Settlers of Cat-an

Pretty fun shirt for your next board game day:

From Shirt-woot up right now.
I doubt this one will go away too soon, but cheaper the first 24 hours, which just started.

I don't know if cats would enjoy this game as much as humans... I'd think it would lose something without the jokes about wood and sheep. Then again, who knows what goes on in the minds of cats. 

Maw Goodness! What Big Teeth You Have!

Least Popular Kissing Booth at the Fair!

But don't let that dissuade you from bringing him home! 

You still have a couple days left to put your name in the hat to get a free Bane Legions Blood Maw!

Details at Frontline Gamer.  He's been going at high speed tossing out free gaming items like Santa in fear his sleigh will crash unless he lightens the load.  

Don't miss out, it's easy: follow his blog, leave a comment, cross your fingers and hope the Blood Maw isn't hungry if he comes to your house. 

This thing is awesome.  It's not just huge, it's very versatile.  Looks like it would be comfy in any gaming setting: fantasy, sci-fi, horror, even work as a godzilla-sized monster in 15mm! 

Apes Hit London & Come Out Swinging! Battle Report for the First Night of Empire of the Dead

Last Friday we started our Empire of the Dead campaign games.  Test games finished, it was time to start building the stories of the new heroes and villains of 1888.

Many of us will be running more than one faction team, since it isn't a very big commitment to create a team, and there are so many fun choices it's hard to limit yourself to just one.  Six of us were able to start last Friday, and there are some rather unique themes and some obligatory classics that can't be resisted.

We had:
Classic Vampire brood
Gentlemen's Club buying as many firearms as practical at such an early stage
American Vampire Hunters Abroad, using the Gentlemen's Club roster
WWWWB: Women Who Wield Wet Blankets Temperance Society (Gentlewomen's Club)
  - You can follow their exploits on his blog here.
Hinterland Hussies (I forget their real name, but the slur might stick)
and my Lord Greystoke's Apes, using the Lycan werewolf roster.

There will also be another vampire team, Ottomans, St.George School for Monster-Slaying Girls, and more.

I recently gave a long background of my faction, so I won't repeat it here, but the roster to start was:

Characters:
James Clayton, Lord Greystoke -Beastlord
Alphie the Ape-Pack Master

Henchmen:
Sergeant Dooley with Club
Woodhouse the Butler with Bow
Margaret the Maid with Bow
Bernard & Cecil the apes (wolves)

The starting team, painting in progress but enough to hit the city.

It's an easy roster to write up, the characters and wolves can not have equipment.  So they're pretty good to start since they have natural abilities.  I wonder if the stat & skill increases will keep them competitive compared to humans & vamps who can get good equipment over time.  Time will tell.

First Game was against the Gentlemen's Club.
The mission was to find an artifact that was rumored to be nearby.  It was night, which was pretty good for me.  We had 7 possible locations to search.  After a full turn searching the spot a team member could search and on a roll of 9 or 10 on the d10 it would be the artifact, otherwise that location was cleared.  Unlike a similar scenario I remember from Mordheim, it is not the case that the sought item will be the last token searched if none of the others were it.  The last is rolled like any other- if it isn't it, there is no artifact- perhaps the rumor was just an empty story.  I like this, since there can be some shenanigans in the other system when it's down to a couple search spots left.

The artifact is somewhere in this neighborhood... then again, maybe it isn't. We deployed in 2 groups, each having a diagonal, I had the lower left & upper right while the Cognac Sippers Super Club had the other two corners. He advanced more cautious than I, preparing for shots when he could take them.  I decided I'd not head him, and raced out to search as many spots as I could.  Of the 7, I managed to get to 6 locations.
None of them were the artifact.
His President and a few others with guns and a shotgun opened fire on my Butler, Greystoke and an Ape, but I survived fine.

When only 1 spot remained to search I started to move to envelop this group, and got a wound on his 2 wound President with an arrow.  Once it was clear there was no artifact, his club left the field. No artifact meant it was a draw. No one was removed from play so we each got 15 shillings for the tie and 2 per surviving member.

Lord Greystoke got an additional attack and Alphie got the regeneration skill.  

Meanwhile, the Ugly Americans were being unchivalrous to the Uppity Women's Sewing Circle:

This was disastrous for the women, as many were removed from play and one was captured and handed over to the Peelers (police) on charges of suspicion of harboring opinions. 

To rescue her, he decided to play for it, so I volunteered to play the Peelers, and tried to prevent her escape.

In the rescue scenario the Peelers have 2 officers with 2 wounds, and a couple heavy pistols, net guns and some clubs. Not the best equipment, but every turn they're attacked they can blow the whistle and more flunkies may arrive to help.  The rescuers have 8 turns to try to get to the center compound and bust the poor woman out of the clink.

