I suppose the name should have warned me - Dropzone Commander Resistance Leviathan Hovercraft

Names are not a reliable indicator. Take this as an example

This is the Douglas TBD "Devastator" torpedo bomber of WW2 vintage. It was never really going to live up to the name - partly because US torpedos were generally awful at the time, but mostly because it was pretty crap. 41 attacked the Japanese fleet at Midway, only 6 survived and they achieved no hits. To be fair they were so easy to shoot down the Japanese fighters were all drawn down to the turkey shoot and the US dive-bombers got a free run in and changed the direction the war in the Pacific was heading. Incidentally the pic is of the cover of the Airix box - nostalgia strikes again :-)

So when I saw the Leviathan hovercraft from Hawk Wargames I was not immediately overawed. This is the stock shop pic and it doesn't give much of an impression of size

Sure it looks a bit bigger than this - the Kraken, which is the other hovercraft the Resistance use

Then I stuck one together, and frankly it is HUGE! Pictures say a thousand words etc so here is my latest addition after being stuck together, posed artistically with a Hannibal Heavy Tank, and a Kraken. I'll try and get a better lit shot later but this gives a reasonable impression of the size of the thing!

For such a big model it went together very well. The resin parts needed careful cleaning and trimming but the fit on the whole was pretty tight. I may use some Greenstuff on some of the joints, then again I may get away without it. Dry runs before assembly are the order of the day - particularly as if you want to have the ramps operate you need to fit one hinge, then the door, then the other hinge in that order as the ramp itself will not clip in (as I first thought). The lack of instructions is probably the only minor point against this model, and even then it is self evident what goes where just by looking at the box. There are 21 parts in the model - technically 25 as you get alternate weapon options of AA guns or rocket launchers and all of them were clean cast with no bubbles and minimal flash, but you do need to take care cleaning the areas where the pour hole or vent has been. Luckily the resin is easy to work with, a sharp knife and emery board (stolen from Mrs R) were enough. Detail is phenomenal, which is pretty much what we have come to expect from Hawk.

If there is a problem with the Leviathan, it's the price. as one will set you back £35 RRP, which is a reasonable chunk. I wouldn't get one if I were just starting out, but then again if you are starting out your Resistance army wont have either 24 Technicals or 12 Trucks to move around, so you wont need one. Actually that may be a fairly big restriction on the Leviathan, as most Resistance armies I have seen don't go for big truck or technical units, but rather prefer to use the more resilient ex military stuff.

Ok there is another problem too - at just about six inches wide you may find some streets too narrow to get the damned thing down! On the plus side the Leviathan offers Resistance players a great way to move a lot of otherwise vulnerable units at reasonable speed, and also comes with some pretty serious AA or artillery support functions too. Great model - can't wait to get it painted.

More on Dropzone Buildings

Part 2 – with some added text - and a disclaimer. I'm not associated with Waugh Games other than as a user of the shop - just in case you were wondering.

OK a bit of background. Brian Waugh is the owner operator of Waugh Games, which is a gaming shop on the outskirts of Middlesbrough. I’ve used the facilities he provides to organise local gaming tournaments, initially for Impetus, and more recently for Dropzone Commander.

Brian saw some of the mdf buildings available to DZC, and decided he could do better. He made a couple of prototypes but I was not very impressed, basically just boxes with squares cut in them. He then got Jez Evans to do some more interesting designs, and this is what we have here. Jez said he looked for real world buildings and then tried to get them into Dropzone friendly dimensions, and I think this has really paid off.

All the range is laser cut mdf, supplied unassembled and unpainted. They’re simple to assemble, as most are still just “boxes” although some have some internal inserts to blank out some of the larger openings, or external panels to give some relief. Interestingly, they all come with some small roof detailing – fans, vents and ducts, which adds something to the basic models. The level of detail is on the whole good

As you can see from the pics they paint up well – again Jez did the paintwork.

These will certainly fill out the table with some nice looking buildings. I’m getting that Cinema to use as my Resistance HQ building so am already looking for Rocky XXII posters to stick on the walls J.

I think the real question will be pricing. The webshop is being revamped as part of the move to the new (larger) Gaming Centre, but as soon as they are done I’ll report back, but they seem to hit a reasonable balance of price to detail.

Here is the demo layout.

The base board was just pained green, roads were printed from the Hawk downloads site and stuck down, then a metric sh*tload of mixed flock was applied. Finally the whole lot was sealed. I have played on it three times now and it really enhances the experience*

*Or something like that

New Dropzone Buildings from Waugh Games

As I mentioned in the post over the weekend, Waugh Games have a new range of laser cut mdf buildings for Dropzone Commander or any similar 10mm scale game. I tried to get some photos at the Teesside Wargames Convention but the lighting was pretty poor, so I have arranged with the owner Brian to drop in to their new Gaming Centre to get some better pics.

