First Play of Power Legion

Seb dropped by on Saturday for some beer, so we fired up a game of Power Legion to go along with it. He took the Exiles while I played using some evil guys in grey.

Zyklon went after Blink but was promptly pounced upon by Sasquatch. He fought his way back to his feet while Kriegeshunde made his way to help out. Nocturne took up a position atop the nearby containers to protect her teammates from the oncoming soldiers. Morph and Spider-Man split off to avoid being flanked.

Morph used his crazy stretching ability to try hitting Zyklon while he was down with little success. (We did note that his stretching die needs to be dropped down to reduce the distance that he can attack from.) My soldiers rolled some awesome activations and surged ahead to cut off Spider-Man and Morph. One of them took aim and scored a lucky shot on Spider-Man, KOing him to the cheers of his comrades.

Nocturne responded by dispatching one of the soldiers trying to creep up on the melee Zyklon was embroiled in. We were just getting into the swing of things, but sadly didn't get to finish the game because I had tix to the preseason Calgary Roughnecks game.

Seb thought the game might be a little too simple compared to SuperSystem but the verdict is still out in my opinion. I'd like to play a few more games and tweak the character profiles to learn how things interact a bit better before I decide. I will admit that I like the feel of it a touch more than SuperSystem in that building characters is a bit easier, while still maintaining largely the same comic book vibe.

I plan to create statistics for some of the other supers that I have and hope to get at least one more game in before end of the year.

Until then, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year everyone!

Final Star Trek: Attack Wing Event of 2014

Yesterday we played our final Organized Play event of the year for Star Trek Attack Wing:  "The Tholian Web."

Now you might wonder why we were playing a scenario from six months ago, so I'll explain. Back when this tournament was supposed to be run our shop didn't get the OP kit in time for me to hold the event. It did arrive later, but we had other kits for tournaments to run and I didn't want to be running a month behind for the rest of the year, so I opted to wait for an opportune moment.

After "Resistance is Futile" OP2 it was looking very likely that we wouldn't be receiving the month 3 kit in time to hold that event before Christmas, so we played the Tholian Web scenario, but this time with a twist: we played 100-point lists but used the extra RiF boosters to add an extra 30 points of mayhem to the games.

I'm happy to say that everyone seemed to really enjoy themselves and we had an excellent turnout. There were a few Federation lists, some Dominion and even a Romulan, Kazon, Klingon alliance thing going on. With an uneven number I didn't join in, as I'd rather have all the players get their three games in than have to sit out with a bye. It was also nice that I got complimented by the shop staff on how well we run our Attack Wing tournaments, which made me very happy to hear!

I did have a list prepared even though I wouldn't have been able to run it...as I needed an Elim Garak card from the Wave 10 Regent's Ship pack to complete it. The shop didn't have it in stock, so I would have needed to come up with a modification and hadn't brought any extra cards to do it with. That said, here's what I was planning to run.

TNG/DS9 Mirror Universe (100pts)

- ISS Defiant w/ Miles O'Brien & Rebellion, Elim Garak, Ezri Tigan and Quantum Torpedoes
- MU Galaxy Class w/ William T. Riker & We Won't Go Back, Jennifer Sisko, Multi-Targeting Phaser Banks and Dorsal Weapons Array
- Improved Shields

The list wasn't any kind of combo powerhouse or anything tricky, just a collection of stuff that looked like it would have a bit of punch and some level of staying power. Borg weren't allowed to play in this event unless you pulled one from the blind booster. I'll have to save this one for an upcoming event because I want to see if it will perform at all.

Seasons Beatings?!

No, no, no, I'm not advocating any kind of violence towards others during the holiday season (even though you might have some dangerous thoughts while all of your family is starting in on their fifth Christmas carol round the piano). "Season's Beatings" is the name of a Yuletide events chart for Strange Aeons. You can download it, as well as two holiday-themed scenarios, over at www.strange-aeons.ca in their Resources section. I've also linked directly to them below, but head over there anyway. There's a lot of other good stuff to see too!

