Chicago Skirmish Wargames

Apocalypticum playtest, trying out vehicle rules

2012-02-29T09:17:00.008-08:00

Last week we had our second playtest session for Apocalypticum, the forthcoming post-apocalyptic ruleset from Ganesha Games. Feedback from the game creator after our initial session helped us fine-tune our expectations for this game. We ended up devising a 3-player scenario — due to a snowy Chicago evening that stymied some gamers' travel plans.

The game started with a biker gang (using the Red Vultures stats from the rulebook; strangely there were no motorcycles on the table, so the gang must have walked in) guarding a collection of parked vehicles in the wastes outside Black Rain City. Presumably the vehicles' drivers were at a secret meeting and had left their armored cars and trucks under a close guard.

And that's a good thing, because two more gangs — KGB agents and Ruin Raiders — were approaching the impromptu parking lot from opposite sides of the table. Victory went to the first gang that could successfully start a car and drive it off the table. Here's the table near the start of the game. The vehicles are in the center and the two invading gangs are approaching from the left and right.

Karl played the biker gang in the center of the table, while Jon played the KGB team and I handled the Ruin Raiders.

Our opening moves saw Karl attempting to defend the vehicles by splitting his forces to engage both encroaching squads. Here my raiders take up positions behind a makeshift barricade to fire on the biker gang.

A melee quickly developed as the bikers moved closer to the raiders. What would have been a killing shot turned into a flub as the lead biker rolled a malfunction, causing his rusty pistol to break during the heat of the battle! The token next to him denotes his busted gun.

Across the table, Karl had a difficult time stopping the ceaseless advance of the KGB agents. After several rounds of ineffectual shooting (this became a theme for the night, alas) Jon realized he needed to go for the victory conditions and try to start up a vehicle. I tried to pace him by sending my raiders after the rusted vehicles parked on the battlefield.

In the Apocalypticum rules, vehicles are pretty much just scenario objectives on the battlefield. You can try to start 'em up, but you must roll a 6 on a d6. We modified that for this scenario to be a 5 or 6 on a d6, but we still found that not a single vehicle worked — so we further modified the scenario to say that the final vehicle, after all others had been tried, would be functional. In practice this meant that we tried the first 4 vehicles, to no avail, and then a mad dash began for the final, working vehicle.

(Sidenote: Black rain, a weather event that featured prominently into our previous battle report, came and went in the space of a single turn in this scenario, and it didn't have much of an effect on the game.)

Anyway, as the game approached its conclusion, my raiders desperately tried to stop Jon's KGB men from escaping in the last functioning vehicle, but we had spent too much time fighting off Karl's bikers. The communists started up the truck and rumbled off toward their side of the table — but some lucky shots from the bikers and raiders took out both tires on the vehicle, sending it skidding to a halt.

We called the game after this point. It was definitely a draw — Jon's KGB guys had claimed the functioning vehicle, but the combined shooting of Karl's bikers and my ruin raiders had stopped his escape.

Afterward we took stock of the game and discussed the rules. Here's something crazy — not a single figure was killed in this game! We each finished the game with the exact same number of guys that we started the game with. Where is the bloodshed and carnage? We unanimously agreed that Apocalypticum is just not deadly enough. No one could gain the upper hand because the combat stats were all compressed into a pretty narrow range of values. Guns that confer a +1 or +2 bonus to shooters didn't give us the sort of "outright death" results that should have come from a fast, furious gun battle in a post-apocalyptic car park.

I'm sure once the game is published it will have a much more detailed armory with heavy weapons, ray guns and other high-tech items to help increase the violence. I also understand that Apocalypticum is a campaign-oriented game, and in a campaign you don't always want your guys to die. But in this game everything felt extremely underpowered.

The vehicle rules worked OK, although they should almost certainly be modified for scenarios that require vehicles to be driven. We very nearly didn't find a single functioning vehicle on the battlefield. Here's the final shot of the game, showing Jon's KGB agents aboard a wastelands truck as they made their escape.

Despite the lack of carnage, we agreed that we really liked how the game played. It just needs a bit more brutality to increase the body count and make games more decisive.

— Patrick, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Miniatures you've never seen: High Command sci-fi

2012-02-16T10:12:00.000-08:00

Here at Chicago Skirmish Wargames, we're big proponents of 28mm scale tabletop wargaming — on a budget. As well as buying from affordable outlets like Mega Minis, EM4 and Denizen, we also acquire lots of figures from companies or model lines that are now out of production. This occasional series of posts will dig deeper into the great lines of OOP miniatures that we've discovered in bargain bins, swap meets, auctions, and the other seedy locales where miniatures are traded.

Today's miniatures you've never seen: High Command sci-fi from Folio Works

This shrink-card of miniatures was offered to me by a friend at Bartertown who knows of my fondness for odd sci-fi minis. These are High Command HC 3/2 Protectorate Officers.

It's marked at DM14.90, which I assume is Deutschmarks. This pack has been on quite a journey over the past 20 years — from England, to Germany and the USA! The rear of the card has neat pictorial instructions on how to attach the weapons to their miniatures, as well as details about the date (1991) and country of origin (England).

From what I've been able to gather, Folio Works was a relatively short-lived company started by two ex-Games Workshop employees. Birthed in the early 90s, it was gone before Rogue Trader gave way to 2nd edition Warhammer 40,000. They produced a Fantasy Warlord fantasy line and a High Command sci-fi line.

Though short-lived, the figures compare well to similar early-90s miniatures and were notable for including separate metal weapons for each pack of figures, a feature that wasn't very common those days. The High Command line had figures similar to GW's Space Marines and Imperial Guard, as well as sci-fi Ratmen and Lizardmen. Some of the fantasy figures are still rumored to be produced today by other companies. Click here for more information about Folio Works and their figure lines. (EDIT: Just a few hours after this post went live, we received word that UK-based Kennington Figures still produces most of the fantasy and sci-fi figures from this line! Thanks Mike!)

As mentioned above the figures themselves compare favorably to their contemporaries. These
Protectorate Officers seem like pretty blatant compatible-with-GW-figures aimed at the 40k market.

Clearly the two figures on the right are exactly the same figure with a coat sculpted over the one on the far right. This adding or subtracting of detail to make one sculpt go further was a fairly common practice in the past, as anyone who has collected Necromunda figures will attest.

They scale fairly well with current Games Workshop offerings. When the soles of the feet are aligned, the swordsman is the same height as the GW plastic Cadian Imperial Guardsman (converted with a Pig Iron head), and the other is slightly shorter. Of course, the sculpting isn't quite up to the standards of today's generation of miniatures.

The gun sprue is nice, featuring some pretty clear copies of a GW laspistol and autopistol, along with a third gun that is somewhere between an SMG and a bolter. I imagine that hobbyists wishing to use these figures for GW games might toss out the weapons sprue altogether and just use GW weapons.

All in all, I'm pretty pleased with these figs. They'll probably be painted up as commissars when I get around to completing my Imperial Guard platoon composed entirely of Demonblade Shockforce Troopers (now sold by MegaMinis).

Coincidentally, researching these figs led to the discovery of the origin of a couple of sci-fi Ratmen that I had recieved a while back. Apparently the critters below are Ratten from High Command, though I can't tell which pack they belong to.

So there you have it: Folio Works' High Command miniatures, a long-lost line of figures from the golden-olden days of Rogue Trader. Good luck and good hunting for these figs — and if anyone has a few more Protectorate or Ratten figures they don't need, I may be willing to take them off your hands...

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Playtesting Apocalypticum, the forthcoming ruleset by Ganesha Games

2012-02-12T11:33:00.000-08:00

Last week our club had the pleasure of playtesting a draft version of the upcoming Apocalypticum ruleset by Ganesha Games.

Apocalypticum is a post-apocalyptic game, essentially a modified version of Ganesha's Mutants and Death Ray Guns title, which is itself inspired by Song of Blades & Heroes, our club's favorite fantasy skirmish game. So you can see how Apocalypticum seems tailor-made for a game group such as ours.

Mutants and Death Ray Guns seems inspired by a Gamma World-type vision of the post apocalypse, with robots, mutant plants and other wierdness. Apocalypticum, on the other hand, is a darker, grittier setting like those imagined in films like The Road Warrior, The Road, The Book of Eli, The Stand and others, where it's mostly desperate bands of humans fighting each other for survival.

It's worth noting that Apocalypticum's force lists are designed specifically around the post-apocalyptic miniatures produced by Lead Adventure, though forces can be custom built as well.

Here are the forces used in our playtest.

Ruin Raiders, painted by me

Tunnel Cutthroats, painted by Patrick

We used a 4x4 layout featuring a burned out city with trenches running through it from a long-forgotten war.

The game scenario involved two computer terminals in the center grey building and right black building. The team would have to reach a terminal, open the computer and then download 10 bits of information (a d6 roll at the beginning of each successive turn indicated how much info was retrieved).

My opponent, Tim, and I both went after the computer in the middle of the board with our opening moves. This picture shows Tim closing in on the front of the ruined multi-level building housing a computer core.

A few lucky activation rolls and I was quickly at the computer and had it open. Here's my one gang member who in the process of downloading data while the rest of the group moves off to defend the building.

Tim came head on to the building, but we found that Apocalypticum's rules for opening doors made it quite difficult for his gang to enter the building.

Sending my gangers up to higher levels, my leader then tossed a frag grenade down on Tim's Cutthroats. The grenade didn't do much, but it did send a few of his raiders scrambling back over the side of the trench.

A few rounds of fire between the forces on the roof and those on the ground resulted in no casualties.

Tim tried again to breach the door, this time with a group effort, but was unsuccessful. The rules for forcing doors are really tough! Must be all the skulls.

My raider at the console grabbed enough data to complete the necessary 10 bits and win the game. The leader rejoices.

Here are a few observations about the game and the rules. Some of these notes will make more sense to those familiar with Song of Blades and Heroes (SBH), Mutants and Death Ray Guns, and other Ganesha Games products.

Black Rain — Apocalypticum takes place in a very specific setting: Black Rain City, a radiation-soaked, ruined urban metropolis inspired by any number of crumbling Eastern European cities. As a result of the apocalypse, black storm clouds hover over the city most of the time, periodically disgorging toxic sludge onto the terrain below. When the rules call for it, Black Rain appears or disappears every time a player rolls two failures in activation and passes the play to the other player, called a turnover. The phenomenon causes a -1 penalty to shooting and makes weapons more likely to break. While it didn't seem to have a huge effect on shooting, Black Rain came and went 5 times throughout the game.
Lethality in combat — Our game was not very lethal, and none of our characters was knocked out of action. Most of the characters had relatively low combat scores which were enhanced by the weapons we were using. Bonuses from terrain and hard cover on the tabletop negated most of the weapons' bonuses — and since terrain was plentiful in our game, we had lots of knocked down or recoiling characters, but no outright kills. In SBH, which is mostly focused on D&D-style melee combat, characters that are knocked down don't tend to survive very long. In a shooting-focused game like Apocalypticum, it's much harder to finish off a character who has been injured. Other clubmates who played the game earlier that evening tried other tactics, such as stepping out of cover to gain a better line of sight on enemies — something we didn't do, as all our characters were shooting at each other from buildings and trenches.
Turnovers — Between the two of us, Tim and I rolled a lot of double failures when activating our gangs. Most of our characters were more difficult to activate compared to our fantasy warbands in SBH, making failures more frequent. The turnovers did slow gameplay a bit, and caused the Black Rain to come and go frequently throughout the evening.
Abstracted weapons — In the playtest draft we received, there were only a handful of firearms listed, and all were prone to jamming or breaking. I liked this aspect of the rules, as it enhances the scavenged post-apocalyptic tone, where everything is held together by rusty nails and a prayer.

Overall, I enjoyed this game immensely. It feels like a ruleset that is focused more on scenarios than kill-em-all battles, and terrain is very important to survivability. I also like the fact that the rules are based on Mutants and Death Ray Guns, and not Ganesha's modern-combat ruleset Flying Lead.

Flying Lead was not a bad game, but it had far more granularity in its approach to firearms, and there were many more variables in terms of shooting modifiers and results of firing. I prefer the more streamlined Mutants/Apocalypticum approach. That said, there are an impressive number of special rules in this game that really can make a character unique. For this game, we used stock characters from the book, but I look forward to making our own custom characters in the future.

Our next trial for the game comes in two weeks, when we will hopefully be able to try out some of the vehicle rules. Check back for more updates!

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Big battles in Song of Blades & Heroes

2012-01-17T08:00:00.000-08:00

Karl and I got together recently to try out some big battles in Song of Blades & Heroes, our go-to skirmish game (and the ruleset that helped this game club coalesce in the fall of 2010!).

