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Ride of the Menofix

ByDankelzahn

I’ve gotten a little bit of painting done lately but not as much as I would have liked. I’m still making progress, though, and I have a few WIP pictures of my latest projects that I can post.

Knight Exemplar Vengers
Exemplar Vengers

The biggest reason for how little I’ve actually gotten painted as of late is my Exemplar Vengers. I don’t even want to try to total up how many hours I’ve spent on these models up to this point, but I’m sure it’s no small number. The gold edging on the armor plates – present on both the mount and the rider – was probably the biggest time sink. Between a black base coat, a coat of silver, a couple coats of gold, and a blackline just inside the edging, I spent a few evenings on that alone. But all in all I’m happy with how the cavalry turned out and I’ve enjoyed fielding them.

Dervish WIP
Dervish WIP

My most recent work has been on my Dervish light warjack, pictured to the left.   After as much time as I spent on the cavalry, this model was actually pretty quick to paint.   I did the purple and tan in one evening, then the metallics in another.   A third evening was spent basing and some general clean-up and now he’s just about done. I’m not exactly happy with the menofixes on the forearm plates yet, but once I get them how I like them I’ll be ready to seal this miniature and call it done.

Base
Custom Base

I’ve also been doing a little work on a base for another miniature I’m assembling at the moment. I started by taking a cast of a Cryxian bonejack (sans head) and putting it on a base.   After that I drilled some holes where the leg would be and added some wire and brass tubing to look like a broken leg joint system. Then I smoothed some greenstuff in a pool at the neck which I’ll paint up as necrosludge. I have some plans for this jack’s head, but you’ll have to wait for the finished product to see that.

The Harbinger of Menoth
Harbinger Skin Tone

Last night I finally started on my Harbinger of Menoth. I’ve had this model for some time now but have been hesitant to start painting and assembling as I wasn’t sure just what I wanted to do with her. Now that I’ve got that all settled in my mind, I assembled her torso (including the brass rod which replaces the flag pole) and started painting her flesh. Instead of using one of my standard flesh tones – I have a yellowy one and a more pink one – I decide to mix the two. I’m pretty happy with the results so far and am anxious to see how it looks once the rest of the miniature is painted.

Finally I had to do a repair job on my Gorman di Wulf miniature. I loaned it to another gamer to use in a game a few weeks ago and he dropped it, chipping the paint on the helmet and the cloak. I didn’t get a picture of it after the fix, since it really looks the same as it does in my miniature gallery.

So that’s what I’ve been working on lately. I’m going to be concentrating on the Harbinger in the near future and hope to have her done in the next week or so. I’ll be taking my time with her and hopefully she’ll turn out well.

Star Wars: The Twilight Path, Reborn!

ByDankelzahn

After a long break to allow the new father in our group to get accustomed to parenthood, we’ve finally restarted our Star Wars campaign, The Twilight Path. The session went pretty well for the most part – the action, roleplaying, and investigation elements were pretty well balanced and paced well throughout the adventure. Things started to drag at one point, but after a break for food we all came back to the table refreshed and regained our earlier vigor.

Unfortunately the gamemaster and I felt that the system was working against us this game. After our experiences with the Spirit of the Century rules, the d20 implementation of Star Wars felt even more clunky and cumbersome than when the game started. On the other hand the two other players really weren’t interested in any possible conversions and were more comfortable with the d20 ruleset so we won’t be converting this campaign.

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4/14/2007 Warmachine/Hordes Mixed Tournament Report

ByDankelzahn

Saturday, April 14th, one of the local Pressgangers ran the 500 Mixed Massacre at Dragon King Games using the Steamroller 3.0 beta rules. We had 11 players show up, including two who drove an hour and a half or so to attend. All of the factions were represented as well – there were two Cygnar, Cygnar, and Legion players while Khador, the Protectorate, Trollbloods, Circle, and Skorne had one player apiece.

