Another package waiting for me today when I arrived home from work; the D&D fifth edition starter box. A bit of an impulse buy when I ordered it, but as it cost me just over a tenner, it won't break the bank.
Initial impressions are that it's pretty standard fare; two A4 books, a 32 page rule book and 64 page adventure book, five pre-generated character sheets, one blank character sheet and, of course, a wee bag of funny sided dice! The books are of decent quality; I do like the new art style they've taken and the dice are, well, dice. The character sheets are just printed on cartridge paper, but as people are bound to copy them first, that's no big loss.
I haven't played D&D in a loooong time, so haven't the foggiest how the rules have changed, still seems pretty straight forward though. There's a murmur going around our gaming group that we'll try and run the introductory adventure as a one off, so I'm holding off opening the adventure book for the moment! Getting a roleplaying session in was one of my gaming resolutions this year, so fingers crossed we'll sort something out.
To be honest, I'm a little underwhelmed by the starter box, but I suspect that's because I have the Star Wars: Edge of Empire starter box, which has a) a lot more stuff in it and b) is a more polished starter product, in the sense that there's a clear logic to what to read first, what to do next and where to go to get more info (such as a second adventure from their website.) This box is a very simple "here's your character, off you go" kind of affair. Having said all that, the SW box retails at close to double the price of this one, so it's not an entirely fair comparison.
Happy enough with the box, not sure if I'll pick up any of the hardback rulebooks or not though, time will tell.
Also, why did they change this D&D to plain "fifth edition?" D&D Next was such a better name!
Recently, I've been on a bit of a Star Wars kick, what with rewatching the movies, Droids, Ewoks (yes I know it was terrible,) the X-Wing tournament and the Star Wars card game. Flicking through YouTube, I came across this:
Now I can't even contemplate how much cash I dropped into this arcade machine when I was a kid (for you infants out there, arcade machines were how you played computer games before you had a computer in the house!)
I'll admit, it doesn't stand up well to the test of time, but this was cutting edge back in 1985! The arcade machine actually quoted the movie with a voice, not text - at the time, this was ground breaking! My favourite quote from Jedi? "Han will get that shield down, we gotta five him more time!" I think this video is actually using an emulator or similar, as back in the day the game was a lot less forgiving!
Yes terrible, even worse than Droids, but, remember, not as bad as the Christmas Special!
This afternoon I spent a bit of time going through the photos from the X-Wing tournament and I'll hopefully get a couple posts in later in the week. Until then...
This weekend I'm off visiting a friend, Gaz, in Edinburgh. As far as we've arranged, the agenda consists of lots of junk food, beers and games. Looking forward to getting away from the 'Deen for a while and relaxing for a couple days.
On Saturday we've both signed up an X-Wing tournament at the Games Hub (which I've been to, but can't remember where it actually is.) The tournament is part of the Assault at Imdaar Alpha event FFG are running to promote the next wave of releases for the game. Hopefully we'll get a chance to break out my Tantive IV at some point too.
Tournaments aren't really high on the list of reasons why I game, the last one I went to was over two years ago, but they are a nice distraction and a good opportunity to get some games in against new people. I've still not decided on what kind of squadron to field there, but I'm leaning towards a Moldy Crow/twin B-Wing list; it looks competitive, not too cheesy and kind of fun. I'll try and take some pictures, but they'll just be with the phone as I've apparently lost my camera!
First off, a big congrats to my regular gaming buddy Adam and his wife on the birth of their new baby errr... no name yet, lets just say little baby B! Very happy for all four of them, their cat counts as a person doesn't she, even if it means less gaming in the next few months (Me? Selfish? Never!)
Speaking of new arrivals, here's my latest addition:
About the same size as and tons more fun than a tiny wee pooping machine (only joking!)
The Rebel CR90 Corvette "Tantive IV" for X-Wing. Most famous for the opening scene in A New Hope, the Tantive IV is in all three films, most notably getting swarmed by TIE Interceptors in Jedi.
It's an absoutely lovely mode, the paint job is on par with most of the recent X-Wing releases i.e. excellent for a pre-paint. There's some lovely detailing work and it has a the usual weathered feel to it. I can't deny being delighted by the fact the gun turrets swivel!
I haven't even had a chance to look at the rules yet, something about energy and multiple attacks and destroying any other ship whose base you touch. Nice! There is a mini-campaign booklet in the box, which is a suitable addition. In Epic Play (the X-Wing rules where you can actually use this ship) the minimum points level is 300, a lot of points, but the scenario book pits you against a relatively small number of enemy ships, decent enough given the RRP of the Tantive IV!