- Season's Beatings
- Nightmare on 34th Street
- Christmas With Krampus

I'll shamefully confess that I have not played either of these scenarios, nor have I used the event chart. However, I was reminded of them after receiving some holiday gaming goodness from jolly old Uncle Mike. As I was going through all those lovely resin bits, I remembered my Black Goat special Maniac Santa figure! I had meant to paint him up last year. That didn't happen due to a scare for the family over Christmas...but this year, by George I wasn't going to be stopped in my work.

Now naturally Santa needs a helper. Magical gift-giving fellow he may be, but there are still a lot of holiday axes to grind. This brought me back to my newly received goodies. I hope Uncle Mike (or Santa) doesn't put me on the naughty list for showing my holiday rendition of this figure. I call him Ichor the elf.

The pictures aren't very good. That's what I get for taking them with my phone...but I hope you get the idea of what I was going for. Happy holiday gaming everyone!

2014 Year-End Kickstarter Roundup

With 2014 winding to a close I thought I'd post another Kickstarter round-up, because I find them interesting. Move along if you don't care...but happy holidays regardless! :D

Achtung!Cthulhu

These guys have done a great job putting together all the materials they promised during the campaign. I'm still waiting on a few books:
- Shadows of Atlantis campaign
- Assault on the Mountains of Madness campaign
- Editable Dossiers
- Dust mashup
- Godlike supplement

Age of Conan expansion

Just last week I went through their web site to submit my "order" and paid the shipping fees. I'm hopeful that this one will actually be delivered on time.

Carnevale 2nd Edition

Fees have been collected, and their 1st survey was made available a few days ago. I've already filled mine out, but I'm not sure when the second one will show up, which will allow us to select all of our add-ons and other goodies.

Deadzone

This one has been pretty lengthy, which is a little surprising from Mantic Games. There were rumours of them doing a second KS campaign this month, but the fans seemed less than impressed with that idea since we've not yet received all of the stuff from this campaign. The third and final shipment is supposed to be in shipping stages now, but I'm not sure if I believe that.

Dragon Tides

No word on pledge manager availability yet, but the last update basically said "soon."

Dreadball Xtreme

I picked my first shipment up from the post office yesterday after work. Inside the shipping box I found the rule book, two sheets of decals, two bags of scenery and the MVPs. In the game box were two bags of players and all the rest of the stuff for the main game. I also received a second counter sheet for some reason.

I went through all the figures and at first thought I didn't get any convicts, but after looking through the rule book I realized that each bag in the box had all the player figures for the game inside. One of the Asterian strikers was missing an arm, but since there are two full sets in the box I'm not so concerned about it.

The rule book is probably the nicest looking one I've seen from Mantic so far, and I really like the cheat sheets at the back. I was a little disappointed that there was no roster pad, but then I remembered that it was an add-on during the campaign.

Dungeon Saga

No word on pledge manager availability yet. Since they just finished shipping out the first wave of DBX I don't expect to hear anything before the end of the year.

Dust Tactics: Operation Babylon

Ok this one is why I've labeled this post with the "rant" tag.

Simply put, the pledge manager and ensuing "process" for this campaign have been a giant mess. A few weeks ago I received email stating something was ‘wrong’ with my order, but didn't say anything about what or how it was wrong. So I had to send email asking for details...we weren't off to a good start.

After a few back and forth communications I was told that I couldn’t swap out free upgrade packs as I had done, to which I voiced my disagreement. The instruction video and one of the project updates both stated that I could do exactly as I had, and I was pretty sure that I'd filled out everything correctly. Even explaining myself to the guy felt like a challenge here.

I requested a refund if they were not able to fill my order as I'd entered it. Over a week passed before I finally sent a follow up query to find out what was going on. At that point I got three replies from two different people saying they'd made a mistake and that my order was indeed fine and they'd get working on shipping it out.

Fuck. Imagine how much pain is being felt by the people who DID have something with their orders. Unbelievable.

Fallen Frontiers: Reboot

I had looked at this game when they ran and then cancelled their first campaign earlier this year. I love the look of the models, but the pledge levels were pretty steep for what I want to get. Or so I thought. I ended up going in on this one and will probably add more cash via the pledge manager. If the models weren’t going to be resin I likely would have skipped it altogether based on the high cost.

Guardian Chronicles

I received my base game at the end of October and have tried the first scenario once solo. The game is just OK after a single run-through. The rule books are a total mess, which isn’t surprising based on the likelihood of it being directly translated from French. There is an English FAQ available, but it's less than stellar as well.

