Holiday Gaming

Belated Merry Christmas to all. In the never ending attempt to find that ruleset that combines the right balance in playability and fun for my collection of Mechwarrior minis, I picked up Battletech: Alpha Strike. LeadAddict and I played the original Battletech when it first came out many moons ago. We liked it mainly for it's concept of giant stumpy robots duking it out on the war ravaged battlefields of the future. Never mind that using giant, expensive (as in the GDP of most countries) in just plain dumb. A lowly grunt with a shoulder fired missile launcher could bring one down, and missing is almost impossible. Never mind that the original models were direct rip-offs of Robotech. We were 13!

Yes, the buildings need paint...

Infantry try to keep pace with the mech.

The original rules were a grind. Hundreds of little ovals to fill in every time you took damage. Keeping track of heat build up. So, when I read a several positive reviews of the new, improved quick rules, boasting of fielding several mechs at a time, I had to at least try.

Infantry disembark

They were worth it. The rules are split into introductory, standard, and advanced. The Intro rules are very basics and really only use mechs. As I have a ton of tanks and infantry, I used Standard.
Everyone had picked up the rules by turn 2, with the only reason to check the QRS, was for movement modifiers to hit. Where the game could real shine is with all the bells and whistles.
Now, I just need more mechs.

That was last week. Last night there were only a few of us. I've had some old boardgames around that needed dusting off. One was an old standard, Wizard Kings by Columbia Games. It's a "block game". Really, an upgrade of the old chit games of old. All the info on you troops is there on the wooden block. You get the added bonus of Fog of War as only you see what on the blocks by standing them on their sides. The was a titanic struggle between Orcs, Amazons, Elves and Undead. As the Undead player, I had cheap troops, but slow (Oh, zombies..) or really expensive highly class undead. My swift moving vampires captured two cities single handed. We played 10 turns, and my undead hordes pulled out a win. The geomorphic maps make replay endless. The would be a great campaign system for Mayhem.
That's it. One more week of freedom, then back to my job that lasts only tip February. Then the grey unknown.