When the Stars are Right.................

Your Cthulhu Wars Kickstarter arrives!

Yup this massive box arrived this week after much expectation. Cthulhu Wars was launched as a Kickstarter in June  with an estimated delivery date of December the same year. Yup that means it has landed only 14 months behind schedule - Yay Kickstarter!

The designers were looking for $40,000 and instead they got $1.4 million. I suspect this is where the delays started to pile up as the designers had probably not expected that level of demand (no shit Sherlock! I hear you exclaim) and they had to rework all their production schedules. Anyway back then, this Kickstarter announcement coincided with a rare bit of good fortune so I was not only tempted but just about able to take part, and between us me and my regular gaming partner Paul managed to scrape together the ££ or $$ to get one of the "bigger" pledges. Our main reason was the figures, which were promised to be 28mm and therefore usable in other games, Call of Cthulhu RPGs and just nice to have around, and there are a lot of them, even in just the basic box. The actual game was of secondary importance - board games had only a passing interest at that point.

In the year and a bit that followed we sort of got resigned to the fact it would be here sooner or later - and by the constant delivery date push backs, probably later. Strangely however in that time we did start playing some board games which is a happy coincidence. The game has finally arrived - all six kilos worth, and we broke it out and tried it Monday night. I have to say we really enjoyed it. Very interesting to play, with the four different factions having totally different options as to how to meet the same victory conditions. The models are pretty damned good too - although original plans to paint them may have to go on hold - there are just so damned many.

Was it worth the costs and delay? Not sure. I am certain that I would not be in a position to pay the RRP on the bundle we are getting \ have got, which is "silly" at £120 for the starter set alone, so maybe. If I had known about the delay, probably not. On the whole I'm happy we took the chance.

So if there are delays reporting on stuff happening on the blog, at least some of those may be down to the arrival of some Great Old Ones.

Sometimes I think if there is any value in the narcissistic process we call blogging, it may be that it gives you an opportunity to vent to the anonymous and amorphous "internet".

Here's the thing - why do we (wargamers) accept and do things that are in "the rules" when they are patently counter to history?

A couple of weeks ago I was playing my second game of Muskets and Tomahawks, this time against a player who plays regularly at another club. M&T is a skirmish game set in the French Indian Wars. They're a fun set of rules with a healthy dose of flavour.

Line of sight and line of fire are blocked by other models unless it is a friend from the same unit in base to base contact pretty standard fare so far. They also have a formation rule for the trained troops that fought in firing lines - basically they are easier to hit but get some morale bonus. Anyway we set up and I was somewhat surprised to see my opponent and his Woodland Indian troops formed into units two ranks deep. When I queried this he said the rules allow it, and its a good formation that maximises firepower while at the same time keeping the unit compact and easy to control - which of course it is.  In fact it exactly replicated the firing line formation of the formed regulars, but with none of the restrictions or disadvantages. It is also not disallowed in "the rules". This is true, but the end result is a game that bears no visual resemblance to the historical record or even the pop culture impression of the war in the woods and forests of North America - in fact it looked much more like a bad 1:60 ratio Napoleonic game. It has been bugging me since.

So whats the solution?

"Its only a game" - sure, but its a game about something real. Not sure what the solution is, probably just need to be less uptight :-)

I think I'm going to have a bit of a tinker with that in our games to discourage Indians and irregulars forming ranks. If it works I'll let you know,

Back from Vappa - York Wargames Show

No pics this time, just a bit of a report on my visit to the Vapnartak show in York last weekend.

Since "Vappa" moved out of the atmospheric, but poorly lit Medieval Merchant Adventurers Hall to the vast glass and chrome racecourse, the show has been constantly on the up and up.

I liked the Merchant Adventurers Hall as a building and a concept - we hear so much about "Guilds" if you play any of the fantasy\medieval role playing games, or even Medieval wargames, but to actually visit a guild hall helps put it into perspective. As a venue for a trade show it was far from ideal because the lighting inside was limited, and space was at a premium.

The new racecourse venue is much better. Lots of space, and well lit. Actually when I say lots of space, it is still a bit too crowded for my liking, but that may be because it is so popular :-)

This year was the first year for a while that I had not been in any of the competitions, so I had the experience of having to queue to get in with the rest of the unwashed, but on the plus side it did mean we set out at the more civilised time of 8:30am rather than the usual 6:30. Vappa is split over a number of floors - the racecourse building is unsurprisingly long and narrow, with most of the traders and demo tables on the ground and first floors, and the competitions higher up. There was a good selection of traders and the demos were also of high quality, and I would safely say Vappa is now the best show in the North East of England by quite a margin.