Although I debated between the Protectorate and Legion until the last minute, I ultimately decided to go with the Menites to try to round out faction representation. I decided instead of bringing lists built for various scenarios, I’d build separate lists for Warmachine and Hordes opponents. With that in mind I put together the following:

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Renegade Horizon!

ByDankelzahn

Renegade HorizonLast Friday I finally got a chance to try out the Spirit of the Century rules in the first session of Renegade Horizon, a game set in our gamemaster’s homebrew world of Aria, and really enjoyed it. The game mechanics for SotC have proven quick and simple but with a depth that both encourages and rewards creativity and narration. However none of us were overly interested in the default setting of SotC – we wanted a world of high action but without the pulpiness of giant gorillas flying biplanes.

Because of the genre-mashing involved, it’s difficult to give a one-sentence summary of Aria. The closest RPG comparisons I can come up with would have to be Privateer Press’s Iron Kingdoms, which they describe as Full Metal Fantasy, and Misguided Games’ dieselpunk game Children of the Sun. A fantasy world at his heart, it does have some basic technology. The most advanced branch of science is aonics – the use of sigils and runes to bind minor “demons” to objects to create a specific effect. This new field has opened new avenues of technology such as limb replacement or airships. In addition men have learned that inscribing certain sigils onto themselves allows them access to a form of sorcery. However such sorcerers must constantly fight a losing battle against the bound demons for control and thus have been labeled heretics by the rest of the civilized world.

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Warmachine Call to Arms Wrap-Up

ByDankelzahn

Cryx vs. MenothThe local Warmachine league finally wound to a close a few weeks ago and from all appearances it was a rousing success. Here in St. Louis we had the largest league in the country, checking in with around 35 players grouped into 14 teams. There were plenty of new faces that showed up and the game store was packed on most league nights, and it was a great time week in and week out.

Cygnar boasted highest representation with 11 players (4 teams). Cryx and the Protectorate both had 8 players (3 teams each) and Khador trailed with 7 players (also 3 teams). Our final player was the organizing Pressganger who occupied a virtual spot on the ladder for the purpose of bonus points and accepted any challenge, playing whatever faction the other player chose.

One of the Cryxians, D.Vader, took the Champion pin, and his team Dead Men Walking (also including Saultydog/Superduck and AslainKheog) won the best team award. One of my Protectorate teammates, Rassillion007, snagged the Relentless award and Patman, a Cygnaran, scored the Tactician award.

Overall the league was a very enjoyable experience. I was able to play a lot of very enjoyable games against both new and old opponents. I also used use some warcasters that I hadn’t really used before to try out new lists and new strategies. I’ve learned the joy of the POW 14 Fire. However while the members of the local gaming group make the league a very enjoyable experience, I’m not 100% happy with the way that Privateer Press set up the rules for the league.

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The Failure that was Earthdawn: First Dawn

ByDankelzahn

In my last blarg I talked about the storyline I had put together for my recent Earthdawn game. If you haven’t read that blarg yet please do, because otherwise some of the issues or events I’ll be discussing below may not make sense.

First Dawn started well enough, with the characters interacting with the various residents of the kaer. Everyone had the opportunity to show off a bit of their character’s background and motivations (except the ork’s player who couldn’t make it) which I think they all enjoyed. After that the party was gathered together for a ceremony that ended with the kaer doors being opened and the party heading out through the traps to the surface with tokens which were supposed to disable the traps for them.

At the far end of the trapped area, the party was introduced to the obsidiman that was supposed to act as their guide. Centuries ago he had volunteered to enter the kaer and enter the Dreaming through the Scourge to be able to guide its people back to the surface when the time came. The party, being told he was how they would open the kaer doors but thinking he was just a statue/key, had drag him up to the surface with the aid of a disk of True Air which levitated him and allowed him to be floated to the front antechamber. Due to the proximity to the surface awoke while the party was resting, leading to some interesting interaction.

