Nuklear Winter 68

A couple games have appeared at the club lately.  First up was our trial of In Her Majesty's Name (the photos of which I still haven't looked at,) and a new(ish) boardgame, Nuklear Winter 68.

One of Scott's finds, it's an alternate history/Weird War Three tactical boardgame, played through a series of thematically linked scenarios. The rulebook starts with a surprisingly comprehensive history of the second world war. Briefly, Hitler is assassinated, Himmler takes over, builds bunkers for the Thrird Reich to hole up in, Allies nuke Germany, build a wall round it to keep people either in or out, nuclear winter for a few years, radiation levels start to dissipate, Third Reich reappear, Mutants appear, chaos ensues.  Three factions are available in the game, each scenario dictating who fights whom; The Third Reich, NATO (with added Russians) and The Black Hand (the mutants from the nuclear wasteland.)

It has a random sequence of platoon activations mixed in with some, normally random, events; not all your units are guaranteed an action every turn, there's a nice balancing mechanic which essentially means most of your units will probably activate each turn.

The core combat mechanics is fairly familiar (stat + 2D6 +/- modifiers to beat a target number,) but with an interesting twist.  Each unit has three states, shaken, reduced, dead.  Attacks can reduce this piecemeal or with one powerful attack.  Although this can make the game a little dicey, it's still suitably difficult to kill something in one shot - a good thing.

Now, this isn't really the type of game I usually would go for, (I usually go for a bit more bling on my boardgames) but the theme and execution here really drew me in.  The board is both large wonderfully detailed, especially considering it's of a nuclear wasteland.  There are plenty of units available for each faction, including aircraft, artillery and the occasional nuclear mutant, and each unit acts appropriately to it's type, digging infantry out of urban areas is suitably sloggy.

I've had a loan of this copy for a couple weeks now and have played through about half the scenarios. Almost all appear well balanced, although the smaller games suffer from flukey dice rolls (looking at you Mr Brown.)  We're planning to run one of the three player scenarios soon, all three factions are fighting to control the crashed alien spaceship, what part of that doesn't sound fun.  Frustratingly for me, the first print run of the game itself is currently out of print, although the author is taking preorders for an expansion.

Heartily recommended.

Btw, If anyone knows where I could get a copy or if you have a copy for trade, please get in touch using the link on the right.

Battlefront European Village Bundle

The postie turned up with a heftly parcel today, one I really wasn't expecting; the next batch from Battlefront's European Village subscription deal.

Battlefront changed the release schedule recently from their original plan (one house per month) to increase the supply of their buildings.  The subscription deal could have easily sold two or three times the initial offering, judging by the earlier grumbling on the FoW forums and some crazy prices on eBay.  That alone makes me glad it took up the offer.

So this release has the next two houses; Cherbourg and Dieppe, as well as the two expansion kits, walls and house extensions, and a blister pack of villagers.  First things first, the paint jobs on the latest two houses is a vast improvement on the first four.  I wasn't particularly bothered by the initial quality, taking a little time to tidy up the houses wasn't that big a deal, but these two look outstanding in comparison; better coverage and depth on the main colours, tidier roofs and much neater painting all told.

The expansion sets are to the same standard and are a nice, flexible set.  The villagers comprise six vignettes, including some nuns, a couple at a cafe table and a couple ladies of the night (charmingly, one has a gendarme telling here off, while the other has a gent doffing his cap to her. Quality.)  Not sure how much use I'll get from them, but it's an enjoyable wee set.

As I recall, Battlefront never explicitly said whether the extras were free or not, so I was delighted to see that the credit card was only charged for the two houses!  Result.  Still to come are six more houses, the Bastogne church and whatever else they come up with.  I'd still like a duplicate house to make a terrace building, but I can cope without for the moment.

Another New Army - Easy Company!

Well, I cracked and ended up ordering a couple blister packs of US paratroopers from Battlefront.  Looking at the Parachute Rifle Company list from Nuts, you can build a reasonable 1200 point Flames of War force with about five blister packs, so I figured "what the hell" and, as I'm on holiday for a week, I'd get straight to work.

So while I was doing the prep work on the first platoon, this turned up from the postman:

Nice, a week earlier than expected.  I suggest you have a look at the Flames of War page for an idea what's in the pack.  As I plan to use a Toccoa Sergeant in each platoon, I cracked open the pack and picked out my favourite guy from Band of Brothers, Denver "Bull" Randleman, ably portrayed by Michael Cudlitz.  How good a sculptor do you need to be to get a likeness in 15mm?

