Wrapping up a Good Week

I had a great week from a gaming perspective. Completed loads of painting, began a mechanical overhaul of Stardust: Ground and got in two quick playtest session of those changes!

First are those Aquan Prime walkers for Planetfall. I went with the camo legs. I think it came out looking pretty cool.

And then we've got the 15mm Space Marines I did up for SDG. I rather like the final result, although it looks like some of the Terminators could use a shave! I'll tidy them up soon enough😉

So... getting bitten by some bug that made me re-think how SDG played, I spent a lot of thought cycles re-considering game play. The only thing that ever bothered me about SDG was speed of play / turn length. The problem is endemic to alternate unit activation games - Dystopian Wars has a similar issue. With the new activation system (closely tied to morale), it also means fewer markers on the tabletop which I know some gamers strive for.

My first test of the new activation system was actually with 28mm sci fi models last Sunday during some solo playtesting.

After 45-60 minutes, it was apparent that the system was quite useable (although my skirmish system needs some tweaking). I wedged it into SDG during the week on paper and Saturday morning I completely re-designed my QRS, now version 2-compliant.

My nine-year-old, Cameron, agreed to help test. He's still a bit "flighty" for gaming so it was a weird parenting and gaming experience but in general, the game worked very well.

Sniper no sniping!  *blam blam*

As usual, the Khan's tanks are complete death machines.

I rather liked this die-rolling action shot. Cameron won the scenario.

We had dinner, then my bride and I played a second game. Same forces, same setup.

She thought the sniper looked cool up there.

It didn't take long for her to start killing my stuff - witness that one of the stands on the elevated highway is missing already, even with all of her crap still back in the deployment zone.  :/

My grav armor pummeled the enemy troops capturing one of the strategic points, but had a terrible time scoring kills.

A cool brawl under the highway. The Dawgs - who are quite nasty in close combat - kicked the Red Guards' asses. You can just see the sniper on the road above, still plugging away, kept alive by his stealth and cover.
So, two nice runs through involving infantry, special weapons and vehicles. Vehicle Close Combat is on the list of items to be addressed, then the dreaded rulebook re-write. Whaaaaa! I also need to re-visit the Robot and Bugs special rules and make required adjustments as they pertain to the new morale and activation system. Maybe next game the sweet Orange Marines will get a baptism of fire.