Now to the crucial question - what did I buy :0)???

Surprisingly little. Partly because finances had taken an unexpected hit over the run up when our hot water system needed some urgent repairs, but mostly I would like to say due to a most uncharacteristic attack of self restraint. I did pick up a box of Wargames Factory Woodland Indians to add to the expanding Muskets & Tomahawks collection, a canoe from Coritani to move them around, and some civilians to run away screaming on first sight of them. Other than that I bought an X-Wing Miniatures starter set - I've been sharing one with my "oppo" Paul but it was a bit of a faff so we now have 2 between us. And thats it! I managed to dodge any number of potential impulse purchases, D&D Attack Wing (and Star Trek), Malifaux, even some modern 28mm that was calling seductively from Empress Miniatures. This last one is mopt so much a dodge as a postponement - as soon as Two Fat Lardies bring out their modern version of Chain of Command I will be there like a shot. Other than that I tried to buy some cabin furniture from 1st Corps but they had sold out.

I also got to sit down and talk to Martin Goddard from Peter Pig about his new version of the PBI rules that was due for release this week, and played a turn or two. They seemed quite interesting, and I would recommend having a look it you want something a bit less full on than FoW. I dont think I will be heading off to play them yet, but maybe once the lead & plastic mountain is back under control I may give them a try.

All the best
 

Brigade to the Rescue! DZC Bunkers (3)

Happy to report my search for a budget bunker for DZC has finally borne fruit.

Tony Francis and Brigade Models are one of the more established companies in the fringe of sci fi wargaming. They have quietly and reliably been producing their ranges for over a decade and have a large fleet scale "Full Trust" compatible starship range, a rather nice line in 15mm and 6mm sci fi, and they were doing the whole Victorian SF thing years before all these Johnny come latelys with their glossy books and expensive boxed sets. 

Tony & co have recently been dabbling in 3d printing and have started to digitally remaster some of their 15mm designs, and damned impressive they are too.

When I started playing Dropzone I was eyeing up their 6mm buildings and wondering if they would work for DZC, but they were just a bit too small. Needless to say I (and I'm sure many others) dropped some hints, and Tony has just obliged with some 10mm scaled versions of their 6mm Sci Fi  Desert Buildings range. Initial releases follow the 6mm range quite closely, so what you get are fairly low buildings reminiscent of Tatoine, but with some modern \ sci fi touches. Of the initial releases one immediately caught my eye - a building going by the modest title "Small Dwelling #1"  . This seemed to fit most of my requirements and was priced at the princely sum of £1.75 ($2.62USD) each. I ordered five on a whim to see what they were like "in the flesh" . After all, they could always be used as other buildings if they turned out to be unsuitable for bunkers, and the whole order including p&p came to £10.75. A few days later they arrived, and I'm a happy little troglodyte!

The first thing I should mention about them is the size. You get a fair brick of resin for your £1.75. Detail is simple but sharpe. They are styled as a simple building with one fairly heavy duty door, no windows and a domed roof. The squat shape and buttressed walls all combine to give them a no nonsense ferro-concrete feel. I was not so certain about the dome, but I can live with it.

As I said I have five, so there are plenty of options to think about paint schemes. For the first I have settled on a weathered concrete \ grey scheme, which I think helps enhance the "bunker-y-ness". I'm planning on picking up some decals at York next week to number them up and add to the sci fi feel, and I suspect these will also benefit from some urban style graffiti in due course. Here is Bunker 1 with a Bear to give an idea of size.

I'm rather happy with these, so much so that I am ordering some more from the range in the near future. The real treat will be if Tony decides it is worth continuing to reproduce the 6mm range in 10mm I will be first in the queue for a 10 mm version of the Vtol Airfield and the Docking Bay  to name a few

DZC Bunkers (2) Wall to Wall

My search for affordable bunkers for DZC continued.

One early option was simply to use a card marker to show where the entrance was. The problem with this is it can easily get lost in the general clutter of the table, and looks naff. I discounted that.

So my next idea was to buy some more affordable 10mm wargames bunkers. This idea immediately floundered on the sad fact that I couldn't find any! Or rather the ones I could find were not to dissimilar in price to the ones from Hawk. Most of the available ones I could find either were too "Atlantik Wall" or didn't fit the bill in other ways, including the actual price. Hawk's set of five bunkers are £35, ie £7 each. I was looking for a significant saving, otherwise you may as well buy the Hawk version, so buying something for £5 that wasn't quite right wouldn't work.

