AAR: Junkyard Pickin'

 Mark, Wayne and I got together at Roll the Bones game store in Savannah on Sunday afternoon for a game of Shakedown, my modern What A Cowboy variant. I put the scenario together earlier in the week and came up with the following.

The guys running the questionably legal towing business in town towed a car to their junkyard a yesterday that belonged to a weed dealer. They didn't know whose vehicle it was when they towed it. The Clanton family heard about and knew the vehicle was owned by that dealer. They decided to break into the junkyard, find the drugs which are likely still in the vehicle, and make a nice score! Of course the Clantons tripped an alarm on their way in so the local police are on the scene to respond. The police also have long suspected the scumbags running the "towing" operation of also running a chop shop so this would give them a good opportunity to get into the office and look for evidence.

Mark took the Clantons, Wayne took the Towhook Gang and I got to run the boys in blue. 

Our 36 x 36 game area. Twelve cars to search. The Clantons are in the back, circled in yellow. They just popped a section of fence. The Towhooks are in the double-wide office (just made this week!). My police are nearest the bottom of the photo.

In no time at all, Little Dale of the Towhooks had located the wannabe thieves. He gave his MAC-10 a long pull on the trigger and gave Uncle Cy a hell of a spray. One of the bullets hit Cy in the head and he was out of action right away!

Since the other guys started the fight straight away at the other end of the yard, I had a long slog ahead of me!

And then it happened. The godforsaken junkyard dog rushed Officer Murtaugh. Roger was rattled but otherwise OK.

And it wasn't long before the JYD was on top of Earl Clanton! Poor Earl got a bit of a bite during his run-in.

"You OK, man? Was that a dog that got you?"

Meanwhile, Officer Callahan had gotten into the office. He was expecting company and was in position to cover the door. When Cale came in after him, "Dirty" Harry was waiting and with a Bonanza token,  knocked Cale down a peg. Cale was taken out of action a turn later.

The summanabatching dog reappeared and took a bit out of Officer Hannah's ass.

Earl's worked his way over to the other row of cars. I worked Murtaugh up to the shotgun fight between Ricky and Booger Clanton because a third shotgun is always fun!

After Harry had enough evidence on the Towhooks, he rejoined the fight was was pinned by Ricky and his sawed-off 12-gauge. Roger took the opportunity to join the shotgun fight and took Ricky down at close range.

Boom, done.

Meanwhile on the other side of the lot, Earl and Booger were making good progress looking for the dope. Surprise surprise, they found it in the Hippy Van! Earl had hit the jackpot.

Callahan moves up to finish off Darrell, the last of the Towhooks. Of course, their trusty dog was right there, screwing things up! I still managed to get a shot off at Darrell forcing him to fall back pinned.

A minute later Harry slapped the cuffs on him. A nice day's work!

But while that was going on, "Fast Earl" had found his calling and made his way out of the lot with the loot! 

So we called the game there. Wayne's group had taken a beating with three KO'ed and one arrested. The cops had plenty of evidence on the Towhook Gang to shut that operation down but failed to stop the break-in and couldn't round up the drugs. The Clanton's lost two of their group and had two make it out intact. My cops performed well, Clancy Wiggums was knocked out, but the others were OK, except for needing rabies shots. That dog was just the worst!

A darn fun game for sure! When Mark chose to enter the junkyard so close to the office, the game turned into a high-intensity firefight right away. Mark did well to extract two guys and continue searching for the loot while Wayne's guys were busy with me. We all enjoyed things and I'm here to tell you, the addition of the dog (a last minute idea thanks to my wife) was just hugely entertaining. The dog would appear instantly and attack any cop or Clanton that rolled triples on any of his activation dice. So you rolled three sixes, great! Fight this dog first though, sucker! Wayne's idea of being able to summon the dog and sic it on someone for its first appearance is pretty strong and I'll remember that the next time it's appropriate. 

Lizards II

 I finished up the second lot of Wargames Atlantic Lizardmen this morning. This group is armed with some very 19th century-style firearms and should make for a neat Sci-Fi or Pulp force. Other than the weapons, I did everything the same as I did with the previous 12 spear-armed Lizzies. Cheerful and colorful for sure!