Despite me and several other backers requesting further information over on the campaign itself we still have radio silence from Iello as to WTF is going on with the follow-up waves. As previously I refuse to support them and won't be buying anything from them after suffering through this debacle.

Guild Ball

Delivery has been delayed until Q1 but generally the creators have been quite communicative. I'm kind of wondering if I’ll be able to get anyone into this if/when it finally shows up and get some models built.

Incursion

There have been a few more updates, mostly videos showing off some of the stuff to be delivered. It seems like the manufacturer is still dicking the creators around. If this one shows up it might be met with a pretty solid ‘meh’, as I’ve long since purchased a copy of the 1st edition of the game along with the metal miniatures. This one might get sold off unless it's head and shoulders above the original.

Judge Dredd Miniatures Game

At this point I think this is the longest campaign I've ever been involved with. I'm still waiting on my zombie bikers. I do seem to receive a little envelope of stuff every six months or so which is both nice and infuriating. Ironically, the "Block War" rulebook expansion the campaign was in support of in the first place was supplanted by a new rulebook over a year ago.

Kings of War 2nd Edition

I backed this for $150 and will likely take two starter armies to add to my Undead / Dwarf starter box and various models from Dwarf King's Hold games. I kinda don’t care about KoW, and wonder why I bothered to pledge. In the end I'll get more models I really don’t need and will likely never build. Whatever...

Lagoon: Land of Druids

Other than Sentinel Tactics, this is the only KS-funded game that I've backed that arrived on time. I have to say that it looks great! The artwork and pieces in this really are beautiful.

I've had a chance to play a two-player game. Quite the brain burner of a game. I realized about halfway in that I wanted to try to limit the amount of blue on the board. Sadly I realized this about two turns too late, as there was no longer enough red on the table to allow me to keep it in check. Pretty abstract and difficult (lots of thinking). Don’t play this one with your analysis paralysis-prone friends. Need a few more games to really form a true opinion.

Peachy Printer

Delivery for this is yet-again delayed; until spring 2015. I really wish I’d waited on this one because I think they have been using the funds to do development and research rather than producing a product that was ready to go. Unfortunately for me, I joined in via BackerKit, so I have to actively monitor the campaign, and have no voice on the KS page at all.

Rise of the Kage

The survey for this one was released pretty quickly and was quite smooth to go through. I added more items which cost a few more bucks, but will allow me to use pieces for this game in Bushido, giving me two new factions to play with. I wonder if this one will be even close to on time though.

Strange Aeons 2nd Edition

Uncle Mike's excellent game of Cthulhu-ian horror on the table top. The survey was made available this week and it was easily the Best Pledge Manager Ever.

Tablescapes

Poor Justin keeps running into more and more delays. It seems they didn’t order enough tiles to fill all the KS backer’s pledges, which could have been avoided with a little more project oversight. I still don't know if the shortage affected my order, because I have had zero direct communication about it. Since I haven't heard anything I'm guessing they haven't shipped anything to me yet. Sadness.

Want to Win Some Free Models?

Over on Tales of a Tabletop Skirmisher, Hendybadger is doing a Christmas giveaway for some pretty sweet Batman figures from Knight Models for their Batman Miniatures game. I don't usually post links to contests, but there it is.

Three More UMW Figures for Strange Aeons

These were among some of the first pulp-themed figures I purchased. Come to think of it, I believe I've had these for nearly three years! They're one of the original sets of investigators from Uncle Mike's Worldwide, purveyors of the fine game Strange Aeons.

If memory serves I based and primed these figures nearly two years ago, after which time they sat on my priming board atop the refrigerator, awaiting paint. I've got dozens of figures in the same condition, and several others sitting next to my painting desk in partially completed states. I don't know why I decided to paint these, other than the fact that the stuff on my desk all looked less than appealing when I sat down to paint the other night.

Currently my Threshold list doesn't need new members, but I know how that can change in an instant. It's always good to be prepared when dealing with unfathomable nightmarish creatures, dastardly cultists and fickle dice that constantly test ones sanity. None of them have had character profiles made up, but I did start thinking of some names. So, here are my agents-in-waiting.