2 officers guarded the woman inside. He had split forces coming at the guardhouse from North & South, but none of his shots were successful, and using the meager cover to get to the attackers, hand to hand fighting broke out and 2 of the women were brought down.  Two more officers came on to the scene and time ran out for the Crumpet Strumpets.

One thing we're considering is as the campaign continues the Peeler force will likely need to be augmented as warbands get more powerful.  They were plenty formidable for this game, but when teams get more weapons, members and skills, the force as listed will be too easy to walk over and rescue the captive.
Not a difficult adjustment to make.

It has already been nearly a week since these games, so we'll be playing our 2nd session of the campaign tomorrow,
so more to come!

Valkeeri War Rocket Review & Assembly

This is the third Review & Tutorial for War Rocket fleets I have done.
The first two were reviews for Imperial & Zenithian fleets.

In the near future I'll do a review for the Galacteers and the Pirate fleets as well.

Unfortunately, I do not have Class III or IV ships for the Valkeeri or Galacteers.  I'd got both of the squadron sets for these (9 Class I & 3 Class II) at a good discount sale, but the higher Class rockers weren't available so I decided I'd keep these two fleets as small scout or raiding forces, and see about getting bigger ships for them sometime in the future.

The Valkeeri are a race of warrior women, an iconic image from pulp sci-fi, where ray-gun toting amazonian queens capture daring earth men only to have their tender hearted flunkies' hearts captured in return.

The Squadron set has the contents below:

Like the Zenithians the class of the rocket can be identified easily by the shape of the ship.  In this case, the rockets have one engine for each classification level. The Class III & IV (not shown) have three & four engines as you'd expect.

These are tied with the Zenithians for the easiest to assemble.  Like the Z's, the Class I & II are complete single-cast miniatures requiring no assembly of parts. All of the fleets have this for their Class I's, but the Imperial, Galacteer & Pirates do have parts to assemble for their Class II's.

Like I did with the other fleets, I brought in some of the flight pegs from GW flight stands, which are a bit taller for their large ones, to add some height variation.

Just like with the other ships, the connection hole is larger than the tab on the flight peg. This is a good thing!

 

Cut the nib off (those things are notorious for breaking anyway) and glue it in with a bit of green stuff

I did have one miscast in the Valkeeri squadron:

One of the Class I's engine didn't fill enough. 

Defects like this can happen, nicer when it doesn't, but it also wasn't too difficult to fix.

If you're handy with green stuff this isn't a very hard fix: apply a thin rope of green stuff, shape, and when dry file it smooth to be flush with the engine.  A bit troublesome is the mold line cutting across the engine.  can't get a file in there and a pain with blade slippage potential when trying to 'dig' in a hole with a knife point.  Considering the benefit and risk reward of the whole process, and the fact that the engine is going to have various 'blorps' of fire-colored paint over it, it's not much of an issue.  I've even been considering sculpting a fire blast coming out of them, a'la old colonial vypers thrusters. 

The Squadron is assembled:

Very quick and easy! 

The ships have a strong 'aquatic' look to them, to my eye, and I think they'd make great pulp mini-subs for a VSF game!

So how do they rate from me? 

Rating:

Casting: 8/10

Cleverness of Design: **

Aesthetics:  9/10

** I always include this category in ratings, but in this case it is hard to know how it might apply. This is where I evaluate how successful a kit is for how it is assembled, it's parts and flexibility of options, etc, but in this case, they are single castings and it's not an issue which applies. 

All in all, a fun fleet.  They didn't appeal to me as much as the Zenithian & Imperials,or the Pirates once those were released, but they've definitely grown on me and I have some ideas for painting. 

The Beast Within: Background for My (not)Lycan Faction for Empire of the Dead

If you saw a couple of the previous updates under the Empire of the Dead label, you know our Friday night gaming group has been been bitten by the new Empire of the Dead game by West Wind. If this isn't your first visit to the Lab then you're sure to have noticed I'm addicted to skirmish games, since they afford easy access to starting new projects: a dozen minis to create a new theme faction is ideal. I have several themed faction ideas I want to do for this game, but the first I'll start with uses the Lycan faction rules, which is the werewolf faction.  I wanted a different spin on this, but I'll let the background speak for itself...

London 1829
Julius Clayton, Viscount of Greystoke, meets a promising student, Charles Darwin, at Cambridge University, where he has a chair, and encourages him in the pursuit of Naturalism.
A philanthropist, humanist and admirer of the natural sciences Lord Clayton pursues the expansion of the knowledge of nature whenever he can.

Julius Clayton, Viscount of Greystoke. c.1845

London 1830
Jonathan Clayton is born to Julius Clayton, Viscount of Greystoke.