I'm away visiting a friend in Auld Reekie next weekend; a fair bit of gaming should be involved and this guy is certainly the first thing I'll be packing!
Well, I guess that's long enough without posting on here. To get the touchy feely stuff out of the way, life has simply been a little too stressful the last couple months to keep my normal routine, not just for blogging, but for a fair few other things.
The quick version is that I legally agreed to buy a house with my Mrs last year, but a few days after that she decided she didn't want to stay together any longer. We couldn't get out of the house buy and neither of us wanted to live in the house on our own, so it was a very awkward and stressful twelve months. Thankfully, March saw a lot of potential buyers view the place, we eventually managed to agreed a sale and it went through towards the end of April.
For the last couple weeks I've been enjoying the modest luxury of not worrying about the place (every time there was a strong wind, I was certain the tree in the garden would blow down through and go through the kitchen window!) Still, the whole experience was pretty rough; lost a lot of money, had to leave my felis catus behind and it took a long time to come to terms with starting again at my age, but, thankfully, I think I've managed to get past that point now. While I'm talking about this, I'd like to throw out a quick thanks to all my internet friends on the blogoshpere and elsewhere for their support (even if they didn't necessarily know they were offering it!)
Right, that's enough of that.
Managed a reasonable amount of gaming lately, obviously not enough though. Played some FoG with the guys at the club; still an enjoyable game, but doesn't really grab me anymore. Scott at the club also ran a Romans vs Britons game using a new (to me) ruleset, the name of which escapes me. A lot of fun, plus the fact that Scott doesn't run small games made it an enjoyable evening. I also tried the Star Wars LCG by FFG, looks like a game with a lot of depth, but I'm waiting to find a regular opponent before I drop much cash on it.
I've also been on a bit of a buying splurge too; a ton of games have been added to the pile lately, notably:
Sentinels of the Multiverse. This is a fixed deck, co-op cardgame which sees a group of superheroes joining forces to fight an evil supervillain. The game itself is phenomenally simple, the rule book contains almost no rules, rather it just goes over the turn sequence and clarifies exactly what the different terms used mean. Instead, all the actions and abilities in the game are on the various hero, villain and environment cards; the game can be taught in literally less than five minutes. Sentinels is also supremely replayable, I have the base game and one expansion and have yet to play the same combination of heroes, villains and environments twice. Lastly, the game doesn't use any existing IP; instead all the characters are original creations and it's very enjoyable reading the humorous fluff for each one. My favorite hero so far is Fanatic, a crusading angel smiting her enemies, while the most entertaining villain is Baron Blade, a mad scientist determined to crash the moon into Earth! An outstanding game.
Star Trek Attack Wing. Right, here's the issue. I already play and love X-Wing. ST:AW is essentially the same game... with worse models... and poorer quality cards... and with some fairly broken combinations. So, what's the appeal? It's STAR TREK BABY! Yeah, I'm a fan boy, so even though the whole experience is less satisfying than X-Wing, it's still Klingons against the Dominion and that's just full of win. I just received the first Borg ship in the mail today (Borg Sphere 4270) and, ooooh, tiny nerdgasm, Borg Cutting Beam, Seven of Nine, Regenerate, what's not to love!
Malifaux Second Edition. A blast from the past this one, I was playing Malifaux not long after it's original release a few years ago. A very thinky skirmish game, but also a lot of fun. Sadly, the game suffered from far too many errors, erratas and updates and I ended up bailing on an otherwise fine game. The last game I played involved us using the original rulebook, the errata, the faq, the new rules sheet and the pdf of the updated cards, simply too much faff to enjoy the game.
I'm glad to say that M2E is a much better set of rules than the original, cleaner explanations of the key mechanics, less clutter and much better presentation. It's also been an excuse to pick up a couple of the new plastic Crew boxes LadyJ and Ramos and get some modelling in (I will get some painting done soon, I swear!)
I'm still pretty addicted to Android Netrunner, the most rewarding game I play with any regularity, but we're really struggling to get any kind of community together in Aberdeen. Online, I use OCTGN whenever I can, so if anyone out there plays A:NR and uses OCTGN, feel free to get in touch (my username is Vladdd309.)
Been churning through the books recently too; I've adapted to reading three books at once now, based on what format (physical book, audiobook and Kindle,) compared to two (one factual and fiction.) I listen to an audiobook on the commute, read the kindle in the house and a regular book everywhere else, especially the bath. Currently reading the original Foundation trilogy by Asimov, forgotten just how good it is. Expect a few Two Minute Reviews to follow soon.
It's that time of year again, the IPL is back (coom on the Kings XI!) as well as the Giro. A few more weeks and I can start pretending again that I like tennis, then it's the Tour and the golf. Not enough hours in the week!
