To Dust or not to Dust?

I've had en eye on Dust Tactics ever since I saw the first miniatures two years ago, I liked Paolo Parentes designs for AT-43 and having them brought back into their 'true' weird-war setting seemed like just the right thing to do. I never did get the old core set though, for two reason: the Allies didn't really do it for me (mainly due to their so-so medium walkers) and I wasn't sure the rules themselves would keep me interested. Simplicity  can certainly be a good thing, but it seems like it might be a bit too shallow. The judge is still out though. Need to play it more...

Anyway, the Axis troops and walkers looks great and I was thinking about buying some anyway to paint at least, and then perhaps get into the game later. While I mulled it over my friend Anders bought the core set and since he's the kind of guy who always go for the German faction if there is one I shelved my idea. Simply because it felt boring for both of us to build the same factions. Instead I turned my attention to Infinity (and I'm glad I did!).

However, Dust has stayed in my mind and it has been interesting to see the new models FFG has produced. I'm still not very keen on the Allied medium walkers, but the rest of the range looks great. And I might be in the minority here, but I really like the Allied heavy walker! Hehe! The light walkers look cool as well and the addition of command squads and heavy infantry seems to help diversify the game. But again... with only two factions I hesitated.

There has been talk of the Russians for a long time and now they have finally been announced! Or rather, the Sino-Soviet Union, so expect some Chinese as well. Even more than the other Dust Tactics miniatures the Russians really channel the old Red Blok faction of AT-43. Obviously this shouldn't come as a surprise, but I'm happy since I liked those old minis.

Obviously the star of he show is the KV47 medium walker. We've seen it before in different collectible model kits from DustGame.com but now they're available for gaming (and a more affordable price). It kind of looks like someone took a Scopedog from VOMOTS and hit it over the head with a huge mallet! And since the Scopedog is one of my all time favourite mecha it might explain me instantly taking to the KV47. It comes in three different configurations; twin cannons, twin flamethrowers or twin combat saws. And then there's the special character walker as well, Grandma, piloted by Koshka Rudinova (seen up top) which is armed with a cannon and a flamethrower.


Then there's the core troop choices:

 NKVD Close Combat Squad armed with shotguns, Molotov cocktails and a flamethrower. Really like the guy throwing the molotov!

NKVD Battle Squad armed with rifles and two machineguns. The true backbone of the army I suppose. Perhaps not as nice looking as the close combat guys, but very Russian! :)

And then we have the Command Squad that in addition to the regular officer/medic/radio operator combo includes a machine gun and a power tool - supposedly to dismantle those pesky walkers in close combat. Great looking squad! The medic is probably my favourite but the mustachioed officer looks the part as well.

And then we have... er... the chopper (or is it an autogyro? I'm not sure). Until now the minis have been really nice so seeing this thing made me a little sad. It just doesn't look very good, it reminds me of a bathtub toy for toddlers! Now, they obviously modelled it on the Kamov Ka-25 and the Mil Mi-4 but they messed it up somewhere along the way. While both of those choppers could be considered 'ugly' they still look real (as in, not like toys) whereas this SSU chopper is just too squashed up and weird looking. I'm hoping it's the angle but something tells me it's more than that. Now if only there were 1:48 scale models of any of the real choppers I wouldn't have to bother with this thing!

However, it comes with one redeeming feature: a squad of Chinese volunteers! Sure it's basically just a headswap but for some reason I really like these guys! Might be the paintjob. So unless the volunteers are released on their own later I guess I might have to add a chopper to my collection.

So, thos are the models, but what about the game? While I would like to play it a bit more, especially using command squads, I'm far from convinced that it is the kind of game that will keep my attention for long. There's of course the upcoming tabletop version of the game (instead of board game) that is being written by Andy Chambers, but since it's written with the intent for all the unit cards to be compatible I fear it might have too much baggage from its board game sister. I'll give it a look for certain, but I think the answer lies in looking at different rules systems.

My first instinct is to go with Secrets of the Third Reich. I don't know much more about it than what I read in this review, but I've heard several people speaking well of it and the setting fits like a glove. There wouldn't be any need to make up rules for walkers or Nazi zombies - they're already there! Then there's AE-WWII but it doesn't seem to enjoy as big a following as SotTR. Company B is working a 28mm version of DP9's Gear Krieg, called Gears and Guts, which might also fit the bill. Don't know much about how it will work though.

Looking beyond the Weird WWII stuff there's Tomorrow's War (which I'm going to get anyway), although it might be a bit too gritty and realistic for the semi-fantastic minis of Dust Tactics. Also, I'm not sure how well it handles larger games, which is something I would like to be able to play - kind of like a counterweight to skirmish games like Infinity and Heavy Gear.

Any other suggestions for 28mm miniature game rulesets that can handle infantry and walkers well? Or do you think there's more do Dust Tactics/Warfare than meets the eye? Let me know. :)

EDIT: Well, I tried out the new Dust Warfare rules and must say I like them quite a bit! You can read about my first impressions here.

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Wanted: More Spaceship Gaming!

Yepp, writing that Firestorm: Armada review got me thinking about other systems out there and my desire to play more spaceship combat games made itself known again. Well, it never went away but it grew even stronger! So here are some random thoughts on different systems, models and gaming mats.There are several systems that I have never tried but would like to as well as a few that I'd like to play again.

