Fantasy Interlude

I bet that title made you wonder what I have planned for this post. Well, I hate to disappoint, but it's just a few figures I painted to break the monotony of military themes. While I'm waiting for the final month of the the Bolt Action challenge to roll around, I've pulled out some fantasy figures.

These are all Reaper Bones, and are not included in the Bones Kickstarter that I'm expecting soon. Again, I don't really have specific plans for these models, but I enjoy collecting them. It reminds me of the "good ol' days of D&D" where I had a collection of random monsters to use in games. However, I almost never had the right model for the game.

I really dig this Bugbear. He looks seriously mean, and he fits in with the gnoll model I have as well. Maybe they're working together for an evil wizard?  Could it be?!

I didn't want another brown giant spider, so I went with green. He hangs out in forest and jungles. Of course you can't get a sense of scale from the picture, but he's on a 50mm base. The funny thing is on the side of his abdomen, toward the bottom it says "Made in China." I didn't see it until too late!

Ah ha! So these bad guys are all actually working for an evil Mind Flayer! I just knew it. I love those crazy octopus-headed dudes. This one came out pretty good.

That's all for now. On the workbench: Infinity!

Blitzkrieg Commander Test Game

I had a chance to play Blitzkrieg Commander with a friend this weekend. So at last my WW2 micro armor got to the game table. Last year I got the bug to play in this scale, and promptly acquired a force of US mechanized infantry from GHQ models.

My attempt to blog this game didn't really pan out as hoped. My camera took absolutely poor photos and the lighting situation wasn't helping. You will see from the pictures that there was a strong directional light that blew out a lot of my pictures. Still it gives a good general view of the action.

We played a 2,000 point game from the Tunisia list, which allowed my opponent to match his German models to mine. We laughed about this, because we didn't have suitable terrain. So we ended up fighting in the rolling green fields and verdant forests of Tunisia!  Oh well. Flex those imagination muscles. We didn't pick a scenario other than a straight up meat grinder. That's always easier for learning the combat rules.

For those unfamiliar with "the Commander" series, these books focus on combined arms forces on a large scale. The rules were written for 12mm, but work in 6mm and can go as high as 20mm with adjustments. The rules are fairly straightforward, and most of the books are made of a myriad of detailed force lists. Blitzkrieg Commander is WW2 specific and covers all theaters in all times.

So we sat down to our test game, and I really didn't know the rules that well. The book is rather dull, and I just wasn't getting the concepts. Once we started playing, things caught on. The key feature of this game is the order structure.  Each unit is assigned to a formation, which is controlled by an HQ unit. The HQ issues orders to move, shoot, etc, to units in its formation by rolling under is leadership value. Every additional order gives a minus, but you can keep pushing until either you are too low to succeed or have failed. A failed order stops that formation's activation for the turn. 

I lined up my force in a neat line. I had 7 Sherman tanks, 8 rifle squads with M3 halftracks, a mortar carrier, and some recce troops with an armored car. Three HQ units followed behind. I didn't have the HQs modeled yet, and so they're empty bases behind the units. The HQs are very abstract in this game anyway. I'll be building real models soon enough.

My opponent had a similar force of Germans, almost a complete mirror of my force.  However, his was unpainted, and so victory was assured! Everyone knows unpainted models die faster.  Also, we didn't have a lot of terrain in this scale either. So you will see some unpainted terrain bits here and there. It was a very open board, which is not a good thing in this game.

US strategy (if I ever had any strategy) was to get my tanks on a hill on the left flank for better LOS (which it did not provide as I later discovered) and have my infantry take and hold the center of the board. I issued a few move orders and the Germans sped up to meet me.  Below are the M3s with their infantry stands behind them, making for the center. We kept the infantry bases behind their rides so we knew which vehicles held which units. I had two bazooka teams mixed in there, so it was important to know.

As a foretaste of things to come, my tank formation failed its first order and just sat there behind the hill.  Crap!

Stalling out in the open was a very bad thing. As the Germans, with their better leadership and flexible command doctrine, were speeding around to catch me sitting on my hands. They got off a few shots, but fortunately the Shermans made armor saves.