One option would be to have a massive self build session. I thought about this - after all the shape I was looking for would be reasonably simple to cut from 10mm or 15mm hard foam. Possibly? In the mean time I stumbled on what has proven to be a reasonable interim solution - AT43 wall sections.

AT 43 was a 28mm Sci Fi miniatures and rules system by the French company Rackham. The hook was pre painted miniatures. In truth they were not bad at all, but Rackham had some production and supply issues and ended up choking themselves into receivership. They sold the infantry in units of 6-8, with vehicles (usually walkers) etc in singles. Most units were packaged with a piece of terrain, a shipping container (incidentally these are brilliant and now command silly prices on ebay) or some wall sections - a bit like Armco barriers about 2" long and an inch high, with two firing slits in them. I ended up with a fair few of these lying around. One of them was sat on the work table when the "bunker" mood was on me, and it got me thinking.......... in another scale, would it work as a bunker?

This seemed to be a possible winner, but it would need some doors. I quickly grabbed some pictures of blast door type doors I have on the rather spiffing "7TV Set Creator" and shrunk them down to the required size, printed them on stickers and stuck them to the walls. The results were (are) I think not too bad - or at least usable - this one has a radar dish added from the spares box.

A long way from perfect, but not bad for minimal outlay, and I do have quite a few available. At least until I find a better solution..........

Duck and Cover, Protect & Survive. Bunkers for Dropzone Commander (1)

I love Dropzone Commander. I love the dynamics, the mainly urban setting, the way each unit has a function. Well, almost. There is usually one unit that sits sad and alone in the box while the rest of the army is out there strutting it's stuff - the flamethrowers. Whether it is Mechits, Tormentors , Flameblades, or FireWagons, the specialist flamethrowers are, well, just too specialist. Yes they are the bees knees at clearing buildings, in fact my Tormentors have yet to fire a shot in anger as the enemy has always abandoned any building when they saw them approaching - pretty much the same effect Churchill Crocodiles were often reported to have had in WW2. The problem is that nine times out of ten the same overall result can be achieved by pounding the target building with standard weapons, or demo capable weapons, until it just collapses. The big advantage of this approach being the units involved can also do their normal stuff. Even against hardened targets, you are usually better off shooting them with tanks rather than including the specialist flamethrowers who are pretty useless at anything else.

Except for the Bunker Assault Mission. One of the missions in the Resistance expansion involves assaulting and holding five key bunkers. The name sometimes confuses players because they think of them as fixed defensive positions that units can fire out from, something like the bunkers on Omaha Beach,  when in reality they are simply the extra hardened entrances to deep underground facilities - think Cheyenne Mountain, MIB HQ or Der Fuhrerbunker. Troops in these cannot be targeted by normal weapons, you either assault them at bayonet point, or use those over-specialised flame units to kill defenders by filling the tunnels with your particular flavour of insidious death - acid, napalm, gas or whatever (Fort Drum Redux).

The Bunker Assault mission is very different from normal missions, and gives a refreshingly different style of game, particularly at tournaments and games days. The problem is you need 5 bunkers. Hawk do a Bunker scenario pack, One of our local players has a set, and I had a good chance to fondle them  and very nice it is too, containing 5 identical bunker entrances.

Like all Hawk products they are exquisitely detailed, but the set is £35. That is a large expenditure on something only used rarely. Worse, if you are organising a games day you need a set of 5 per table, so even a small event with 8 players would require 20 bunkers, or £150 expense. No Tournament Organiser can do that without official support, so the Bunker Assault mission gets rarely played.

I like Bunker Assault, so I have been looking for cheaper ways to allow it to be played on a budget. Next post will show some options.........

  

If you go down to the woods today you better not go alone - 'cos theyre full of Rangers

Just a quick update - I realised when posting the earlier piece about the Canadian Militia that I hadn't shown the completed Rangers.

As I mentioned in an earlier post I bought a "British Wilderness" starter force from North Star Miniatures. It consisted of 16 Rangers, 6 Indians, and an Officer, supposedly enough to build a 200 pt force.

I was pleasantly surprised at the figures which had a lot of character and painted up well - at least by my standards.

Here is the finished product - advancing out of the forest with the Indians scouting ahead

and a closer shot of the Rangers.

I'm quite pleased with them - more so when I discovered that by upgrading the Rangers I can actually stretch a supposed 200pt force to 300pts. Another positive is that although technically a French & Indian Wars unit, they can also double up as Queens Rangers for the American War of Independence, another bonus.

I'm enjoying building a force and playing Muskets and Tomahawks - just completed our third game now and all have been fun, which is a very good sign. Recommended