I decided to try and save a bit of time by basing all the figures before priming them.  Normally I like to glue them to wooden sticks in order to paint figures individually and then carefully base them afterwards.  It's a fairly laborious process, but it appeals to the obsessive-compulsive in me to get each figure painted properly.  However, with only four figures per base, that shouldn't be as much of an issue.  And, to be honest, I could do with worrying less about painting each individual detail, than actually finishing units.

Using the snow basing tutorial in the Nuts book should also shave off valuable hours texturing and flocking all the bases, so I'm anticipating fairly rapid progress (at least, rapid for me...)

Bolt Action - First Impressions

Amazon managed to send out Bolt Action rulebook, only about ten days after the official release date, which wasn't too bad.  So ends my attempts to paint up a platoon before the rules were released (who am I kidding, I'd have a better chance of becoming Prime Minister than finishing a nerd project on time!)  I thought I'd put up some of my first impressions from the rules, not a review as such, just what jumped out at me after reading and playing.

Physically, Bolt Action is similar to Osprey's other hardback rulebooks like Force On Force or the Field of Glory range; lots of artwork from both Orsprey and Warlord Games, as well as lots of photos of Warlords miniatures.

The rules themselves take up about half of the book, with the scenarios and army lists take up the remaining pages.  Although that is a lot of pages of rules, the basic rules themselves are surprisingly brief, particularly as the pages are taken up with lots of diagrams and photos.  In keeping with Warlord's other rulebooks, there are also lots of little panels filled with trivia about particular weapons, tanks or anecdotes from World War 2, a really nice touch.

The order system is a nice little element to the game, nothing ground breaking, but it simply means that activating a unit isn't always automatic (think Black Powder or Hail Caesar.)

The random unit activation doesn't seem as much of a negative as I thought it would be, in fact, there looks to be a bit of depth to the mechanic.  Quickly, each unit in the game has an order dice, all dice from both sides are placed in bag or cup and are drawn out one at a time, each dice lets the relevant player activate one unit.  A couple of things to keep in mind; forcing a unit to go "down" before it has activated removes it's order dice from the pool, giving your opponent less activations that turn, while going into "ambush" makes one of your own dice unavailable for the next turn, again limiting the activations available.

The pinning mechanic is very simple, but elegantly affects every facet of the game.  Again quickly, a unit takes one pin marker for each enemy unit that fires upon it (some weapons inflict more than one marker,) each pin marker inflicts a -1 modifier to your order tests, shooting attacks and morale tests.  So more pins makers, the harder it is for your unit to be effective.  It's kind of a risk management mechanic where you have to decide to actively remove pin markers or to try to move or attack and manage the pin markers on your unit. Simple concept, lots of depth.

Combat looks pretty straightforward, a standard "to hit" score of 3+ with lots of modifiers (mostly negative,) with a fixed kill score based on how experienced your troops are.  A nice wee twist to the shooting is that if a "to hit" score goes above 6+ (Bolt Action only six sided dice exclusively,) the roll simply becomes a 6 followed by a 6, so no having to work out what an 8+ or 9+ would be.  Again, shooting looks to be pretty quick with just the two steps (roll to hit, roll to kill,) which kind of explains why the sample army lists from Warlord Games were much larger than I thought they would be.

Close quarters (melee) combat is suitably brutal, even more so than in Flames of War. Simply charge, take the defence fire, then both sides roll to kill.  No saves of any kind and assaults are always resolved in one turn, with one unit being removed from the table.  In rare circumstances, it looks possible for both units to wipe each other out too.

There are a nice mix of weapon and unit special rules, many of which aren't used with the army list in the book.  Presumably, we'll see a lot more of these in the nation supplement books.  Most of the special rules read like they are appropriate to what they are describing, flamethrowers work like they should, assault weapons are good in assaults, that kind of thing, but I haven't tried out too many of them yet.

The six scenarios included in the book are mixed nicely and are simply what you would expect from a wargame rulebook.  There's a free-for-all mission, a hold the line mission, a couple objective missions etc.  Nothing startling springs out at me, but on the other hand, nothing seems out of place or missing either.

I've only skimmed through the vehicle, building and artillery rules, all of which look appropriate enough, if a little simple when it comes to vehicle profiles, my concern being there isn't a huge amount of difference between different tanks etc.  The four army lists have a good mix of units for each nation, with options for veteran and green troops, along with plenty of support units.  A little flavour is added through the different army special rules, eg. the feared German machine guns roll extra shooting dice, while the Soviets get a free squad of conscripts for their army.  Nice enough, but I hope there will be a lot more depth from the nation supplement books.