By this point, after pushing hard, both sides had lined up to what would become a static firing line. This is just a function of the scenario (or lack thereof) and the distinct lack of terrain of any consequence. All of that is easily solved, but it did make this game a bit of a dice rolling exercise. The Germans seized the hill at the center and disembarked from their half-tracks. Lo and behold, there were two MG teams up on that hill. Ouch.

I got to see a command failure in action, where the Germans ended up firing on their own HQ. They almost killed it too. But the worm would turn soon enough. We traded shots, and the Germans were infinitely more effective, destroying one unit and suppressing three others. Suppression in the open is a disaster to say the least. Then I flubbed a command roll and my third formation of recce teams and mortar carrier ran away.  Ugh!  This picture is so blurry probably because I was crying too hard at the time I took it.

On the left flank things were marginally better. The Shermans finally got in gear and mounted the hill. They took out a German tank and celebrated for a bit.  That party was short-lived.

As my center was crushed, the armor on my left flank crumbled. I got to see a "command critical" in action. This basically awarded the German player a free action, which proved devastating. The Germans passed order after order to fire, and in one turn destroyed everything they could see.

Back in the center the Germans blew up my M3s, suppressed all my units (effectively taking them out of the game) and the recce units and mortar carrier hadn't even had a chance to move back up after their command failure. The German infantry remounted their half-tracks to prepare to sweep behind my stunned infantry. We called the game, since I was flattened.

I haven't been so roundly beaten in such a short time as I was for this game. I will admit, it soured my enthusiasm a bit, since I was like a man on the ground with a rhino stomping on his head. In one turn I had no more army. I'm not sure if that's due to hot rolling or what, but it was overwhelming. I really hope that was a fluke.

Overall, the game mechanics were easy to understand and modeled the units well. Despite getting my ass kicked, I'm planning to invest further in this game. I see a lot of potential for this rules set. The only down side is getting enough terrain in this scale to provide protection and some maneuver opportunities.

Bolt Action Painting Challenge, Part Three

So, more Russians. As the third installment in the 1,000 point Bolt Action painting challenge, I'm now in the home stretch. The bulk of the painting is done with this batch. Russians have been surprisingly easy and fast to paint. In fact, I had these completed last Sunday, but only had time to take pictures today.

For the month of March, I've got an 11 man rifle squad with LMG and on SMG, a medic, AT rifle team, and a Maxim MMG team.  That totals to 248 points. I've got carry over from last month as well, and that will all go toward next month.

Here's the group shot for everything.

I took a few individual shots. The medic came out too blurry, but you can see her well enough if you enlarge the picture above.  First, here is the third rifle squad.

Next is a Maxim MMG team.  These are from Plastic Soldier Company. They don't have a ton of detail, but for uniform style and size  they mix nicely with the Crusader models.

Here's an Anti-Tank Rifle team. These are also Plastic Soldier Company models.

You've probably noticed that I painted the base edges of the rifle team.  This is to help me identify which squad they belong to.  I find once  I start pulling models, I get everything screwed up. I had tried hash marks, but they weren't obvious enough for me. I thought the edging looked fine and was not too distracting. I've done it for all my rifle squads.

Here's the collection in the box as it stands now. The Russians are still sharing space with my Dark Ages models for the time being.  Next month, they'll have to move out.

So that's it for now. Next month finishes this army at 1,000 points. I'll be doing a tank, a mortar team, and the free rifle squad. I'll have four rifle squads and an SMG squad, quite a lot of soldiers!

Savage Considerations

I've been leafing through my Savage Worlds book recently, and I've given some thought to trying it. I could use the game as-is, but have also considered their tabletop miniatures adaptation Showdown. My first thought was to do do something in a genre that I have no other rules to match. Spies and modern adventure came to mind. At the same time I had this idea, I was reading the Danger Girl comic collection. Say no more, my concept had arrived!

I planned to create my own team of Danger Girl operatives and use Savage Worlds to play these as a tabletop game. I didn't need to look too far for suitable models. Reaper's Chronoscope line has plenty to fit the bill.  So I ordered five blisters and painted them up.

