A ghastly outing

"The Revenant Outbreak of '68 followed closely by the first Lycanthrope Incursions caused a panic across the land. The government was ill equiped to fight this new menace. Many brave citizens of means took it upon themselves to hunt down, and destroy these Creatures of the Night. Be it for love of Queen and Country, scientific research or just the joy of adventure, they would be known forever as the Royal Monster Hunting Society..."

The village of Brumley on the Brook is overrun. The citizens have fled, leaving only 6 groups of 4 hunters to take on the horde of undead.
I did these cards for the Hunters:

I used a modified set of GASLIGHT zombie rules. There was a turn deck with a card for each hunting party, plus a cards for each zombie type, a zombie spawn card, then a "dark lords" card that would be added after the first "20" was rolled.

The hunters needed to take out the 6 spawn points. Each time they fired a gun or otherwise made noise, noise markers were added. Then, when a spawn card come up, special dice (marked 0-3) were rolled for each noise marker. Thus, if 5 noise markers were generated, 0-15 new zombies might show.
The game started with the hunters blazing away, only to watch in horror as zombies poured out of the woods.
The Prussians especially seemed to act as a zombie magnet. The Baron dispatched dozens.
Tactics eventually changed, and s[awn points were discovered. Gunfire became limited.
It was close. One team was wiped out while others were steadily taking losses. When the Dark Lords showed up (tougher monsters like werewolves) things got really interesting.

A great pre-Halloween game.

Last minutes project: beginning Day 3

Zombies based and flocked. I think they turned out great for as little time as I spent on them. The Hunters will get a bit more attention.

Last minute project: Day2

Day 2 saw the zombies getting painted, and bases gooped.
The minis had already been assembled and primed with a dark brown yesterday. I normally start with black, but this allows me to skip a step. And this particular paint bonds to plastic.

I then started with a mix of purple, gray and a stone color dry brushed over the brown with my trusty, beat old drybrush. It's massive. this lets me just drag the brush over, catching the surface and leaving the dark bits still brown. The purple undercoat gives the zombies that bruised flesh look dead skin has. Also using a cool color like purple makes all the subsequent colors that are added also take on a cool cool.

Next was a dry brush of dirty white or aged bone. Then, I gave the open wounds, mouth and hands a wash of deep red.

A final drybrush of almost bone color finished them off. I went in add dotted the eyes white, the teeth dirty yellow and went ahead and left the clothes the muddy gray like they've been in the grave. These are not fresh zombies. For those I'd go a bit brighter in palette.
Tomorrow the finished pieces and start on the hunters.

Last minute Project. Or how to paint 50 miniatures in a week.

Now that my children are teenagers and less interested in Halloween, I forget about holidays. Since next Thursday will be All Hallows Eve eve, I decided a horror inspired game was in order.
Enter the Royal Monster Hunting Society's annual outing. A Victorian era themed zombie/monster game.
I have 30-oddzombies to paint plus some extra Gothic themed must-haves, and 20 or so hunters.
Zombies assembled, everyone based. Off to be primed.

A great night of VSF gaming and turning 45

I needed something special for my 45th birthday. I wanted lots of terrain and miniatures on the table, but still get a game done in a respectable time. Ahhhh, GASLIGHT.
The Germans are flooding through Belgium. A small British expeditionary force is in danger of being cut off. Most importantly, an important scientist (there are 3 on the table and the Germans don't know which one) and his/her research are in danger of being captured in the roll up.
The British must cross the board length-wise to get the scientist to an approaching submersible. Meanwhile, the Germans are closing in from the side. I proved a nail biter to the end.

 The sub approaches

 The British man the walls of a fortified farm in hopes of holding up the steamroller.

 Unicylce Uhlans and Lady Hussars!

 A British contraption ends the Uhlans with a spray of Gatling fire

The Scientist, Lady Cottingham, champion of paranormal research, escape along with her secret weapon. The Killenkanner, which long term reaers wil know is of dubious reputation, manged to not only stay running most of the game, but deal a lot of death.

This year was a trial to say the least. I lost my father and a career of 20+ years. It has been an adjustment to say the least. But, my family, friends, and my wargaming family, have been very supportive. And there's always my little lead minions who are always there.
Don't know what this second phase of life will bring, but I'm sure there will be a lot of dice, beer and miniatures.

Another night of 5 Core

We had so much fun last week, I thought we've give 5Core/5 Parsecs another try while I wait to paint up the crap-ton of minis it will take to play Lion Rampant.

Militia advances

The scenario involved some rebel planetary defense militia attempting to capture a no-name town on a back water world. The Unity government decided to respond with sending in an Assault Marine squad. Both sides started with an objective and had to take one on the far side.

 Marines move up to meet them.

I decided to give the militia a 2-1 advantage because the Marines were armed with the particularly nasty Assault carbine and had Power armor.
An otherwise enjoyable game was ruined by yours truly by missing a single line in the rule book that would have let the marines advance after some terrible Event die rolling. I missed that the "Firefight" Event allows you to move if there are no targets available. The Marines rolled Firefight like 3 times in a row, allowing the militia to take positions quicker.

 Heavy armor and nasty guns

The battle for the hill is a stalemate, but it forces the marines to commit half their dwindling numbers.

The game otherwise does a great job of handling modern/near future warfare. It is really hard to dig out troops in defense. A well placed guy with a machine gun can hold down an enemy platoon. So, you have to flank them or force his head down while you advance.
In the end, the militia was able to out flank the marines by massing their firepower down the middle to keep the marine's heads down.
You either like this kind of warfare (a thinking man's game IMHO) or you don't. Line 'em and shoot ain't gonna cut it. Go play 40k.

5 Core / 5 Parsecs from Home Playtest

I read a lot of good things from bloggers I like about the 5 Core rules series by Ivan Sorensen. They are designed for small skirmishes with between 5-9 models per player. Just the scale I use for my own rules. We only had a few Basement Generals come by last night so it was a perfect chance to play.

I think 5 Core does a fantastic job of recreating the tension of small modern skirmishes without a lot of rules. The guts of the main rulebook being only a couple dozen pages.

This killing machine dropped 3 enemies in 3 shots.

The rules could easily be called "roll and look for 1s & 6s, because that's all that really matters". Before each player turn, a player rolls a die and if a 1 or 6 shows up something special happens, "Scurry" or "Firefight". If this doesn't happen, then a player can activate 2 members of their unit.
I really, really love how cover works. No screwing around with how much the model is showing or line of sight. It is assumed every model is trying his best to not get shot, so unless he actively "peeks" around a corner or out of cover he cannot be shot. Period.
Short range weapons (pistols, SMGs) only shoot 12", everything else is in range. Roll one color die for KIll, another color for Shock. Look for 1s or 6s.
Sounds easy, but the tactics are where this game shines.
Throw in the Five Parsecs from Home SciFi expansion with its really slick campaign/RPG system and I am sold.
I used OLD SCHOOL WH40K for this skirmish, but 15mm SciFi I think is the way to go. It might get me to by a few WW2 miniatures again for some commando raids...