They say a picture says a thousand words so I'll just leave it up to the pics :-)

Show Report - Teesside Wargames Convention - New DZC layout & Buildings

Just returned from Teesside Wargames Convention. The organisers were aiming for a low key local affair and I think they got it just about right. It was fairly busy through the morning and tailed off after 3pm. I was there doing a demo of Dropzone Commander, and to be honest I was so busy I never got a chance to have a proper look at the rest of the demos (sorry guys) but the 1945 what if game from Redcar did catch my eye, as well as the Mantic and Spartan demos.

The Dropzone demo was on a new terrain layout which was put together to be used in Waugh Games new Gaming Centre. They're moving to a much bigger venue and so will have more space, so they are having a some semi permanent layouts to play on (and run demos), one of which will be Dropzone Commander.

I have to say it was a treat to see and play on. All the buildings are from Waugh Games new mdf buildings range and they are just about in the sweet spot for detail and price. Not sure if they are on the website yet but hopefully some time next week.

Only problem is the klutz with the camera (me) couldn't get the settings right and the light in the hall was a horrible yellow which has pretty much screwed up the pics, however here are some of the better ones.

 
The building designer (Jez Evans) has tried to copy some real life buildings and some of them are particularly good - the cinema for one

There is also a rather nice US style Town Hall shown in this sadly yellow pic

Here's another of the whole table

I'm hoping to get a chance to take some pics of the layout once it is installed in the new centre next week, so keep an eye on the Blog :-)

Chinese update

Bit of an update on those Chinese Nationalists I mentioned in earlier posts. I've painted up the armoured element of the Early War army, a Sdkfz 222, some T26s and a BA10. There is also a troop of Shermans but these are for a later period of the war so will get done another time.

First up the T26s. Initially I tried a three colour scheme that had been used on some Chinese Vickers 6 tonners, but I gave up because a) it looked too much like the Japanese who would be the opposition, and b) I couldnt find any record of it being used on the T26s. In the end I went with a simple Russian green which they would have been delivered in in 1938, with plenty of mud, as T-26s seemed particularly prone to spreading the stuff around. There is no record of them being repainted and it looks like the Chinese just used them pretty much as delivered.

The BA10 is another Russian import, again in a simple green scheme

Lastly the Sdkfz 222. There are some photos that show these retained their German Grey , so again a non fussy result.

Everything will need another coat of matt but they are looking ok for now

More Gruntz - Polish Flyswatter

Just a quick update. My New Vistula Legion troops for Gruntz have been a bit on the back burner, mainly because other "stuff" keeps getting in the way. I'm still planning to expand both my Poles and Crusties for use in Gruntz, when I get some organisation done.

One quick addition to the NVL is this MANPADS (anti aircraft missile) team. As with the others these are from Oddzial Osmy from Poland purchased from Fighting 15s and theyre great little figures. These are the first I painted from scratch myself, the rest of the Detachment were a lucky ebay win but I think I managed to get them looking pretty similar.

I'm hoping they will provide some much needed light AA capability. Actually in Gruntz because of how the game mechanics work they will also provide an additional light anti tank capability - something I am a bit lacking in as well - assuming there are no air threats, so a nice force multiplier.

I was weak - Dreadball

I quite enjoyed playing Bloodbowl - or rather I enjoyed it once it got "ported" to pc and the computer did all the hard work working out the oh so numerous dice rolls.

I was in our new Tea Shop Tea at Hart , which is a rather interesting shop that sells Tea & Cakes but also panders to the gaming community by selling boardgames and the like. Splendid cake btw, when I noticed they were starting to stock Mantic Games "DreadBall", and were offering teams for a Tenner if you joined their soon to launch Dreadball League.

I'm not sure about Mantic. They have a reputation for cloning anything GW did (but at a reasonable price). I bought a couple of figures from them in the past and they were ok, but the little I had seen about Dreadball in the past made me dismissed it as a Bloodbowl clone.

Anyway, my weakness struck and all that stuff about concentrating on a couple of projects somehow got forgotten and I left the shop with a "Kalmarin Ancients" team. Opening them was a mixed experience. Half the team were made of resin\plastic (restic???), half metal. The restic stuff cleaned up and assembled quickly and easily, but the metal looked a bit badly cast, lots of mould lines etc and I couldn't be arsed. Fortunately there is more than enough in restic to make up a basic eight player team, so I quickly painted them up, which took an evening.

As you can see, there is no shortage of tentacles and claws. We tried the rules Monday night and I was pleasantly surprised - much slicker and more streamlined than Bloodbowl. Worse case scenario is they get played once or twice, but for a tenner I think I will get my moneys worth