Though it has a well-designed rules engine, Song of Blades & Heroes is definitely meant to be played around the 300-point benchmark, which equates to anywhere from 5 to 10 models per side. Seeing as how our club has dozens of SBH games under its collective belt, Karl and I decided to push the envelope a little bit and try out a 500-point game, followed by a 1,000-point game.

Playing at this level required two important rule tweaks: We required 1 leader for every 250 points on the table, and we allowed each player to fail one additional quality roll before his turn ended. Normally in SBH, if a player rolls two or more failures when trying to activate a figure, his turn ends immediately, even if he hasn't activated all the guys on his side. With this change, it gives the player one last chance to get something going, even after he fails once.

Both of these changes enhanced the game immensely and really made things hum at the 1,000-point threshold.

In the first game, Karl's 500-point elven warband faced off against my 500-point dwarven squad. In fantasy, the elf/dwarf animosity is a known quantity, so it was a cinch to come up with a plausible scenario: the two warbands were trying to take control of a small hamlet located on the windswept frontier. Whoever controlled 2 of the 3 buildings on the table by turn 6 would be the winner.

As it was, the 500-point game was hardly a contest. Karl's force was much more optimized than mine ("That's very 40k of you," I recall saying as he carefully positioned his troops to box out my dwarf leader), and he won a clean victory by slaughtering my poor dwarves and occupying 2 buildings.

In the second game, Karl recruited another warband, this one composed of fanciful woodland critters, alongside his elves. I added another 500-point hobgoblin warband as allies for my dwarves. We set up another scenario using a big ol' 3-tier hill in the center of the board. The objective was to seize the high ground and hold it until the end of the game. The side with the most troops atop the hill would be the winner.

Then we added a fun little wrinkle: a "fast travel" rule that allowed models to enter a passage behind a waterfall and emerge, one turn later, from a cave at the base of the hill objective. Here's the layout:

We actually used this rule quite a bit, and it resulted in some fun photos, such as this dwarf warrior emerging from the caverns to aid his fellows atop the hill. That is SO METAL!

At 1,000 points, we found that our turns took a bit longer than a typical game, but the house rule allowing two "fail out" rolls meant that we were still able to mobilize our dudes. Karl sent his elves charging to the top of the hill, where they met my huge troll warchief and his big honkin' axe. He was full to the brim with special rules (that's very 40k of me) and he held the elves at bay for several turns before dying.

Across the table, a major fight was developing around the waterfall. My dwarves attempted to create a stout blue line to block the entrance to the cave passageway, thus denying Karl the chance to use it to transport his guys across the table. We quickly added another house rule about the waterfall: it was actually holy water, and models standing in it received a bonus to combat! Here's how that scrum looked.

Yes, that's an anthropomorphic enchidna with a sword fighting against my dwarf crossbowman.

(Side note: It's a lot of fun playing with gamers who aren't super competitive and "in it to win it." The fact that Karl and I were able to come up with flavorful house rules on the fly, all in the name of adding some coolness to our game, speaks to the sort of game environment we've tried to foster with Chicago Skirmish Wargames. I think this sentiment describes just about everyone who we've ever gamed with at a club event.)

Anyway, after my troll warchief was killed, the game started going sideways for me. I still pulled off a few upsets, though: I used my flying manticore to swoop in and kill Karl's elf leader, which resulted in a morale check for his guys, and I sent my two mounted knights galloping up the hill to join in the fight the last minute. Here's how the table looked just before my troll warchief bit the dust and we called the game.

On the middle tier of the hill you can see my four hobgoblins swarming up the slope while Karl's two pesky critters (a hyena and a cougar) harried my flank. Atop the hill, my troll warchief is doing his thing against a gaggle of elves, most of whom are wisely keeping their distance.

All in all it was a fun game, and we proved that larger SBH battles are not outside the realm of possibility, at least for experienced players.

— Patrick, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

With liberty and brush dipping for all!

2012-01-16T07:26:00.000-08:00

Though I love the look of painted figures on dramatic terrain, I find painting to be one of my least-favorite parts of wargaming.

Since I discovered dipping a few years ago, it has revolutionized my hobby experience. I'm painting more figures, enjoying it more, getting better results and spending far less time per figure.

Dipping is a shortcut method, and advanced painters may find little of use here, but for those who want tabletop-quality models quickly, dipping is an excellent option. It is not only quick and easy, but can also be quite inexpensive. It seems that every other week the same questions about dipping appear on the forums I frequent — and to that mass of interest I present the following article on brush dipping.

What is dipping?
For the purposes of this article, dipping is the application of a polyurethane-and-stain combination product (referred to hereafter as the dip) to a miniature to create shading and highlighting. Traditional dipping involves the immersion of the figure in the dip. Brush dipping refers to using a brush to apply the dip instead of immersion, and is the subject of this article.

What does dipping do?
Dipping is a time-saving painting technique that in one step achieves the following results:

Gives a shading effect to the model
Darkens the recesses of the model like a wash or ink
Creates a pseudo-highlight as it settles away from the edges of the miniature leaving it lighter than the rest of the model.
Provides an extremely durable protective coating on the figure.

Why brush dipping?
In the author's opinion, applying the dip with a brush (called the "splash on" method by some) is preferable to the immersion method for several reasons. First, it allows the hobbyist more carefully control the application of the dip. Second, by virtue of not requiring the painter to shake off the excess dip, it can be done indoors with far less mess, effort and preparation. Lastly, there is not a major difference in the results or the amount of time required.

Army Painter Quickshade vs. Minwax Polyshades Satin
Might as well get this one out the the way early. Much ink has been spilled on the interwebs over whether Army Painter Quickshade is a re-labeled variation of Minwax Polyshades, a highly specialized revolutionary wargaming hobby product, or something in between.

Having never used Army Painter products, I cannot say for certain how they compare to Minwax. However, I have extensive experience with Minwax and can recommend their products with confidence. Also, I appreciate the fact that they cost one-quarter to one-third the price of Army Painter's products. I will be using Minwax Polyshades names for this review, but for those using Army Painter, the approximate Quickshade-to-Polyshade equivalents are below.

Army Painter Quickshade/Minwax Polyshades equivalents and Description

Soft Tone/Pecan — A light brown dip, best used for applications where only a little shading is called for. This is my least used dip, but good to have around.
Strong Tone/Antique Walnut — A more heavily pigmented brown dip. This general purpose dip is good for almost everything. This is by far the most common dip I use.
Dark Tone/Tudor — This is a unique dip with black pigment. It is best used with colors that you would not want to add a brown hue to. Blues and some greens can look great with this dip, though it is by no means limited to those colors. I find myself using this dip more and more frequently.

To choose the correct shade of dip for your project, I recommend visiting the extensive Army Painter Gallery pages. The galleries are searchable by game, army, and basecoat color and often provide side-by-side images of the results of the three different shades of dip.

Supplies

Dip — See above. Minwax Polyshades are carried by most US hardware or home improvement stores. The exception is Tudor, which can be hard to find. I've either found it, or special-ordered it from ACE hardware. It's worth the effort. Army Painter products are available online or at most gaming stores.
Paints and Brushes — Whatever you normally use for painting your figures is fine for this. I use cheap craft paints and brushes, but there are definite advantages to high quality supplies as well.
Brushes specifically for the dip — Buy cheap brushes for applying the dip. As long as the bristles aren't too coarse, any ultra-cheapo craft brushes that aren't too small will do.
Paint thinner/brush cleaner/mineral spirits — The dip is not a water-soluble product, so you will need some paint thinner for brush cleaning and general cleanup. Don't bother with specialized model thinner. A can of mineral spirits from the Hardware store will do just fine.
A small glass jar to hold the mineral spirits.
Newspaper for protecting your surface and wiping dip off your brush.
Matte varnish, either the brush-on variety or a simple spray can. This will take away the shiny surface that the dip leaves when it dries.

Brush dipping step by step
Let's follow the brush dipping process with a group of fantasy elves.

1) Priming — As dipping will darken the model overall, I recommend a white basecoat to keep the initial painted colors brighter. Grey or colored primers may be acceptable, but try to keep them a shade or two lighter than you would otherwise use.

2) Painting — The basic dip technique requires only basic block colors. Neatly applied base colors are all that is necessary, though some folks will do a bit of highlighting before the dip. At this point, I also do the basing (sand, one color of paint) but no highlight/drybrush or foliage. As with the primer, remember to compensate for the darkening effect of the dip by using colors a shade or two brighter than you otherwise would.

3) Prepare the dip — Stir the can of dip to make an even consistency. It should be a pretty smooth flowing liquid. If it seems to viscous (sometimes it will thicken over time), you can stir in a bit of mineral spirits, but don't overdo it.

4) Apply the dip — With one of your dip brushes, apply the dip all over the model. One or two brushfuls of dip is usually enough for one 28mm infantry model.

5) Draw off the dip — With your dip brush, dab away dip from the places it is pooling on the model. Wipe your brush on the newspaper often. You want the dip to darken the recesses without completely filling them and to shade the other surfaces without making them look overly muddy or pooled. It's ok to leave some on the base to shade the basing as well. At this point and periodically throughout this process, it's a good idea to clean off your brush with some mineral spirits.

6) Final draw off — After you've drawn off the dip from the model, check again to make sure that it hasn't pooled up again, and then set it aside. If at any point in steps 4 through 6 you find you've missed a spot, you can always apply some more dip. The pics below show very clearly how the dip will pool and how it looks when the dip has been properly drawn off.

7) Last check — After a few minutes, or when you've finished 5 to 10 models, check your figures again. At this point, the dip will have thickened too much to be drawn off, but if you find that it's pooled or gotten too thick at any part of the model, a brush dipped in mineral spirits can be used to clean off that spot (or the entire model). When you've removed the offending gunk, you can repeat steps 4 through 6 for that section of the model.

8) Allow to dry for 24 to 48 hours — I highly recommend 48 hours if possible. If the dip is not completely dry, it can interfere with the later steps. Matte spray on top of not-quite-dried dip can produce an ugly crackled film.

9) Edge the base and do any additional painting — Most of my models will receive very little additional painting. The most common additional painting I do at this stage is painting the edge of the base, drybrushing the base texture, adding eyes and sometimes drybrushing any fur on the model. If you find that the glossy post-dip surface is too smooth and slippery for effective painting, you can proceed to step 10 (matte finish has more "tooth" than gloss finish), then return to step 9 and repeat step 10 again.

10) Matte finish — A matte finish will take away the glossy shine that occurs when the dip dries. It also provides an additional level of protection. I use clear matte spray from the hardware store or artists brush-on matte varnish, both of which are very affordable. Lately, I've been using the brush-on stuff more often, as it is much easier to apply at my desk, dries faster, and requires no additional setup.

10) Base foliage — Some folks prefer to add foliage to the base before the matte finish and some prefer to do so afterwards. I prefer before as the matte finish can help in adhesion, but it's by no means a firm rule. With the elves here, I was going for an early 90's Games Workshop look, so I went with the old-school method of ballast painted green with a drybrushed highlight and no foliage.

11) And you're done! Now get those miniatures to the table!

Want to see more? Here's a gallery of miniatures from my collection that have gotten their own dip treatment.

These two Void Junkers, the fantasy giant and the dwarf were dipped with Minwax Antique Walnut.

This Reaper Echidnox was also dipped with Antique Walnut. I include it as an example of heavy drybrushing applied after the dip.

This Scots Terrier shows that even over a fairly dark brown, the black pigment in Minwax Tudor can still provide contrast.

The Jaguar's spots were not painted first. The coloration is all due to the Tudor dip!

I hope you found this article useful. Any questions? Please post in the comments section and I'll do my best to respond.

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

28mm on the cheap: Sci-fi hovercraft

2012-01-09T07:46:00.000-08:00

While finalizing my entry for the Tomorrow's War Strike Force Contest over at Ambush Alley Games, I realized I needed an APC for my mercenary company to ride around in. I found a likely conversion candidate with this toy, part of a group that Karl picked up for cheap at a gaming auction.

It's from an old toy line from the 90s. The model is the right size to cart around a half-squad or a reinforced fireteam. It just took some quick conversion work and a rough coat of paint for this grav vehicle to fit in with my strike force. Here's a closeup of the finished product.

And here's a photo of the entire strike force. Almost all of the figures are Pig Iron Heavy Infantry troopers. Vote for me if I end up in the running for the fan favorite award!

— Patrick, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

28mm on the cheap: Post-apocalyptic vehicles, before and after

2012-01-08T09:40:00.001-08:00

In my last "28mm on the Cheap" article, I offered a how-to guide on turning toy cars into gaming models. As promised, here's the followup article showing before and after shots of a few more toys-to-models conversions.