Lastly, on a complete impulse, I bought a PS Vita in March. I'm a Xbox fan, but haven't been able to either use the 360 I have much nor pick up the new console. My laptop isn't up to playing a game so the Vita has been a godsend. Notably, Killzone Mercenary has just been eating up the dead hour between ten and eleven at night and Wipeout is just as great as it was back in 1994!
Anyway, thanks to those of you have stuck around to read all this. I'll try not to leave it so long until the next post! S.
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.
After an interminable three hour meeting at work, I was really looking forward to this when I got home last night.
So what's in it then? Well, it's my huge, extravagant and completely unnecessary Christmas splurge gift to myself; a big pile of Deadzone goodness.
Ok, justification time. We can use the scenery for at least two games other than Deadzone itself. I've only heard good things about the gameplay; plus it plays on a two foot square area, meeting the whole "game in a box thing" I've got going on at the moment. Lastly, I wanted to drop some cash on myself, rather than solicitor bills and property management companies. Job done.
By my count, that's 51 figures (with two still to come) added to the lead pile, twenty two sprues of scenery, plenty resin and plastic tokens and a whole new game to explore. Everything I'll every need to pick up... well, until the next wave of releases in March!
I read the core rules this morning and everything looks pretty straightforward to far. Deadzone ticks most of the boxes I look for; simple enough core rules, plenty of options and special rules, a nice dice rolling mechanic and plenty of player options, both in choosing your strike force and on the table. Consider me happy!
Going to have to rename this blog "Not Enough Free Time"
Quickly:
First the boring stuff. Despite being told that my workload (and hence hours) would be greatly reduced over February and March, work is still hectic. My assistant is pregnant too, which isn't helping (I know pregnancy isn't the same thing as being ill, but in either case, she's absolutely bugger all use at the moment!) Coupled with the fact that my sporadic insomnia is running rampant, I'm really not getting much done. Seriously, when my head hits the pillow I instantly burst into wide awake mode; put me on the couch at 7pm with a full belly and I'm out like a light!
Managed to get a couple games in this month though. Another big game of 5150: Fighter Command last week and a big session of the Lord of the Rings card game at the weekend. Plenty of photos from both 5150 games to come, I just need to get round to fiddling with them first. A quick preview above.
The Lord of the Rings day was an interesting occasion. My mate Adam fancied another go so we built a couple decks and rattled through some Khazad-dûm quests. Adam, who admittedly is a much more experienced card gamer than I, then promptly ruined my theory that the game is too hard by trouncing the first four quests. He sees combos and synergies in cards that I simply don't, so much so, that I think I was just there for the fun of it; he could have easily beaten some of the quests on his own. A real eye opener!
Work continues on the 10mm ECW stuff and some figures for the Analogue Painting Challenge bonus round this weekend, but not terribly quick work. There are a few guys at the club painting up some ECW forces for some FoG:R gaming, with every major force represented. Frustratingly, the thorny issue of basing has reared it's ugly head again. We eventually agreed normal FoG bases (20mm x 40mm for infantry,) but apparently they're too big with only five figures per base, so some are advocating going back to 15x40mm (the original plan.) However, plenty of us have already bought bases, or even have some completed bases, so the discussion isn't going too smoothly. I'm sticking with the big bases though, I'm of the thought "if you're going small, go big" when it comes to scale, so I want my pike bases bristling with pointy bits and my muskets looking deadly. At least I'll always outnumber the enemy?
Lastly, I'm offloading some wargaming odds and sods, mainly WW2 Soviets from Warlord Games. I'm still not 100% sold on Bolt Action as a game, having sat in on a couple games at the club, it just doesn't really do anything for me. In any case, certainly not at 28mm. Maybe 15mm and in a different theatre might help, but, no, these guys are going. My eBay page is here, but if any bloggers out there want to make me an offer, drop me an email.
Every now and then you come across a book and you ask yourself "why have I not read this before?" This most recently happened to me when I finally settled down to read William Gibson's Neuromancer. I had certainly heard of the book before hand, but had no idea of how influential it has been; Neuromancer is full of the original source material for many other cyberpunk settings. Case in point, Neuromancer coined the term "Matrix" in the sense of a digital reality. Quite simply, one of the best books I've ever read.
At it's heart, Neuromancer is a character and setting driven heist novel. The plot itself is fairly derivative (except for the object of the heist,) but the real energy of the book comes from the parade of characters you're introduced to and the eclectic series of locations we travel through.