London 1831
Julius Clayton arranges for Captain Robert Fitz-Roy to offer a berth to young Charles Darwin on his ship The H.M.S. Beagle, as a Naturalist for a five year journey.  No word of his involvement is allowed to be given to Darwin.

London 1839
For the next last six years of his life, Julius Clayton encouraged Charles Darwin to continue to write and publish his findings.  A frequent guest, Darwin came to know his son Jonathan.

London 1845
Julius Clayton dies and his son Jonathan Clayton inherits and becomes Viscount of Greystoke.  Though nominally under the guardianship of his Aunt and her lawyers, Jonathan Clayton proves to be a mature and capable young man.


London 1855
Jonathan Clayton marries Elizabeth Yates.

Jonathan Clayton c.1857

London 1858
Jonathan and Elizabeth give birth to their first son, Jonathan Clayton II

London 1859
Charles Darwin publishes Origin of the Species.  Jonathan Clayton senior begins to pressure Darwin with plans for a voyage to Africa.  Charles is not interested.  Darwin continues to refine his publication over the next several years, and says that Jonathan Clayton's interest in Apes and their relation to Mankind while scientifically sound is too controversial for him and his publishers at this time.  Jonathan plans for an expedition to Africa himself, but duties of family and estate prevent it.


London 1860
Jonathan and Elizabeth give birth to their second son, James Clayton.

James Clayton b.1860

London 1860-1880
The brothers, Jonathan and James are educated and inherit their father and grandfather's obsession with the secrets of the natural world.  With their father they make plans for a voyage to Africa.
John's obsession with the Dark Continent runs deep, while James' interest focuses more on the laboratory.
James becomes convinced that all the answers to Man's questions can be found within the blood, if only one could find the key to unlock it.

James Clayton c.1875

London 1882
Charles Darwin and Jonathan Clayton senior both die in the same year, only months apart.

London 1885
John Clayton begins a courtship with Alice Winthrop.
James Clayton increases his laboratory, bringing in exotic animals from around the world.
Though the two brothers have the same interest at heart, their divergent paths cause them to grow ever more apart.
James works behind locked doors in his lab on African Great Apes, trying to unlock these secrets.

London 1888
John Clayton marries Alice and the two leave for a voyage to Africa.
Though invited, James declines the invitation, stating that his laboratory work is at a critical stage, and he can not abandon it when a breakthrough is so close.

John and Alice Clayton, lost 1888

John and Alice Clayton's ship is reported lost off the coast of Africa.
James assumes duties as head of the Greystoke Estate.
Within months James unlocks the secret he has been looking for: the essence of nature itself.
He gives name to this as 'The Nexus' for it is the point of connection that links all living beings.
With the secret of the Nexus, he hopes to show how all species are connected, and to guide this development for the benefit of mankind, to take the best, strongest and healthiest aspects of all species for the betterment of Man.

With the nexus of the African Great Ape, James Clayton is the first man to step across this threshold.

James Clayton's experiments had a disastrous side effect.  He now is physically in flux as the Nexus is unstable in his system. While sometimes no outward sign of his change is present, at others his body increases in size and strength, as the animal nature takes over his mind and body.  At such times he hunts the streets of London, looking for something which his more human mind is unaware of.  He travels with his sentient Ape experiment, Alphie, and the less successful Apes often follow as a pack.

His loyal household staff, captained by his butler, Woodhouse, endeavor to keep his secret, following the apes and their Lord into the night streets, armed with tranquilizer guns, to protect their master from doing anything too rash, and to guard him from those who might mean him harm. Money and position is not without benefits.  Clayton has officers on the Police Force who he pays to cover any evidence that might lead inquiry back to his door.

..............................................................................................

The miniatures, work in progress:
Center: James Clayton, Lord Greystoke. (Lycan Beastlord)
at his left, Alphie the Ape (Lycan Pack Master)
in back: The Apes (Lycan Wolves)
at left: Police in Pocket (Lycan 'wolfskin' flunkies: close combat equipped)
at right: Household Staff:  Butler Woodhouse & Maids (Lycan 'wolfskin' flunkies: tranq guns count as bows)

More to come, thanks for reading!

Stories To Paint By: River God by Wilbur Smith

In the ongoing series, Stories to Paint by, where I review one of the audio books I've finished recently, lets move a bit away from the first two which were Science Fiction and go to ancient historical fiction with Wilbur Smith's River God.  As always, I'll try to keep spoilers to a minimum, with never any significant plot reveals.  Personally I hate 95% of movie trailers because they always show much more than I want to see before I actually see the movie, so I won't do the same to you.

I read Wilbur Smith's Birds of Prey & Monsoon a couple years ago, which are great naval 'tall ships' adventures and I highly recommend them. Knowing I like the author's writing style and adventurous pace, I selected the audio book 'River God' which is a novel set in Ancient Egypt.  The unabridged version from Audible (I won't bother with abridged) is just shy of 25 hours long.

