General Store in the Works

Another wee update on the World Works Games terrain. Here we have a General Store over two stories. As you can see, the second story just sits on the first so you can easily lift it off. The quality of the textures is first class and I'm really looking forward to getting more done. I have a dozen more floor tiles to finish and I'l probably concentrate on more tiles until I have at least 3 foot square.

Single story on the four tiles.

Roof off. The stairs look quite nice inside.

Built up to 2 stories. There will be a balcony on the front when finished.

The stairs are now outside. The edging is still to be done, too.

The roof is off. I like the rug on this tile.

As you can see, the stories just lift off.

All the above...yes, all of it...comes apart to just this little pile! 

Connectors, posts, anchors...oh my!

I did some more cutting, folding and gluing last night. It seemed like I was doing it for an eternity with little progress, but I realised that I was actually doing the most fiddly bits - the anchors and posts. In the end, it turns out I made enough anchors to do my two tiles with plenty left over, all from one sheet. It was tedious, but easy. The posts were a bit more of a challenge. It was relatively straightforward to cut them (after reading the instructions - this is recommended!), but I found that folding them was a little difficult, as the dual layer of card means the outer layer doesn't quite wrap around the inner correctly. I'm sure there's a knack to it, but it was a little frustrating. It meant that I had to colour in a bit more than just the edge, but once assembled it all looked pretty good! I also tried a single wall and that was really quick to do, which is encouraging. It means that once I get enough posts and anchors done, I should be able to churn out the rest of the terrain pretty quickly!

The tiles all conncected. You can actually hold them up!

Rear shot showing the connectors in place.

Anchors attached and posts in place. The wall is complete. The stairs I did a couple of nights ago.

All assembled. Inside...

...and out!

Some terrain is on the cards!

Fuelled by the insane amount of fun we had with the Wild West game the other week, I decided to try and add some terrain into the mix. However, I don't have a lot of space to store large gaming pieces, so I thought I'd give the modular paper terrain offered by World Works Games a try. One of my boardgaming friends has a lot of paper terrain and his setups look stunning, so it seemed like a worthwhile thing to embark on. I've completed 6 of the tiles, which measure 6 inches square, but it did take me a bit longer than I'd have liked. I think that it'll get quicker with more practice, though. And I have to say, I am pleased with the result:

The 4 floor tiles. A building will sit on the wooden one.

These 2 extra tiles will provide the first floor and the roof.

Gunfight at the Triple-G Corral

Played an excellent game of The Rules With No Name at the G3 Club tonight. George has quite a wee horde of cowboys and I managed to finish another few for my own gang, so we thought we'd duke it out Wild West style! Also taking part was my brother, Carl, so we had a three way shoot out at the Triple-G Corral!

The quiet town of Woodside doesn't know what is about to hit it!

The terrain was placed as above and my gang, the Barons, entered bottom left in the pic. Carl's gang, the Hogfields, entered in the next corner counter-clockwise and George, the Jones', from the far side corner. The common objective was a stash of loot being held by a suitable villainous character in the hotel in the top left of the picture. The scenario had a wee twist though. I decided that a neat way of counting VPs would be using playing cards, especially as we used poker chips for activation. Each time your gang kills another character then you get to draw a card, with numbered cards worth 1, face cards worth 2 and aces worth 3. But cards are also playable, with numbers allowing a re-roll, faces allowing you to roll 2 dice and pick the result and aces allowing you to declare a single dice to be whatever you want. So you can gain advantage but at a cost in VPs. The other wee twist is that each gang hates one of the others, in a cyclic way. So the Barons hate the Hogfields who hate the Jones' who hate the Barons. You get to draw an extra card if you plug one of your hated foes!

So on to the game. Each gang immediately made a beeline for the hotel, but Carl moved one bandito towards my corner. I duly activated one of my gunmen and took a potshot at long range. Scooter had obviously been down the range, as his bullet took the hated Hogfield lackey straight between the eyes. I then sent Beauregard Baron, my shootist, to my right to make sure of him and get into the Hogfield's flank.

"Yup! He's dead, Pa!"

"Boss! Them Joneses are over here!"

"Well, don't just stand there, you stoopid dawg! Shoot 'em!"

Meanwhile, the rest of the Hogfields had made it into range of the Jones' and began firing wildly. George had a bit of a slow start and got a little bogged down in a fire fight. My legend Uncle Jess and Lucas were closing in on the hotel. From their position they got a good view of the action unfolding between the Hogfields and Jones' but were a bit too far away to intervene. However, their proximity to the hotel would pay dividends later!

"Look, Uncle Jess! We caught 'em blindsided!"