 

 

 

Wayne, Mark and I are supposed to be getting together for a game of Shakedown tomorrow, my modern What A Cowboy customization. Looking forward to that for sure and I'll of course get some pictures for the blog. Be well!

A Rehab Project

 I was digging around in the garage a couple weeks ago looking for something or other when I stumbled upon some rather old neglected GW Space Marine miniatures from I'd guess the early 1990s. Eighteen beautiful metal sculpts in need of some love! I stripped the old paint and got cracking on a beautification project. Here are the first fifteen.

Eleven rank-and-file unique sculpts, two librarians, an apothecary and a techmarine. Some close ups...

I must say, these were an absolute joy to paint. They took me back to my gaming and painting roots which really started in 1990 when I first stumbled upon the WH40K Rogue Trader book. I'd already been playing D&D and Avalon Hill games before that, but the pictures of the miniatures just hooked me right away.

So, the next group from this collection that needs work are these bad mammer jammers:

Three Space Marine jet bikes still in the original Crimson Fist colors. Standard GW broken flight pegs. Maybe this collection will make their way into a game of Grimdark Future Firefight?

AAR: Dystopian Wars Returns

 It's been close to year since the last game, but Zig and I broke out the Dystopian Wars toys on Saturday. We decided on a land battle and because they've haven't gotten any play time in recent memory, I used my Prussian forces. Ziggy brought his Polish. The scenario was a nothing-special shoot 'em up. We decided on 1200-point forces and we use the "Fleet Action" rules which Spartan put out right before they closed up shop. It's a much quicker, nicer game that retains 90% of the awesome while reducing the frustration by 100%.

Our setup. I had trouble locating my Prussian air units so I had the Honorable Eclipse Company mercenaries lend a hand. My "big units" are on the cheap side and a shorted a couple units resulting in having a couple extra units compared to Zig's Polish. That ended up making a difference as things progressed.

Early in the going, Ziggy is doing his best to re-create the Led Zeppelin I album cover.

A view from the right flank. We'd been mauling one another pretty well by this point and still only in turn 2.

Stompy heads toward the hated Polish airship.

But it was the H.E.C. interceptors that streaked in to finish off the monster! It's always a relief to see that thing get taken off the table.

Twice I attempted boarding actions with my medium tanks. Both times I was thoroughly smacked and sent packing, resulting in a massive build-up of disruption markers on the unit.

The Rarog Landship is looking a little lonely over there with a massive walker right there, the big Prussian tank as well and the H.E.C. Sky Fortress cruising into blasting range.

Final shot of the game. The Sky Fortress unloaded on the big Polish tank, bombers smash into a medium tank and that was all it took. Ziggy's force was thoroughly decimated and we wrapped the game there. 

What a nice afternoon of gaming! The win was a bonus, but DWFA really does deliver an entertaining experience. It's not terribly deep or thinky, but sometimes you just want an excuse to blast the hell out of each other and roll loads of dice. I'm glad I never got rid of my stuff and boy oh boy do I need to find my Prussian fliers!

I Am Lizard, Hear Me Hiss

 I picked up a box of Wargames Atlantic 28mm Lizardmen a week or so ago for a "change of pace" painting project. I figured they'd be fine multi-purpose model for Pulp or Fantasy gaming. Like all other WGA plastic kits I've worked with, the sprues are generous and the models are brilliant. With 24 models in the kit, I decided to equip 12 as melee troops and will do 12 others with low-tech firearms. I poached shields from some Oathmark Goblins for this first group of fighters.

Gloriously colorful! I went with the Chameleon-style heads and picked up some inexpensive static grass flowers on Amazon to really make them pop. I really like the finished look. The next 12 are in the assembly queue now and should make an appearance here soon.

Ziggy and I are supposed to play Dystopian Wars on Saturday. It's been close to a year since we had those toys out. I'll of course post an AAR; Dystopian Wars is one of the OGs (Original Games) on this blog and has been a constant presence here since early 2012.

Check Your 6 Jets - Battling in the Baltic

 Four of the Space Cadets gathered for some CY6JA gaming on Saturday afternoon. Those in attendance were David, Ziggy, Wayne and myself. I had been working on a way to get some unloved planes into a game and put together some scenarios based on the idea of a Soviet attack on Sweden in 1967. It's enough of an excuse to put planes on the table... 