We start off in the Chiba City, Japan, where we meet Case, a damaged former computer hacker. From there Neuromancer takes us around the world and then into a couple of off world locations, New Zion and Freeside. The cast of characters grows quickly; Molly Millions, a razorgirl, turns up to protect Case, Armitage, apparently the mastermind of the con, slowly reveals what exactly he's planning, Dixie Flatline is a digital reconstruction of a dead hacker. All very engaging and wonderfully written. Gibson also paces the book perfectly, drip feeding information and plot development to begin with, before escalating the tempo as the team struggle to complete their mission.
Neuromancer is full of memorable scenes, Zions elders, a blank Armitage in his hotel room, Case jacking into Molly's nervous system, Riviera's holographic show, Wintermute trying to talk to Case, too many to relate here. What should be emphasised is the depth of the world Gibson creates, just how cyberpunk everything is. Not only the vibrant, neon urban areas; Gibson treats cyberspace the same way, he doesn't try to describe the indescribable, but instead relates the rush, the freedom, the danger involved in hacking. Neuromancer is one of the most immersive books I've come across.
I feel I should also mention the narrator of the audiobook I listened to, Jeff Harding, because he was simply excellent. This was the first audiobook where the quality of the voice acting was a noticeable positive. Each character has their own accent and is consistent throughout; Armitage has a booming boardroom voice, the Finn has a gritty Irish growl while Maelcum has a languid Caribbean drawl. The editing is handled very well too, to the point where the different voices flow seamlessly from one another.
Any negatives to report? Well, Neuromancer does feature my least favourite plot device, namely one of the main characters is poisoned at some point to ensure their commitment to the scheme. I hate that mechanic, but at least here it isn't too intrusive to the plot. Other that that, not much. The narrator does take a little adjusting to when you start to listen; he has that peculiar American accent that dips down at the end of a sentence, making everything he says sound sarcastic. After half an hour, though, I'd forgotten all about it.
Lastly, something I noticed about listening to this as an audiobook. Neuromancer is a short book, the kind of book I suspect I would have blasted through in a weekend. By listening to it instead, and considering I listen to books either commuting or while out walking, I was able to string Neuromancer out to well over a week. This really helped me enjoy the book; not only did it give me a lot of time to think about what was actually happening, but the anticipation of what would happen next kept me hooked.
At last years AGM, someone at the club (I forget who) brought up the idea of having a "bring and buy" night each year, to help move some unused lead and plastic between the different club members. So we held it this week; lots of emails flying around with people hawking their various wares.
A nice haul (especially for the price - £0!) Cheers Adam.
I wasn't prepared enough to get rid of anything (still in the acquiring miniatures frame of mind,) but there was a nice enough turn out. Most members arranged trades or sales privately, but quite a few people brought along stuff simply to see if anyone else fancied them. Adam moved on a fair few things "When am I going to get round to painting these?" Lots of books and magazines, plastic minis on frames and plenty of plain lead lying around, seemed like a success for the first outing.
Me? Well I picked up a couple books, as well as Adam's redundant Khador miniatures for Warmachine. I also snagged from Ken some spare bows for some miscellaneous dark age figures and a handy dead Norman knight for the next Painting Challenge weekend. So it was a simple enough event and I wouldn't be surprised if we hold another one in the summer. It was also nice to see something agreed at an AGM actually take place for once, certainly against expectations!
A few days ago, my (replacement) secret santa present arrived, a Perry Miniatures Medieval Cottage! A big thank you to whoever it was who sent it!
A great addition to my growing terrain pile, the kit consists of the cottage itself and some fencing along with some kind of hutch or chicken coop. I think I'll end up using the fencing to make a field or some other kind of linear obstacle for Saga.
The cottage itself doesn't fit in too well with the time period for Saga, so I've been brainstorming an alternative use for it. At the moment I'm thinking of kitbashing some steampunk or fantasy gubbins to it, for use in something like Malifaux or HoMachine etc. Who knows what it'll end up as! Thanks again!
Time to draw from the biiiig book of excuses i.e. I've not posted at all or finished painting anything in the last week or so. To be honest, I've simply not been in the mood to sit down and write anything recently. On top of that, I work in retail and have just finished the busiest period in our year; Christmas, sale and stocktake. However, now that's past, my workload is a lot smaller for the next few weeks, I'm hoping to get back into the swing of things. Anyway, here's how January 2014 has shaped up so far.
Analogue Painting Challenge
Well, I missed one of my personal goals and didn't submit anything for the vehicle bonus round, thereby squandering another 75 points. Two GZG mechs have been painted up, but the putty for the bases hadn't finished setting in time to get them primed and painted.
I'm still plugging away at my 10mm ECW stuff though, managing to pick up the brush most days, if only for a colour or two at a time. At the risk of being accused of sandbagging, I think there'll be a fairly hefty entry once I get round to basing them.