Full Thrust

There's only one way to start this article and that's with Full Thrust from GZG that I simply want to play more of. While I've played it a few times I don't think it's enough to form a firm opinion on how the system really works. It's a little clunky with all the order writing, but on the other hand I really like the kind of thinking ahead it forces you to do. In many ways it feels like the game you compare other games to - it has that kind of grandfather feel to it. In a good way! Sometime in the future we'll hopefully see a proper second edition of Full Thrust, but I know how busy Jon is and even though he wants to there is simply no time right now.

As for models, well... you've seen my UNSC and FSE fleets. I really like the GZG models in general and would love to expand my UNSC fleet. Unfortunately they're still out of production and waiting for new moulds to be made. In the meantime I've been thinking about getting some more ships for my FSE instead, or perhaps make a small pirate fleet and of course you can never have too many civilian/support vessels!

Lightning Strike

Another oldie is Lightning Strike from DP9. While you can still buy the models and the books there is no active support of the game from DP9 at this time. I really love the setting of Jovian Chronicles and the rules are interesting as well. The real stars of the show are the EXO armours that are supported by a small number of ships, however I think the system is stable enough to play without the mechs as well if that's more your thing. I would like to try it both ways, although my selection of models is very limited. I like the submarines in space vibe you get from the game and the fact that ECM plays a large part.

Right now I have a handful of Jovian and CEGA EXOs but no ships. Some of my favourite ship designs are made by DP9 though and I'm have no idea why I still haven't ordered a Valiant-class strike carrier - it's such a beautiful design! While the ships aren't to expensive, getting enough EXO's in your fleet can get a bit pricey since they're relatively cheap in points but not in dollars. Now, if only I could find some more great eBay bargains...

Starmada

Recently I've been looking a lot at Starmada from Majestic 12 Games. Whenever you see a thread on TMP or SCN where someone asks what system to go with Starmada is one of two titles that always come up (the other being Full Thrust). From what I understand it has a pretty much unbreakable ship creation system which sounds cool! It's (primarily) hex based but I don't have a problem with that nowadays. I probably would have discounted the game for this reason alone when I was younger but now I actually see it as a plus. Sure the mat won't look quite as pretty, but neither will you have to do all that measuring and careful turning of models. In any case it's nice to have it as an alternative (double-sided mat anyone?)! The picture above is from Mike Wikan's excellent blog The Redoubt. See the rest of the pictures here!

MJ12 is coming out with a new edition of Starmada soon and I've been reading some of the designer's notes on the forums (Attack Dice, Vector Movement, Defense & Damage) and so far I like what I see. It seems like Dan is going for a more streamlined version with more "built-in" dice rolls but without sacrificing granularity (which is what I think is missing from Firestorm: Armada). I will certainly pick up the new edition when it's released in... February(?) but I think I will get the current edition as well to compare. Besides it's cheap from DriveThru RPG!

There are no specific models for use with Starmada and I'll probably use my Full Thrust minis for it. I did also order a few Deisho ships from Chris at Ravenstar which will hopefully be the start of a new fleet so there are those as well. Really love the Deisho design! There is a clear Sulaco vibe to the ships and they simply look sleek and brutal at the same time. Starmada also lends itself exceedingly well to stating out ships from your favourite fictional universes, and if I ever manage to dig up some proper Babylon 5 miniatures I might use them with this game.

AV:T, Squadron Strike and Voidstriker

I would also like to try a game with more realistic Newtonian movement. The ones I have in mind are Attack Vector: Tactical and Squadron Strike, both from Ken Burnside at Ad Astra games as well as Voidstriker from Irrational Designs. Of the three AV:T seems to be the more complex one so I'm thinking Squadron Strike might be better as an introduction as they are of a similar design but Squadron Strike allows for a few more ships in play. It also allows to choose how many of Newtons rules you want to obey when it comes to movement. Versatility! There is a demo available for Voidstriker and it seems to be the least complex, eschewing 3D movement for ease of play for example. Like Starmada it's hex based which is nice. In the end I think I would like to try all three of them, starting with the Voidstriker demo.

There are miniatures available for all three of these games and I must say they are all great looking! Going from very realistic (AV:T) to fairly realistic but with "extra flair" (Voidstriker). They're all fleet scale so bit smaller and more delicate than my Full Thrust minis. The Ad Astra miniatures are fairly pricey and anything from Shapeways is as well, so getting specific fleets for any of these games is not a priority. However, I really do love the belters for Voidstriker and the British for Squadron Strike. Hmm...

There are many more games out there than this of course, I've heard good things about Babylon 5: A Call to Arms, but it's out of print these days. Might hunt it down on eBay though. I also haven't mentioned Victory by any Means (VBAM) which is a spaceship combat campaign system that has been applied to several different game systems and settings (including Jovian Chronicles and Starmada!). I haven't delved deeper into it but from what I've heard it's good! Definitely on the list of stuff to investigate further.