All these followed roughly the same easy process as in my previous article: disassemble, convert, prime black, drybrush colors, a few heavy washes, drybrush with tan for dust and seal. Thus, I haven't included much in the way of instructions or procedure. These are mostly just before and after pics to get you inspired, along with a few tips along the way.

Land Rover by Fast Lane/New Ray

Fast Lane is the Toys R Us box name for a slew of toys, and many of their 1/43 vehicles are simply New Ray toys in a different box. New Ray toys are partially metal with lots of plastic parts and are notable for producing well-detailed toy vehicles at a very affordable price. Here's a very similar toy to the one I purchased.

Some paint and a lot of additional bits later, here's the final result.

The machine gun seen in this almost-completed picture is on a pin so that it can be removed for storage or switched out with some of my other vehicles that also have holes to accomodate weapons with a pin mount.

Peterbilt Tanker Truck by Fast Lane/New Ray

Another New Ray product, this truck is no longer available at most Toys R Us stores, but can be found elsewhere. Here's the original toy:

This toy was extensively diassembled and modified.

In order to make it possible for figures to stand all around the tank, the bed was halved and widened and moved outward, and the tank was moved back.

1/43 trucks are large enough to accommodate 28mm drivers. This driver was made from various Games Workshop Imperial Guard body parts. The pictures don't show that one hand is on the wheel and one is on the shifter.

One other tip: The paint jobs on toy cars are so sturdy that after the initial paint-over, you can usually scratch the paint you applied away with your fingernail to reveal the logos from the original paint job. In this case I was able to bring back the Peterbilt logos on the front and sides of the hood.

GeoTrax Dumptruck by Fisher-Price

This Fisher price vehicle comes from the GeoTrax line of vehicles that run on plastic train tracks. It cost me a dollar at a resale shop. The GeoTrax line has many vehcles that have an exagerated style that can be adopted easily to sci-fi settings. Here's the original toy.

And here's the final product. The wheels came from another toy found at a resale shop.

The roof is detachable, and I removed the plastic ballast and electronics (it had light and sound) so figures can be placed in the bed as well.

Silverado Dually by Jada Battle Machines

Widely available (with new paint schemes each year), this 1/32 scale vehicle is covered with guns and it quite usable right out of the box.

I still decided to raise the bed gun, add stowage and railings (made from the roll cage that comes inside the truck cab) and give it a good dirtying.

At 1/32 it's a bit larger than my other cars, but looks fine on the table.

How do they compare?

Here's all but the Fisher-Price truck in a rough scale comparison. The Mahindra Scorpio (far left), Silverado and VW are 1/32. The Peterbilt Tank Truck and Land Rover are 1/43.

We've decided to run a post-apocalyptic "Road Warrior" scenario at Little Wars in April, so these vehicles will doubtless play a starring role at the convention!

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Happy New Year from Chicago Skirmish Wargames

2012-01-06T07:54:00.001-08:00

As Chicago Skirmish Wargames heads into 2012 — our first year as both a game club and game blog — we decided to pause and take stock of what our members have been able to enjoy as gamers.

In a gaming world dominated by just a few big sci-fi and fantasy wargames — designed to both limit a player's options and force him to buy certain products — we have created a club that focuses on just the opposite. Our primary games (Song of Blades & Heroes, WarEngine, Tomorrow's War, and more) encourage players to collect, paint, modify and game with whatever miniatures they want.

In the photo above, which shows a typical game of Song of Blades & Heroes, we've got the following miniature lines in action: Grenadier, MageKnight (repainted), Confrontation, Reaper, WarMachine and Alternative Armies, all slugging it out on the tabletop.

And for a hobby that seems more and more to feature hordes of unpainted toys being pushed across a table, our club has kept to simple but effective standards for painted miniatures and terrain — resulting in visually inspiring tabletop gaming experiences that, incidentally, make for great battle reports on this blog. We're not hard-nosed about painted miniatures; rather, we try to build enthusiasm in players (even mostly-non-painters) so they are swept up in the excitement of gaming and painting with us. It feels pretty damn good to bring your latest finished miniatures to a game night and watch as 4 or 5 other players ooooh and aaaaah over them.

Lastly — and most importantly to many club members — in a hobby that has very real barriers to entry, we have tried to foster an environment where complete strangers can come in with little or no gaming experience and enjoy the hobby with friendly gamers who are happy to share their time, figures and knowledge.

This mission reached its zenith at Little Wars, a convention outside Chicago last year, where we ran our first-ever convention game. Here's a photo, showing players of all ages having a great time.

We're set to run another game for Little Wars 2012, scheduled for April 27 to April 29.

As always, if you're ever in the Chicago area and want to stop by for a game, check out our mailing list (and associated game calendar) or post a comment here and we'll get back to you!

Thanks again for a great year — on to 2012!

Warpath: Battle report and game review

2011-12-31T10:23:00.000-08:00

At last week's club game night, Jon and I had a chance to try out the Warpath ruleset by Mantic Games. We completely forgot a few things (such as modifiers for shooting at units that have moved, etc), but in general we got a pretty good handle on the rules. After the game report, I'll review the rules.

Like Mantic's Kings of War fantasy game, the rules and force lists for Warpath are free! Our game pitted the Forgefathers (Mantic's space dwarves, represented in this game by my Blood Angels Space Marines) against the Corporation (represented by my Imperial Guard).

We found that the Forgefathers and Corporation army lists were a good fit for the Space Marines and Imperial Guard units in my collection. Each side had approximately 1,000 points.

Forge Fathers (Blood Angels Space Marines)

Huscarl (Commander Tycho)
Steel Warriors section with BFG and special melee weapon (10 marines with missile launcher)
2x Drakkarim teams each with flamer and special melee weapon (two 5 marine assault squads). We gave this unit jump packs at a cost of 20 points per figure. This is not a standard option in the rules, but we borrowed a similar upgrade from the Marauder Orx force list.
Stormrage veterans team (5-marine devastator squad) with 4 BFGs (yes, this is how Warpath handles heavy weapons...they're all BFGs)
Heavy Drakkar (Land Raider tank) with 3 BFGs

The Corporation (Imperial Guard)

Commander (Commissar) with special melee weapon
Sniper (Ratling)
3x Corporation marine sections each with BFG and special melee weapon (10 Guardsmen with autocannon)
Heavy weapons section with light laser cannon (3 lascannon teams)
Striders with burst lasers (3 Sentinel walkers)
MBT-01 Pulverizer tank with heavy laser cannon and light laser cannon (Leman Russ Demolisher)

We each deployed our forces along a table edge and agreed to play a kill-em-all/meatgrinder scenario. Here's how the deployment looked for each side of the table.

We used our first moves to advance into cover, either in buildings or behind hills. However, two lucky rounds of fire killed off my Steel Warriors section and one of Jon's Marine sections before they even had a chance to get into combat. Our tanks fired away at each other with little effect. Jon's MBT-01 did a little damage, and I realized that my Heavy Drakkar did not have the firepower necessary to damage his Tank with anything other than a very lucky rear shot.

By the middle of turn 2, one of my Drakkarim teams (assault squad) had already leapt into close combat with Jon's Marine section. The other team would have done so as well, but Jon's heavy weapon section suppressed them and they dove for cover.

Realizing the futility of firing on Jon's MBT-01, my Heavy Drakkar moved to engage his right flank, where it destroyed his heavy weapons section in a barrage of fire from three Hailstorm Autocannons. The MBT-01 fired on the Stormrage Veterans (devastator squad) but somehow the tank missed with both weapons.

In turn 3 the Drakkarim team wiped out the marine section in close combat. However, the second marine section took up positions in a ruined rotunda and eliminated the second Drakkarim team before it had a chance to recover from suppression.

On the far flank, the Heavy Drakkar destroyed all three Striders (Sentinel walkers). The Stormrage Veterans and their commander advanced, but were now in full view of the MBT-01 tank. They managed to do some damage to the tank.

In turn 4, the MBT-01 drives over the Stormrage veterans (giving us a chance to try out the rules for running down pedestrians with vehicles) and then turns to chase the flank of the Heavy Drakkar. The veterans stay in the fight but only after sustaining heavy damage. The Corporation commander (commissar) charges into the remaining Draakkarim Team.

By turn 5, it was all over. The Corporation commander's fury routed the Drakkarim team, and the marine section in the rotunda finished off the Stormrage veteran squad. The commander of the Forgefather force and his remaining tank quit the field in defeat.

Warpath Reviewed

Warpath does little to conceal its roots as a Warhammer 40,000 knock-off game. In many ways, it is 40k stripped to the bare essentials and then modified even further with a few mechanics that speed up gameplay. Thus, I'll be making many of my observations by comparing it to 40k.

The most obvious change from 40k is that squads take damage as a single unit, not as a collection of miniatures. When the squad takes damage, figures are not removed — instead, the damage is accumulated by making notes next to the squad's army roster sheet. Every turn that damage is taken, the squad makes a roll to see if the amount of damage accumulated thus far is enough to surpress the unit or take it out of the fight. This means that many games might not see any figures removed in the first turn or two, even though damage is being taken. Some 40k players might find this disconcerting, but testing for destruction only once a turn speeds up gameplay and forces the opposing player to judge how much firepower he or she wants to concentrate on a particular unit.

Like damage, combat is determined on a squad-versus-squad basis, with almost no emphasis on individual figures. The exceptions are heavy weapons (BFGs) that can fire separately from the rest of the squad. Warpath differs significantly from 40k in that unless suppressed, a squad's combat abilities do not degrade as it takes damage. This is a big abstraction compared to 40k, but as with other changes, it does massively speed up gameplay as the combat capabilities of the unit are contained in its statline and do not change from turn to turn.

I was pleasantly surprised that Warpath has a movement stat. This simple change provides a bit more variation between units and is a welcome change compared to 40k, which which has one baseline movement rate for most infantry.

Vehicles seem to be handled well, if somewhat simply. There are provisions for firing arcs, overunning enemy units, collisions, transport and ordinance weapons. Notably absent are differing armor ratings for side, front and rear. Vehicles take damage in the same manner as other units, but units with "penetrating" weapons get a bonus when firing at the rear and side arcs.

Other notable features of the rules:

Pre-measuring is allowed at any time
Rules are included for aircraft strafing runs
A section of 25 special rules provides just enough variation to give units a bit of flavor. Many entries will be familiar to 40k players, such as rules for individual characters, jump jets, steadfastness, armor piercing, and crushing strength.

Warpath will not be my go-to ruleset for all sci-fi gaming, as I have a few major reservations about the game. First of all, calls for each player to field a very large army. After our game, 1,000 points seemed like the minimum amount necessary for an enjoyable match — Warpath is clearly made for gaming at 2,000 or more points per side. It's simply too abstract to function well for a small skirmish of just a few units per side.

I'm not entirely sure it has enough tactical possibilities to make it a game that I would play every week in the way some folks play 40k. Creative scenario generation could fix this, but it's not going to offer the kind of granularity and unit customizability that keep people forever re-reading their codices and tweaking their 40k army lists.

Warpath does not have a unit creation mechanic. Mantic has planned for 8 races (3 have been released so far) and they seem thus far to be extremely analagous to 40k races. However, if your sci-fi army doesn't fit one of those force lists, you will have to do a bit of adaptation on your own. I don't see this as a big downside, as the available army lists seem to have enough unit variation that only minor changes seem necessary.

Lastly, I feel obligated to compare Warpath to my favorite sci-fantasy game WarEngine. I see them both as fulfilling different roles. WarEngine offers more granularity and tactical options: it has a reaction/overwatch mechanic along with more customization. Like Warpath, WarEngine isn't well suited for very small battles, but unlike Warpath, it also isn't a good choice for very large battles with lots of vehicles and tanks. I would use WarEngine for battles with 5-7 squads and a small vehicle or two per side, whereas Warpath seems to work best with 8 squads or more and lots of vehicles.

Despite the reservations above, I really enjoyed this game. Having never played Warpath before, it took about 2 hours, but both Jon and I agreed that a game of this size would typically be completed in an hour or less. Our enjoyment of the game was probably colored by what we were hoping to get out of the game: a quick, enjoyable game of "40k lite" full of familiar rules, big armies and streamlined gameplay.

And of course, we were delighted to get our 40k armies on the table. Both of us have big 40k collections that we really like but just don't get much play anymore.

Warpath delivered on all counts. As a disaffected 40k player who still loves the miniatures and background — but who no longer has the desire to play games that take longer than an hour or so — I will definitely be using Warpath again to get my 40k figs back on the table.

So is Warpath for you? That depends. As mentioned before, the game is a streamlined 40k-clone that makes no pretentions about being realistic in scope, rules or background. According to Mantic, it's about "big battles," and if commanding a company of troops and a tank platoon on a battlefield the size of a soccer pitch (like 40k...) with a fast-playing and very streamlined ruleset (not like 40k) is your thing, then Warpath will probably deliver.

