Let's Talk About Mechs, Baby! (Part 1)

 

Ahhh Battletech. I picked up Battledroids from my local comic book store back in '84. We had a good time with it, and picked two or three of the twin pack of plastic 1/144 scale mechs. A name change and  year later second edition was released. This was the core of modern Battletech. I played it obsessively for the next five years or so. Loved the expanding lore; the Clan invasion was one of the highlights of gaming. 

Alas Battletech's super detailed game system was a two edged sword. It felt great tracking all the damage on a full 8.5x11 sheet (per mech) you could really fine tune the tactics to the mech(s) you had on the table.

But...It was a slow game. Like, a really slow game.

It took a few hours to fight a 4 v 4 battle with experienced players. Any more than that and your whole weekend is gone. Which also meant there was a real shallow pool of viable scenarios, mostly just matching different types of Lances against each other. 

I guess it is a hyper detailed skirmish game? 

Still, I loved it. Painted a couple of companies worth of metal mechs, read all the novels, tried some of the variant games (Aerotech, Succession Wars, Battleforce, et al) still my number of plays kept going down. Then three things happened in the early '90s: The amount of good Battletech product releases approached zero, Good PC video games arrived and, of course, Warhammer 40K.  More specifically  Adeptus Titanicus, a giant mech game with (ahem) truly epic battles. That much pretty ended my tabletop Battletech gaming.

However, I never totally abandoned Battletech. I still picked up the novels (such as they were at the time) Played Mechwarrior 2, 3, and 4 a whole lot, and hoped for some kind of makeover of the game system.

Then came the Kickstarter...  To be continued! 

 

Go Roll Some Dice

Giant Robots Make Everything Better

New Paints for Painting

As I've said many times before, I'm an average painter. I do think I've done up a few models that verge on really good, but for the most part I'm painting for the battlefield. My skill has improved over the last five years or so, and I'm pretty happy of where I am at. But that doesn't mean I take don't take small steps forwards, and try new things. 

Waaay back in the early '80s when I was building plastic model airplanes I was painting out of the Testors Model Master paint jars, and it was good.

So it wasn't much of a culture shift when I got into miniature wargaming. I gradually shifted over to Citadel paint pots, mostly for the more appropriate color range, but the water wash-up was new and awesomely better than cleaning my brushes with paint thinner.

The dropper bottles came onto the scene, but I never really cared for them, mostly because I didn't use a pallet, and it just kinda seemed like extra steps for no good reason.

Well, I've slowly come around. I really do like the new Army Painter Fanatic line of paints, and I see the usefulness of the dropper bottles as well. Now that I am expanding with some non-40K minis, the available colors matter as well again. So now I have a mixed arsenal of pots and bottles with a truly wide range of colors to pick from. There are many choices out there, don't limit yourself just because you haven't tried something.

Go Sling Some Paint

Fun Comes in Many Shapes

 

Escape from Projekt Riese Lands

 

Well it took a long time, but my Deluxe version has finally arrived. It has the base game and all the expansion minis in a very nice two box slipcase.

The base game game comes with full color standees and is completely playable without any kind of miniature. The flip book full of maps and scenarios makes for a compact and fast set up/playing game. 

But...

I'm a sucker for minis. WW2 weird war Nazi zombie monsters? Oh my yes. The figures are pretty good. Softer plastic than I would have preferred, but nice sculpts with good details. I'm sure they will paint up just fine. 

I'm going to read the rules and get it on the table this week for festive zombie slaying.

Go Roll Some Dice

Try Something New

Spooky Season Gaming

 

While I wait for my Deluxe version of Escape from Projekt Riese to arrive (next week, juuust missed Halloween) I thought I would throw together a quick list of horror themed games we have played recently.

The new kid on the block. The first game in Rayobx's WW2 zombie games, it is a compact and fast playing solo/co-op zombie killer. 

Fourth(!) in the Horrified series, we have only given it a couple of plays, but it is quite good, and you can add in the monsters from Horrified Greek Monsters (which our current favorite of the lot).

Great for a group of like minded folk, it's silly and fast paced culty fun!

While mostly being long over playing Munchkin, I do like to drag out the Cthulhu set for the Halloween party.

A very fun game, and very thematic, it does a good job of making the player feel hunted. It is a solo only experience, but a very good one. Huge amounts of replayability, and I have a few expansions I've yet to try out.

Still my favorite of the Zombicides, fast and fun, great with 1-4 players. Now if I could just get around to painting the minis...

My new Number One horror game! It's kind of a tower defense style game, but you are trying to get the hell out of there. I will do a review of it soon-ish. 

There are a few classics I didn't mention because they did not hit the table in the last few months. Maybe next year!

Go Roll Some Dice

In Costume!