Battlefleet Gothic

I mentioned Battlefleet Gothic in my last post and I do think it would be fun to play it again, just to see what it feels like. It's not something I'm interested in pursuing in the long run, but doing a quick revisit could be interesting. I still have a bunch of ships stored away - a large Chaos fleet, a smallish Imperial fleet and a very small Ork raider fleet.

Gaming Mats

Something else you need when playing with spaceship minis is a nice looking space! So far I've simply used some black cloth but I really need to upgrade. My friend Anders have a mat from Hotz (the regular, not the enhanced) and it's decent looking but to be honest I thought it would look better than it did. There are also mats available from Terrain Mats and Monday Knight Productions. I don't really like the look of the one from Terrain Mats. The mat from Monday Knight looks better, although a bit plain, but I would like to see more pictures of it. It's the cheapest of the bunch though, so there is that!

The best looking mats, in my opinion, are the ones available from CorSec Engineering (who also make really good flight stands that you can disassemble). My personal favourite is the Blue Stars mat as it's still fairly dark and "spacey". The CorSec mats are also made from fabric instead of felt which most other mats are made from. This should make them more resistant to damage in the long run which is a nice bonus. However, they are also the most expensive which of course is a factor in deciding what to get. User neghvar on the SCN forums made an interesting post on the prices of different space mats as a price per inch chart. Check it out!

Right now I'm leaning towards getting a double sided enhanced mat from Hotz. It's not the best looking and the hexes that are printed on one side look like they might be a bit brittle, but it does look nice and the price is affordable. I would like to get a CorSec mat later on though.


I'm sure there are many of my readers who have other games to recommend or more nice miniatures or mats that I haven't mentioned (I'm especially curious about Colonial Battlefleet). Let me know in the comments! :)

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A Review of Firestorm: Armada

About time I reviewed a miniature game here on Fire Broadside, and even more about time that I reviewed something involving giant starships hurling plasma at each other! In short... time for a review of Firestorm: Armada from Spartan Games.

This blog was born when I wanted to document my first forays into starship gaming back in 2009 and my game of choice was Full Thrust. It's been out of print for more than a decade but the books are available to download for free from GZG and it's still one of the most widely played starship combat games, so I thought it was a good place to start. Also I really like the models, and the price. Anyway, I managed to get my friends Anders and Martin interested as well (even though we lived at the opposite ends of the words at this time) and they each bought a couple of fleets each.

However while I was painting my ships in Tokyo my friends started looking more and more towards the upcoming Firestorm: Armada from Spartan Games. They liked the look of the models, but mostly I think it was the fact that the rulebook was actually in print and it had reasonably high production values that did it. I know they're both suckers for flash! Especially Martin. Haha!

So instead of sticking to my guns (or spaceships in this case) I decided to give it a go myself. I had followed its development over at Starship Combat News so I knew what it looked like at least. That was a bit of a problem though as the only fleet that appealed to me was the Sorylians that Anders had already bought. The Dindrenzi looked decent as well but that was Martin's fleet of choice. That left the Terrans and the Aquans and they both left me cold. And I do mean cold... as in I think they're plain ugly (and yet...)

Although I pondered getting one of those fleets anyway in the end I simply couldn't do it. Instead I started my little Firestorm: Yamato project; making a fleet based on the classic Japanese cartoon Space Battleship Yamato, aka Starblazers. In the end that project kind of stalled and I got the Relthoza when they were released instead. I quite like the design of both the Relthoza and the Directorate but in the end the vertical design of the Relthoza won me over. So with a starter fleet almost fully painted (missing some cruisers) I got to play Firestorm: Armada.

The Company

First off a few words about Spartan Games. I will be a little harsh in this review so I would like to preface that with saying that I simply love this company! They're small with fairly niche-games so far, but have managed an amazing output of miniatures ever since they started. Not once have they faltered, there has always been new minis hitting the streets as well as updates to the rules. The design haven't been perfectly to my liking every time, but the execution of the models are spectacular. Incredible detail with usually very little cleanup needed.

They also listen to the fans and mr bigwig himself, Neil Fawcett, actively participate on the forums. I think many other miniature games companies could learn a lot from Spartan Games.

The Miniatures

In my mind Firestorm: Armada started out so-so but steadily the miniature designs have become better and better. Let's start with the bad stuff. Looking at the original four fleets I think the Terrans and the Aquans should have gone back to the drawing board. The Terrans are much too blocky and featureless for my tastes. I can see they went for a BSG-vibe but all those flat panels make them look like cheap toys and doesn't give a feel for the scale. Making the Aquan ships more organic looking and with a marine theme was a cool idea, but in the end the starter minis just looks strange, in all the wrong ways. Now, I've seen people rescue these models with great paint jobs - making them look really good - but I think they should have looked better from the start.

The good news is that the Sorylian ships look great! They're certainly not breaking any new ground, but look really cool in a traditional sci-fi way. The Dindrenzi have a more interesting design principle with their long "necks" and I quite like those as well. The fleets that were released later (Relthoza and Directorate) also look good with their own distinctive features.

With the addition of new ships to the different factions I wonder if the designers at Spartan Games felt similar to me as the new Aquan vessels look a lot different (better!) than their original outing. The same goes for the Terrans, with more panelling and detailing being put on their floating shoeboxes (kidding!) - the Aegis class shield vessel in particular is excellent! I'm harbouring a hope that they will actually go back and resculpt the original Aquans and Terrans. It would certainly make me happy!