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

28mm on the cheap: Toy cars as wargames vehicles

2011-12-21T08:35:00.000-08:00

Toy cars are a great source for vehicles for the 28mm gamer on a budget. For those gaming in near future, modern, 20th century, or post-apocalyptic settings, it is reltatively simple to convert and repaint them for use on the battlefield.

As part of our "28mm on a budget" series, this tutorial will offer some tips on turning toy cars into 28mm vehicles. In the article below, I will show both a simple repaint of a VW microbus as well as a more involved conversion of an SUV into a post-apocalyptic rambler.

What you will need:

Toy cars — Anything from 1/56, 1/48, 1/43 and 1/32 scales can work if it has the right look. The toys used in this article are 1/32, which is about the maximum size that will look good with 28mm figures. In my opinion, 1/43 vehicles are ideal.
Paints and brushes
Washes — For a fast and dirty job like this, I simply use water to thin paint as necessary to wash models. If you have actual paint washes or want to use "wet water" (water with a bit of detergent to break the surface tension), this will only improve your results.
Small craft hole puncher, 1/16 or smaller — We'll use this tool to emboss rivets on armor plates. I use this one.
Plastic from blister packaging — To be used to make armor plates.
Super glue
Snips, razor saw and knives — If you plan on modifying the cars.

Here's a closer look at the toys I'll be converting.

The SUV is a 1/32 Mahindra Scorpio (an Indian SUV) by the Centy Toy brand. This particular toy may be a bit hard to find, as it appears to be only available in India. The picture below (not mine) shows it in good condition. I found mine in poor condition (missing a couple head and tail lights and a roof rail) at a resale shop for 50 cents.

The VW was a Kinsmart 1/32-scale toy that I found at an area train store. They are widely available for between $6 and $9 in the U.S.

Both toys were taken apart. Most toys of this type are assembled with screws and usually have a pull-back-and-go friction motor, which I usually remove.

I sawed off the rear roof of the Scorpio and cut it down to be used as the rear floor, and also cut the middle seats apart to be used as wheel well covers. The rear seats were set aside to be added later.

The VW bus was taken apart and the surfboard was removed. The window section was set aside as well.

After cutting out pieces of thin plastic from a standard minis blister to use as armor plating, I gently squeezed them with the hole punch to create the rivets and bolts — not hard enough to punch through the plastic, just hard enough to emboss the round shapes you see here. I applied about 13 pieces of armor plating including a front window piece. The curved edges of blister pack material can be usefull for covering corners.

After removing the pull-back motor from the VW, I used a piece of old credit card and super glue to keep the wheels in place.

The Scorpio was primed black.

Only the lower body of the VW was primed black.

Base colors were heavily drybrushed over the black sections. Then several very heavy washes of brown were applied and allowed to pool in the recesses and grooves. The brown adds grime, but also a nice rusty look to our wastelands vehicles. Also, the interior seats were painted contrasting colors.

At this point, the Scorpio was reassembled. The base color for the Scorpio was a very light tan for the body and metalic silver for the floor. In the pic below you can see where the roof has become the floor and he middle seats have been used to make wheel well covers.

I used the same process for the VW bus except that only the lower section was base coated in yellow (which later turned green after washes). The top white section was not basecoated but got some brush-on matte varnish to make it less slippery before the brown wash.

After this, I typically apply a second (and sometimes third) wash to the model. Keep applying washes until you get the look you like. Here are pics of the Scorpio and VW bus after receiving a second wash.

A final thicker wash was applied to areas that needed extra grime or — in the case of the VW — where the original paint or chrome was showing through too much. Then I finished the painting with a light drybrushing of tan and brush on matte varnish.

The VW was reassembled after the thick wash, but before the final drybrush and varnish. Some of the window hazing is from the superglue I used to reassemble the van, and some is a very light drybrushing of tan. I did not apply matte varnish to the windows. At this point I also realized I had forgoten to deal with the holes where the surfboard had been. Two 1x2 LEGO tiles covered them nicely.

As you can see from these comparison shots, the 1/32 scale is a bit large compared to a 28mm (1/56 supposedly) figure, but it looks good on the game table and the extra space for placement of miniatures in the rear of the scorpio is a real benefit.

There you have it: quick and easy transformations from toys to gaming models. These took a few days to complete, but the actual time not spent waiting for washes to dry was probably only a couple hours.

As for uses, the Scorpio is pretty tied to the post-apocalyptic genre, but the VW could be used in a range of settings from the 60s to modern to post-apocalyptic, either as a working vehicle or as a nice worn-out bit of terrain almost anywhere in the world.

Be on the lookout for an upcoming article where I'll dispense with the step-by-step and just show before-and-after pictures for several more toy vehicles to that became wargaming models in the same way as the models shown here.

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Two back-to-back games of Tomorrow's War

2011-12-19T09:03:00.000-08:00

Tim and I got together for a game of Tomorrow's War using a scenario we'd come up with, but the game was over so quickly that we were able to squeeze in another game. So read on for two after-action reports from Tomorrow's War. Both illustrate the unpredictable nature of the game itself — something we quite enjoyed, I must say.

Ambush on Saltpan Road
Colony World: Fornacis V
Area: Saltpan Salient 64-Alpha

Mercenary squads from Markham’s Skybolts completed their mission to find and extract a downed pilot from Neo-Soviet territory, but that victory came at a cost: 4 prisoners of war were captured by Neo-Soviet troops.

Now, in the hours immediately following the raid, the Skybolts have mobilized to recapture their comrades. Three Skybolt mercenary recon teams operating in the area have been re-tasked with intercepting the Neo-Soviet convoy that is escorting the POWs back to a fire base. The recon team has been in the field for six days and is low on supplies, but the mission must be carried out. The Neo-Soviets suspect an attack, but they must move carefully because their POWs are severely wounded.

As the Neo-Soviet escort closes in on its forward firebase, the hard-bitten mercenaries spring their ambush...

(This scenario was a follow-up to a game we played in October that saw Colonel Wade Markham's Skybolts (my mercenary company, made up of Pig Iron's Heavy Infantry figures) win a pyrrhic victory against Tim's Neo-Soviet forces.)

The game began with Tim's light APC (carrying wounded POWs) moving down a lonely, windswept road, escorted by a squad of Neo-Soviet regulars on foot. The commie troops weren't alone, though — they had brought several horrid, vat-grown mutants to the fight, as evidenced in this photo.

We treated the mutants as "dogs" as per the Tomorrow's War rules. As it happened, they turned out to be very effective at detecting the Skybolt mercenary troopers, who were equipped with stealth recon armor and suppressed weapons. You can see the three mercenary fireteams in ambush positions in the photo above.

The game opened with the APC zooming forward, trying to get across the table as fast as possible (as per the scenario victory conditions). In response, the ambushing mercenary teams opened fire with their heavy laser cannon and shoulder-mounted missile launcher. But because the Skybolts had done a forced march to get to their ambush positions after several days of in-country combat ops, they received the "Poor Suppies" penalty and suffered from reduced firepower for the entire game. Again, this was part of the scenario design...the mercenaries were exhausted and operating with depleted ammo as a result of their frantic overland hustle to intercept the convoy.

In any case, Tim's Neo-Soviet troopers and mutants surged up the ridge to root out the first fire team. During the ensuing combat, I rolled a "1" on my Troop Quality dice, which meant I had to draw a Fog of War card! The results was an atmospheric storm that whipped across the battlefield, reducing visibility and combat effectiveness of all units. Cool! Here are my sad little men getting harassed by the Neo-Soviets and their ghastly creations. Later in the game this fireteam suffered another Fog of War card that further diminished their fighting spirit...brutal, just brutal.

By this point, the APC containing the POWs had zipped down the highway, shrugging off the firepower that I was able to muster from my other two fireteams. It reached the Neo-Soviet firebase at the end of the table and zoomed off to victory. Game over! Tim and I agreed that the Skybolts mercenary squads were at a severe disadvantage because of the "Poorly Supplied" rule, although it was narratively appropriate for the scenario.

On to game two! We re-oriented the terrain and set up a scenario where Tim's Neo-Soviets were attacking a "thin green line" of Skybolts mercenaries defending a supply depot. I took just one photo of the game, which shows a mercenary weapon team perched atop a silo. I call it "The Calm Before the Storm." That green wall makes for a pretty cool-looking "sky" for this photo.

We played only two turns of this game before a Fog of War card ended things for us. Tim rolled a "1" for his Troop Quality while skirmishing with my defenders and promptly drew a Fog of War card. It stipulated that his units, fearing a gas attack by the opposing force, were forced to quickly don chem gear, thus reducing their Troop Quality by one dice for the rest of the game.

Now, Tim's Neo-Soviets were only Troop Quality d6, which is the lowest in the game. Any further reductions means the troops are removed from the table as they retire to the rear or lose their nerve to fight. And that's exactly what happened! I was victorious because Tim's entire force melted away at the threat of a gas attack.

Of course, they didn't actually die in combat...they just lost their nerve and fled. This may have repercussions as we continue this mini-campaign.

As far as rules comprehension, game one was pretty damn tough. Tim and I managed to forget pretty much everything we thought we had internalized about the rules. We blundered a bit and probably made some mistakes. By game two things were humming along smoothly...and of course the game ended prematurely!

There's no arguing the fact that both games were quite short: less than an hour for the first scenario and less than 30 minutes for the second scenario. Some players might be put off by the fact that the two games were so brief. The first game ended because the mercenaries were really outclassed, and the second game ended because of a random Fog of War card. Luckily, Tim and I are "story" players so we don't really mind the abrupt endings as long as they fit into the narrative of the game. And they did!

We'll certainly play Tomorrow's War again. I've already got some ideas for a follow-up scenario. Those POWs are still out there, waiting to be rescued.

— PatrickWR, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Fully painted: Pledge photos from November

2011-12-13T07:22:00.001-08:00

After a long November spent painting (and procrastinating), the club has prepared photos of our painting pledge. To recap, a few of us assembled a pile of unpainted figures last month and pledged to work on them through November, with the goal of completing the figures by Nov. 30.

Here's a blog post from last month showing our mountains of unpainted lead and plastic.

How did we do? You be the judge. Here are the finished products.

Jon's pledge - a squad of Japanese sci-fi warriors. 4 were completed in November.

Karl's pledge - a squad of Void Junkers, some assorted fantasy miniatures and a 28mm mech pilot. The Junkers and fantasy elves were completed in November.

Pat's pledge - a handful of small terrain pieces, plus 2 mounted warriors and 2 fantasy monsters. Everything was completed in November.

Tim's Pledge - a collection of fun monsters, dragons and beasties

28mm on the cheap: Mega Miniatures

2011-12-06T06:43:00.000-08:00

Though not as cheap as the dollar-per-miniature goal that we strive for, a few companies today make quality metal 28mm miniatures that range from $1.50 to $3 a piece. Building a 100-figure, Warhammer 40k-style army can be expensive even at this low price — though less so than with Games Workshop products — but warband and platoon skirmishes are quite manageable, and being able to choose exactly what you need is a definite benefit.

One of my favorite companies in this price range is Mega Miniatures, aka MegaMinis.

Mega is owned by Johnny Lauck and produces a large selection of fantasy, modern and sci-fi miniatures. MegaMinis has some proprietary figure lines, some of which are as low as $1.89 a piece!

In the opinion of the author, however, Mega's best offerings are the defunct figure lines it has acquired and rereleased. This includes ranges of figures from Grenadier, Metal Magic, Demonblade Games and Alpha Forge.

This review will give you a brief look at some figures from the Demon Blade and Alpha Forge lines as well as a couple of Mega Minis' proprietary designs. Though they have been selling off the molds to many of their older fantasy ranges, Johnny has been re-releasing Demonblade figures at a rapid rate and assures us that he plans to keep releasing nearly the entire line in the near future.

Demonblade Re-Releases

Among other games, Demonblade was the producer of Shockforce, the game that originated the club-favorite ruleset WarEngine — as well as a massive line of figures, a few of which are described in detail below. Note that the figures are exactly as they came from Mega. No flash has been trimmed and no mold lines have been removed.

Frontier Defense Force
These figures were originally released as Shockforce Megacom Troopers. They're well sculpted, though perhaps with not quite the same level of clarity as the classic Games Workshop Cadian troopers that they are fairly obviously based on. So far there are 15 to 20 sculpts released for this line, covering all manner of troopers armed with a basic lasgun and a selection of special weapons such as grenade launchers, missile launchers and flamethrowers.

