Painting and Planes

 A bit of recent painting made its way through the queue this week. First up are agents Scully and Mulder, from X-Files of course. These are 28mm 3d prints purchased via Etsy. I hated the models. Heads are cast separately from the bodies, as are the hands. The way the right hands are attached to the sprues is miserable. Both of mine broke. I had to use less interesting alternatives donated by other minis. Frustrating.

They painted up nicely and will fun characters to add to my modern What a Cowboy games.

 The other painting I did during the week was on some 1/600 aircraft. The pictures are off-the cuff but get the point across.

Swedish J35s, F-105s and MiG-15s.

And then some F9F Panthers and more MiG-15s.

I've also spent a few hours in the last couple weeks re-basing the other planes in my collection, getting rid of the magnets. I'm very close to being done! I also put together a couple of Check Your 6 Jet Age scenarios for the next time the group gets together for a game.

Steampulp? Sure, I Suppose

 I finished up the Malifaux models I included in the previous post. They painted up more quickly than I was expecting. I didn't go gangbusters with the highlighting and all that. Just colors and inks. Rough and ready, looking for some table time.

And a reverse of the lot

I can't explain the blue base edges; it just sort of happened. 

I did test out a new set of skirmish rules I've been working on Saturday evening with my wife. The intention of the rules is "group friendly" and "very little explanation needed." The test went well. We used my 15mm toys - it was an X-Files episode again.

Recent Hobby Stuff

 Just a quick update on gaming things I've been up to recently. 

My wife and I played another installment of X-Files a couple weekends ago. We played out on the patio since the heat finally broke. There's a lot to be said for playing a heavily themed game on the dark!

There was a bit of a game mechanics change this time around. Instead of a head to head engagement, I took a note from Insurgent Earth. The FBI agents took on the role of the "survivors" while the US Military Industrial Complex took on the role normally occupied by the aliens in IE. The game played out well, with the agents locating all the evidence they were looking for and escaping. I think I need to add more bad guys for the next time through. A great time nonetheless.

I knocked out this MDF kit this week. A nice fountain and planter. 28mm of course. I'm sure they'll show up in a game of Infinity soon enough.

A Bigger Than Typical Post

 Ye olde multi-topic post here, so get your notepad and pen ready.

Those of you who have been reading for any period of time may remember my adventures with luthier-ing which I posted about at least once. Well, during March and April I put together a new axe. I present you with The Green Monster.

Plays well, stays in tune. What more can you ask for? It was a lot of fun and did a passable job of keeping my off the streets.

On to actual game-related activity. I painted up a handful of minis quickly this week, a couple Bones Undead and some 15mm moderns.

The Undead are specifically for Mantic's Vanguard Fantasy skirmish game that I came across a couple weeks ago. They have a free basic rules and army lists for 15 or so various typical fantasy factions. Glancing through the rules, it's pretty close to what I've been after for many years - simple enough, small enough and generic enough. Since my 28mm Undead are mostly Ghouls and Skeletons, I figured some variety wouldn't be the worst thing. They were an easy distraction from the Infinity stuff I've been working on recently.

The 15mm are for my modern skirmish game I've featured on the blog a few times, SKIrmish. Those games have often featured the X-Files crew and space aliens, although I've got plenty of Army guys, zombies, nuts with guns and cultists to go around. My wife and I love the TV show Supernatural, so I whipped up some statlines for Sam and Dean (the two on the right) and more typical Hunters. I even found a suitable toy car for them which of course I forgot to take a picture of this morning. They'll be a fun addition to that game for sure! The models are Rebel Minis, and I ended up with 20+ extras who'll make great gangsters, thugs, etc.

I did get an opportunity to test out Vanguard last evening with my 14-year-old. It was a pretty straightforward Orcs vs. Humans affair with three objectives to control / fight over.

No full AAR, but a few pics.

I quickly noticed that my Troll was the fastest thing on the table and he bee-lined it towards the enemy!

Mister Troll gets jumped by a Halfling! Try as I might, I was unable to golf-ball the little runt off the battlefield!

A broad shot of the fight

The Halfling gets by with a little help from her friends. Mister T is taken down!

The offensive on my left is going well.

But as time ran out, the score was tied at six, each of us controlling an objective on the wing and neither of us ever able to gain control of the center point long enough to really claim it.

I like the game and it's passed my test. If you have a collection of fantasy minis and don't have a go-to game system, Kings of War Vanguard is worth a look. Although it does require some special "power dice" you could easily replicate their function with playing cards and about 2 minutes of effort.

Recent Games

 I haven't had the energy to put together full battle reports for the last two games I played but I took loads of pictures and figured I should share.

Both games are from a couple weekends ago. I took the Italian Wars models over to Mike's place and we played Swordpoint for an afternoon. 

The game war a closely fought affair. I commanded the Venetians while Mike and Mark split the Spanish contingent. 

My newly painted cavalry smashes into a regiment of swordsmen. My heavy armor proves to be useless since my dice are obviously traitors.

My troops complete the long run across the table. My pikemen plow into the halberdiers. The dice again prove to be my undoing.