The recently added alliance vessels add more variety to the fleets and I like what we've seen of these so far!

The System

The game has been out for a while now so I won't really go over the rules in detail. It's your basic age of sails in space with buckets of dice! You each ativate one ship or squadron at a time and then the turn goes to your opponent. During combat you roll a number of dice equal to the ship's firepower value (you can link fire with other ships in the squadron) and every 4+ is a hit, 6 counts double and "explodes" adding another die to the pool. If you manage to score more hits than your opponents Damage Rating he looses a Hull Point, and if you also go over his Critical Rating there's some bonus damage inflicted. All in all it's a good solid mechanic that is used throughout the game.

There are also rules for fighters and bombers as well as torpedoes and how you can use your ships' Point Defence systems to defend against them. Battleships are large and lumbering while frigates are quick and nimble, very nimble actually - making a 180° during their activation is usually no problem. Ships are also surprisingly durable and a cruiser can usually survive even a full broadside attack from a battleship.

Boarding plays a part in the game as well and there are surprisingly intricate rules of how it works with every ship having stats for both crew and marines. I'm not sure how large part it plays in the game (I haven't managed a boarding yet) but it's cool nonetheless!

Like the other games form Spartan Games there are also a deck of cards you can use while playing which gives you some special rule breaking abilities that can hopefully sway things in your favour. I like the idea, although I would be much happier if each faction had their own deck of cards to help diversify them more (which Neil has said will come in the future).

The "Feel"

So far I have only played line them up and fight battles, which are never as much fun as more specific scenarios, but I still think I have a decent grasp on how the game plays. The battles have all been pretty much the same with both sides maneuvering towards each other, trying to get your opponent into your broadside fire arc at range band two (all ships excell at this range) and while there might be some initial torpedo volleys they usually don't do any damage. And as even larger ships are relatively fast it's difficult to stay at arms reach. In one battle I tried to stay as far away for as long as possible, thinking I'd make use of the Relthozas' stealth technology and torpedoes. But it was still just a couple of turns and then we were in each others range band two again. It's also pretty easy to maximize your firepower each turn as you can usually maneuver enough to get something in your broadside arc.

This means that it kind of boils down to a battle of attrition and who rolls more 6's. Yes, I'm a bit harsh here and oversimplifying but that is what it feels like. It rarely feels like you have the opportunity to make some smart tactical maneuver to surprise your opponent or move in a way where he can't attack you, it just feels like a slugging match. A large part for me I think is the all pervasive resolution mechanic, the only thing that that makes torpedoes different from firepower is that you can defend against them with your PD fire. Besides that they're mechanically identical. And there are also only two types of weapon systems, firepower and torpedoes... and they work almost the same.

Fighters and bombers are similar as they also (after having gone through Point Defense fire) simply add up their Firepower value and try to roll over the target's Damage Rating. I can certainly understand the designers wanting to use the same resolution mechanic throughout the game as it does streamline the experience, but I wonder if it's not at the cost of variation.

My Thoughts

When I play Firestorm: Armada it reminds me of the old GW game Battlefleet Gothic. There are some passing rules similarities but mostly it's that the theme of both games have a lot in common - space opera with huge boats in outer space. But while F:A quickly starts feeling like a boxing match between two punch-drunk heavy weights just trading body blows BFG managed to retain a sense of tactics all the way through a battle. In it you have three quite different weapon systems (Firepower, Torpedoes and Lances) and how your ships are positioned relative to your opponent actually matters. And while it's harder to plink away at a cruiser in BFG, gradually wearing it down, it's perfectly possible through clever tactics to simply cripple it in one swift blow.

When I play miniature games I want the rules to capture the right feel of the miniatures and the setting. I want a machine gun to work differently from a shotgun and I want clever gameplay maneuvers to be more important than my list or the luck of the die. Now, I don't mean that you can't play tactically in F:A, and all those buckets of dice should even out statistically, but I don't think there's enough diversity in the game to keep me interested. Granted, I've started leaning more towards "realistic" space battles as the years have gone by so perhaps I'm not the target audience, but even so I remember having more fun with BFG.

I'm starting to repeat myself but in the end it comes down to lack of variety in how the weapons work and the fact that it's all too easy to get to use your strongest broadside fire arc every turn. When it's all about the almighty broadside I think actually achieving that elusive firing position should be somewhat difficult, and when you do make it the "I'm screwed!" look should be plain in your opponent's eyes! In this game though, you keep hammering at each other to see who breaks first. If I'm allowed to oversimplify for a little bit; it all contributes to a feeling of weapon choice and maneuvering not mattering all that much, or less than in other games at least.

Now, I do like the basic system - there is certainly nothing wrong with it - but I think it's over-used and makes the game feel "samey" as you go along. For some reason I am much less opposed to it in a true wet navy setting like Uncharted Seas or Dystopian Wars (although I have played neither yet). It might be my inherant preconceptions of space combat but for use with plain old cannon the system seems much more fitting. I've talked about Dystopian Wars a lot earlier and I'm looking forward to trying it out to see if how it "feels".