These figures were originally scupted by the great Bobby Jackson to supplement the K-Force troopers that Demonblade had acquired from Grenadier. These earlier troopers are similar in style, but a bit bulkier and not quite as crisp (I have almost the entire line) but have not yet been reissued by Mega.

Here's a trooper leader and a kneeling trooper.

Here's a trooper with a plasma gun (called a heat gun by Mega) and a flamethower. The flamethrower is called a "Heavy Machine gunner" by Mega.

Despite its similarities to the smart gun from Aliens, this long-barreled weapon has a hose on the bottom of the barrel and is attached to a set of tanks on the back of the model, all of which strongly suggests that it's a flame weapon. That said, with a magazine and removal of the tanks, this would make a great SAW.

Mega also makes a flamethrower trooper with a more traditional GW-style Flamethrower that they call a vaporizer.

As a nice touch, these figures come with separate backpacks. I liked the backpacks so much that I contacted Johnny, who sold me some separately.

Here's a pair of scouts. There are four of these in the figure line. Each is armed with a sniper/assault rifle and is posed in a crouching or kneeling position. The backpacks for these figures are cast-on.

The treads on the boots seemed like a nice touch and the detail overall is good.

All in all, I'm very pleased with these figures. I ordered about 10 of the Demon Blade trooper miniatures

Moonshiners

These figures are a rather goofy range of cartoony rednecks previously released as Brethren models for Shockforce. The figures below are the only ones I purchased from this line and I chose them because they looked more like post-apocalyptic survivors than the rest of the range, which is a delightfully wierd mix of cartoony inbred redneck men and Daisy Duke-looking women.

The overall sculpting is a bit softer than the troopers, but the look is well excecuted and they will fit right in with my other post-apoc figures.

Alpha Forge

Alpha Forge was best known for it's Star Mogul game. Mega has released all these figures, which includes two races of aliens, human troopers and salvage crew, androids, robots and even a vehicle or two. They also had a line of zombie survivors, two of which I purchased.

Salvage Crew

I've purchased most of the Alpha Forge Salvage Crew figures. The link above has them, as well as quite a few Demonblade figures, mixed in the same section. The Salvage Crew models come with 2 random heads from a selection of 10 to 12.

The heads are hit or miss, some are quite nice, some are just OK.

Zombie Survivors

These are really nice figures with lots of character. They are mixed into the "Modern Civilian" section of the MegaMinis website. You can tell them apart as they are the figures that are shown unpainted.

I liked all the figures that I reviewed, but these had the sharpest detail and were the best sculpted.

MegaMinis' Designs

Here's a couple of examples of scupts that Mega has commissioned for itself.

Robot Small is a really cute fig, and the model is notable because he may have use in a 15mm as a full-sized robot or 10mm as a hard suit.

I picked these animals from a few different product codes and packs just to give you an idea of the size and sculpting of Mega's animals. Even though many of the larger animal molds have been sold, at 166 different codes, Mega still has what is probably the largest selection of 28mm animal figures on the market today. The cat and dogs pictured are all only $1.43 each!

Overall, I'm very pleased with these figures. No one is going to confuse them with the hyper-detailed high-end figures from companies like Infinity or Privateer Press, but they are all well sculpted figs that are a good representation of their subject matter.

While many of Mega's propriety sci-fi and designs and reissues of classic fantasy figures are somewhat dated in scale and style, the ranges they have acquired from Demonblade and Alpha Forege are mostly from the late 90s and early 2000s and still compare very well with current styled figures in size, style and proportion.

It is also worth noting that the casts are very clean. Mold lines are no more than you would expect from the major brands, which is surprising when you consider that Mega does their own casting!

I do have to mention that one of my troopers did have a very small miscast hole in the side of his boot that will have to be filled with putty, but it was not a major issue.

I highly recommend these figures to anyone seeking sci-fi figures on a budget. Mega Miniatures has done the hobby a great service by making these great figures available again and at such a low cost.

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

New Bases for old Metal Magic figures

2011-12-04T12:44:00.000-08:00

In the 80s and 90s, Metal Magic released many great sci-fi and fantasy figures. The quality and sculpting were quite good, and many of these figures are still available today from EM-4, Mega Miniatures and others. These figures were cast with a 15mm wide integral base, as seen on these Sarday'kin Legionaire miniatures from the Spacelords line.

These bases fit into a round cavity on a 20mm by 20mm square plastic base that was supplied with the models. This is a good system and still works well for fantasy figures, as 20mm square is still a very common basing convention for 28mm fantasy models.

For sci-fi figures, it's a different story, as nearly all sci-fi infantry is currently based on 25mm or 30mm bases, Thus your choices when working with these old Metal Magic figures are either to cut or grind off the base, or landscape the basing to hide the rise

Enter Mantic Games. A couple years ago, Mantic arrived with a figure/base system that looks very similar to that used by Metal Magic. Their newly released Warpath sci-fi system includes round bases with circular indents!

What you really want to know is "Do they fit Metal Magic ?"

The short answer is no.

The inner cavity is almost exactly 15mm in diameter. The metal magic figure bases are just a smidge (perhaps 0.2mm) wider than 15mm. However, with a minute or two of filing I was able to make a figure fit nicely into the base.

Another option might be to use a circular Dremel tool to quickly widen the plastic indentation on the base itself.

As someone who is planning a major Spacelords project for 2012, I'm very pleased with these very affordable bases. The miniatures are just about level with the base, and I can flock the base the same as any other figure.

The bit of work required to fit the figures into the base is no more than it would take to remove the intergral base. Also, the resulting connection between base and figure is much stronger than it would be if the round integral base were removed and just the feet were attached to a base.

Of course the option still exists to glue the whole figure on top of a regular plastic base and hide the transition with plaster, but not much time is saved — and you end up with a very tall base. I've been collecting miniatures to build a Sarday'kin Legion Platoon (currently buying if you have any...) and I'll be using these bases exclusively.

Here's a bit more information on these Mantic bases:

Base size: 3mm high x 25mm wide, which is the same as a standard GW slotta-base, but with straight sides rather than sloping.

Price: 10 for $3.50, 50 for $9, 100 for $16.50 (plus $4.50 flat rate shipping to the USA)

Can be ordered from: Mantic Games

Metal Magic figures are available from:

EM-4 — Currently selling a limited range of the original Spacelords line
Mega Miniatures — Currently selling a limited range of Metal Magic fantasy figures. Many of their own proprietery miniatures use the Metal Magic basing system as seen in the individual model pictures.

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

28mm gaming on the cheap

2011-11-28T08:42:00.000-08:00

Since 28mm is the scale of choice for large, expensive games like Warhammer 40,000 and WarMachine — as well as smaller boutique games that are still rather expensive on a per-figure basis, such as Malifaux and Mercs — some gamers naturally gravitate toward scales that purport to offer more bang for the buck. That's why 15mm seems to be all the rage; fantasy, sci-fi and historical gamers want to stretch their dollar and still end up with a nice tabletop army for their game of choice.

Well, here at Chicago Skirmish Wargames we play almost exclusively 28mm at our club nights — and we do it on the cheap. I'm not talking about saving 20% by shopping at the right online retailers. I'm talking about scouring flea markets, making your own terrain and generally getting your per-figure cost down to $1 or less.

What follows is a broad roundup of tips gleaned from our club members about exactly how to maximize your enjoyment of 28mm figures — which, as we all know, are an absolute joy to paint up. Nothing says "hey, come over here and check out this game" quite like a couple of well-painted 28mm armies slugging it out on a pretty battlefield.

We'll try to expand on these topics with individual posts where possible. (Curious about the above photo? There's a description of everything in it at the bottom of this post.)

Play skirmish games that don't require specific miniatures — This topic is listed first, as it may prove to be insurmountable for some game groups. For us, it was an easy sell. Why enjoy games from companies that base their business model on ever-escalating new releases, each having some new, potent impact on the game? Rather, we seek out clever rulesets that encourage the use of different miniatures — even if the publisher happens to sell an "official" line of figures for the game! Our favorites are Song of Blades & Heroes, Tomorrow's War, WarEngine and Full Thrust.
Plastic is your friend — Plastic figures, often sold in boxes of a dozen soldiers or more, can often supply everything you need to play a typical skirmish-level game. Moreover, the secondary market for plastic figures is often very affordable, even for Games Workshop models.
Buy as a group to save money — This is pretty self-explanatory. Split a couple boxes of Mantic's new Warpath game (someone gets the space dwarves, someone gets the orx), for example, and you'll find that the price becomes pretty reasonable even with shipping to the U.S. factored in.
Check out flea markets and discount bins — Once you've decided that you can play a game without using any sort of "official" models, a whole new world opens up to you: the discount shelf. Our club routinely acquires and paints up miniatures from older, defunct game lines like Hundred Kingdoms, Void, Celtos, Warzone, Legions of Steel, Grenadier and Crucible. Oftentimes we can buy these items for just a couple bucks per figure, or less! Many regional gaming conventions have dealer halls with big boxes of dusty blister packs, just ready for you to paw through.
Collectible miniatures games can provide warbeasts, vehicles and more — We keep an eye on cool-looking figures and vehicles from Heroclix, Star Wars CMG, Mechwarrior, MageKnight and D&D Minis. Sometimes they need a repaint, but other times we use 'em as-is for our skirmish games.
Look at cheap model kits from mainstream manufacturers - Revell or Tamiya kits in 1/35 or 1/48 scale make great starting points for vehicle conversions, and they're frequently on sale. HO-scale railroad stuff is a bit more expensive, but some shops sell broken or opened items for a discount.
Make your own terrain — Not everyone has the tools or skills for this, but you'd be surprised what you can whip together using a few small plastic desk organizers, a can of spray paint and a drybrush. 28mm has an advantage because everyday items like cardboard boxes and kids toys can be pressed into use as terrain. More on this to come.
Make your own miniatures — Again, a niche hobby, but if you have the skills to make vehicles or spaceships, go for it!
Keep an eye on closing sales or going-out-of-business announcements — Liquidation sales are a good opportunity to stock up, often at very good prices. We've done a bit of this here and there, with fantastic results. The business owners involved are always quite grateful for the help.

Check back regularly, because we're hoping to expand on this topic with a series of articles. If you're curious about what's in photo at the top of this post, here's the breakdown: that buggy is a converted GI Joe vehicle, with Necromunda plastic figures on board, along with a Star Wars CMG droid walker thing in the background. The quonset hut on the right is from a plastic army men toy set, and the rocky desert terrain and waterfall in the background are Playmobil items covered in textured paint and then drybrushed.

— PatrickWR, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Vintage Warhammer 40k 2nd edition

2011-11-21T08:31:00.000-08:00

As well as the Tomorrow's War game mentioned in the previous post, last week's club game night also featured a game of 2nd edition Warhammer 40,000 at Games Plus in Mt. Prospect, Illinois. Those who know our club's game tendencies may be asking themselves, "What were you doing playing Warhammer 40k, and why 2nd edition?"

I assure you that I had three very good reasons. First of all, it was a chance for me to indulge in a bit of nostalgia for the version of 40k that was one of the first wargames I ever played. Second, it was a chance to get my 40k armies on the table again. Lastly, I was interested to see how the older, more granular 2nd edition rules would work for small skirmish actions.

The following restrictions and guidelines were in effect.

750 point armies
Max 25% characters (from your list or allies)
No vehicles
No wargear cards
No using the Dark Millenium supplement.
No special characters -WYSIWYG (except for grenades of course)
Half-squads were allowed for units where the required number of minis is 10+

I brought terrain and enough miniatures for 4 armies (two Space Marine and two Imperial Guard). Due to a few no-shows, only one game took place. See the pic below for the gorgeous setup that was on hand for the players who didn't show.

First-time-attendee Don (not to be confused with the other Don who has played with us for a while) and I played a Blood Angel Space Marine assault force consisting of three squads of five marines and a captain. All marines had jump packs and mostly close combat weapons and pistols. Across the table, Mike had a full platoon of 30 guardsmen, 10 ratling snipers and two five-man command squads.

The terrain was provided by Mike M., a Games Plus staff member who also took part in the Tomorrow's War game across the room. We used the mission cards from the 40k 2nd edition boxed set and hid the objectives from the other team. As it turned out, Mike's objective was get units across the entire board and ours was to hold a central objective.

Mike did a great job setting up fire lanes and using overwatch to decimate more than half the marines before they got into close combat. He had some great dice rolls also, but it was definitely a case of sound tactics taking the day.

By the time they reached the guardsmen, there weren't enough marines left to tear through Mike's lines, and the game ended with a massacre of every single marine despite their superior stats and armor.

I had a good time with the game. Here are some observations after this nostalgia-fueled exploration of Warhammer 40k 2nd edition.

