Wasteland Wanderings

I've been a bit busy with work and "stuff" recently, and not doing a lot of gaming, however I have a soft spot, and it just got prodded.

Fallout

For those of you who don't know, Fallout is a series of computer games set in an alternate future, a rather bleak post nuclear apocalypse where small groups of survivors struggle to survive against each other, horribly mutated creatures and all that. The games have a rich and interesting background, and allow you on the whole to wander around to your hearts content til you get eaten by the aforementioned horribly mutilated creatures. One of the attractive parts of the background is the image of mankind desperately trying to rebuild but without the technology - nothing new is being built, everything (just about) is scavenged from the ruins of the old.

Modipius announced they were going to be bringing Fallout to the tabletop a year or so ago. The game is called Fallout Wasteland Warfare. I was lukewarm about it when the details came out - it was expensive and another game in another non standard figure size - 32mm, which would mean you couldn't easily use other miniatures.  I shrugged and got on with other projects.

One of my regular opponents Paul decided to buy the starter set, and we had a go last week. It was an interesting game - enough to make me pick up a box of figures and paint it. That seems to have been a good decision.

First impressions was this was a very fussy game, with a plethora of counters, cards, different dice, measuring sticks - just about every gadget under the sun. The rules at first glance were similarly complex and labyrinthine. However once we played a couple of turns it all seemed to click into place, and much of that fussiness and complexity now looks like an attempt to be complete and future proofing.

The miniatures in the starter set are slightly bendy pvc plastic - not too bad, however the resin models in the expansions are very nice indeed.

We're still learning how the game works, but I have to say I am quite impressed and have rushed out to buy some more.