Conclusion

Well... there's been a lot of I, my, me in this article as well as talking about touchy feely stuff. But the bottom line is that Firestorm: Armada is probably not the spaceship battle game I'm looking for. It's not that it's completely unenjoyable or the rules are bad, I just think there are better alternatives out there for this sort of game. I want a bit more detail and more tactical... granularity. If you're anything like me you will likely have a similar reaction to the game.

However if you are looking for a simpler more streamlined game than a lot of the other stuff out there you should definitely check it out. Something else that Firestorm: Armada brings to the table is availability and broader appeal. I would say it's the best produced and supported spaceship battle game available today. Granted that doesn't say an awful lot in this little niche of the miniature gaming market, but it's still something. Sure, Full Thrust have been around for ages, but you can't go to your FLGS and pick up the rulebook and a starter box for it.

I will likely play Firestorm: Armada again and I'll more than likely pick up a few more models (have you seen the dreadnoughts?! They're insane!!) but it is not the game I hoped it would be. Yesterday I ordered a few Deisho ships from Chris at Ravenstar Studios and I think I might have to cook up some neat Full Thrust scenario where they could be used. And I've got the urge to play BFG again, just to see if it's my rose-tinted glasses or not...

If you desperately crave some kind of arbitrary number to quantify the merits of this game I give you... three out of five.

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Past and Future II

Here we are! A bit late but here's my 2011 retrospective / 2012 prospective. Basically what I've been playing in and what I will (hopefully) be playing soon. I'm one of those anal types who log every single time I play on Boardgamegeek.com and using those statistics I can reveal my top played games in 2011.

Board Games

In first place I'm happy to say we have Earth Reborn! I mentioned something about it making this list next year back in 2010 and indeed it did. It might sound strange that it got so many plays since it's fairly complex and not always easy to introduce to new players, but we played it pretty intensively for a few months. It's been a while now but I'm feeling a resurgence coming! It's definitely my board game pick of 2011 as I think it's awesome in pretty much every way.

Then we have Lord of the Rings: The Card Game that also saw a lot of play when I first got it. We haven't played it for a while now, but I'm getting excited about the new Khazad-Dûm expansion! So far I have also only got the first Adventure Pack and would like to complete the Mirkwood cycle before delving into the depths of Moria. What I really haven't started doing yet is deck building. Probably about time though...

Number three on the list is Gears of War the Board Game which me and my group of friends found to be a lot of fun! We still haven't managed to actually win a game yet, but I'm sure we'll get there. So far it goes splendidly well in the beginning and then we muck it up right at the end.


Below the top three we find Mansions of Madness, Race for the Galaxy, Claustrophobia and... well it goes on and on. Overall I think these top three games correlate well with what I consider the best new board games I played last year. Games I'm looking forward to playing during 2012 are Rex: Final Days of an Empire, High Frontier, X-Wing, Merchants and Marauders, Star Trek: Fleet Captains, Dark Darker Darkest and the reprint of Merchant of Venus (whoever publish it) to name a few. Besides discovering new games it would be fun to try more expansions like Shards of the Throne for Twilight Imperium and Banners of War for Runewars (which I think I might just buy at the end of the month.

Roleplaying Games

 

We finished The Gathering Storm campaign for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 3rd ed. during the spring and after that I was certainly ready for something different. It's not the fault of the game, but rather the adventure - it's a bit too... conventional. My friend Anders told us that he would GM a session or two but in the end that didn't happen. So I started looking for something fresh and different and returned to Diaspora, discovered Mouse Guard and experienced the joys of Fiasco.

We've only played Mouse Guard twice so far but it's been great fun and I really want to play it more. I think Diaspora might be next up though as my friend Jimmy fell in love with it when I first showed it to him, so he's very eager to get going and between the two of us I think we can rustle up a couple more players. Our Farrely brothers-esque session of Fiasco was a blast! From now on I'll simply always bring it and a bag of dice with me to all our gaming nights and pull it out when we want something different.

For 2012 I'm looking forward to more of the same as well as trying new stuff. I've been reading Pelgrane Press' Ashen Stars and Trail of Cthulhu as well as the Dragon Age rpg and Apocalypse World. Not to mention The One Ring which is right behind Diaspora on my want-to-play-list. It will be interesting to see what FFG does with the Star Wars license - I would definitely be in the market for a non-D20 version of Star Wars. For quicker pick-up games it'd be fun to try 3:16 - Carnage Amongst the Stars and Lady Blackbird. Hmm... it'll be a busy rpg year!

Miniature Games

Well... I think you already know. Yes, Infinity which actually was the second most played game overall! That certainly surprised me since we play a lot more board games than miniature games these days. But again it proved popular with the group of friends who I introduced it to. Sure they still haven't actually painted anything, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I'm really happy that we took the plunge with Infinity, especially since we all seem to enjoy it and it feels like something that's here to stay. Would like some proper  terrain though, and with the new Project Infinity releases from Sarissa I think an Ariadnan frontiers town might be in the cards. Really love the look of their designs!

I also squeezed in a couple of games of Firestorm: Armada. It's decent enough but it doesn't quite click with me. I'm not sure why but think the rules might work better in a traditional naval setting like Uncharted Seas or Dystopian Wars. I'm in the process of writing a review of the game that should be up soon where I expand on my thoughts.