2nd edition 40k is more granular than the current edition and much, much moreso than any games our club regularly plays. 40k squad members have nine (9!) stats per miniature plus weapon stats, which seems like a lot after playing Song of Blades & Heroes or WarEngine, which have less than half as many.
It takes a while to play. We resolved the game in just over two hours. Two hours for 750 points isn't bad, but if we were using larger armies, psychics, vehicles or special characters I could easily see it stretching three or four hours. That's just too much.
2nd edition is written like a skirmish game rather than a squad-based game, yet it requires players to organize their models into squads and enforces squad coherency. Many things such as scattered landing of jump troops and close combat are worked out on a time-consuming individual basis rather than by squad.
2nd edition has the capacity to be a more tactical and "realistic" (if such a rule can be applied to any Warhammer editions). The inclusion of Overwatch and a movement stat adds a tactical element not seen in the current edition.

In conclusion, it might be fun to play again with forces that are more balanced (marines with fewer jump packs and more ranged weapons perhaps?) but it will probably be a while before we play this again. I had a hard time thinking of ways that 2nd edition 40k is better than my preferred sci-fantasy game of WarEngine, which would produce an equal-or-more-enjoyable exprience with a fraction of the rules and stats in 30-50 percent less time.

Still, it's fun to dip into the grimdark world of Warhammer 40K now and then, and for small size games I'd prefer 2nd edition 40K to the current 5th (soon to be 6th in 2012...) edition, which is superior for large games, but (IMHO) too streamlined for small engagements.

Most importantly, preparing for this game has got me excited about Citadel/GW miniatures again. Hopefully someday I'll find the time to properly flock and dip my large collection of block-painted Blood Angels. I've also been picking up a fair number of Rogue Trader-era miniatures so be looking for some of them to appear (possibly) by late 2012.

— Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Tomorrow's War report: Operation Scrub Down

2011-11-18T13:48:00.000-08:00

Operation Scrub Down
Colony World: Elysium Prime
Area: Cronid South Timber Sector

Rural pacification efforts continue apace on Elysium Prime, with the Terran Heavy Infantry establishing forward fire bases to guard against a local insurrection funded and armed by the Neo-Soviet Empire.

In the Cronid South sector, rebels lurking in the heavily forested hills claimed an early victory after they knocked out a medium battle tank using a roadside bomb. Within the hour, word of this loss reached the Terran commander in the area. Hard pressed by simultaneous counterattacks on his flanks, the commander was able to dispatch one infantry platoon to the area. Its orders were to reach the disabled tank and sanitize its computer core to prevent sensitive information falling into the rebels’ hands. Recovering the tank crew, if they were still alive, was a secondary objective.

As the first rays of sunlight filtered through the wooded ridgeline, the Terran troopers deployed into the combat zone...

This week we played our second game of Tomorrow's War. This time I set up a scenario to make use of the asymmetric warfare rules. A small, elite force of Terran Heavy Infantry were tasked with infiltrating a forest and "sanitizing" a disabled battle tank. The rebel insurgents, for their part, were trying to capture or kill as many Terrans as they could.

The game began with the battle tank in flames in the center of the table. It was immobile but the three-man crew had a chance to get the guns working during the game. The tank was an Ironstorm resin model from Pig Iron Productions, and it drew plenty of comments from players and spectators.

The rebels started with three squads on the table, but they received a random bunch of reinforcements at the beginning of each turn. This meant that scrappy fighters were constantly filtering onto the board to oppose the Terrans, who themselves had three fireteams for a grand total of just 12 dudes on the table. These are converted plastic Warzone troopers, with Pig Iron heads.

Despite all that, the Terrans had one piece of equipment that helped them win the game: body armor. The rebels had none, so they got shot to pieces whenever they tried to advance on the disabled tank. As the game unfolded, the casualties mounted on the rebels' side.

At one point the rebels rolled well for reinforcements and an AGR-815 agricultural walker showed up, ready to tear into the disabled tank with its cutting torch. Unfortunately the Terran squad nearby was able to shred the walker with concentrated chaingun fire. The rebels are Pig Iron Kolony Ferals figures, and the walker is from the Star Wars collectible miniatures game.

Plenty of rebels arrived over the course of the six-turn game, drawn by the desperate struggle around the disabled tank. The random nature of the reinforcements meant that sometimes just two or three guys toting assault rifles would show up at a particular hotspot. Since they were classified as irregulars, they had a hard time activating without having a leader nearby. Ultimately the hodgepodge rebel groups couldn't mobilize fast enough to stop the Terrans troops and their awesome body armor.

In fact, only a single Terran soldier died during the raid, though two more received serious wounds. On the rebels side, more than half of the fighters on the table by the end of the game had taken a wound of some sort. Check out this photo...the little red blood splatters near the figure bases indicate wounds.

I was surprised how many "walking wounded" casualties we had. The rebels took a ton of casualties but suffered no KIAs. I was so surprised that I took my question to the Ambush Alley Games forums. So many casualties, so few kills — had we been playing it wrong? Turns out that combat in Tomorrow's War is designed to produce far more casualties than KIAs, which models advances in first aid and lifesaving technology that are even now being observed in modern-day battlefields.

All in all, it was a solid victory for the Terrans — but the insurgency was far from quelled, as this photo makes clear. No fewer than 20 fighters lurked in the woods, ready to continue the rebellion to dislodge the fragile Terran toehold in the Cronid South sector.

And here's the battlefield at the end of the game, showing the Terrans retreating to their board edge having safely sanitized the tank and rescued its three crew members.

— PatrickWR, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Coming up this weekend: Legends in the Fall in Mundelein, Illinois

2011-11-17T09:32:00.000-08:00

Several of us here at Chicago Skirmish Wargames are planning to trek up to Mundelein, Illinois this weekend for Legends in the Fall, a game convention organized by Skip Peterson. We'll be there on Sunday, Nov. 20 for the War Chest flea market and to (hopefully) meet Jim Roots of Ambush Alley Games. If all goes well, we'll be able to get in a demo of Tomorrow's War with Jim.

If you're planning on being at Legends in the Fall on Sunday, post a comment here. We'd love to say hello!

The Valley of No Return: A Supersystem 2 report

2011-11-17T08:33:00.001-08:00

(Editor's note: Inspired by reports of the new Blasters & Bulkheads title that takes the Goalsystem into space, CSW member Don shared photos and a writeup from a game he ran last year using Supersystem 2.)

"The Valley of No Return" was a three-player 28mm cooperative game where three of the world's most famous hunters (Alan Quartermain, Kraven the Hunter, and Ka-Zar the Savage) were sent to a valley to hunt some big game. Although they were working together, each player had some secret objectives.

During the game, the group was beset upon by a host of creatures including renegade Chinese troops, a giant spider, and King Kong (or is that Mighty Joe Young?)! Then for the final curve ball, a Predator was secretly hunting all three during the game which led to a truly pulpy (and by that I mean bloody) climax. As with all my games, a prize was given out to the overall winner (a Predator DVD) which was Kraven the Hunter I believe.

Supersystem 2 worked really well for all these disparate elements, and my players — who are not hard core gamers — picked it up quite fast. There is a a lot of dice rolling, but it goes pretty fast, so all players are engaged. It also helps to have each player pursuing secret goals unknown to the other players, which leads to great backstabbing. Stats for the characters can be generated fairly quickly, as there are ample examples for a balanced game, and if you do some google-fu you can find various other creatures that only need a bit of tweaking.

One complaint about the Goalsystem games are that fights can take a long time. This was supposedly addressed in the Victorian Horror game Chaos in Carpathia and I will report once I run a trial game.

— Don, CSW club member

November painting pledge: The club goes to work

2011-11-16T14:58:00.000-08:00

Some of us at Chicago Skirmish Wargames decided to take a painting pledge this month to bolster our creative initiative. As part of that effort, we each took photos of our respective heaps of unpainted lead and then pledged to finish painting the lots in November.

The photos speak for themselves! We'll post shots of the finished products at month's end.

Tim's Pledge - a collection of fun monsters, dragons and beasties (or as he put it, "This is what I'm working on.")

Jon's Pledge - a Japanese-themed sci-fi warband.

Pat's Pledge - a handful of small terrain pieces, plus 2 mounted warriors and 2 fantasy monsters.

Karl's Pledge - a squad of Void Junkers, some assorted fantasy miniatures and a 28mm mech pilot.

Escape from New Chicago: All Things Zombie report

2011-11-06T07:38:00.000-08:00

This week's game night was our much anticipated post-Halloween zombie game. We'd been talking as a club for a while about trying out a zombie apocalypse game, and this scenario hit all the high points: survivors, random encounters, loot, cars and of course zombies. Tim decided to run the game using All Things Zombie from Two Hour Wargames, which proved to be an excellent decision.

In preparation for the game, we assembled a huge pile of modern-looking zombies from our respective collections. Tim prepared extensive notes on the scenario and served as the gamemaster for the zombies. The other 5 players ran one survivor each, though we allowed players to quickly re-join the game if their survivor was killed. There was very little downtime, as we were all keeping a close watch on the undead horde that was slowly building on the tabletop.

In All Things Zombie, you have only marginal control over your character. You can send him running around the table, but he will react to everything he sees (mainly zombies in this case) and sometimes those reactions won't be exactly what you had in mind. As part of the game, zombies were drawn to noise: gunshots, car engines starting, doors slamming, etc. As the survivors bumbled around the map, looting cars and searching buildings, a steady stream of undead started appearing in the bleak urban cityscape. Our attempts to greet them with firepower only resulted in more zombies!

Virtually everything you can see on the tabletop had a random zombie/loot table associated with it. Players could send their survivors into the individual floors of the two largest buildings to search for supplies, though we learned the hard way that large buildings are full of proportionately large numbers of zombies.

Indeed, zombies were appearing faster than we could slay them. At one point, Jon's overwhelmed survivor character rolled a grenade into a mob of approaching zombies, but he misjudged the blast radius and was incinerated — along with 2 other survivors and a half-dozen zombies. Only Burt the shotgun-wielding biker survived, owing to his "Tough as Nails" trait which allowed him to shrug off his first "killed" result. Here's a picture of him standing tall amid the smoking carnage of the grenade blast.

Tim played the zombies and had great fun with them. When survivors died, the zombies would pause and feast on the fallen heroes. The zeds weren't particularly smart, and in several cases they bunched up on the wrong side of a chainlink fence, attracted to the sound of our gunfire but unable to climb the fence.

Our game lasted for about 3 hours. We could have played longer, but the game shop was closing up. On the fly, we invented a nice, logical endgame for the scenario: Our SWAT-lookin' cop survivor found a set of keys for a nearby police truck. It had room for 12 passengers, so our game quickly turned into "scoop everyone up and get the hell out of here."

This bright idea couldn't have come at a better time. The zombies were swarming through the street at this point, and the survivors were scattered all over the map. Brian's trio of survivors (he started with one guy and found 2 more allies in a nearby building) provided cover fire while the rest of the stragglers clambered aboard the police truck.

Survivors that were already aboard the armored vehicle aided their fellows by firing out the windows at the horde. Burt, maniac that he is, stood atop the vehicle and kept the zeds at bay.

The SWAT truck zoomed off the board and we called the game. Then, of course, we put everyone's zombies on the table and staged with glorious parting photo: the SWAT truck, with Burt perched on the roof, escaping to safety while the zombie horde advances inexorably. Good game!

Naval Thunder at Rock-Con

2011-11-05T21:09:00.000-07:00

The scenario I ran at Rock-Con, an annual convention in Rockford, Illinois, was one I created myself using historical ORBATs from several late-war battles in the Pacific during WWII. The rules used were Naval Thunder: Battleship Row, which I found to be a great and easy-to-use naval ruleset.

The goal for the Japanese was to do significant damage to an American island base without losing their important cruisers and battleships. The Americans had to defend their base and hopefully sink or seriously damage Japanese ships.

There were 20 American ships and 16 Japanese ships on the table by the time the US reinforcements showed up divided into several divisions. At the start of the game, the Americans had three battleships — Tennessee, California, and Pennsylvania — on the board, as well as two light cruisers, Omaha and Milwaukee. Six destroyers made up the remainder of their fleet, divided into two division of three ships each.

The Japanese entered the board with the powerful battleships Yamato, Musashi, and Nagato leading their fleet. They also had 7 heavy cruisers: Kumano, Suzuya, Chikuma, and Tone in one division, and Takao, Haguro, and Myoko in another. Finally they had 6 destroyers spread out in front of their heavy ships as a scouting force.

Turn 1 - The Japanese entered the table in the corner opposite the US base and immediately their battleships turned to bring all their guns to bear on the base. The cruisers continued ahead with their destroyers to put themselves in front of the valuable battleships. The American destroyers charged at the enemy line while the American heavy ships turned to bring all their guns to bear as well. One American destroyer was sunk by Japanese cruisers during the shooting phase.