After some discussion with the obsidimen about who he was and then ultimately what to expect outside, the adepts finally opened the front doors to the kaer and saw the destruction the Scourge had caused to the countryside. With that visual the first session ended. In hindsight it was a successful session and had hit all of the goals and themes I had set (with the exception of the missing player).

Everything went downhill from there.

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Earthdawn: First Dawn – The Campaign that Wasn’t

ByDankelzahn

As mentioned previously, for the last two months I have been running an Earthdawn campaign I had titled First Dawn. The story was originally intended to cover one kaer’s reopening to the world above and the adepts who were sent to scout the surface. The game was scheduled to run roughly six to eight sessions and start with the exploration of the valley between Southhome, the player’s Kaer, and Northhome, their sister kaer.

Unfortunately during the second session I let the campaign take a sharp left turn away from my intent and things only went downhill from there. I primarily blame myself for this, but afterwards I just couldn’t get the story back on track. I’m going to try and identify the problems I had and what I could have done to correct them below. However in order to convey the magnitude of diversion from the intended story and feel I first need to start with a description of the campaign as it was intended to be.

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Database Server Upgrade

ByDankelzahn

I upgraded the database behind my instance of WordPress so any visitors should experience an improvement in page load times.

I’ve also been working on some new posts behind the scenes and hope to get those out soon.   In addition I’ve joined a new gaming group and have some more experiences and observations to inspire more blargs, so stay tuned.

Delayed Blast Fireblarg

ByDankelzahn

Turns out that running a campaign, trying to keep up with session write-ups, and doing a blarg just don’t work well together. I don’t have enough time to tackle all three sufficiently, so things have suffered for it. I’ve already decided to drop the detailed session write-ups and switch over to some basic overviews and summaries so that should provide some relief.

As for blarging and the campaign, I’ve been rather unhappy with how this campaign went. I made what I think was a major mistake early and wasn’t able to repair it quick enough to get the campaign back on track and it’s suffered for it. I’ve decided to wrap the game up after the next session and after that I’ll come back here and write more about where I went wrong with this game.

One More America Hill

ByDankelzahn

One More America Hill
Wednesday, February 14, 2007

With our league starting up next week, this was most likely to be the last America Hill game we’d be playing for awhile. In addition it may be my last battle report for a while. While I’m playing a league game I’m not going to be able take the time to take pictures of everything between turns. So don’t be expecting a new post every week. 🙂

This time around we went with some changes to the hill rules. To emphasize getting to to the hill even more, we required

  • At the end of each turn, the player with the most models on the hill gains 1 VP.
    • A unit counts as 1 model, regardless of the number of members on the hill
    • In the case of a tie, VPs are awarded to all players tied for most models on the hill
  • At the end of a turn where a player has his warcaster/warlock on the hill, the controlling player rolls 1d6 and gains the following bonus:
  1. Immediately activate the Yellow Woldwomper
  2. Immediately activate the Blue Woldwomper
  3. Immediately activate the Red Woldwomper
  4. Place any one model currently on the hill or within 3” of the hill within 6” of its current location. Model may not be placed more than 4” above the table surface. There must be room for the model’s base at the destination.
  5. Place 1d4 3” cloud effects in play anywhere completely within the warlock/warcaster’s control radius. These clouds remain in play for one round.
  6. Place 1 3” fire storm template anywhere within completely within the warlock/warcaster’s control radius. The warcaster/warlock must make a magic attack roll against each model in the AOE ignoring LOS, cover, concealment, elevation, Stealth, Invisibility, or intervening models. Each model hit suffers an unboostable POW 12 damage roll and the Fire continuous effect.

We also decided to fight it out on a large molded plastic terrain board and had to use a smaller hill for the center of the table. Most of the rocks and rubble provided cover, and we let people move out of their deployment areas without movement penalties on the first turn because it would have been too unfair to a couple players.

James, the Cryxian player, opted to go last so I wound up going first. We deployed and set up in the following order:

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