Death by painting

Over the weekend I finally remembered to pickup some replacement filters for my respirator mask that I use when spray painting and using my air brush. This is what you get after a year of casual use, (I think you can tell which one is the new filter) rather alarming really to think all that gunge I would have inhaled. The picture doesn't do it Justus, I got a black finger from wiping it across the dirty filter.

I cant recommend using a mask enough, you just need to look at the filters. A huge $12 for the new filters, and about $60 for the mask originally. Money well spent I say.

I can here all those people out there saying $70, no way, think of all the models and toys you can get with that cash..

To that I say, I’ll be 90, half blind, unable to paint, in a wheel chair, sucking back  baby food though a straw…BUT! I’ll still be roll dice and pushing toy solders around a table and you'll be dead.

Money well spent I say.

Mary Gold Pirate Queen

W.I.P.  - The picture looks a bit glossy but I’ve nearly finished Mary Gold, just a matt varnish to take off that sheen, then some gloss on some of the metal parts and she should be done.

Viking misery

Well my new Viking list suffered two defeats yesterday in a row. Both games were played against Chris with some proxies armies at 800 pts (He was using my unfinished Egyptian army, hence the strange pictures). Back to the drawing board I think with the list. Or maybe I just need to figure out a few more tactics.

The first game I lost when I went into terrain with lots of heavy foot and got shot to S#@$% (I should know better) The second game I also got shot to S#@$  again by lots of light troops and I just couldn’t catch them with all my heavy troops. I did learn a bit today with playing my formation a bit different from my usual. We came across a few different confrontations that bent the mind trying to work them out and struck the frustration of the FOG rule book.(Which has a really bad index) I still need to brush up on the finer parts of the FOG rules as I’m rather rusty. Still, even with losing it was a fun day as usual.

Star Craft – Game 2 & 3

Today has been one of the awesome days where things just start off right and just get better. After getting my models in the post this morning I managed to get in two games of Star Craft the this afternoon. First game was a four player and the second one was a two player game.

After re-reading the rules, and also having had the guys playing read though the rules a bit as well, we managed to cover most rules correctly between all of us. So by my third game I’ve now got them down pat pretty well. (I did really screw up the rules in the first game .. oh well .. live and learn)

First game of four players was a longer game, about 4 hours with lots of stock pilling and only a few combats.  Then we struck the end game cards in the third phase of the event deck (a kind of timer for the game) right before I had my chance to take the win by special victory condition. I had amassed a large number of troops and had just planed (in my head) the end game where I take over a planet and win. But it wasn’t to be.

The second game was a real head to head, with only two players you have to get stuck in otherwise you lose ground. Mike won by his special victory condition as I wasn’t watching for that.

Having played three games now, I can really say I like the game alot and I’m glad I got it. With the map setup at the beginning of the game it gives you lots of replay ability. Also the game is alot different with varying numbers of players. So that also lends itself to replay ability. It’s another game where the 2nd and 3rd games you play it gets much more interesting and enjoyable as you begin to understand the rules and mechanics of the game.

It will be a very interesting game with six players.

I have also used some of the old plastic containers from miniature boxes as token holders to try and help keep them on the table, seemed to work rather well.

I’d defiantly recommend this game to anyone that likes both board games and miniature games, it’s a real highbred one foot in each camp. And it’s alot like the video game.

P.S. The rules themselves aren’t that hard to grasp after a couple of games, the hard part is managing everything and planning out what you are going to do, which is what the whole game is about.

Madness

Well I’ve given in and started on my first Flames of War Tank, so far this is what I’ve got. Airbrush the base colours on, then added in some black washes to bring out all the crevasses etc.  Added a couple of layers of browns on the tracks. Not too bad so far, for my first 15mm tank, not to mention being a beginner with the airbrush as well.  Still needs a bit of work, I’ll add in a few damage marks and a few highlights.

StarCraft

Today was gaming day, So I turned up at Mark’s for some Legends of the Old West. But after seeing my StarCraft board game, it was just to much goodness to resist. Even though I hadn’t gotten to read all the rules, we started up a game with three players. (A space for Will once he turned up later on)

So for the first two rounds it was spent on learning the basics of building, moving and orders etc. About round three Will turned up and got the short end of the stick, not knowing as much as we did and having to pickup the rules and from where Mark and I had gotten him to on the board.

I shot off a couple of pic’s during the game, to show what it looks like. In the end Mark won with all his resources, only after a draw with me on conquest points.

We screwed up the combat to begin with, as I was skip reading the rules as we went, but for the most part we got things right. I thought it was pretty good for our first game, and I really enjoyed it. (rules blunders aside)

I’ll reserve my overall rating of the game for now, but out of the gate I enjoyed it alot and I have no dought that Will is going to master it far to quickly :-). The box and component quality is awesome. Its my first Fantasy Flight game, so I don’t have a lot to compare it to. I’d defiantly agree with the other reviews out there on the quality of FF games, just awesome. I can see that there will be a few board games appearing over the coming year.

Will’s revenge came swift and fast in a game of Infinity late afternoon. I made my typical mistake of spreading my forces out to much and forgot a few rules. I really , really hate flame throwers. (I think I need some in my force). So I lost yet another game of Infinity. But on the bright yellow side, my security fences looked pretty darn good on the table, even in there unfinished state. Looking forward to getting the rest of the set done and on the table.

View article...

Vikings vs Carthaginians

After not playing FOG for several months and getting the bug again after our FOG Napoleonic's game last week, The Hung Over One (Mark…LOL… serious hangover he was) and I thought we would bust out the troops in an 800 point game on Sunday. It turned out to be an epic all day battle, with some mind bending re-learning of the rules as we went. We started mid morning after messing about with lists and making sure we had the step-up the table all correct, as per the rules. Straight off the bat Mark had most of the terrain in my half, which is no good for my Heavy foot troops, which is almost all my army.