Painting these models was a refreshing break from military drab colors. I seem to be endlessly painting military models these days. Anyway, the green and black model is my homage to the team's Danger Girl origins.  Otherwise, I just did whatever felt right at the time.

I've cooled off a bit on the original idea of getting these on the table. But now I have models ready for whenever I pick up again. The biggest challenge I have is collecting appropriate terrain and other models to be the "bad guys."  Since Danger Girl faces the neo-Nazi Hammer Empire, I thought my Dust Tactics Axis models could fit the bill. That gives me some incentive to get painting those too.

Well, back to military drab!

Bolt Action Painting Challenge, Part Two

As promised, I'm back with my February installment of Bolt Action Russians for the 1,000 point challenge.  It's getting a little dull, as the army is nothing but infantry, a few support weapons, and a tank (which I've yet to buy).

This month was easy, since I basically painted two squads.  I finished off my seconds squad for 90pts, and painted an SMG squad for 143pts. This leaves me 17pts to carry over to March. Here's what they look like today.

So the top is the rest of seconds squad and the SMG squad. The detail shows second squad's LMG team.  You'll also note for the SMG squad I rimmed the base of one model in yellow. I don't have an SMG NCO figure left, so I just colored the base to indicate he's an NCO.

The army is coming along, and next month will look at lot like this month, only I'll have a MMG and AT rifle team to go with my rifle squad.  The mortar and tank will see me through the final stretch in April.

Here's what I've got done so far.  They're sharing storage space with my Dark Ages warband for now.  I've got to find a new home for the Dark Age models soon.

Sergeants Miniatures Game Overview and Report

I've had my eye on Sergeants Miniatures Game (SMG) by Lost Battalion Publishing for a long while. The only thing that held me back from buying it was the likely lack of other players and the cost. However, a friend of mine got into this over Christmas and I immediately volunteered my services as a player!

Having played a few games now, I'm thoroughly impressed.  This is a great game, a perfect blend of board game and miniatures game, with the individualization of an RPG -- all set in my favorite historical gaming period, WW2! Cost is no longer a factor now that I've seen what this game has to offer.

The game parts are excellent.  It uses 20mm figures, real metal that are painted to a high quality tabletop standard. The figures are mounted on a special base, with a dog tag and serial number for your specific man. You play on a board of heavy, interlocking card stock with nicely done art much like a game mat used in RPGs or board games. All cards and markers provided are sturdy and good quality.

The game play is deep. It's a man-to-man level of combat, really a rifle team with possibilities for support weapons. The turn is divided into three action phases, where actions you can take are randomly determined by story cards. You also have a hand of cards that are linked to the men you've chosen for your squad. These cards drive just about everything, and managing your card choices makes for some really tough decisions. Each soldier also has a stat card that interacts with the board as well, either enhancing or hindering actions you want your soldiers to take.

It's a dice free game, with your deck managing everything for you. It's really an ingenious system. On top of this, you don't have any charts or tables to look at and book keeping is not an issue for the level of detail the game achieves. The rules are straight-forward.

Objectives are randomly determined at the start of the scenario. Random events can trigger, which can also change your objective. This happened twice in the last game I played. The scenario gives you a certain number of turns to complete your mission. Ultimate victory is done by totaling victory points, from killing enemies like many other games, and bonuses earned and objectives achieved during the game.

The most amazing aspect of this game is each soldier is unique. I mean... really unique. If you buy the game, you won't have the same soldiers I do. Each one has his own stats and cards. Your squad is truly unique to you and no one else will ever have it. I believe the starter box is the only box with the same troops, but even with the same names the stats are different. Talk about individualizing a game!

To give you an idea of the flow of the game, here's a quick write up of a game I played recently.

Currently the game is Americans versus Germans (Brits are in Kickstarter right now). I'm a sucker for playing the US, so I chose that force. First step was to determine a scenario and find out what was required. I had to take two soldiers, Harrison and Fields, plus 12 points of other men.  Harrison is the leader, and I could've upped him to a Staff Sergeant or dropped him to a Corporal (or something like that) but I took him as a sergeant. I added a few more men for a total of five for this mission.

