Dreadball Xtreme

Well, the Dreadball Xtreme Kickstarter has been live for a couple days now and has already garnered a smack-ton of cash.  Your truly and Mr B have jointly signed up to it, at a fairly hefty, but not ridiculous, level.

 

At the moment I'm reasonable happy with what's on offer, but, given the previous projects Mantic have launched this way, I'm expecting to see a lot more value added over the next three weeks.    Given how much we've collectivly dropped on the original Dreadball, it still's still a good deal so far.

Very little information is available about the actual gameplay, but the core seems to be the same as the original Dreadball game.  Dreadball was easily the best (miniatures) game I properly invested in last year and is one of those games that I would play without resevation.

One of the notable decisions Mantic have made is to move away from their heavy plastic (rastic?) figures to preassembled plastic miniatures.  If there's one thing that frustrated me about Deadzone, Dreadball and some of their other figure ranges, it's cleaning those hideous mouldlines and glueing the pieces together.  I've had Deadzone for a week now and have suffered through assembling a whole seven figures!  Hopefully this new material will be easier to work with.

The big draw for me so far is the customisable board; appropriate given that DB:X isn't played in a traditional arena, but in back streets, warehouses and prisons.  I'm also anticipating what new teams or races Mantic add into the mix.

Three weeks to go with eleven updates so far, looking forward to seeing what the final package will be.  Check out the Kickstarter here.

Some DreadBall and a bit of a whine...

Another game of Dreadball at the club last week, me with the Orx against Adam's new shiney (and unpainted I might add) Judwan team.

Here's the state of the game with one Rush to go (basically one more turn.)  Not good for my Orx team, see that green token on the track to the top left?  Well that means I'm six points down in this game.  More frustratingly, I haven't even killed any of the opposing team!  In hindsight, I think I was trying to be too clever this game; I should have spent the first few rushes brutalizing the other team, then walked the ball to the scoring area when there were only a couple left! Would have been a lot more fun too!

I think I'm getting to try out some of the other teams available next week and am really looking forward to seeing how a couple of them in particular play.  Rumours about the next wave of Dreadball teams (Season 3) have surfaced recently, see the BoLS article.  The phrase "The Zee's - A group of identical monkey clones" is just full of win!

Aside from the game, I've not been up to much gaming or modelling recently.  I've had a lot of solicitor and other bills recently and they've really sapped my will to do much of anything. August was particularly harsh as, aside from a weekend away visiting friends, I've done absolutely bugger all.  I had hoped September would be much better, but yet another solicitor bill has wiped out my overtime and my six-month bonus from work.  I'd planned a week's holiday away somewhere (all the advice I've had since becoming single again involves having a couple holidays away on your own) but that's been knocked on the head until October at the earliest.   Suffice to say, I now understand all those lawyer jokes! Well, that's enough whining for one post, just wanted to give you an idea why there hasn't been much on the blog the last few months.

Away to the club again this Tuesday night coming; trying out the new Osprey rules, Ronin.  Quality.

A Quick Update

Hello peeps.  Sorry for the recent inactivity on the TMFT, but things have been fairly busy lately and not left a lot of time for blogging!  Short story; being single for the first time in sixteen years is taking some getting used to!

First things first, a big thank you to Tamsin for her recent giveaway.  Her generosity means I've now another nine spaceships from GZG added to the painting pile.

This week, we finally managed to squeeze in a couple games of Dreadball.  I'd delegated painting the box set to Adam from the club.  He'd obviously thoroughly preparing himself for the task as they've, as yet, no actual paint on them.  I'm sure he'll do a great job though. . . . . . eventually.

To the game itself.  I'd had a read through of the rules before we played, but couldn't honestly remember much at all. Adam guided me through the first game and, although we made a fair few mistakes, were impressed enough to have another game.  The core mechanic is success based dice rolls (aim to roll more successes than your opponent) as opposed to rolling a higher dice score than your opponent.  There are several skills and stats you roll against, usually with three dice, but with a lot of modifiers.  A bit confusing at first, but once you get the mechanic, the game becomes massively enjoyable.