Turn 2 - The Japanese battleships blasted the island again and were rewarded with something blowing up. The battleships all missed each other as did the cruisers. The destroyer skirmish was inconclusive as well. All players were confused as to why they were getting virtually no hits. At the end of the turn more American ships came onto the board.

By the Japanese appeared the large cruiser Alaska leading the cruisers Baltimore and Canberra onto the board. Next to the island 6 American ships appeared. The battleships Indiana and North Carolina are a close match for the Japanese super-ships, while the cruisers Wichita, Minneapolis, Vincennes, and San Francisco are additional welcome relief to the beleaguered Americans.

Turn 3 - The Japanese were slowly moving toward the island while their cruisers and destroyers moved toward the American ships to screen their battleships. This turn the shooting was a lot more exciting. Kumano got hammered by Alaska and lost several turrets. Myoko started flooding. Yamato and Musashi used their secondary turrets to blow several destroyers out of the water, but they had already launched their torpedoes. Omaha and Milwaukee ganged up and sunk a Japanese destroyer. Suzuya was sunk by torpedo but the American destroyers were out of torpedoes at this point.

Turn 4 - The Japanese turned to escape, feeling that their mission was complete. The Americans didn't try fancy maneuvering, they simply charged the Japanese. Several ships were damaged in the new exchange of gunfire, including the last surviving American destroyer. The American battleship commander wished he could actually do some real damage to the Japanese as his older battleships couldn't even penetrate the armor of Yamato and Musashi if he hits.

Turn 5 - The last turn of the game. The American cruisers continued to accomplish little, and Baltimore barely avoided being torpedoed. Alaska finally sank Kumano after hammering it all game. Two more Japanese cruisers sank to gunfire from the older American battleships, while North Carolina finally hit Musashi and, amazingly, took out all three main battery turrets with three hits. All players were amazed by this and wondered if main battery hits should be more rare.

After this turn the victory points were tallied. The Americans sunk three Japanese cruisers for three victory points and destroyed the main turrets on Musashi for another three points, bringing them to six. But the Japanese destroyed the island's airfield, the tarmac, one ammo dump, both fuel storage farms, and one set of barracks. They get eleven victory points and score a victory, having met their objectives.

All the players enjoyed the game and had suggestions on how to make the scenario work better. If I run this one again, there will be fewer ships involved and they will be closer together at the beginning so some hits can actually be made. Nothing really happened for the first three turns until finally some real fighting took place. I might try to make my next scenario a knife fight in a phone booth in the dark, just for giggles and the sheer violence of it all.

— Mike, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Full Thrust: Diplomatic mission ends in fighting

2011-11-01T06:49:00.000-07:00

I played my first game of Full Thrust using the Cross Dimensions rules. I greatly enjoyed the game and finally experienced an Epic Space Battle. Our attempts to do this as kids, using Starfleet Battles rules, resulted in 2-day long games with a metric ton of paperwork. Using Full Thrust, we were able to finish a multi-ship game in 3 hours, with minimal bookkeeping.

Our host had a cool starfield mat for our game, and Patrick and Ryan had impressive ship collections, so I was able to borrow a New Anglican Confederation fleet. Together Ryan and I would have a total of 6 capital ships and 6 gunships; Pat would have 2 battleships, a number of missile destroyers and smaller capital ships, and at least 6 gunships.

However, his force would be split; some waiting in-system, the rest forced to wait at least 5 turns before coming on to the board. After a quick description of the scenario and some initial setup, we went over the rules. Pat is good at explaining rules and we were ready to go after an overview and some quick questions. I'm going to continue in narrative form, because the game really fired my imagination.

Constant border tensions had been taking their toll; our many attempts at peaceful resolution had been rebuffed by our unpleasant Gothic neighbors, the Neu Swabian Legue. One more attempt at a peaceful diplomatic mission would be attempted, but this time we would have some insurance in place--no more "deep space accidents" as our Germanic friends called them. In conjunction with our allies from the Eurasian Solar Union and a task force from L'Astromarine des FSE, we prepared a mix of capital ships, escorts, and gunships. With great care and stealth, we infiltrated a gunship squadron of three ships and and one small escort into a gas cloud near the flagship of the Neu Swabian League. Running on minimal life support, they waited patiently for the arrival of our diplomatic mission.

We approached in 2 groups and made good speed towards the planet of New Alsace-Lorraine. The stance of the NSL fleet changed in a manner that seemed rude and hostile. We sent out communications assuring them that we were on a diplomatic mission while putting our crews on battle-alert. After a short while it became obvious that the NSL fleet was moving to attack, and we decided to activate our insurance. The gunships exploded out of the gas cloud and massed around the sides and stern of the NSL battleship. Attempts at communicating with the battleship were pointless, as it immediately opened fire on our ambassadors of peace. The gunship Kukri was crippled almost immediately, and was soon lost with all hands. However the ESU ship scored many hits on the battleship, and my gunships Dagger and Raj fired all they had. It was obvious that the NSL wanted a fight.

Our capital ships were still too far to assist, so the gunships were all on their own for a while. They continued to inflict heavy damage on the battleship, but before long gunship Raj was obliterated. The Dagger finally pulled away and made towards the planet. About that time the capital ships came into contact, and the darkness of space was filled with missiles, torpedoes, and beams. To be honest, my gunners did only slight damage to the NSL fleet, but my allies scored hit after hit; many of them well-placed shots to power cores, life support, and fire control systems. Our right flank advanced steadily, while I held the middle, and sent the CL Victory to meet gunship Dagger at the planet. Victory had a full complement of elite and heavily armed diplomats that planned to land at the planet’s capital city.

The NSL’s reinforcements had arrived and entered the fray by now, scoring many hits on the Dagger but failing to destroy her. She would shortly take up orbit around New Alsace-Lorraine and begin to disrupt planetary communications. My allies continued to disable or destroy NSL ships; the first of the NSL battleships drifted, without bridge control and a failing life support system, directly into the path of BC Vengeance. Vengeance’s boarding parties, wearing vacc suits, were soon swarming over the crippled hulk.

The CL Victory took heavy damage on its way to the planet but took out a gunship in return and was well on its way to landing troops, I mean diplomats, on the planet, when the NSL fleet retreated and engaged their FTL drives. Our colonists could rest a little easier, knowing the border had been pushed back...at least for a little while.

— Bryan, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Games played: WarEngine and In the Emperor's Name

2011-10-25T10:22:00.000-07:00

Last week's game night saw two events being run concurrently: a WarEngine scenario hosted by Mike, and a guncrawl game run by Tim at an adjacent table. Tim used the 40k-lite skirmish ruleset In the Emperor's Name for his scenario.

I had a chance to play through both scenarios in about 3 hours. In the WarEngine game, we decided on the spot to make use of the excellent 2-story warehouse terrain piece that Karl had brought in. We plopped it in the center of the table, put a tank inside and said that both sides were racing to claim to vehicle for themselves.

The photo below shows how close my scavengers (from Pig Iron's Kolony Ferals line) got to the tank before being thrown back by the opposing troopers.

The game was a bit of a bloodbath for me. Both Mike and I concluded that WarEngine tends to play best at around 2,000 points per side, which is generally a far larger game than our club plays. In WarEngine, 2,000 points per side is at least 20 models per player. For this game, we played 1,000 points per side, and consequently we just didn't get a very robust experience in terms of mobility and morale. It was just too small for the game's rather epic firepower mechanics.

Karl also ran his Void Junkers through the same scenario. Here are a few pics from his foray. Note the sandrunners...they devastated their enemies, but then one fell to enemy fire, and subsequently fell off the table and broke. Karl decided to put the stricken sandrunner back on the table where he died, hence this photo.

Over at the other table, Tim had set up a bunch of interlocking floor tiles taken from the Doom board game for his guncrawl. To my surprise, he had written a short bit of fluff that set the scenario in our Galactic Frontier setting, which was completely awesome and really helped set the scene for me as a player. In the game, a handful of Terran troopers were investigating a derelict stellar wreck (or space hulk, if you'd prefer) which was infested with bugs. Here are Karl (left) and Tim prior to the start of the game.

Tim is developing this scenario to maybe run at a convention one day, so we played it less like a by-the-book battle and more like a competitive brainstorming session. We both suggested new ideas and modified existing elements on the fly. I particularly liked the inclusion of one-time-use batteries carried by the troopers. These batteries could be used to open doors, activate various utility robots scattered throughout the ship, or attempt to download sensitive information from the ship's mainframe computer. The Terrans received only 10 batteries at the start of the game, so they became a precious resource that had to be shepherded throughout the scenario.

Here are a couple more photos of the doomed Terrans as they pushed deeper into the crippled starship.

I found that I really liked In the Emperor's Name. The ruleset is solid and the gameplay is fast. I also love that it's a fan-made supplement that appears to be supported by an engaged group of players. The average game calls for 6 to 10 models per side — almost exactly the same amount as Song of Blades & Heroes — so I predict we'll dig deep into this ruleset for sci-fi skirmish.

— PatrickWR, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Coming next week: Zombies!

2011-10-24T08:34:00.001-07:00

Tim sent over this photo of a house (made from Hirst Arts molds) and a pack of zombies from Wargames Factory. We're slowly assembling a vast horde of undead, as well as some intrepid survivors, ahead of our Nov. 3 zombie game. Tim is devising a scenario using All Things Zombie from Two Hour Wargames, with a few special rules thrown in for good measure.

Expect a post-game report with photos after the game!

How to turn a model railroad building into wargame scenery

2011-10-21T13:00:00.000-07:00

My newest structure, which we used during this week's game night, started life as a Walthers kit, Backshop 933-3039. I found it in a resale shop for 6 bucks! This exact kit is currently out of production, but a slightly larger version is available.

Though in HO scale (roughly 18mm scale) this building's large entrances (intended for HO railroad engines) and extremely high ceilings suggested possible use in 28mm wargaming. Being from Walthers, it's no surprise that the molding of parts is flawless, assembly is dead simple and the resulting structure is very sturdy. However, a few changes had to be made.

In order for larger 28mm vehicles to access the structure, the front and back entrances were enlarged.

The grooves for track in the floor, as well as the rest of the floor, were plastered over.

The large windows looked great, but for wargaming purposes some of them need to be reduced. Luckily, this kit comes with rolling door and brick options for the various entrances, which happened to be the same width as the windows! These, along with a bit of brick I had cutaway from the enlarged doorways, were used to mostly brick up the windows on one side.

This added the impression of rolling window shutters as well.

Also, it had a sloping roof, unsuitable for the placing of miniatures. This was remedied by cutting away the roof guides on the inside of the parapet walls and making new edge supports for the flat roof out of various bits of plastic.

Perhaps most importantly, the kit has no 2nd story floor. Luckily it included two extra roof supports and some other I-beam bits which I sawed up and used to make supports for the floor. The floor itself is a piece of plastic cross-stitch mesh fabric, a material I find supremely useful for walkways, windows, grates and other wargame terrain details. As always, I lightly sanded both sides so that the soft plastic will better accept glue and paint. Superglue is a must for this type of material. This mesh was also used for a ladder and the grating over the drains on the ground floor.

Nearly all the various techy bits are pieces of Pegasus Hobbies Hexagon and Chemical Plant kits. Hexagon panels have obvious attachment points where they are meant to clip together, but the tech sections from panels are easily trimmed with a pair of clippers.

After assembly, painting was quite easy. I primed the entire thing with Krylon Ruddy Brown. Windows, grating and roof were primed black. I did a "wet" drybrush of colors, followed by a lighter drybrush for some sections. Then I glued in the windows and gratings that had been primed black and painted those. Brown wash and orange drybrush helped dirty up the details, then I lightly dusted the building with a clear matte spray to protect the paintjob.

In the end the piece is very playable. The roof and 2nd floor accommodate figures well and two of the sides have adequate cover on the ground floor. We found during a recent game that the interior was large enough to accommodate big 28mm vehicles.

Most importantly, the finished product is generic enough to would work well in near-future and sci-fi genres that our club tends to play. These pictures show it being used in a game of WarEngine, and it will feature prominently in our upcoming post-Halloween zombie game.

Much of the inspiration for this building is owed to the wonderfully 40k-ified railroad buildings featured at Necromundicon, which are far more detailed than mine, but also more tied to the “Grimdark” 40k setting. Our club isn't known for playing 40k, but those who do will be pleased to know that this building scales well along side the 40k plastic building kits.

—Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

Ryan's Orcs carry the flag for Chicago Skirmish Wargames — literally

2011-10-21T08:41:00.000-07:00

Ryan, a founding member of Chicago Skirmish Wargames who has since embarked upon a self-imposed exile in Kansas City, found time this summer to finish painting a group of GW Black Orcs.