It started out pretty much even, with the Cathy’s moving up and holding position on the far side of the open fields, mean while this gave my Vikings time to move about. Somehow I managed to rearrange my line and move past most of the open fields causing me grief in the deployment.
Then it was a bit of cat and mouse as our light troops picked away at each side trying to cause someone to break or inflict enough to do some damage. We blundered a few rules as we went, but corrected ourselves as and where we realised.
Then we did the whole over think the rules bit, and got ourselves lost in rules as an entire battle lines clashed, with all sorts of overlaps all the way along the main battle line. After lunch and lots of rule reading we figured it out.

In the end I managed to break enough of the Carthy’s to take the win, just as several of my mighty Huscals were on the edge of auto break due to loss of numbers. (Which was a first for me, as there cohesion was untouched, I just kept failing on the the death rolls and losing stands, but making the cohesion tests every time)

Hail to the Dice God’s… I think they were laughing too hard at Mark and his hangover to lend him a hand …LOL.

It was an epic battle, taking all day with us re-learning the rules. But who cares how long it took or who won, it was fun, rolling dice and pushing toys around the with mates. Now that's what it’s truly all about. Roll on Christmas with more toys and lots more games.

Madam Elizabeth Starr’s Cowgirl Possie

Now that I’ve finished up my Cowgirls, I started putting together some names and history for my first Possie. Talk about an interesting adventure looking up female names from the old west. I came across several good sites and a lot of really bad sites. I’m still astounded at how badly people put together web sites. I mean I’m not expert, but when you cant read the text for the background picture….oh well.. life goes on to better web sites. So here’s my first list and names. I’ve tried to get the names to match the models to really get the fell of the game and also make it nice and easy to tell who’s who at a glance of the table. I plan to make a little bit of background for each Cowgirl and post photos etc later on in the week.

Clan Aerospace Fighter

With work taking over everything at the moment, I haven't had much time to paint. I did manage to get around to putting the transfers on my Batu fighter last night and grass the base. I’m now looking forward to try it out in a game, having never used the aerospace rules before.

Legends of the Old West

Holy Cowgirl ! My rule book turned up today, which is super impressive, since I only ordered it 6 days ago. From England to New Zealand, that has to be the fastest delivery ever. So a thumbs up for Forge World on there service.  Now I just have to wait for the Cowgirls and bases to get here…. hopefully this week.

I also started on a Card system for Legends of the West as well, having learnt a few new tricks in Photoshop it’s been fun making them. It still needs lots of work, and I’ll need to finish the Gladiator cards one first.

Gladiator cards

I spent a bit of time today tinkering around with an idea for making up some cards for Gladiator. In a similar fashion to cards from games like WarMachine, it would save a bunch of time having to flick back and forth in the rule book, not to mention saving the Rule book from wear and tear. So this is what I’ve come up with so far. Still needs a bit more work, especially since I don’t have the rule book myself and I only know the very basics of the rules.

I plan to do the same sort of thing for Legends of the Old West as well which I’m really looking forward to getting my Cowgirls sometime this week.

Awesome Battletech game

Today we rolled out a large game of Battletech with six players (3 per side), at 6850 points per side. (Odd number of points to play but it suited what we had painted up ). It was House Kurita vs House Marik. With a few new returning players who hadn't played in years and a couple of us who have gotten back into again over the last few months. We kept the rules pretty basic, opting out of some of the more advanced rules to keep the pace going so we didn’t spend to much time looking in rule books.

House Kurita : Mark, Arthur and Lee

House Marik:  Bryan, Kevin and Rob

As usual Mark laid out an awesome looking table with some of the new Gale Force 9 rocks, along with lots of trees, a river and a swamp. As well as lot’s of buildings in a city setup at one end. More photo's of the table are up on Marks blog http://kiwi-colour-studio.blogspot.com/

House Marik deployed spread out along the length of our edge, with the Grasshopper and Catapult down the far end in the forest part , then the Grand Dragon and Whitworth took the centre leaving the Commando and Quickdraw in the City.

House Kurita crowed into the city with the 3 tanks , the Crusader and the Battlemaster. Leaving there Grand Dragon in the middle section hiding in deep forest.

The first few turns were spent running up and getting into positions, with Kevin blasting away with his Catapult artillery, which was only semi successful.

The little Commando and Quickdraw were heavily out gunned in the City in the first few turns, so there was a lot of running in behind cover and buildings.

My Commando dies in a catastrophic ammo explosion after a stand up fight with the Battlemaster, I did have help from Bryan running his Whitworth up along side of me, but that didn’t help the little light Mech. Then Arthur charged into the Whitworth after dispatching the Commando, causing some serious damage and then falling over.(Much to our amusement). Lee held the flank for House Kurita with his Grand Dragon, while Mark rolled his slow moving tanks into position. (Yes, Flames of War tank stand stand-ins)

After taking a battering all over, but nothing critical I jumped my Qucikdraw into the Crusader for a Death from Above attack. I managed to cause some damage but failed my piloting check and eat the dirt as I fell over.  Arthur then opted for a meat in the sandwich approach to the Whitworth which had jumped over the Battlemaster to blast away at it’s back leaving my Wuickdraw on it’s face in the dirt.

I then managed to stand the Quickdraw up and inflict a little bit of damage on the tanks before I got vaporised by PPC fire from the Tanks on two sides. Meanwhile Kevin finally had managed to move his Mech’s up into the fight.

We finished the game up not long after that, with House Marik losing two Mech’s (both the one’s I was running ) and taking lots of damage on the reaming ones. So the win goes to House Kurita.

Overall it was a great game on an awesome table. I’m looking forward to some Clan Jade Falcon revenge.

View article...