Thinking Outside the Box

Recently I scaled back my weekly VS System stuff to once a month, and yet people still didn't bother to show up for that. I organize (or try to) near-weekly game nights at my house, and again most of the time the folks I invite can't seem bothered to reply, or don't always show up even if they do reply. I've got board games, card games and miniatures all over the place, most of which I know to be great fun, and yet I can't seem to convince many people to actually sit down and play games with me. Now to be clear, I'm not painting everyone I know with this brush as there are a few exceptions. However, I wanted to set the stage for what I'm talking about here with some context for you folks that are not local to me. So these sort of things have gotten me thinking about what makes games actually fun. Is it the rules, the components, the theme, the gameplay, the other players, or some other nebulous concept? Obviously in some cases such as a card game l...

So things have been pretty exciting on the miniature gaming front for me recently. First off the DreadBall campaign recently finished and the survey was sent out by Mantic shortly afterward. I had already pledged for all the extras I thought I'd need and filled my survey out quickly. I did end up adding a few more things but missed two of the MVP figures because I didn't realize they weren't included in the Striker package. I'm sure I can pick them up at a later time easily enough should I desperately decide I need them. There have been some preliminary conversations between myself and the folks of my gaming shop of choice (Trilogy Gaming Club) about DreadBall as well. We've made some plans for demoing the game at an upcoming Blood Bowl tournament; to be followed up by two different league nights. Originally I had thought there would just be one event weekly. After talking about it however, it looks like we'll try doing two events per week. The one I'll be...

When I started testing the Kulten beta rules I thought it would be fun to put together a "Weird War" style list using some Nazi troopers, a mad scientist and some zombies. I had already picked up a really cool squad of Nazi Gestapo troopers and a leader from Bob Murch's Pulp Figures line. The leader came in a pack with a scientist figure, and I had dozens of zombie miniatures floating around so in reality I was already all set to go. I used the Strange Aeons rules for human cultists to equip my troopers and their leader. The resulting six profiles were a nice even 25 points. The mad scientist and his batch of test zombies worked out perfectly at 15 points to round out the 40 points starting cult size. Since these models weren't properly painted, I only used them once in a test game. They won that game and the list was a lot of fun to play, so I've been itching to use them again ever since. I do hope to finish painting them shortly after Halloween, which is the...

I've been asking around for a set of rules to play Weird War type scenario skirmish games with lately, and one of the suggestions I received was to try Flying Lead , which is based on the Song of Blades and Heroes  engine by Ganesha Games . I had never heard of the system or the publisher so I dug around a bit and found that there was a new edition of  Song of Blades and Heroes  released in September. A few moments, and $8 later, I was reading through the PDF book and wondering why I'd never heard of it before. The reason I decided on this book, rather than one of the themed books was pretty simple: other than Hordes , I don't own any skirmish rules for fantasy gaming...so I wanted that one. The book isn't very long but provides detailed, yet simple, rules for movement, melee and ranged combat, morale tests, larger scale battles, scenarios and campaign play. At the end of the book are several pages containing a very comprehensive list of profiles for all kin...

Did a little previewing last week. First up was our monthly Strange Aeons night at Trilogy. Uncle Mike and James were there with some newly made terrain pieces when I arrived. As soon as I sat down Uncle Mike nudged a binder at me, "check in there and make sure I spelled your name right" he said. Opening it up I found the printer-proof of Shocking Tales of Madness & Mayhem , cool! Inside the upcoming book are three different Black Dossier adventures, the conclusion the "The Council of Thirteen" and tons of new Lurker profiles. Plus the book looks excellent. I can't wait to receive my copy as soon as it arrives. Mike and I also had time to play a game. I ran a Lurker list comprised of a Winged Nightmare, Cult Leader and two measly .22 pistol-armed cultists. I ended up losing, but was able to drag one Agent off the board and kill another. Mike's character survived but will be in pretty tough shape after this adventure. I'm sure I'll get paid b...

Last Thursday was supposed to be our VS System night but it ended up being only William and I. Neither of us seemed too concerned about playing so we chatted while he sorted through a newly arrived package from Greater Than Games . Seems he had gotten in on the Kickstarter campaign they had a while back to help with the enhanced edition of Sentinels of the Multiverse . Last year I introduced Sentinels to my group to pretty much universal acclaim. I believe it was some time in August that I was trying to track down a local Canadian retailer that could get it for me. I met with zero success and ended up ordering directly from the publisher. Shipping ended up costing me half again what the game did, but I was the first person around to have it. Shortly after making my enquiries at a few shops, the game started popping up with quite a bit of regularity...so I guess my asking around did have an effect. While going through the box William put a few things on the table and said that I was...

October 1, 1922 Attn: Director Silver RE: Field Operative Roster Update Director, After a short break to allow myself and Mr. MacIntyre to recover from our recent injuries I've chosen some Agents from those listed on file as available. As per your previous communication, I've issued recall notices to their last known field offices and await their arrival. We'll be ready to deploy immediately upon their assembly. Please have the files for the following personnel updated to reflect their status as active members of my field team. Dr. John McDermott Archaeologist Doctor McDermott's experience in ancient architecture, language and culture will prove invaluable in our efforts to retrieve the artifacts lost in pursuit of case file SA-120816-RtA. He has also proven a steady hand in the face of the assorted...creatures we're likely to face. Walter Daniels Former Occupation Unknown I realize that Agent Daniels has spent the last few months under observati...