15mm sci-fi deserves a mention as well. I've only played a single game of Gruntz so far but I've been painting a fair bit at least. My EarthSec army is currently the largest with a small group of Reds and some other random elements as well. We should see some additions during January thanks the Gruntz painting competition. I'll prooobably end up painting another EarthSec squad and their ride. Oh, and there's still time to get in on it! Robin will hand out the 1.1 version of the rulebook to the winner and I heard something about Critical Mass Games also contributing with the beautiful new Imperator Mecha. Good stuff!

During the coming year I'm looking forward to a lot more Infinity! That's my number one priority at the moment. But I would also like to finally get my Heavy Gear Blitz army all finished as well as continue on my AE: Necromunda project. I mentioned Dystopian Wars in my last Past and Future post but I managed to hold it off for a whole year. With the release of the French faction though, I think my defences have finally crumbled. There are a few other games I've been looking at but I try not to get (more) distracted. Tomorrow's War is high on the list, but especially I would like to try some more realistic spaceship battle game, with fewer ships but more details. Currently looking at games/minis like Cold Navy, Zandris IV and Squadron Strike. Although the upcoming space supplement to 5150: Star Army (aka 5150: Fringe Space) is looking interesting as well, check out The Ceres Crossroads for more info on the project.

EDIT: I just remembered something miniature game related that I really want to get into during 2012 and that is airbrushing! It's something I've been wanting to do ever since I saw it first used on miniatures in my early teens, but even more so during these last few years when it's become more and more popular. And just looking at the results I feel like I'm missing out. Jarret over at Minijukie.com recently made an excellent Airbrush Equipment Video that has also really inspired me. Check it out!


And, there you go! It's actually fairly similar to the post I did at the end of 2010. I'd say the biggest new things are Infinity and 15mm sci-fi... and perhaps the addition of the new wave of Indie RPGs. Hmm, that's pretty much half the list so I guess there are some changes afterall! Haha!

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Twilight Imperium - final days of the year...

Sorry for the lack of updates on Fire Broadside! It's all because of the that damn Star Wars: The Old Republic. It's very addictive! My bounty hunter is in his mid thirties and I have a smuggler and an agent on their way up in life as well. Excellent story and solid gameplay. Anyway, I'm here to talk about Twilight Imperium - my favourite board game. Unfortunately I don't get to play it all that often but it's always a blast when it actually does hit the table.

So I was really glad when we managed squeeze in a game of Twilight Imperium (with the first expansion) before the end of the year. Sure, we were only three people but it allowed me to refresh my memory and, more importantly, introduce a new player to the game! Mats had never played before but had heard me wax poetic about the game many times before. Me and Anders met up early and started setting up the board. We decided to use one of pre-made maps from the FFG website as I have heard from several veteran players that they make for a more balanced (and hence fun) game. We also included Artifacts (but revealed from the start) but decided against the Distant Suns as that option which, while kind of fun, really adds to the time it takes to play and makes the experience quite a bit more random.

What we played.

We also picked a race for Mats. Both to save some time and also to make sure he got something with some fun special abilities but not too tricky to play, so the Mentak it was. I wanted to try the L1Z1X Mindnet as I had never played them and the technophile Anders took the Jol-Nar Universities (well, he's a technophile in TI but a luddite in real life!).

Setup. I'm blue, Anders purple and Mats orange. Sorry for the blurry pics.

We started out and Mats grasped the rules fairly quickly. We all started to spread out and approach Mecatol Rex. Anders as the Jol-Nar was the most aggressive as he brought two planetary defense platforms and placed them in a system next to MR... it felt like the Cuban missile crisis in space! Mats and Anders each had an artifact while the one between me and Mats lay unclaimed for a couple of turns. The Jol-Nar annexed Mecatol Rex through Diplomacy (which is against the rules as we discovered afterwards) and then managed to push through a new law stating that no one could invade MR, effectively making it his for the rest of the game! The Jol-Nar had a lot of systems with high Influence values so there wasn't much of a political game. Anders could simply decide what would happen.

After a couple of turns. Notice the unclaimed Artifact between me and the Mentak Coalition.

He also took the lead and I decided to risk making a pre-emptive strike against his fleet massing near Mecatol Rex. Just before that another law was passed saying that all space docks had their production capacity reduced to two, meaning no one wanted to spend it making fighters and ground forces. This put me in a good position as the L1Z1X has cheap dreadnoughts and I had build a number of fighters before the law was passed (which the others hadn't). Also, since I had Hopes End I could make shock troops for "free" each turn. With the help of my fighter screen it was a fairly one-sided battle when I attacked the Jol-Nar and Anders' only managed to retreat with his damaged Warsun.

After my first attack on the Jol-Nar. You can see the damaged Warsun has retreated to a friendly system.

This put the Jol-Nar on the defensive while I slowed down to try and redeploy my forces. The Mentak had grown a bit and started acting more aggressive. I was hoping Mats would invade and finish off the Jol-Nar Warsun that had escaped but instead he decided to do a raid into one of my systems using his cruisers. The Mentak also took the unclaimed artifact between us.  Around this time Anders was leading in points with me right behind and  Mats trailing a little bit behind. But then Anders announced that he'd managed to achieve his Secret Objective, giving him two more VP's and securing a solid lead. The rest of the game mostly centered around how to catch up.