The narrator, Dick Hill, was very easy to listen to.  

While not having a vast array of character type voices, the ones he uses are significantly different from each other and help keep the characters clear in your mind.  Always a potential problem, he handled opposite gender characters just fine, without resorting to grating falsetto. 

The story is told through the character Taita, a slave of distinction, serving in the court of the Grand Vizier, Lord Intef.  Taita pulls strings to help his two younger friends in their hopes of romance and a life together in the face of political plots, invasion, exodus, revenge, war and tragedy.  In a way, you could think of him as the 'Egyptian Merlin'.  

The action is quite good. Wilbur Smith knows his way around a tense battle or hunt, there is no doubt.  

Just like Birds of Prey, he is also good at portraying the impracticality of adolescent love, but here you do get a longer span of time and it is nice to see these characters mature.  There is some good depth of character here.  The fact that there is some romantic motivation in the characters doesn't make this 'Twilight' for Pharaohs or a 'romance' novel by any stretch: humans do have emotions and romantic motivation, and that is weighed appropriately in this presentation of the characters' span of life.  

If there is one downside to the story for me, it is the overwhelming accomplishments of the main character Taita.   -no real spoilers- Taita is a eunuch, which would be problem enough for anyone, but to make matters worse he's a full-monty eunuch. Ouch.  Either this causes him to really feel the need to compensate from this loss with exaggerating the length and breadth of his many accomplishments, or the author is suggesting that if you have to live life without this most enjoyable aspect this frees up enough time to master every discipline known to man. Either way, it is too much. At every turn, Taita is not only competent but the veritable master of anything needed. He is the finest artist, architect, doctor, scientist, engineer, fastest runner, most attractive, widest linguist, and more. He is Archimedes, Leonardo DaVinci, Newton, Paracelsus, and Edison all rolled into one and not one bit modest about it.  

It did get to be a little much.  

Though the afterward states that this is a true story, translated from a discovered scroll, the author is just having a bit of fun. It isn't, and there are several historical inaccuracies that make that clear as you go through the story if you know this time in history.  But that doesn't take anything away from a great story.  

There are two other books related to this one, 'Warlock' continues the life of Taita, and 'The Seventh Scroll' is set in modern times with archaeologists trying to find the treasure from River God.  Both sound very promising and I'm sure I'll check them out. 

For the Gamers: 

This had me wanting to play large games of chariot battles in the ancient period. 

Some great descriptions of battles, chariots, tactics and more.  If you find yourself building a 'Chariot Wars' period army, this is a great novel to listen to while doing it! 

Rating: 

I give this audiobook 4.25 Bottles out of 5: very entertaining, you'll want to keep painting!

If you have an interest in ancient history I highly recommend the book.  Even if you don't, you'll likely still enjoy it for the 'movie-style' adventure that it is.  

Orc Sailor Blood Bowl Charity Team: WIP Converted

On July 14th, 2012 there is a Blood Bowl Tournament in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
The 'ACCC': Atlantic Coast Charity Cup, with all proceeds going to the Wounded Warrior Project,
a non-profit charity.  - That was a link there, so go check it out!

I was contacted by the organizer and agreed to donate my time to paint up a complete team for a prize for their tournament, to help raise money for the charity. For theme he was thinking something military, given the nature of the charity, and since they are just a few miles from the ocean and a Naval base, we were thinking Navy would be ideal.  That left the team, I was thinking Orcs would be fun to convert, should work, and as a prize, who wouldn't be happy with Orcs?

So it was settled: Orc Sailors!  I thought a classic World War II style would be best, with the iconic hat and knotted kerchief and square back flap (I'm sure there is a name for those), and bellbottoms of course!

I even decided I'd make a set of tokens for the team, and will be sending them off in one of the Team Carry Cases I make available to clients who commission Blood Bowl Teams.

The team is all converted now and work has started on them.

Here are the conversions before priming:

Have to have a Troll and a couple Goblins! A river troll seemed best for a sailor troll.

The back of the Goblins.

Blitzers! Two in head-long blitz and two in 'steady while I clock you'. 

Black Orcs! Ready for some brawling! 

Line Orcs. Swabbies? Or did that term go out of fashion when ships became metal? 

Thrower & Tokens. Anchors are a bit hard to see against the background.

My Grandpa was in the Navy, in the Pacific during WWII. 

Unfortunately he died in late 2010, he might have got a kick out of these. 

I can't go to the tournament- too far of a commute for me, but if you are near Virginia, or have the itch to do some traveling, look into going to the tournament, you could win one of the cool prizes, maybe even this team!  I'll update the team when they are finished.