At the first Privateer Press Weekend at DieCon 8 I assembled my Protectorate of Menoth forces to take a stab at the Hardcore tournament format. I was happy with my army’s performance and would have been happy to run it again but I wanted something different. This year I turned to my Legion of Everblight forces, the Frostfang Brood, to see if I could lead them to similar success but first I had to build an army.
For me the first step in building a Hardcore list was to decide what I wanted to accomplish. Every round of a Hardcore tournament is an assassination game so there’s no building lists for scenario victories but it’s not uncommon for players to gear their lists towards winning one or more of the four Hardcore medals:
Despite what most non-gamers think, gamers aren’t a bunch of socially maladjusted slobs with no sense of hygiene or communication skills. Most of the gamers I associate with are good folks who are friendly, outgoing, and dare I say normal. But still it’s inevitable that any community has its own shining stars of asshattery. One particular way this is embodied in the gaming community simply astounds me. “Ur game sux!”
I already talked aboutthe SS Designs Armored Personnel Carrier miniature bag. It works so well for me that I picked up one for each of my armies so I can transport both to events. Getting from my car to the game store for a game night wasn’t a big deal, but last year as con season approached I realized that I wasn’t going to throw a bag over each shoulder to walk from hotel to game room whenever I wanted to play a game. That’s when decided that I needed a miniature transport transport solution.
Folding Luggage Cart
For criticizing their Armytransport, Sabol Designs has a decent con-going solution in their Division bag, but it’s a pricey $165. On top of that I didn’t need yet another bag – I already had two that worked fine. I stumbled across a better solution at a local department store – a folding luggage cart.
It’s not elegant but it does the job. A pair of bungee cords hold my miniature cases in place and there’s plenty of space on top of them to toss a backpack (or another miniature case or two). Or if you’re a podcaster a portable studio’s worth of recording gear.
Most wargamers will inevitably run into the issue of transportation when they want to take their armies of choice to a game somewhere other than their home. For some gamers the simple solution is to toss their miniatures into shoe boxes, tupperware, or tackleboxes. However for gamers who want something that provides a little more protection, the foam tray and shell system has become the army transport option of choice.
There are a number of companies that cater to the miniature war gamer and manufacture cases specifically for this purpose. I’ve checked out a few manufacturers’ products but in the end the best transport case hands down was the Armored Personnel Carrier by SS Designs.
The other hosts of Iron Agenda and I found the SS Designs bags when we were first getting into Warmachine back in 2006. Ever since we showed up to our first tournament with them folks immediately started trying to get our local game stores to carry the bag. Almost everyone immediately saw their benefits over the more common Sabol bags. Since that time the APC has become the most dominant bag among the Warmachine crowd. It’s just that good.
The St. Louis Riverdogs are pleased to announce our second Annual Privateer Weekend at Diecon 9. This will be the premiere event for the Midwest prior to Gen Con 2009. Privateer Weekend contains 3 days of spine crushing, cortex smashing fun over more than 8 events. The terrain is amazing and includes specialized scenario tables. The competitors are top tier in both skill and personality. The gaming will be second to none. Featured events over the weekend include three steamroller competitions, an ongoing Tide of War competition, Iron Kingdom knowledge tests hosted by Capt. Saulty Dog, and our main event, an official Hardcore tournament on Saturday. If this wasn’t enough, monsters will also be running loose throughout the city as we host 3 monsterpocalypse events over the weekend.
Check out http://diecon.gamestlouis.com for our complete event schedule and follow the link to Diecon 9 to see other convention activities and pre-register. Or check out http://www.diecon.com for a summary of all convention events and to preregister. Preregistration can be done by paypal for $26 for the entire weekend! Those wishing to participate in our Saturday’s official Hardcore tournament should select PP Hardcore under the list of Sat Events. There is an additional $5 fee for the Hardcore event that will be paid on site but those who play in hardcore will receive a specialized dog tag for participation. A summary of our event schedule is below.
Iron Agenda: The podcast about Warmachine, Hordes, and whatever else is on our minds.
