right there on page 13, door rules. Nice. I'm nothing if not an easy sell.