My secret objective was to destroy two space docks from two different players in one turn. I had a chance early in the game when the Jol-Nar had a space dock close to Mecatol Rex, but as it looked now it was pretty much impossible. I invaded Mentak space and took control of the Artifact Mats had just taken, but only managed to get a single ground trooper planetside. In the following turns there were three or four battles fought in the system between the Jol-Nar and the Mentak (twice involving Warsuns) but they never made it down to the planet and my lonely guy held it to the end of the game! I fought a couple of skirmishes with the Jol-Nar towards the end as well, trying to open a path to one of his space docks, but it didn't work out and Anders won with eight points agains my five and Mats' two.

What the board looked like at the end of the game. 

All in all a great game! It showed that although three is perhaps not ideal for Twilight Imperium it certainly works and can be a lot of fun! I should also add that I think the pre-made maps are the way to go. Sure, you loose a little bit of the fun of making it yourselves, but on the other hand you'll have a lot more balanced playing experience and since there are a lot of planets around Mecatol Rex there will probably be more player interaction (battles!) as well. Highly recommended! I also think artifacts are good and have changed my mind about Distant Suns; I prefer playing without them. Anders thought that there weren't enough resources to go around, but in my opinioin it was just right. At the end of the game I could squeeze out a couple of dreadnoughts without too much trouble but building a warsun was still taxing. As it should be I think.

Mats really enjoyed himself and I thought he played very well for being a complete newbie. He might have focused more on creating a strong fleet than on actually claiming victory points, but that is something we all do quite often. Warsuns are fun! It never felt like he was out of the game though, thanks to his strong military presence. In the beginning it was a tight race between me and Anders, but when he got his Secret Objective I knew it would be very hard to be able to catch up. It's such a huge game and all the variables create a different experience every time. This time for example, thanks to the spacedock law, saw the return of large dreadnought-centered fleet warfare as opposed to the fighter heavy fleets you often see in TI.

Looking forward to playing again with more players and the new(ish) Shards of the Throne expansion. I'm especially keen on the added political element in it as that is one of my favourite phases in the game.

Well... happy new year everybody! I'll be back in a couple of days with a proper 2011 retrospective!

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A Cosmic Encounter causes Panic at the Station

It's been a while, but we actually managed to get some non-digital gaming done this past Friday. There were five of us and there were going to be board games. Since I had recently got Panic Station and it's a quick game that was a given, however what more to play had not been decided. Some suggestions were Mansions of Madness, Cyclades, Fury of Dracula, Battlestar Galactica and Cosmic Encounter. I voted for Mansions of Madness or Cosmic Encounter but would have been happy to play any of the suggestions (although I feel a little burnt out on BSG).

Either way, we started with Panic Station. It's a new game designed by David Asloos (check out his upcoming game Dark, Darker, Darkest!) and published by White Goblin and Stronghold Games. In a nutshell it's The Thing - The Board Game. Your team of soldiers are dispatched to a research base to discover why it has stopped communicating. As you arrive you come across parasitic alien creatures that are resistant to normal weapons, and you realize that one of you has most likely been infected by an alien virus... but who?!

So you need to explore the base to find a new type of ammunition that is effective against the parasites while you try to avoid getting infected. The final objective in the game is to find the Hive and destroy it with your flamethrower (which requires three gas cans). So it starts out as a cooperative survival horror game but with a hidden traitor, aka the Host. The main difference from games like Battlestar Galactica or Shadows Over Camelot, that also have a traitor mechanic, is that in Panic Station the Host can infect other players and they can in turn infect others. This is built into a trading mechanism in the game. Every time you enter a room where there's another player you have to trade; you give each other one card face down so the others can't see. If you recieve an infection card (all players start with three of these) you are now an alien pawn, unless you traded one of your gas cans in which case you're still human.

Exploring the base...

It doesn't make perfect thematic sense (like a few other things in the game) but if you're prepared to overlook a few "logical holes" there's a great game of paranoia and betrayel in Panic Station! Another really neat mechanic is the Heat Scan. If one of the players manage to get to the computer room one of the actions he can perform is use it to scan the entire base and find out how many humans and how many infected there are in it. It doesn't tell you who, just how many.

Anyway, during our first play I got infected by Mats who was the host in the first turn, and I managed to infect Anna on my next turn. So the humans went from four to two very rapidly! However both Micke and Anders heavily suspected this and when Micke made a heat scan it simply confirmed their fears. They tried resisting the alien virus but me and Mats ganged up and killed Micke's two characters (yes you can attack each other) after we had tried to infect him, unsuccessfully, several times. Anders held out for a bit longer but was finally infected by Anna.

We had fun although we played a few things wrong, how parasites are placed on the board for example. Oh, and I made the classical mistake that's so easy and stupid that you think you'll never do it: I said "Oh, so you just need one more gas can" insantly revealing myself. Silly silly silly. Haha! This first game, with a lot of rules checking lasted about 45-60 minutes.

