Frostgrave 2025 Campaign Game 1

 Good morning! Ziggy, David and I played our first campaign game of Frostgrave yesterday. Two years ago we played in a Stargrave campaign that was a lot of fun so we're running it back with swords and sorcery. I put together a Chronomancer group, Billy Thorpe and the Children of the Sun. Ziggy's running an Elementalist group and David's got a Thaumaturge. 

We played The Mausoleum as our first encounter. I was sandwiched with David's group on my left and Zig on the right. Those ruined buildings in the pictures we completed during the week ahead of the start of our campaign. I picked up this box from TT Combat rather inexpensively from Noble Knight.

My group. The bizarre names are a long tradition Ziggy and I have over our 30 year gaming history, with its roots in Blood Bowl.

I kind of got loot-screwed and was essentially forced to rush the center in order to get a claim on two treasures. I got Jimmy Changa onto the treasure at the lower right corner of the Mausoleum pretty easily with the help of a Fleet Feet spell. David made a play for my other target at the lower left corner of the Mausoleum, sending two Thieves towards it. Dropping a Wall in my work area was kind of a pain the neck. I couldn't believe David was trying to take four of seven treasures for himself! This act of selfishness by the Thaumaturge's gang kicked off an almighty brawl between our groups.

David (in yellow) and Ziggy. We played up at Roll the Bones games store again, the same place we played Alpha Strike back in November.

I got a Petrify spell to stick on the thief running away with MY treasure. My troops subdued her buddy, the green-clad thief.

David threw up a wall of Fog in order to protect his ball-carrier but to no avail! Sweet Dee summoned an Animated Skull into combat with the Petrified thief, then Betty Toothpicks, the javelineer ran in to assist. 

We took care of the thief while under the watchful gaze of a filthy archer a block away. Good grief that guy was annoying!

Having sorted out two of David's thugs and two thieves, I press the brawl with the Thaumaturge, sending Sand Panther and Betty after the Apprentice and working Meat Cheetah, my thief, around into contact with David's Wizard. I grabbed the loot bag with my Archer and kept her close to both Billy and Dee, hidden in the Fog bank. At this point I'd lost two thugs KIA.

No picture, but I rushed my empty-tube Crossbowman into melee with the Apprentice to pin him and promptly got sent to the infirmary by a critical hit by Dave! UGH.

I chase the spellcasters while working to extract treasure from the tabletop.

Last licks... Betty is taken out by David's Apprentice in melee but she is then avenged by Sand Panther!

So, at the end of the day, I had five group members KO'ed, the Crossbowman, Javelineer, two Thugs and my Thief. Only Betty the Javelineer was really hurt and has to miss the next encounter due to injury. I claimed two treasures and earned 245 experience.

Failed Casts Causing Injury - 9 x5

Successfully Cast Spells - 7 x10

Participation Trophy - 1 x40

Treasures - 2 x40

Monster Kills - 2 x5

My treasures totaled 80 gold and two Grimoires, Blinding Light and Absorb Knowledge.

My two level-ups will be +1 Fight and a -1 to the Casting Roll for Petrify, though I might re-think the spell cast modifier, Fleet Feet is also tempting particularly since it lasts the full length of the game. Billy and Co. are setting up a base in an old Laboratory they saw while heading towards the Mausoleum.

David took six casualties, five thanks to me and one courtesy of Zig, so we really laced into each other. None of his were permanent injuries. Ziggy took no casualties. 

A Snow Day?

 Like many others across the southern US, we got a good bit of snow dumped on us last evening! It's been a few years since the last one, but four inches of snow in Savannah Georgia is pretty crazy. I hear New Orleans and those areas got much more!

And this poor egret looking for lunch in the ditch near our house.

So, working from home for a couple days because southerners + icy roads = bad situation. Be well everyone!

Frostgrave Oddballs

 I've been working on MDF Frostgrave terrain for the last few days. Pics of that later. I did finish a few small odds and ends for FG last weekend. Some bears my son made for me on his new 3d printer, a floating skull because, well, if you take the spell, you need the model, and some crates. 

Since painting these up, I've re-rolled my Wizard and warband so I won't have any immediate need for the bears, but they'll be useful. I'm going to use a Chronomancer. Seems fun and I'm happy with the spells and selection of soldiers. 

That's Italian!

 Hello hello, I hope everyone's had a good start to 2025. Mine's been fine so far, with just a major work go-live looming ahead on January 21st. I must have faith in the talent of the team.... I must have faith in the talent of the team.

Enough of that, on with the hobby stuff! So, those Bolt Action Italians that I got at the end of 2024 are table-ready! Two weeks, 40 infantry, 3 support weapons and one armored car. Not bad, especially for me. I still have to put the Semovente 75 together and paint it, but I'll get there. It would have been a distraction from painting infantry. To recap, this is two squads of 10 regular army infantry and two squads of 8 Blackshirts, along with HQ-types, platoon commander, medic, medic and assistant. I've also got an 81mm mortar, an HMG and a 47mm ATG. The AB41 armored car is a resin 3d print picked up for $20 on Etsy.

I mounted the HMG on the tripod backwards and because of the fragile nature of the model, there was no reasonable way to fix it. Oh well. Overall I'm happy with the look of the group and look forward to putting them on a tabletop to duke it out with my Canadian force. 

Travels and New Armies

Happy New Year all and I hope you had a fine Christmas.

 The wife and I had a terrific time up in Washington and Oregon. We needed a get-away after a 2024 filled with headaches and drama.

THE Coast of Washington. Windy, rainy and  just gorgeous.

A fine house porter at the Astoria Brewing Company.

We parked here to tour the Flavel House Museum. I immediately recognized the black Jeep from Goonies. Moments later I realized that the building is the jail that Jake Fratelli breaks out of at the beginning of the movie. 

BULLET HOLES!

I love the colored glass on this fixture.

And the detail on the central element.

Certainly looks haunted, right?

We of course visited the Goonies house the following morning. You cannot go in, but it's fun to visit such an iconic location from my childhood memories.

A 3-hour drive to Seattle for some more touristing. The Space Needle of Course!

While waiting to go up, there are a couple of scale models showing stages of construction. Appears to be about 1/100 scale judging by the people. Need to get this model into a game somehow. 

The views from up top are impressive. The weather was even starting to clear!

The trip was fantastic and aside from wrecking my right knee walking back to the parking garage on Sunday after the Space Needle visit, everything was easy and pleasant. There's a lot to be said for travelling without an agenda.

And awesomely, I had a new pile of minis waiting for me when I got back home. They were ordered just before we left on our trip.

Bolt Action Italians. Huzzah! An opfor for the Canadians for sure. I just couldn't do another German army. I painted a bunch for FOW, pre-blog days, painted plenty of 1/72s and just wanted something different. Canadians and Italians fought plenty in Sicily. The AB41 armored car is a 3d print ordered from XPForge via Etsy. Very nice model. 

The infantry are being organized as two 10-man squads of regular infantry and two 8-man squads of Blackshirts along with regular army support elements (mortar, MMG and ATG).