Meet Sergeant Harrison 022-210, PFC Fields 092-795, PFC Campbell 381-300, PFC Andrews 885-777, and PFC Carter 065-271. (I just like throwing in their dog tag numbers for fun. There's a minor game function for the number, but otherwise they're for flavor.)

 Camera flash is making them look crappy. But they look really nice in person. Note the numbers in the field in front of them. There are four actions you can take: move, hide, look, and shoot. Those colored boxes are modifiers to all those actions in a certain square.

OK, so the squad is assembled and the scenario begins. We're in France shortly after D-day. Sgt Harrison and PFC Fields decide to go scrounge food from a farmhouse up ahead. Andrews, Campbell, and Carter decide to tag along in case they find anything good!  What they will find are Germans in the area.

Here's a shot of the whole board. It's actually late in the game when I took this picture, so the models are all over the place. The Germans have taken some casualties, too.  But this gives you an idea of where we played.  The board is very small, and actually you can play games on boards twice this size. Since we're still learning, we kept it small.

My mission card, drawn before turn one, is for me to enter the board from behind the farmhouse on the right (the picture is from the US side of the board) and exit from the road on the left about 2/3 down the board. It's a simple recon patrol, with the hopes of getting some food from the farmhouse.

Turn one draws a random event. An old lady runs out of the farmhouse and starts shouting at all the soldiers to leave her farm. All soldiers start the game as spotted. This is huge, since your soldiers start hidden from enemy view, and they must be spotted first. It can be tricky to do, and if the cards are against you, you might not be able to spot. If not spotted, you can't be shot at.  So we're all in the open thanks to the angry French grandma.

The Germans, seeing the old lady cursing the Americans, open fire from across the board. Despite good cover between the farm house and fields, the Germans wound Sgt Harrison right at the start. Being wounded means a soldier's stats are all cut in half. This seriously hampers my leadership from turn one!

The Americans hunker down in cover and try for return fire. But with Sgt Harrison wounded and Carter carrying a short range Thompson, we're not doing so well. Soon, we draw another random event and this has us change up our mission.  So the US mission becomes to survive the encounter and count their own models as VPs.  Quite thematic!

As the game progresses, the Germans push the Americans into the corner. It seems like they're going to crush us, but luck turns and we start pinning and wounding the Germans. The American's make a tentative push out of their corner, and take out a German! One of the Huns moves through the house, and PFC Fields rushes to engage him. The hand to hand lasts a few turns, but ultimately Fields succumbs and is taken prisoner! (The Huns must be looking for intel and trying to capture prisoners.)

Unfortunately for the Germans, I draw some hot cards that let me move up and engage the German holding Fields captive. PFC Carter rushes in, and now he and Fields are on the German. They beat him, opting to kill rather than capture. In the meantime, Andrews and Campbell take out more of the Germans, pushing them back. Come turn eight, the Germans have only two men who are pinned (which reduces their stats as well) and no leaders left to rally them. We call it, and it's an American victory.  Sgt Harrison lives to fight another day!

Carter has rescued Fields in the farmhouse, killing the German captor

Poor Schulze and Koenig are trying to hold on in the trees after their squad has been depleted of manpower

I'll be playing a lot more of this exciting game. I really like the story driven element along with the game play itself. There are a lot of expansions available, and I think 3d buildings have been released recently, adding to the visual appeal of the game. If you have an opportunity to try this game, I highly recommend it.

Bolt Action Painting Challenge, Part One

OK, first 250 points of Soviets for Bolt Action are complete. As I mentioned in my last post, I had to break up the second squad to keep under the points for the month. Here's the first group.

 

So that's a Second Lieutenant and an extra rifleman.

 

The main body of this batch was an infantry squad of 11 men w/ LMG, SMG, and 8 anti-tank grenades.

 

And since I only had infantry models for this go around, I put together the start of another squad to round out the 250 points.

  So that's it for January. Next month I will continue painting infantry to complete the second squad and add in some support weapons to fill out the points. I'm wondering where my other two challengers are in their monthly quota. I haven't heard or seen anything, but there are six days left. So maybe they're waiting for a last minute reveal. 

Ok, I'll be back with more Bolt Action Soviets in February!