We’re finally ready for an official announcement! The Iron Agenda Podcast is an hour long discussion in which we will try to cover two topics – one strategic topic and one more meta-related topic – when discussing Privateer Press miniature games. That said we’re certainly going to stray from this format from time to time. In fact we’re occasionally going to stray from PP games entirely – we already have plans for a Pulp City episode for example.
In addition to the regular hosts you’ll hear other voices from time to time as we have some of the other locals on to provide additional views on whatever topics we happen to be discussing.
Our first episode has been released on our web site as well as an initial Episode 0 designed as an introduction to our show. Episode 2 and Bonus Episode 1 have both been recorded and are currently being edited – our feed will be updated as soon as they drop.
We’re still finding our voices and settling into things but we’d love to get feedback from anyone who cares to listen.
As exhausting and draining as it was, Privateer Weekend was a phenomenal success. The PP Weekend committee did a fantastic job organizing the events and putting the weekend together. We had a number of great players come in from the surrounding areas and every tournament that was run was packed. And to top it all off we were able to reach the 32-man requirement for our Official Hardcore tournament and still had about a dozen people playing in a Hordes Steamroller event that ran simultaneously!
Despite my best intentions, I got absolutely no models finished in February. Not a single one. Talk about shooting my efficiency in the foot. I’m going to go out on a limb and say the primary culprit for this procrastination was an old nemesis which somehow caught back up with me: Sid Meyer’s Alpha Centauri. That cursed game consumed many hours back in college and when I made the mistake of reinstalling it I found myself falling into old habits. However March was an entirely different story.
The St. Louis Riverdogs are pleased to announce our first Annual Privateer weekend at Diecon 8. This will be the premiere event for the Midwest prior to Gencon 2008. Privateer weekend contains 3 days of spine crushing, cortex smashing fun over more than 7 events. The terrain is amazing including specialized scenario tables. The competitors are top tier in both skill and personality. The gaming will be second to none. Featured events over the weekend include three steamroller competitions, an ongoing tour of duty competition, painting competitions, Iron Kingdom knowledge test against Capt Saulty Dog, and our main event, an official Hardcore tournament on Saturday.
Check out http://diecon.gamestlouis.com for our complete event schedule and follow the link to Diecon 8 to see other convention activities and preregister. Or check out http://www.diecon.com for general convention information. A summary of our event schedule is below.
I’m pretty happy how quickly I was able to get some painting done in January. I started my Blighted Legionnaires early on and was able to finish them in less that two weeks. While I was working on them I also completed my Swamp Gobbers Bellows Crew. After that I took about a week or so off and before deciding to break into the big stuff. I’ve had a few warbeasts sitting around primed – a second Carnivean, a second Seraph, and my Raek – that I decided to try to do all at once. It’s slow going and the process is pretty monotonous but they’ve been sitting in my miniature case primed for long enough.
Raek Flesh Details
I haven’t finished the warbeasts yet but I hope to in February. I’m taking my time and trying a slightly different color scheme – doing something a little more gray and a little less blue. I’m also adding a little bit of texture to the beasts’ musculature to give it some additional visual interest. I still have some shading to do on the skintones – especially on the Seraph – but I’m making pretty good progress. I finished up the dirt and stone on their bases and now just have to do the wrecked warjack on the Carnivean’s base, the Seraph’s wings, and the bone and mouths on all the beasts.
Angelius Tail Repose
On top of the painting I’ve also started work reposing my second Angelius. I hacked apart the end of its tail and repositioned it using an paper clip armature. I’ve added some bulk with greenstuff already but haven’t gotten any detail work done on the top layer. I’m looking to finish the sculpting and assembling the rest of the model by the end of the month. That way I can have both Angelii primed and ready to paint so I can do them both when the mood finally strikes me. Given how much I like using these beasts I hope the mood strikes me sooner rather than later.
I did pick up Aiyana and Holt as well as a box of Incubii and a Feralgeist in January. I also had a few gift certificates that let me get a second Angelius and a box of Farrow Bone Grinders. Thirteen models in and twelve out left me one in the whole for the month, dropping my running total to a negative seven – definitely not the direction I was hoping to go.
At least there’s only about 7 models from February through April that I’m interested in getting, so I’ve got a good chance of pulling back into the positive pretty soon as long as I can keep up a decent pace. With any luck I can be in the black by the end of March.