This figure always makes me think of John Watson from the Sherlock Holmes stories. Maybe the book he's carrying are his memoirs, or some tome of dark and lurid magic. Doyle Jones seemed like a good name for him.

This is another figure that totally makes me think of Dana Scully from X-Files. I already painted one of the other agent figures with red hair, so I opted for colours I don't often use here. Most notably the green for her jacket, which was a watered down Vallejo green. I liked the shiny finish on it as it looks sort of like a rain coat. Melinda Carson isn't related to anything, and I don't know anyone named even remotely close, but that's what I came up with for her.

This model sort of reminds me of the Hermann Heizinger figure from Tannhauser, even though they really look nothing alike. The face on this figure was a little roughly cast, but you can still tell that he's definitely an older gent, so I gave him a mustache too. I think he's supposed to be equipped with a civil war sabre but one could argue it's a family heirloom or something. I haven't thought up a name for this fellow just yet. If you have a suggestion drop it in the comments below!

First Impressions of Mordheim

As a miniature wargamer, Mordheim is one of those games that you hear about quite often. It's like that popular movie from the 80s that everyone seems to have seen except you. What little I knew about Mordhiem before last week amounted to this:

1. It's a fantasy skirmish game
2. It's based on Games Workshop's mass battle fantasy game Warhammer Fantasy Battles (you can see how they really stretched for a name on that one...)
3. It's yet another game that people seemed to love that GW no longer supports

Like some of the other specialist GW games, the rules took on a life of their own and were, for a brief time, available for free download from their website. I was given a copy of the rules and built a warband. I fully admit that I only skimmed through the book until I found the undead section, where I set about building a team based on figures I actually owned.

We played a three player game last night.

After only one game my overall thoughts on the game are as follows:

• most undead (zombies!) are tremendously slow
• the undead have terrible ranged ability
• there are a lot of tables and modifiers to dice rolls, which for the most part still end up with you rolling one or maybe two dice at a time, and you generally need 4 or better
• the game itself feels pretty slow

Of course I have only played one game, so this isn't a review so much as a first impression. We went through the post-game stuff as though it was a campaign game, so I may be coerced/convinced to play a follow up.

In retrospect I sort of feel like you could get almost the same game experience using the Kulten rules from UMW, but of course you'd miss out on being able to play as rangers, elves, skaven and the like. If we play a few more games I might eventually write a full review. Or I might not.

Field Report: SA2-141125-MA

November 25, 1924

From: Carl Selinger
To: Director Silver, Calgary Field Office
RE: Case File SA2-141125-MA

Last week my team was investigating the rumours of a large creature near Dead Man's Flats west of Calgary. The rumours proved to be factual; we found the beast near the small church north-east of the settlement. It was easily double the height of a normal man with pallid oozing skin, no visible eyes or mouths, and copious amount of tentacular appendages.

The beast proved surprisingly agile and was nearly upon us in moments. Dynamite seemed a prudent choice and we were lucky Agent Moreau was able to tap into her psychic abilities to help Agent Carter focus his efforts. Randolph ran forward and landed a lucky shot with his incendiaries, but was immediately pounced upon by the monster. We feared him dead as the beast continued its pursuit.

My own gunfire proved ineffectual in slowing the tentacled mass, but Agent Daniels valiantly jumped in its path and disappeared screaming amidst those writhing, ooze covered arms. Monique and I both lost our nerve a bit at this point and began retreating towards the safety of the church.

At the thought of leaving my men behind however I screwed up my courage. I believe Agent Moreau is partly responsible for my change of heart. I could feel her mind brush my own, lending me clarity as I reloaded my double-barrelled shotgun and turned to face the nightmare lumbering toward us. My first shot went astray, but the second...the second landed home. I can only term it luck, some might call it divine providence.

I'll take it regardless, as the beast collapsed and began to...deflate or rot, I'm not completely certain. It cast off a most revolting, noxious aroma. There was little left to investigate, but we managed to collect a small amount to bring back for study. I'm also happy to announce that all of the members of my team are well and accounted for, if a little worse for wear.

I recommend that we further investigate the parishioners of the area, as I doubt it is mere happenstance that we encountered this beast so near a church. A church can hide many secrets, as you well know director.

Carl Selinger
Commanding Field Agent