The scenario: Soviet bombers have been set to hit a shore position. They have some MiG-21 escorts. The UK is helping Sweden defend and send up some Lightning F.6 interceptors to stop the aggressors.

That's three (3) Il-28 Beagle with heavy bomb loads, three (3) MiG-21s w/ 2 R13 each. Facing them are four (4) RAF F.6 Lightning. The Beagles need to make it across the map (short direction) in order to bomb their targets. Damaged planes cannot drop bombs so they really need to remain intact.

David and Ziggy took the RAF defenders. Wayne drove two MiGs and a Beagle, I drove two Beagles and one MiG. The Baltic Sea was looking very polluted today. I couldn't locate my blue ocean mat, so I had to make do with ol' faithful tan mat.

Those Lightnings are quick! The bombers, suspiciously, are in Vietnamese and Egyptian colors. The Lego stands worked very nicely once again.

That's Davis, Zig and Wayne, left-to-right. 

At the end of that game, it was a total beating. We lost two bombers and two fighters and only scored five points for getting one undamaged fighter across the table. Score, 24-5.

Since it had only been two hours, we decided to replay the scenario with some tweaks. The defenders were replaced with Swedish J35 Drakens, all with Skilled crew. One MiG (mine) was upgraded to a Veteran pilot.

No pictures of the second game, but it went much better than the first one for the Soviets. Wayne and I did not fly the bombers in formation or at the same altitude. It made things a little tougher for the defenders. The Drakens' weapons aren't quite as reliable as the Lightnings', which was telling and the one better MiG pilot helped a lot. I think swapping one Draken pilot out with a Veteran might actually make this scenario "just right." At the end of the day, we got two bombers through and I shot down one Draken while the defenders only managed to damage one bomber. Final score, 14-2. Wayne and I retained some honor!

 A great afternoon of gaming for sure. Always looking forward to the next outing.

Bolsheviks!

 I just finished up some reinforcements for my Bolshevik forces. These are, of course, 28mm Copplestone Castings on 25mm round bases. The flag gave me hell, but at least it looks like a flag. A joy to paint, for sure!

More Trench Crusade Minis!

 Well, those TC models didn't last long on the work table! A week and job's done. That's a far cry from the last lot which lingered for months. I found these miniatures easy to paint and once I had a uniform worked out in my head, everything just clicked. I was really wondering how the bright green was going to turn out on the big mechanized guys. I'm very happy with that result. On with the show.

The lot

The mechanized heavy infantry. Who says bright lime green isn't "Grimdark?" 

Shock Troopers. I gave these troops distinctive dark green armor. Kind of a badge of "I completed the training" sort of like a special forces beret. These guys are obviously melee-focused. The banner-carrier has a bit of a painting flaw. The brow of his helmet took some flesh-colored paint. I've gone back and fixed it.

Some specialists. Two lieutenants, a Trench Cleric and Combat medic. I carried the gold and blue "national colors" through on the leaders' helmets. I also went back after the photo shoot and fixed the back of the cleric's robe where it looks like some rust pigment made it's way into the white highlights.

More specialists. Two sniper priests and an engineer. I gave the engineer the same dark green armor that the shock troopers have, indicating he went through that same training.

And finally some grunts - Yeomen. I'm not sure why one is kitted out more like a WW1 infantryman, but, well, what do I know. Yeoman can be upgraded to Trench Moles which gain the ability to infiltrate on the battlefield. I suppose that's what I can use him as.

And the painting corrections...

Paints are my usual combination of Vallejo, P3, MIG and Army Painter. The bases are primarily painted with cheap hobby store paints because I just hate using the "good stuff" on dirt and rocks. The big mechanized guys also got a visit from the pigment fairy to add some stains. Everything got a heavy black oil-paint wash, allowed to almost dry, then wiped down with cotton swabs. It's such a good technique for getting that heavy, sooty look and like a good sauce on food, "brings it all together." There's a lot to be said for consistent basing and a consistent finish on a collection like this.

Now that I have two very nice forces, I'm ready to but Trench Crusade on the table for a run!

The damage done. 🤣