Our next game was decided by a roll of a die. Some other games were added into the mix and the candidates were Elders Sign, Cosmic Encounter, The Name of the Rose and... something more... Fury of Dracula perhaps. Anders rolled a two so Cosmic Encounter it was. Which made me very happy!

I owned the old Swedish translation of Cosmic Encounter called Universums Härskare (Ruler of the Universe) but as kids we never "got it" when playing. The rules weren't difficult, but we simply missed out on the whole human interaction element, which basically is Cosmic Encounter. Hey, we were used to Monopoly. So I was very happy to A: get to try the game again as an adult, and B: do it with FFG's lovely looking reprint!

We drew some random aliens. I drew the Warrior (grows stronger throughout the game), Micke drew Morksomething (each ship is worth four), Anders drew Something (something, something), Anna drew Loser (can switch the result of a battle around so the loser wins) and Mats drew The Mutant (always holds eight cards in hand).

After a couple of turns. I'm green.

Micke and Anna soon took the lead with Mats right behind them. Anders had only got one colony while I had none. I think I tried relying a bit too much on my ability while the others feared it too much. In the beginning of the game I joined the loosing side only to get more experience points, and later in the game the others were afraid that I'd get too strong and simply didn't invite me either on the attacking or defending side. This meant that I only got a chance to get colonies in my own turn and then I often faced a large alliance, or I faced the Loser against whom I simply couldn't win.

Either way I did very poorly while Micke or Anna would clearly win the game, it was just a matter of who could do it quickest. In the end Micke conquered the final fifth planet and won the game, he even allowed me to get two pity colonies in his system as a reward for aiding him. Haha! Again a game that is quick to play, features tonns of human interaction and that I feel will be much better the next time when everyone knows what to expect of it. Looking forward to it!

Did I mention I was green?

We still had an hour or so left of our alloted game time so we decided to try Panic Station again. We almost played Elder Sign (that I'm eager to try as well) but since only Anders and Anna had played it we opted for Panic Station instead so we wouldn't have to do another rules explanation.

This game was very different from the first. Since we played with the correct rules there were a lot more parasites on the board and we were all much more paranoid from the start. We also split up early on and when I and Anders both found magnetic key cards and security doors to hide behind we did just that. I ended up alone in a corner of the base with a computer terminal. But only two gas cans. I tried searching for more while holding the parasites at bay. Finally the Hive ended up in my section and I just needed one more gas can to torch it.

The others had real trouble with the horde of parasites and all of them were wounded and Mats was even killed by them! In the end Anna used another computer terminal to open the security doors to my isolated section. She rushed in and tried to infect me, meaning I had tro trade away the third gas can that I had finally found. I was really lucky though and found another on my next turn meaning I could run in and burn the Hive.

As I said, a very different game this time. Anna was frustrated as she felt that she couldn't infect any of us as we all carried gas cans and both me and Anders were behind security doors. However, since Panic Station is so short it's not the whole world if you sometimes get a game that feels a bit off. I think it's much worse when it happens in Battlestar Galactica and you have invested four or five hours into a game that doesn't feel as fun as you know it has the potential to be. When you only play for 30-45 minutes you can just shrug it off and give it another go.

All in all I really enjoyd both Panic Station, which I feel could easily become a staple filler game, and Cosmic Encounter which I think really appeals to our socially minded group! Looking forward to playing them both again soon. Naturally their quick play time is another point in their favour.

With Panic Station still in my mind I just had to check out the new prequal to John Carpenters The Thing, also called The Thing. I watched it today and was surprisingly satisfied with what they've come up with! Basically it tells the story of what happened at the Norwegian polar station that McReady explores in the original 1082 film. Overall it's done very well and it slots pretty smoothly into the original film. There's a lot of Norwegian actors in it and the language barrier creates another dimension of paranoia. There is (of course) CGI in this film which you won't see in the original but it's generally well done and captures the feel of the well. It's not perfect and they show too much of it in places but it could have been so much worse.

The big difference is that the Thing is a lot more aggressive in the prequal. It's more of a monster movie with some paranoia sprinkled about than the other way around. I didn't like this at first, but you could argue that this shows the Thing trying out different approaches and in the end realizing that it's better to try and stay hidden than simply aggressively trying to assimilate each and everyone fairly openly.

There are some continuity errors, or rather continuity confusion, here and there where you go "oh, I thought that guy went away on the snowcat?". But bottom line I think this is a worthy companion piece to Carpenter's original. Go give it a watch!

And I almost forgot! I played the original Drakborgen, aka Dungeonquest, with my wife and seven year old niece the other day. You know you're in for a grim ride when you die in the first room you enter as you get bitten by a poisonous centipede! That happend to me so I started over with another character. My wife made it half way to the treasure chamber as Yuubara Tori-Jima before a stalking shadow throttled her. Both me and my niece made it into the chamber, scooped up loads of treasure and made it out without the dragon waking up. I made it about half way back when I ran across a mountain troll, I tried to hypnotize him with my psychic powers but got my head caved in instead. Damn. My niece was in the final room before the exit but the path was blocked by a portcullis and her character, Iril, only has a strength of four... and the sun was about to set! She tried lifting it four times but failed and then the sun set.

Totally unforgiving game. Love it!

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