And now we get to the part where Mark's patented "stop retreating at the edge of the carpet" talent kicks in. My troops drove him back to the edge and then the Spanish just stopped backing up.

The face of evil... and Mike.

Mark's mortar finally finds a target late in the game and finishes off a unit of Venetian arquebusiers. Feh.

In "the other" battle on the left flank, I had a squadron of light horse rout when threatened by a flank charge from some lousy Spanish pikemen. The curses were loud and long. Nothing like routing on turn 10 of a ten-turn game and no way to rally.

In the end, we gave the Spanish a minor victory for eliminating two units compared to just one that wiped out. Mark's inability to fail morale tests caused me considerable trouble. Mike's skillful maneuvering of his units on the left kept my light cavalry hemmed in and busy. Either way, it was a great afternoon's battle.

A couple days later, on Monday (Labor Day here in the US of A) my wife and I played a bit of my simple skirmish rules that I put together to play X-Files themed games.

The table layout was tasty. We had aliens and government agents competing to control five uplink sites. 

A group of aliens wastes little time capturing one of the control points. Looks like they've got a massive robot moving in as well!

A couple of SUVs and an armored personnel carrier move in. Two agents hop out and make their way to one of the pylons.

My helo spots another group of aliens in the distance.

I send some soldiers to battle a group of invaders amidst the fog. Things don't go well for my soldiers.

Scully and Mulder have hitched a lift on the chopper and head to assist a lone agent near pylon 1.

Their presence helps, but is it too little, too late?

It seems to be, as the aliens complete the uplink and they're able transmit their message to the mothership.

And of course a quick video of the table.

So there... not just painting around here lately. There has been some gaming. Looking forward to Southern Front this weekend!

Y-Files Episode 2. Zombies!

It's Tuesday and gaming is in the house! There's little that can compare to a Tuesday morning 6x4 shoot 'em up. Mark can by today for a few hours of dice rolling entertainment. This installment of the Y-Files featured our FBI agents and Task Force Yankee  rolling in to deal with a horde of the wandering dead. This was primarily a play test of the zombie and werewolf units. The Zombies really just had to eliminate opponents and attempt to exit units off the opposite board edge. The living just needed to try to stop them.

The table setup. We've got a farm, gas station, house, cemetery and two creepy old houses in the woods. TF Yankee was in the Stryker vehicle entering on the road at the upper right in the picture. The FBI agents would arrive from the opposite end of the road. Many groups of zombies were at the ready.

Brains! You can also see one of the werewolves between mobs. The werewolves are much faster and tougher than the zombies. They give the creepers a bit of "oomf."

The FBI splits up, two left, two right of the house. The Hummers are new since the last game. I had a real problem finding suitable GMC Suburbans, but Walmart had a bunch of H2s on the shelf. Some gloss black paint, a few number decals to tell them apart, and job's done!

 

The hordes are immediately attracted to the armored vehicle and move towards it. They're greeted by (nearly ineffective) grenade and machinegun fire.

I decide that maybe the house and its hedges should be where I Alamo-up. The Hummers turn around. The Stryker continues to shoot into the hordes but still isn't very effective.

The two werewolves inside the perimeter are enough to make me reconsider setting up camp in there. The vehicles will serve as obstacles! Two trucks block the driveway entrance. The werewolves have very little trouble vaulting over and engaging the agents who just exited the vehicles. Gah!

The other vehicles are parked end-to-end and bam, instant fort! Task Force Yankee soldiers get atop the vehicles to fight the zombies. Meanwhile, agents and Lt. Dan duke it out with the werewolves.

It has officially gotten real.

Ballroom Blitz! A werewolf pops up behind our lines and make a beeline towards some agents. Scully and Mulder are firing at the hordes from the back of a pickup truck. On the left, a scantily-clad zombie has engaged TF Yankee in melee!

Agent Reyes, who'd gotten injured by the werewolf gets out of Dodge, presumably to get medical assistance. She notices more zombies incoming from around the house!

Four-player dogpile on the werewolf! Our heroes join the brawl.

Zombies are all over the trucks now! The army guys hold their own though.

Man, this is grim. The gunfire and other noise got the "flankers" attention so at least they aren't heading off the table, but they are heading for my troops!

A round of terrific gunfire wipes out a mob of attackers.

It's nearly over now! Just a few more zombies to go... the go-go dancer proves to be a formidable adversary; she's still fighting with the TFY trooper atop the Stryker.

And as quickly as it began, it ended. Three Task Force Yankee troopers will have to be taken into the custody of the Special Medical Advanced Research Team. Poor fellas. Scully and Reyes both have werewolf scars to compare. Four other agents were taken out along with a TFY soldier who turned zombie during the battle.

That was a heck of a game. Mark liked it, I liked it... what's not to like? Simple rules, simple scenario - just go for it and play. We came up with a few tweaks for the zombies and werewolves. The humans didn't need any adjusting after the previous game. We came up with some scenario-specific ideas that'll be interesting in future games but for now I'm content with it just as it was.