Frostgrave

It looks like the next new game about to get played in our little group is Frostgrave. Being just a rulebook and available from books.etc for under UK£8 it seems rude not to give it a try.

I like the look of this, as it is more very small warbands of about eight to ten figures, it won’t take much to try it out.

It looks like my first warband will be a picked from my Dwarf Tir-Na-Bor collection as I have two wizard types, one of which can be the apprentice. The next trick is to be able to pick models that are suitably armed for the roles of thug, man-at-arms and crossbowman.

I also hope this will encourage me to paint up more of my Rackham Cadwallon faction for use as a warband, but do I rebase from square bases to round bases?

Steam Wars Playtest

The first draft of my Steam Wars rules had a run out this week. The rules started out as a cut down version of my fantasy No Quarter rules and then proceeded to be simplified more and more to make a game that should play out quite quickly.

The first draft was a very light two pages, the first line reads “If it is not clear, make it up.”

The last year or so has been spent painting up loads of Bob Olley’s Prussian Scrunts, Andrew May’s British steampunk infantry and a variety of vehicles including Ramshackles Pugs and Ironclad Miniatures light tanks. This is what it was all leading to, Steam Wars.

Using a spreadsheet to work out points values and model profiles, I created a list for each force and enlisted the help of Mr Steinberg to help give it the first play test.

A standard unit size is five or six models, consisting of a unit leader, several riflemen and up to two specialists.

The model profiles can be modified to create heavier units such as these heavy infantry models from Clockwork Goblin and the Spartan Treadbikes.

The game uses alternate unit activation rather than I Go You Go. Each model has two actions which can be used to move, shoot or fight along with a few other basic actions. All weapons come from a standard list, although it is possible to create custom weapon profiles if required.

All ranged attacks hit on a 4+, all melee attacks hit on a 4+. These can be modified by certain circumstances. A unit that takes hits will get a pin counter which will reduce the number of actions it has available.

I have even created rules for jump pack equipped troops and painted some Rackham Tir-Na-Bor Dwarf Meteors to fill the role for the Scrunts.

Vehicles of any size can be used, although we did decide that the tanks in our test game were a bit too tough and needed their armour and wounds reducing.

Attacking vehicles from the rear is the best option as their armour is greatly reduced, there is nothing worse than having a tough unkillable tank on the table.

Tunneling models like this little beauty from Ironclad Miniatures allow units to pop up and attack the enemy anywhere. For tunneling model movement, the controlling player uses three counters, only one of which is the actual tunneling machine. Using two dummy counters means the opposing player is not sure where the thing will surface.

A command unit can be used that contains a leader to help with unpinning units, a medic to try to save wounded models, an engineer to repair vehicles and a battle standard that allows rerolls to unpin. Specialist models like medics can be added to basic units as well.

I could not resist adding in some old Ogryn models as I think most if not all were originally sculpted by Bob Olley back in the glory days of 40K.

The first results of the playtest were pretty good, it flowed well, seemed quite well balanced once we had allowed for the excessive armour of the vehicles. However, even attacking the toughest tank from the rear still took it out quite quickly. We also decided that a stationary vehicle is easier for an infantry unit to hit in melee.
I need some counters made to show the status of a unit such as if it is pinned or ready to fire.

The rules will be available for download soon if anyone else in interested in having a go, but a few more playtests are required first.

Empire Lancers

I have to get myself some of these uni-cycling lancers for my Empire Army, they are utterly insane. These painted models are from the prolific Matakishi and his Tea House. Just brilliant!

They are made by Eureka Miniatures, but in the UK, they can be obtained from Fighting 15’s. They are also due to be at the Derby Wargames Show in a few weeks so I will get a few there.

AvP Game

A couple of weeks ago John and I had our first game of Prosos’ new Aliens Versus Predator board game, the Kickstarter that generated £379,141 from 2,094 backers back in 2013. I would like to say that we were both using delivered pledges but that would only be half true. John’s has indeed delivered and it is a nicely put together game. My copy on the other hand is still in some warehouse in Poland waiting to be shipped along with about 250 UK backers. Sigh…

Anyway, our first attempt at the game was a little slow and interspersed with numerous reads of rules to see how certain situations should work. At least Prodos have made the rules available as a PDF download so I was able to read them on my tablet.

We had a second go this week and decided to play the actual rules rather than what we thought the rules said, usually a much better idea.

So the second attempt was much more successful than the first, but we still missed some bits and we did not use the environment cards.

Alternate model activation makes it totally different from a certain other game and there are not endless reinforcements for the Alien player.

Also, we did not try the Predators…

The Aliens need to rely on their speed to get behind the Marines and mount an assault from the front and the rear, with some being able to move four sections this does not appear to be difficult.

The Marines are not able to carry over the “sentry” action until the model is next activated in the next turn, which is a bit odd as the action is wasted, a model loses its sentry status at the end of the turn, leaving a model open to attack.

It was looking very bleak for the Marines, they were pretty much surrounded and wholly outnumbered. I thought we would be in the pub by nine…

The strategy cards make a huge difference, some giving a good bonus to hit, an extra attack, an extra reduction of armour, an extra move and lots of others.

The Smart Gunners ability to reroll hits is very misses is very useful and they can decimate a group of Aliens.

The Marines managed to snatch a victory with two surviving to the end and able to meet their objective.

Of course these are just the baby Aliens and once the full grown Alien Warriors make an appearance the Marines will not find it as easy to win through. They may just have to nuke the site from orbit instead and go straight to the pub.

Treadbike Squadron

Three more Treadbikes with headswaps finished to make a total of six. These will be fielded as two units of three in my Steam Wars game and have been profiled up with twin-linked Light Machine Guns.

Great models but I did break off the ammo feeds a few times when painting them, I hope they last a few games.

I even got a bit carried away painting the rivets.

British Artillery

I finished off some Dystopion Legions crew for my varous cannon and other assorted artillery.

One was a Prussian model I think that I did a head swap on.

Bath Chair Bloke

This chap is more likely to be used in Empire Of The Dead I think, a rather interesting character model but a little bit out of place with the rest of the British steampunk army.

Or maybe not…if I go for some uni-cycling lancers as well…

Misano Race Day

Race day! A classic race. Not the result for Valentino Rossi that the 92000 fans wanted, but an event filled day.

Misano

Off again to Italy for the MotoGP at Misano where I will be supporting Valentino Rossi as usual.
Rossi leads the championship at the moment, in search of a tenth World Championship.

As you can see, Misano is near the coast and we are staying yards from the beach, up to the right near the peninsula bit you can see…

Walkways

This was very easy to put together but I think I will mount it on a small board so it will be a bit more durable.

I have not put the railing on yet until I decide exactly where the stairs will fit to the walkways.

This is to be used as part of a landing station for the Aeroneff Skyship that was built some time ago.