Making a break from the gunfight, George's Legend, Frank Jones, made a run for the hotel and made it first, bursting in on the target. A quick draw duel saw the rich land owner wounded. As the gunshots rang out in the hotel, Uncle Jess told Lucas to cover the back of the hotel.

"Knock, knock!"

"Holy cow! There's more of 'em coming!" BLAM! BLAM!

Back over at the Hogfields, a couple of barrels of grapeshot from Bill Elder, a Jones gunman, saw Bull Duvall, a Hogfield gunman, wounded. He lost his nerve and cowered behind the stables for the rest of the fight.

"Momma!"

"Who wants some more?"

Hearing the gunshots from the hotel, Jesse Jones ran to help his brother out, but he didn't count on Lucas Baron who had been skulking around the corner of the hotel. As Jesse neared the door Lucas leaped out and shot him clean through the head!

"Oh no you don't!" BLAM!

Things were now finely in the balance. Just as his brother was gunned down, Frank finished off his mark and seized the loot. If he could make it off the table, George could still win, despite the Jones gang being sorely roughed up. The Hogfields were still bogged down trying to pick off the last Jones', but trouble was brewing for him as Beauregard and Scooter Baron were moving up behind them.

"Ol' Scooter's got you now!" BLAM!

BLAM! "I'll take that loot!"

The last picture above shows Frank Jones finishing his mark off, but under the balcony lurks Uncle Jess Baron. Frank was the first to activate and ran out of the hotel, past Lucas and straight towards the board edge. But just not quite far enough. Crucially, Uncle Jess activated and claimed an action chip which let him activate again! He darted from his cover and let fly with his sawn-off shotgun!

BOOM! BOOM!

In a nail-biting finale, the buckshot caught Frank Jones dead in his back and killed him outright. Uncle Jess ran over, grabbed the loot and was off like a hare! Lance Hogfield, Carl's Legend, managed to wound Bo and Scooter, but it was too late. The loot had fallen into the clutches of the Baron gang and was gone!

This was a most fun and entertaining game. The Rules With No Name give a really fun game with lots of flavour. Sure, there are is the oddity of only moving in a straight line, but I think it makes you consider your moves a lot more and I actually quite like it. Certainly, this game was very cinematic and had lots of high drama and tension and we all came away from it grinning like the proverbial Cheshire cat! I think we definitely have the beginnings of a campaign here and next we'll start to add in more gang members and give the ones that survived this scuffle some skills. All in all, I'd highly recommend this rules set for anyone thinking about gaming the Wild West!

Black, grey or white?

I've started yet another project. Terrible, isn't it? But there's something about the nights drawing in that always makes me feel like painting the smaller scale figures. So, after purchasing Maurice and being mightily impressed by it, I got some Pendraken 10mm Austrians for the SYW. Now, normally I'd prime them black, but I'd read a few forum posts, and what have you, espousing the virtues of a grey primer with a black wash. Now, when I first started painting 6mm Napoleonics I'd actually used white and a black wash, but switched over to black later on. But I thought I'd give grey a try. However, I thought that the effect was acceptable, but not as crisp as a black undercoat. Also, I think the black is a bit faster, too, as you're not waiting for the wash to dry and you don't have to block the gaiters, cartridge box and tricorne in as they are already black.

So here's some pictures of a unit primed with grey + wash versus a unit primed with black and you can make your own minds up.

Black primed front

Black primed back

Grey primed + wash front

Grey primed + wash back

Here are some side by side shots from different angles:

I realise the comparison should probably have used the same pose, but I think you can still clearly see the difference.

Memoirs of a boardgame!

I picked up Memoir '44 a while ago and it's become my 'go to' game for evenings where my brother comes round, so I thought I'd post some thoughts about it. There are a couple of reasons Memoir '44 has bubbled to the top. First, the box is nice and light and smaller than Battlecry. It's a small detail, but it matters when you're reaching up into a cupboard. Second, it's a bit quicker to play than CC:Ancients. Like BC, it's more lightweight than CC:A and therefore each turn is a bit more straightforward. And last, I think it's a bit more flavoursome than Battlecry. Perhaps it's just that WW2 appeals a bit more, but the synergy of the artillery, armour and infantry seems to suit this game a bit better. It also seems that infantry firefights can be a bit more protracted in dense terrain, due to the fewer dice thrown, which makes infantry a touch more durable than in Battlecry.