Having only had a couple small games, I'm pretty impressed by Bolt Action.  The rules are simple enough to grasp the basics on the first read through, but I think there will be enough depth to keep me interested.  As with all games, how enjoyable you find Bolt Action will depend on different factors, most of which are nothing to do with the rules themselves; your opponent, your armies and the table you play on.  I'm looking forward to getting some games in at the club in the near future.

P.S.  Sorry for the wordy post, still having trouble uploading images, I had to resort to hotlinking the picture above!

Bolt Action Plans

Although I don't have the rule book yet, I've been looking at the options for my Waffen SS force for Bolt Action.  Thanks to a couple great posts on WWPD and the Warlord Games site, you can get a rough idea how many points your force will amount to.

Firstly, my initial force should look something like:

Officer with a radio team and a medic
2 squads each with 1 LMG, 2 smg, 1 assault rifle and 1 Panzerfaust
81mm Mortar team
MG42 HMG team

That should come in at just under 500 points and, handily, includes all the stuff I either have at the moment or have ordered and am waiting for.  Once they've all been painted and (presumably) I've managed to have a few games, I think I'll add in:

PaK 40 team
MG42 team (another one)
Panzerschreck team (or two)
1 reduced squad with 1 LMG and an smg 
Armour, either a Panzer IV or a StuG

That should take the force upto the 1000 point mark.  From this point, assuming I've still got the mojo for it, I'd like to double up the LMGs and add some halftracks for a full panzergrenadier force, drop in some specialist troops like a snipers, flamethrowers or pioneers and maybe .  Based on Scipio's effort  I also really want to paint up a Schwimmwagen (ain't it cute!)

P.S.  Our internet access is still out and the mobile broadband stick I've got is really playing up, hence no photos or WIP shots lately.

Bolt Action SS - WIP 2

Just a quick update on the Waffen SS figures.  Camo patterns are almost all done, only the dots on the Pea Dot scheme need added, and I've started the detailing and equipment.

Mostly happy with how the camo looks so far.  The Oak Leaf looks the best to me, with a good bright green.  The Plane Tree looks really good up close, but from further away, the brown looks kind of washed out, I may go over the brown in a darker shade, but maybe not. The Pea Dot pattern still doesn't look right, the tan/light brown colour and the green both look off to me.  I'll see how it looks after the dots are added, but don't think it will make a huge difference.  So far this has been a decent learning experience, as I've mixed quite a few colours myself and tried a couple different tricks.

Next job is getting the equipment painted.  I really like mixing up the colours used on late war Germans; the idea being that with their supply problems, these guys will have picked up equipment whereever they could get it, so different helmets, breadbags, gaiters etc.  My new bases arrived so I can get to work on the next batch of figures, more riflemen and the squad LMG.  I'd like to get these finished at the weekend, but recent history suggests it'll be a bit before they're ready to go!

Bolt Action SS - WIP 1

Some WIP pics of the first seven Waffen SS figures.  Two NCO's with MP40s, two with StG44 assault rifles and three with good old Kar98 rifles.  I need a larger base for the LMG team, so I'm waiting for them to arrive; the rest are based on 2p coins.  I've managed to stick to the "do something every day" ethos this week and am relatively happy with the progress I've made.  There are another dozen or so figures prepared and based, but I'm only working on a few at a time.

The first job was to paint all the skin on the seven figures (I hate painting faces, I'm terrible at it,) before starting on the camo patterns.  I'm just winging it at the moment, using Google to get an idea of the patterns and an Osprey book for the colours.  The first two figures, in Oak Leaf Spring camo, taught me that I can't add shade very well, so now I'm working from a much darker basecoat and highlighting up before adding the camo pattern.  Hopefully it will turn out ok.

They are by Warlord Games and I have to say that they are really excellent sculpts.  Some very dynamic poses along side some great expressions on some of the figures.  Of course, as metal miniatures, they take an absolute age to prepare, too many mould lines and flash, but definitely worth the effort. 

Going forward, I plan to finish all the camo patterns before moving onto the equipment.  Still undecided whether or not to use metallic paints or to try my pseudo-nmm technique.  I think they would look better the second way, but for convenience they might get the old Boltgun Metal, wash, highlight treatment.

A day out and some Bolt Action... errr... action

As the big orange warm thing was in the sky again today (two days on the spin,) the Mrs and I decided to trek out to the beach.  The picture below is proof positive that you're never too old to go paddling, but not piddling, in the sea!

Without sounding too much like an old man, it was nice to see that families with toddlers still go to the beach, build sandcastles and run into the sea etc.

On the gaming front, I decided to go ahead and pre-order Bolt Action from Warlord Games. Having read the couple articles Rick Priestly has written and a couple reviews from play testers, the game has a lot of promise.  I like the pinning mechanic and the leadership tests needed to activate units, although I'm less sold on the random activation sequence.