Look closely at the banner — it was inspired by the City of Chicago flag, which incidentally served as the basis for CSW's own logo. Props to Ryan for keepin' it real with his roots! We hope to face off against these green-skinned raiders when Ryan visits next spring.

Review: Tomorrow's War by Ambush Alley Games

2011-10-18T08:39:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow's War, the new hard sci-fi tabletop wargame from Ambush Alley Games and Osprey Publishing, is something of a hybrid. It's not a skirmish game where individually armed soldiers move around the battlefield on their own initiative, nor is it a stand-based game like Alien Squad Leader, where the smallest unit is a base of 3-5 figures representing a single squad or fireteam.

Rather, Tomorrow's War uses individually based figures (of any scale, though the book uses plenty of 15mm and 28mm example photos) to simulate squad-based actions. Single figures don't fire at single targets; instead, squads add up their firepower based on the number of effective troopers plus any support weapons. They roll these attack dice against a similar handful of defense dice representing the opposing squad and any cover modifiers.

This basic engine forms the nucleus of a very innovative, playable sci-fi game. It's clearly designed to model gritty, near-future sci-fi, rather than the zany, far-future hijinx that other games cover all too well. The rules don't differentiate between basic trooper weapons — an assault rifle = laser rifle = heat ray. But that's OK ... Tomorrow's War rewards common sense tactics, which is refreshing to say the least.

Our club tried out Tomorrow's War last month after receiving a preview copy from Osprey. Having played 5150 from Two Hour Wargames, we were pleased to see that Tomorrow's War's reaction/overwatch system forms an integral part of the game. Each turn, the player who wins initiative can choose to place some or all of his fire teams (the smallest unit building block in the game) on overwatch, thus giving them the chance to interrupt enemy actions later in the turn. Then, non-overwatching units get to move and shoot like normal — but the enemy can attempt to react to these actions with reactions of his own. It's the rare turn where you'll be sitting on your hands, waiting for your opponent to finish moving his dudes.

Unlike 5150, these action/reaction cycles don't go on forever. There is a clear stopping point, which TW defines as a "round of fire." Our club liked this a lot, as we'd gotten caught up in several seemingly endless chain reactions during our last game of 5150.

Some games offer a super-granular approach to weaponry (think lots of +1 bonuses, different range bands, templates, etc) but TW deliberately ignores all this. Basic soldier weapons can see and shoot anywhere on the table within line of sight. Every piece of open ground is a potential kill zone.

Differentiation comes in the form of various troop stats, which are generally shared by everyone in a given unit. Troop Quality is the most common stat rolled, but there's also Morale (how inspired the troops are on this particular day), Tech Level (better tech = more firepower), Supply (well supplied troops can afford to waste ammo), Confidence (do you trust your logistics supply chain and senior leadership?) and Combat Stress.

Frankly, the number of individual stats here seem a bit overwhelming. Why differentiate between Morale and Confidence? Semantically they mean about the same thing, and I don't think the game would suffer much if they were just rolled into one stat. Thankfully, most firefights will involve just Troop Quality and Morale.

It's also clear that the authors LOVE their acronyms, especially as it pertains to weaponry. I can't tell you how many times I struggled with abbreviations such as RGL, NOE, SAGP and SLAM. Often these abbreviations showed up in sentences, only to be defined in a pullout box three pages later. Not good, especially when the reader (me) is flipping pages trying to find the definition so he can properly get his game up and running! The writing assumes a level of military tech-speak that I don't yet possess.

Another quibble is the wound system. When a unit takes casualties, the figures may be 1) dead 2) lightly wounded or 3) severely wounded. If it's the last two options, the figure stays on the board but reduces the combat effectiveness of the squad (as they administer first aid and move more slowly with the wounded trooper). The rules for this are fantastic, but the execution pretty much requires you to place a bunch of little counters, chits or markers next to lots of individual figures throughout the game.

In our game, 3 of 4 figures in a fireteam had taken wounds, which meant that there were 3 individual tokens attached to the team, for a total of 7 little doodads that needed to be moved whenever the squad moved. This resulted in a very cluttered tabletop, which we didn't like because we enjoy taking lots of photos of our game (requiring the regular removal of tape measures, dice, counters, chits and tokens prior to the photos). We're already looking into some alternative and/or aesthetically pleasing ways to track wounds. Again, the rules for wounded figures are top notch, but the tabletop logistics are tough to deal with.

The game lacks a point system, which is perfectly fine for my club but which may turn off other players. I enjoy the challenge that comes with creating a balanced scenario or adapting something I found elsewhere for Tomorrow's War. The web is full of inspirational material, plus most of the scenarios written for Force on Force, Ambush Alley's flagship title, can be easily ported over to Tomorrow's War.

Individual chapters deal with vehicles, air support, artillery, robots and cyber-warfare. Power armor is suitably epic in TW — gone are the days of vanilla space marines fighting and dying in droves. If you field a 3-man fireteam of power armored infantry in TW, you can expect them to dominate their section of the battlefield. Power armor feels like power armor should, and that is a wonderful thing.

The section on asymmetric warfare is particularly interesting, as it includes a set of balanced rules for playing games with very imbalanced forces. A squad of basic troopers might look powerful on paper, but the game ensures a fair fight if they try to tangle with a nest of colonial rebels on some far-flung backwater planet, for example. You've really got to read over this section yourself to truly grasp the potential for asymmetric scenarios in Tomorrow's War.

The best part of Tomorrow's War is that most of the game is highly intuitive. The players instantly grasped the spirit of what the writers were trying to convey: that is, the explosive action that comes with a desperate, futuristic firefight. You want to move your guys? OK, well that chaingun team is going to fire off a belt of ammo if you do. Maybe you want to put that squad on overwatch to keep an eye out for insurgents? Well, the rebels might appear suddenly on your flank without warning.

What didn't I go over? Production values are top notch, but you've probably read that in other reviews. The official fluff is well and good, but our club probably won't be using it. There are rules for aliens, but the authors suggest that they not be all that different from human troopers, which is fine by me.

To sum up, Tomorrow's War is a great exciting product that has injected a big dose of hard sci-fi excitement into our local club. We're eagerly anticipating the commercial release so we can try our hand at crafting some scenarios.

— PatrickWR, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member

After-action report: Tomorrow's War

2011-10-17T08:30:00.000-07:00

After a supply ship was brought down by Neo-Soviet recon elements on the desert world Fornacis V, the decision was made to send in a retrieval squad from Markham's Skybolts, a well-known mercenary company operating dirtside on the planet. The pilot bailed out and made landfall, offering vague details about the Neo-Soviet platoon that was mustering in the dry woodlands around his position. He sought refuge in a nearby colony hab-unit and waited for rescue.

My local club gathered this week to try out Tomorrow's War, the highly anticipated "hard" sci-fi ruleset from Ambush Alley Games and Osprey Publishing. We had been hearing about this game for the better part of a year, as it debuted a while back as an add-on to an existing Ambush Alley title. Now it's being released as a standalone hardcover book — a gorgeous tome, I should add, replete with tons of color photos and example illustrations.

The folks at Osprey were kind enough to send me an advance copy to read and review. What follows here is a battle report of the Skybolts' attempt to extract their pilot from a Neo-Soviet ambush. I'll offer a more substantive review of Tomorrow's War in a future post.

For this game, I ran a scenario straight out of the book. Four players showed up, so I opted not to run a squad and instead perched on a stool spewing rules minutiae for the entire two-hour game.

The photo at the top of this post shows the battlefield at the outset of the game. The three 4-man Skybolt fireteams (figures from Pig Iron Productions' Heavy Infantry range) entered at the bottom of the picture and had to reach the building, grab the pilot and exit the map by Turn 8. Four Neo-Soviet squads were waiting in ambush in the scrub woods surrounding the building.

The first two turns saw the Skybolts players rush their mercenary squads forward, using the rapid move ability to grab some cover on the flanks.

The Neo-Soviet players responded by moving a few squads out of ambush and advancing forward, prompting a couple firefights. In Tomorrow's War, a unit that is being fired on can choose to react by either returning fire or moving away. Moreover, a troop quality check made at the outset of that exchange means that sometimes the targeted squad is able to shoot first, inflicting casualties on the enemy squad before it has a chance to shoot.

Lots of these little firefights — called 'rounds of fire' in the rulebook — erupted as the various fireteams jockeyed for position on the tabletop. The Neo-Soviet troops were low quality but numerically superior. The Skybolt mercenary soldiers were high quality, but few in number. Both sides inflicted a few casualties before the Skybolts managed to charge into the building in the center of the table, quickly locating the missing pilot. From there, they used the comparative safety of the building to pour fire into a Neo-Soviet squad, all but wiping them out.

By this point we were on turn 5, and the mercenary players knew they didn't have much time to dither. They hustled the pilot back toward their edge of the table as fast as possible — which wasn't very fast, considering that squads escorting dependents (the pilot in this case) can't use the rapid move ability! Seeing this, the Neo-Soviet players charged their squads out of cover and began a full-on pursuit across the windswept battlefield. Here they go!

The Skybolt squad in the lower right corner has been 'wiped out' in game terms. The soldiers aren't dead, but there isn't a healthy trooper available to make a first aid check, so the unit stays tipped over until its casualties are assessed. As it happened, this squad wasn't reached by a healthy trooper before the end of the game, so the tipped-over models counted as captured soldiers for the scenario. This particular victory condition put the Neo-Soviet players over the top when we tallied up points at the end.

Anyway, the Skybolts slogged through a fearsome hail of gunfire as the Neo-Soviets enveloped them with superior numbers. Luckily Skybolt one squad that had spent pretty much the entire game on overwatch proved very useful at disrupting the Neo-Soviets advance. With just 3 combat effective soldiers, this little fireteam held up at least twice their number of lower quality Neo-Soviet troopers. This sacrifice allowed the main squad to escape with the pilot at the end of Turn 8. Here's the squad (with pilot) as they make their exit off the battlefield. The rearguard fireteam is just visible in the distance; those soldiers were honored posthumously for their dedication to the mission.

So, the Skybolts won, right? They accomplished their mission? Well, they did, but the Neo-Soviet players also had their own mission objectives. Chief among those were "inflict casualties" and "capture wounded," both of which they did in spades. The Neo-Soviets were able to squeak out a victory based on the specific parameters of this scenario. A marginal victory at best, as one of the Skybolt players pointed out.

Here's a picture of the final positions of the units on Turn 8. The Neo-Soviet players' squads are badly mauled but still active; the Skybolts also suffered proportionate casualties.

Overall I was very pleased with how this scenario turned out. Tomorrow's War doesn't have a point system, which makes it extremely important to craft well-balanced scenarios. This game was an example of that. The forces were evenly matched even though the Neo-Soviet player put about twice as many miniatures on the table as the Skybolts player. The mechanics supported this as well, with the Skybolts using their improved troop quality and weaponry to counter the numerical superiority of the Neo-Soviets.

The victory conditions meant that although the Neo-Soviet players were rather demoralized to watch their troopers die en masse for most of the game, they were still able to accomplish their objectives and win the day. This was a nice departure from so many games, where if you lose a big pile of figures you're pretty much guaranteed to lose the game as a result.

We made a few rules blunders here and there, of course, but overall the game played out quite well. I've played in horribly one-sided scenario games that were just no fun to play. This game moved along briskly and victory wasn't assured until the very last turn of the game! It was "a real nail-biter" as one player pointed out at the start of Turn 8. This game will likely become the go-to squad sci-fi game for our club.

(Editor's note: This battle report was originally published on RPG Diehard on Oct. 7. It has been republished here after Chicago Skirmish Wargames started its own in-house blog.)

About Chicago Skirmish Wargames

2011-10-17T08:16:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the blog for Chicago Skirmish Wargames, a local game club in Chicago, Illinois!

We're a friendly group of tabletop wargamers who enjoy many genres and scales. Our interests feature one important game element: generic, non-brand-specific rulesets that don't limit the miniatures we can use. We also try to keep our games small (about 8 to 20 figures per side) which makes it very easy to collect and paint up a squad, warband or gang. Our most common rulesets use 28mm scale figures, so that's what comprises most of our collection.

We play regularly at Chicagoland Games, a store on the north side, as well as various club members' homes. If you're like to meet up and play with us, you're encouraged to apply for membership to our Yahoo group.

Our goal for this blog is to chronicle our battle reports, photos and hobby tips. We're incredibly enthusiastic about playing with painted miniatures (as opposed to the "primer legion" or "silver horde" that some players put on the battlefield) so you'll find plenty of examples of painted figures on this blog.