This week, I'm aiming to paint up my next two bonus entries (heroes and casualties) and ***ahem*** base the first of the ECW infantry units. Well. . . that's the plan anyway.
Gaming
I've been back on a card game kick this month. About a dozen games each of Android: Netrunner and the Lord of the Rings (both by FFG) have been keeping me pretty busy. Oddly enough, I now seem to be getting worse at A:NR (five games on Saturday, all loses!) but still absolutely love both games. I introduced LotR to Adam at the club, but made the mistake of playing an easy quest so I don't think he saw much challenge in the game. He's hinted that he would try it again though, so we'll try something more difficult and see if his opinion changes!
I also had another friend, Gaz, visiting for a couple days earlier this month. About six more games of LotR (we won one) and a load of X-Wing, coupled with some beers and junk food made for a very enjoyable time. Since we last played, Gaz dropped a lot of cash on X-Wing, so we had the full range of ships to choose from. I tried out my two latest purchases; the Tie-Bomber (meh, ok) and the Moldy Crow (immense!) Still an outstanding game, but I'm not sure yet if I'll pick up either of the two large ships FFG are about to release, the freighter and the frigate. Maybe.
Finally, I managed to finally run a game of Iron & Oak at the club. Adam and I played one of the set pieces of the American Civil War, Hampton Roads. Adam took the Confederates (shock) with the Ironclad Virginia, while I had the plucky Monitor on the Union side. Much like our last ACW outing it was a hideous (and ahistorical) loss to the Union! An enjoyable game though, looking forward to trying one of the larger scenarios sometime soon. This week, we're going to try out the 1863 scenario from A House Divided. Putting my foot down this time though, I'll be the Confederates and see if I can pull out a win for a change!
Writing
One of my goals for 2014 is to run more miniature games at the club (or elsewhere for that matter.) The first one I'm planning is a naval Punic Wars game. Frustratingly though, I'm struggling to find a suitable set of rules. They're either too simple (Fleets of Battle) or too involved (Naumachiae) or just not fun (Salamis ad Actium.) To fix that, I've started putting together my own set of rules based, obviously, on ripping off mechanics I like from other games! I haven't done this in a few years, but it's very rewarding so far. Assuming the enthusiasm doesn't wane, I'd like to get a game in around the end of March, start of April, but we'll see.
Reading
I've ploughed through three books so far this month. Nothing unusual in that, except for the fact that none of them were actually print books. Two audio books and a digital book on my kindle. All of them great, so expect some two minute reviews soon, but this whole no-physical-book is taking some getting used to!
Bowels
For the first time since 2001, I took a sick day off from work! I had a takeaway meal one night, seeing as I couldn't be bothered to cook anything. A couple hours later, it started coming out of one end, a few hours later still, out the other! No permanent damage, but this really wiped me out for a few days! Helped me lose some of that festive weight though, just not from the right places!
So that's been my 2014 so far. Busy, but with not much to show for it! Reading that back, there's a lot of "I" in there, so I'll sign off with what is becoming a common sight in the blogging community, hot chicks with guns! (I'm blaming you, Loki, Fran and Ray!)
Well, I'm glad to see that I wasn't the only one who, over the festive season, completely lost track of the days of the week! Suddenly it was the fourth of January and I had to quickly paint some D&D boardgame bad guys for the second theme weekend! To avoid a repeat, I've had an hour or so today to quickly base and prime my entry for the 19th January. I'll like to get them finished with a couple days to spare, in order to take some pictures in daylight this time (I've only been free in the evenings, so it's been harsh lights and camera flash all the way.)
These guys are really, really tiny. Why are they taking so long to paint then?
Other than the theme weekends, I've been painting up some 10mm ECW infantry. Some guys at the club have been talking playing some small Field of Glory: Renaissance games in, but no one seems to have got very far. Perhaps seeing some finished figures could spur some of them on!
The idea with going with 10mm figures, is that it's more affordable than 15mm (by a good margin) and that they are quicker to paint too. It's not gone to plan so far though; firstly I'm cramming ten figures to a 20x40mm base and, secondly, I can't get out of the habit of base, wash, layer and highlight when painting - and it takes a bloomin' age to do! For the second unit of infantry, I'll try a simpler colour scheme and see if I can speed things up!
A night off painting tomorrow, as the club is back on. I've a couple card games arranged, the obligatory Android: Netrunner savaging (although, I have won a few times recently,) and then a intro game for a friend to the Lord of the Rings card game. Both games by Fantasy Flight Games and both absolutely fantastic. Good times.
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