The release is about a month away, so it seems perfectly possible to paint up a small platoon for some early gaming.  So I've started work on a first squad of SS Germans, with a view to having these finished next weekend.  Another squad, a command platoon and three or four support options should finish the platoon off nicely.  But we'll see how I get on, best laid plans and all that.

An Inspirational Shot in the Arm

  

This morning I picked up the latest issues of both Wargames Illustrated and Wargames Soldiers & Strategy.  I was surprised by how much I enjoyed both issues - the last few issues of WI didn't do much for me and the last WS&S was garbage.

Instead, this issue of WS&S had plenty on offer; an interesting theme of Colonial warfare including a Saga variant, a Dux Bellorum dark age rules Q&A and the usual entertaining editorials.

Of particular interest was the Norman scenario article (I automatically associate Normans with the Conguest) and a showcase of 15mm WW2 rules manufacturers.

Speaking of World War Two, Wargame Illustrated devotes a fair chunck of space to the new Flames of War book, Devils Charge.  Fortunately, it looks really impressive.  I mentioned earlier the great studio paint job on the German tanks; WI has not only the Konigstiger, but Panthers too.  Both, along with the new American gear, are showcased in a huge battle report that didn't sound too scripted.  Great work.

And staying with World War Two, the designers notes for the Warlord/Osprey rulest Bolt Action are really engaging.  Bolt Action reads like a fairly predictable game with the odd flourish thrown in - the random activation mechanic sounds interesting, it could be a blast or be absolute pants.  I've begun painting my Bolt action Germans in preparation for the release.  That's still two months away, surely I can finish a platoon of figures in that time?

Other than that, there are two hobby articles, one on painting skin and faces and the other on photographing miniatures, both areas where I struggle just now.

What really got interested though was the amount on new releases announced.  Victrix are apparantly releasing plastic Republican Romans (can I get a woooh at the back!)  Quality, the Punic Wars is THE period in history that gets me going - my first wargaming army was an "eclectic" mix of plastic and metal figures that vaguely resembled Romanan and Carthaginian armies.  Nowadays, with so many different ranges of 28mm figures, it would be much easier (and cheaper) to build up a legion or two.  Maybe I should get some Warlord Macedonians painted now, so I've an enemy of Rome ready to go.  And now I think about it, I've been looking for an excuse to buy that metal Phyrrus figure someone released.

If that wasn't enough, Conquest Games have announced a date for their plastic Norman infantry set.  Suddenly a six point Saga force becomes readily affordable.  Lastly, one of the magazines (I didn't notice which) has the greens for Warlord Games plastic WW2 Soviets! Well, those Germans will need someone to fight, won't they.

I remember thinking this last year, but this really is a golden age for wargaming; plenty of new and expanding companies in the historical range; Privateer Press and Mantic muscling in on GW, GW responding with bigger and crazier kits, new RPGs on the way from FFG and Privateer Press, the appearance of Kickstarter etc.  I could go on.  This kind of inspires me to get some projects finished, lest I miss out on any of the goodness.

Fallschirmjager - Flames of War WIP

After several months of prevarication, I've finally managed to get some paint onto my 15mm Fallschirmjager. A sold my original Fallschirmjager last year, I was never happy with the paint job I'd done, and have had the models lying around since then. Having looked around for some inspiration and worked on a couple test figures, I think I've settled on how I want the force to look.

I'm planning to get a small force painted (for me) relatively quickly; two understrength platoons, hq & weapons, mortars and some anti-tank guns. So these figures are for the first six infantry bases. Frustratingly, I've discovered that all the PaK 40 trailer components are quite badly miscast, so I'll have to get replacements from Battlefront.

  

For the last few 15mm projects, I've been undercoating in white rather than black. Although it takes more coats to get a good finish in some colours, it is much easier to get the right contrast between your colours than working over black.

Although I won't get close to their high standards, have a look at what I'm aiming at, John Boultwood here and Ruben Torregrosa here.

British Heavy Mortar Platoon

Feeling a bit more human today, so I managed to finish basing the mortar platoon.  I started these as a distraction and found them enjoyable enough to paint.

I tried a different way of creating a bush/hedge, but, to be honest, it looks exactly like my previous efforts.  I am quite happy with how the flock looks though - one tip I read somewhere was using multiple layers of flock/pva to get a thicker coverage and the colour mix you want.  Up next. . . Hoplites! ! !

P.S.  Tried to put all the images into one big image, but I don't think it opens out to the right size.  Anyone have any suggestions?  Like with the washing machine, I have an innate inability to use Photoshop.