It's generally a good sign of a game when halfway through your first play, you're already thinking "I'm going to buy this and this next week."   We played one game each with the two starter teams, but both games generally dissolved into the Orx player thumping the humans at every opportunity.  Great fun.

I also sat in on a game of Bolt Action, hosted by Tom and a couple others (whose names escape me just now.)  I've read the rules and have a couple of the supplements, but haven't gotten it to the table myself yet.  My biggest concern was the random activation sequence (blindly drawing dice from a bag,) in that I worried that tactical decisions would be overruled by unlucky dice draws.  Based on the game I saw, that doesn't seem to be a concern.  I've some 28mm Soviets in storage so I'll try and get a few painted up in time for a game.

Lastly, away to Spain for a week next week.  The old man has taken pity on me and paid for a wee break there (it helps that he owns a house there.)  Nothing planned except some reading and relaxing, but I do fancy a day trip to Cartagena for a wander round the Roman ruins.  So, if nothing appears here for another week or so, you can assume my pasty Scottish skin is getting gently roasted by the sun!  Have a good week everyone.

Carronade Loot

Earlier this month I had a wee drive down to Falkirk to the Carronade show.  The biggest wargame show I can easily get to, it was an excellent day out on a rather rainy Saturday.  Lots of great demo and display games available on the day. I really liked the look of the Dead Man's Hand game the Angus club (I think) were running and the tron/lightcycle game was very entertaining (apart from the kiddie in tears playing the game.)  

The hypercritical part of me thinks however that there were no really outlandish games on show, they were all very traditional.  Still, nothing wrong with that.  There is something wrong, imo, with an (unnamed) club running a participation game (yup, it was listed as participation) where everyone playing is a club member, sitting huddled together round a table, ignoring anyone who came near them.

There's also something wrong with a games company (i.e. not a trader) basically showing no interest in someone who, clearly, wanted to be persuaded into buying something.  Seriously, "tell me about the two Rus faction boxes" is about as obvious a buying signal as I could have given.  No interest from the guy running the stall (I take it everyone knows what company I'm talking about now?)

Both these happened in my first pass round the four halls and put me a little off the place for a while.  Not sure if it was a direct result of those experiences, but I really didn't feel like taking many photos or getting involved many games. Still, met plenty of people I know (even a couple I only know online) and generally had a good time.

Enough of me moaning, lets get to what we're all wanting to see: my LOOT!!!!

Dreadball

Yup, I knew there would be at least one impulse buy.  After a random message from a friend a few weeks ago, I was keeping an eye out for a copy at a decent price, which duly presented itself at one of the trader stalls.  The board itself is a bit meh (I really wish I'd gone for the kickstarter with the premium board,) but everything else in the box is very impressive.  The figures themselves are excellent, dynamic poses and great sculpting quality with little flash.  The rulebook is outstanding, a great mix of rules, fluff and atmosphere, images and designer notes.  The rules themselves read well, but I need to get a game in before I can really comment.  Good stuff.  I'm trying to hold off buying any extra teams before we've had at least one game, but it's really tempting (esp the new "bug" team.)

In Her Majesty's Name

I didn't realise that these rules had actually been released, so a welcome surprise.  Had a quick read through of the core rules on the drive home, and generally impressed.  There are a few fellows at the club interested in playing IHMN, so I'll certainly pick something up for them.  I've been looking for an excuse to get a couple Teutonic Knights from Spartan Games, thank you!

Netrunner

Due to the crippling supply issues affecting Android: Netrunner in the UK, I wasn't expecting to find any product at Carronade.  This was the only pack on offer from any trader, but it was the only one I was missing.  Nice.  Still, these card packs are as addictive as crack.

Warhammer Fantasy 3rd Ed

A present from my mate Adam (who is clearly after some fantasy gaming,) this is a real blast from the past!  I haven't read this in at least fifteen years, but it does give me something to aim for with those Mantic Undead I have lying around!