Its That Time of Year Again

The coming weekend marks the Triples show in Sheffield, held once again at the English Institute of Sport.  Amazingly this year it doesn't clash with the Mantic Open Day.

I will be there with a few of my gaming friends.  Not much of a shopping list this year, just some bases etc and some plastic spears if I can find any.  Of course, once I get there I might be tempted...

I will, of course, post anything interesting that I find.

A Bit of KoW

Once again, its been a while; more on that in another post.

I had a great game of Kings of War last night against T'Other One's Undead.  It was great to get the old orcs out again, I've not played with them for ages.  We used T'Other One's great Tablescapes terrain tiles, and his army looks excellent.  If you want to see more of it then check out his blog (Link at the bottom of the page somewhere).

Anyway, we rolled Invade, meaning that to win you had to get more troops in the opponent's half of the the table by the end then he did on your side.  We each had 1000pts, and, unusually, neither of us had any magical artefacts.

N.B. the battle is written up from my point of view, the Undead may well have another story to tell.

It became obvious early on that we were both going for a refused flank...

though there was a horde of zombies (with accompanying necromancer) on the far flank.

The orcs move off, desperate to try and hold the foul undead away from the orc tribal lands.

The early clashes consisted of the werewolves and ghouls charging and wiping out the orc skulks.  In exchange, the gore riders took out the werewolves in a cloud of thundering hooves and shredded fur.  In the confusion the ghouls have slunk off behind the orc lines.

Meanwhile the Krudger and one of the orc ax regiments take down the revenants.

A regiment of orc ax turn to head off any threat from the undead on the other side of the tower, while the Krudger and his gore riders decide what to do about the revenant king.

In the centre of the field the other ax regiment takes down the zombie trolls.

Then both axe regiments sandwich the poor wights, while the Krudger trades blows with the revenant king.

On the far flank the zombies have managed to work their way round behind the orc lines, aided by the necromancer's Dark Surge ability.  The orc ax horde turns to face them, hoping that the river will hold them off.

Which it doesn't.  However, crossing the river Hinders the zombies, making their attack less effective, and causing much merriment in the orc camp.

The final stages of the battle didn't get photo'ed, but the orcs continued their triumphant run, wiping out the ghouls, the zombies and the revenant king.  Eventually the lone necromancer fled, no doubt threatening revenge.

All in all a great battle, played with nicely painted armies on lovley terrain.

1000 points is a good size for a small to medium battle, we both felt that we were somewhat constrained in troop choices, but that's probably what 'real' orc krudgers and necromancers have to face.  it's also a great size of battle to learn how to use your troops and the rules (neither of us had played for months, so we were both a little rusty).

I should point out that T'Other One was less than lucky with his dice rolls.  Twice his zombie horde charged my orc horde with 30 attacks.  Each time he did one point of damage.  Also when Dark Surging his wights towards my rax regiment he stopped one inch short. I did seem to have to dice gods favour however.

TWD Tryout

Last night I tried out a two layer game of The Walking Dead; All Out War, Mantic Games' latest kickstarter.  I have previously tried it out as a solo (which it handles very well) so I had a basic understanding of the gameplay.

T'Other One was my opponent, apt as it is he who first introduced me to TWD.  We used his 'Last Night On Earth' figures and Mars Attacks vehicles and barricades, plus a few bits of street scenery which were there just to look nice (though at one point I thought a bench was a barricade and nearly put Carl in mortal danger).  The mat is just some very old Fat Dragon street tiles designed for Heroclix IIRC.

I won't give a blow-by-blow account, but here are some observations:

The game play is pretty simple and straight forward.  It's hard for gamers to judge, but I think it will be easy for non gamers to pick up.

The feel of the game is pretty much spot on.  Lots of sneaking around and trying to avoid the walkers. At no point did we actually come to blows with each other, though Rick did shoot at a walker and draw others onto one of the opposition.  There was lots of gathering of supplies, by the other side at least.  Rick got one lot which turned out to be a Lurker, the opposition got several, and was close to winning on more than one occasion, only to have a team member die and drop all collected loot.

There were a couple of points we were unsure of, and one tactic that happens in the comics, but doesn't seem to be modelled in the game, but overall a very pleasing experience.

Now I'm really looking forward to getting the finished game and hoping there is a good campaign system in it.

TWD Playtest

Mantic have just released the playtest rules for the All Out War game.

Why not check them out and leave feedback on the Mantic forum

January Hangover

No, not an indication that my New Year's Resolutions are slipping, simply me finishing off the last unit of orcs for my Dragon Rampant force.

A sample of the 12 figures, all from Magister Millitum's 15mm fantasy range.  Here they are based on 15mm diameter 2mm thick MDF bases (Warbases I believe) and undercoated using Vallejo white primer.  I would normally use spray undercoat, but with such small batches its not really worth it.

These Magister Millitum orcs are lovely minis.  Just enough detail for the scale, but not so much that painting them becomes a chore.  My only slight complaint is that it can be difficult to clean mold-lines off thin pieces.  The goblin bows were particularly difficult in this respect, and in the end there are more lines left on than I am happy with.  Still,, I hope it doesn't show much at this scale.

Now the base coats are added.  I paint skin tones first.  For the orcs that is any of Orkhide, Knarloc green, Gretchin green or Khemri brown from the Citadel Foundation series (sorry, I have no idea what the new names are), or Sick green or Stonewall grey from the Vallejo Game Color range.

Leather is painted with Calthan brown (CF), metals with Oily Steel (VMC) and then in some cases with Dwarf Bronze.  Cloth is any one of several colours, but I keep to a fairly limited palate here.  I imagine the orcs have looted a few bolts of cloth and use it for various purposes; trousers, bags, tunics etc.  Deneb Stone (CF) is a particular favourite of mine for unbleached/undyed cloth.  All orc tusks are painted in Bone White, eyes will be done at the end.

February is Terrain Month

As i said the other day, i am concentrating on terrain this month (and finishing off the orcs from last month).

First up are eight corner ruins for Frostgrave amongst other things.  I am using D.M. Scotty's excellent ruins tutorial which I thought provides fantastic results given the materials.

Here are two of the tall ruins and two of the short ruins.  I've still to paint them (obviously), but they are otherwise built.

I made a few changes to DMScotty's method; I used single ply corrugated card, but laminated two sheets at right angles for added strength.  Also I used thin card for the stonework on the corners, and made it a bit more elaborate.  This was taken form one of those card envelopes you get wargames books in from a well known online retailer (I'm sure they do other books as well).

The folds along the edges are ideal, just cut a stip 1cm from the fold on one side, and 2 cm on the other.  Hot glue means you don't have to wait around while it sticks to your fingers better than to the card. 

I was pleased with how quickly I could build these once I got going, and the material cost appeals to the Yorkshireman in me.

I still have my fold flat ruins, but these will help fill up the table.  I am thinking of something a bit more impressive when these are done,. but i'm not sure what yet.

The Walking Dead

Mantic's latest kickstarter, a board game based on The Walking Dead graphic novels, launches today.
It's looking like a good board game, with the possibility of add-on packs for extra factions.
Players control groups of survivors, with the Walkers being a hazard to everyone (there are ways to manipulate their behavior to sic 'em on your opponent).