An excuse, a couple photos and a good book!

We had a rare sunny day last week, so my immune system responded by going on holiday and leaving me laid up all week.  So instead of being productive, I've spent the last week lying around on the couch and generally being pathetic!

I managed to get started basing the British Heavy Mortar platoon I've been working on.  They have had the first layers of flock and some tufts added and next I'm going to try a new way of making hedges.  These were quite fun to paint up, I've tried a new way of applying the main colours using my wet palette and this certainly sped up the whole process.  I'm still concerned that overall the figures will be too dark, or at least lack contrast, when compared to the base.  Once they're finished, I'll see how they look under proper lighting.

Things haven't been all bad though, not least by getting to spend the entire weekend watching sport on the box!  I also treated myself to Adrian Goldsworthy's In the Name of Rome.  Goldsworthy is one of my favorite authors, siting somewhere between being a narrative historian and a "proper" academic.  Each chapter looks at a particular general (Caesar gets two, greedy bugger) and discusses two or three of their most notable battles or campaigns.  It's a wonderfully old fashioned history book, in that Goldsworthy doesn't bother getting bogged down in economic or political themes, but focus on each man, their military skill and the decisions they make.

In the Name of Rome is also a wonderfully "male" book.  Each chapter is self-contained, can be read in around an hour and has plenty of anecdote and amusing little notes, for instance, I never knew that Caligula means "Little boots."  None of the figures in the book are new to me, as I've read a fair bit of Roman history, but that doesn't detract from enjoying the little journeys the author takes you on - no matter how often you've heard it, I love reading about Pompey mincing around the Mediterranean.

15mm German Pioneer Platoon

   

I finally got round to finishing the German Pioneer Platoon I've been working on.  They're all Battlefront miniatures, painted to my "B" standard i.e. they look fine on the table, but don't bear too much scrutiny close up.

  

My aim with these guys was to worry less about each individual detail and focus more on the contrast on and between each figure.  I think it has worked out well enough.

   

I also used some new basing materials, namely the Gale Force 9 blend range and some Army Painter tufts.  Although the balance isn't quite right (the bases are a bit too green) I'm still fairly happy with them.

   

I've started work on another SS Platoon and a British Mortar platoon, I want to try painting skin differently and practise camouflage at 15mm.  If these both work out I'll make a concerted start on my Fallschirmjager force.

Flames of War Version 3 Rulebook

   

My hardback copy of the new Flames of War rulebook arrived yesterday.  It's comes in at a hefty weight and in three parts.

No surprises with the main rulebook as it's identical in content, barring a brief history of the war and some maps, to the small A5 paperback edition.  The page numbers also match up perfectly - not a big deal now, but as more and more rules questions are answered, this will prove very handy.  Another nice touch is that each page has the topic covered printed along the outer edge, helpful while flicking through the book.  It's of the same high quality to other recent hardback rulebooks (Grey Wolf, Red Bear etc) so I've no complaints there.  It does smell a bit weird though. . .

  

The Forces supplement looks like it's a straight 100 page update of Fortress Europe. Thirteen army lists ported over from the old supplement with updated points costs.  My knowledge of the Flames of War isn't encyclopaedic enough to spot all the changes, but there's nothing obviously amiss here.

   

Having said that, all non-German lists are rated Confident Trained, whereas I thought there was more variation in FE.  There are no surprises in the choice of army lists (no Commandos, Fallschirmjager or Guards lists for instance,) but there are small arsenals for each nation with updated mortar and breakthrough gun profiles for the British and Americans.

   

The Hobby pamphlet is a scant 40 pages covering all the usual hobby stuff, choosing an army, painting, playing a game, FoW website etc.  It is nicely laid out and very well written, but there's absolutely nothing here for an existing player or experienced wargamer. Actually, for this reason, I think it was a great idea to include this separably from the main rules.

   

I really like the aesthetic Battlefront have chosen for the new edition, the red and stone scheme is much more atmospheric than the old scheme. Although there is a lot of recycled content, there is some loverly new artwork here and the hobby section in particular features some great photos. The design and layout of the new rules is also a great improvement over the previous book, the text is easy to read and the overall layout is much more logical than the last edition.  Both Battlefront and the community have talked about the number of  diagrams and summary/checklists used in the rules, but it's worth repeating here that they greatly improve the process of understanding and using the rules.

   

Overall, a nice package at a nice price.  I'm not sure how much use I'll get from the two supplements, but both are well done and I'm happy they're there (remember there were no army lists included in the V2 rules.)  And although I have an A5 rulebook, I much prefer having the hardback to actually study the rules properly, but that might simply be due to a combination of age and eyesight!