As far as components go, this is right up there with Battlecry. The box is nicely organised and the pieces are very nice. I had a slight issue with some barricades that were missing, but Days of Wonder provided them quickly and without fuss. A couple of the terrain tiles also have a slight printing error, but I can live with that. All in, a good quality set. The rules are well laid out and you get some nice touches, like cards that summarise all terrain penalties and such. The Command Cards are of a decent stock and feel like they'll last well. Overall, I'm happy with this game and so far it's given some pretty good, tense battles. The scenarios are well thought out and ones that you might think would give this system a hard time, like Omaha Beach, actually deliver a tight and plausible game. The other plus is that there are plentiful expansions that are mostly in print and cover the major theatres - the Pacific, the Med and the Ostfront. I've asked Santa for the Pacific one as it should provide some pretty interesting scenarios and it gives me a fix of the Pacific ground warfare without a high entry cost.

 

Umm Qasr Redux

Tuesday saw George and I refight the Umm Qasr scenario from Road to Baghdad, this time switching sides. I was quite looking forward to trying my hand at the insurgents in this scenario, as I think the tactics they need to use are a bit different than in most asymmetric engagements. Normally, the irregular player gets lots of reinforcements during the game and you can be somewhat callous with your forces, but in this scenario the victory conditions hinge on there being Iraqi (or Murdistani in our case) elements left on the table. The rule that the British can't fire heavy weapons towards the port also means that maneouver is more important than usual, too.

George lined the British up quite similarly to the first game and my Murdistani cells were also deployed very closely to his last time. Actually, the deployment zone is a little restricted in this scenario, and you have a fair few cells to pack in, so the deployment is a little predictable. However, I was well aware of the devastating fire that the British can put down and the Challenger turning up at Turn 4 means a standup fight is not an option. So I decided to only use 2 or 3 cells to ambush the British and move at least one backwards at the start to create a bit more depth to my position and make it harder for the Brits to penetrate through the restricted fire lanes. And so we began!

The British have a difficult time getting started, despite heavy Murdistani casualties

The first couple of turns saw the British probe their centre and  left flank to gauge the strength of the defenders in and around the Administration building. I decided to be bold and hold my first ambush until they were at optimum range and, thankfully, they weren't spotted first. The crackle of AK-47 fire left 2 Brits seriously wounded and George immediately pulled them back. The overwatch fire decimated the Murdistani cell in return, though. The second Brit fireteam to go received similar punishment as they crossed the berm and they were withdraw, too. The large cell of 10 irregulars was soon down to half strength, though. Even a few D8s can seriously beat up a D6 quality unit in FoF. As I said, this shouldn't be a standup fight. Yes, the Murdistani side gets VPs for killing or wounding the enemy, but you will suffer in this scenario if you leave your troops exposed to the British quality and this showed here as the Murdistani casualties quickly mounted. At last, though, the British right flank gained a foothold in the buildings and started to push towards the Murdistani table edge, where I had moved one cell in the very first turn. This cell was actually quite potent with 2 RPGs and I chose them specifically to pose a threat to the tank which I hoped would have to move into the restricted terrain of the buildings. 

The British clear a way through on the right flank.

The Murdistani irregulars fall back to catch the infidels as they try to envelop.

And the tank arrives...

...and makes it's presence felt!

So now there were only two cells left to face the tank, but I had managed to get them back so that the tank couldn't risk firing it's main gun and damage the port infrastructure. In fact, in the earlier firefight, the British GPMG had already inflicted damage and gifted me with 3 VPs so doing it again would create a bit of a mountain to climb. So the Challenger began moving down the road and my cell duly popped up to try their hand with the RPGs. George proved a wily tank commander, though, and only ever presented his front armour which meant I only had a slim chance of damaging it. Essentially I was rolling 4D6 to beat his armour of 5D12!! The first shot gave George a bit of a sweat, though, as he only rolled 2 successes and I began shaking my D6 with glee. I only managed 2 successes, however, and the armour held. It's these moments that make FoF, and most wargames for that matter, a total blast! 

The final moves of the game saw more British troops advance and I decided to concentrate my fire on them instead. I reckoned I couldn't harm the tank, but I had a reasonable chance of wounding or killing the soldiers. A couple of rounds of fire saw more expensive British casualties being dragged to safety, at the cost of the entire Murdistani cell. All that remained was the remnants of a single cell cowering behind the berm with the railway track on it.

The British seize the last building before the port is open to them. In the background is the huge pile of Murdistani KIA.

Prepare to sell your lives dearly!!

But time ran out! George managed one more round of fire and took out two of the five survivors, but it was not enough. There was still an active cell on board at the end which gave me 3 VPs and robbed George of 3 VPs. Coupled with the infrastructure damage and about eight seriously wounded British, the Murdistani side won with 14 VPs to 8 VPs. Crucially, if the British had managed to finish off those three irregulars it would have been a draw, which shows how finely balanced this scenario is. Brilliant stuff!! :)

I'm not sure what the next scenario will be as George is still working on the vehicles for some, but I've no doubt we'll get another done soon and I'll post that AAR here, too!