I picked up a new game at GenCon- Heavy Gear Blitz. Its been around a long time in one form or another. There is a RPG of it, and there has been a tactical game for it for ages. I last looked into it back in its last revision and the newest rules are much better. They are designed to play large forces against one another in a reasonable amount of time. Think of it as a flames of war weight Battletech and you’ll get the general idea. Most of the time you only fire one weapon per gear per turn. Its a squad activation game were you move everyone in one of your 3-4 squads at once. Pics after the break. Read more…
Tags: Gears, GenCon, Heavy Gear, Jager
Posted by Brian on Dec 22, 2009 in
Editorial Found this Russian site not to long ago. Its a great compendium of all sorts of airplane camo and markings. Great if you’re researching how to paint up some planes. Wings Palette
Tags: Link, Reference
Posted by Brian on Dec 21, 2009 in
Editorial 
This is one of the models I painted for a friend, and what a model it is. I really like the sculpt and level of detail, but man was this a PITA to put together. I think its the hardest mini ever for me. The legs I ended up gluing down with super glue and using some blutack to hold them in place while they dried. Then I went back with epoxy putting and reinforced the joints. The torso and arms both needed putty as well.
Don’t mind the Victorian base. It was the one I was given for him and so I used it. I don’t think it really fits the model, the sewer bases were better with the rest of the box set. I forgot to photograph those before I gave them back, so I’ll have to post them later. Pics after the break.
Read more…
Tags: Arcanists, Malifaux, Steamborg
Posted by Brian on Dec 21, 2009 in
Editorial 
I’ve started playing Malifaux. I first mentioned it back during Gencon, but one of my buddies got me a box set in exchange for doing some painting for him. I got Zoraida as my first set. I’ve played a couple games with it and she’s interesting. Very much a support and crowd control model rather than an in your face combat model. After reading the rules it seems almost criminal that they don’t pack her with a voodoo doll. Why you wouldn’t use one at all times, I have no idea.
Anyhow, this is also my first real foray into 28mm (well 32mm) painting. All the tip and tricks that worked well on a small scale don’t always work well when you are working on larger model. This set is actually my second set, I started this set didn’t like it and set it aside. Then I painted the Ramos box for my friend first and immediately after came back to these. So this is try two. I’m still not super happy with Juju. He’s shiny which my matte coat isn’t doing much about, and I don’t know about the colors. The Silurids came out well the second time I think. I was sort of annoyed that almost all the detail in the pictures was painted on. Pics after the break. Read more…
Tags: Bad Juju, Malifaux, Neverborn, Silurid, Zoraida
Posted by Brian on Oct 7, 2009 in
Editorial,
Tournament 
If you look at the Flames of War tournament victory points system, you’ll notice its pretty flawed. Its designed to represent that you should get a higher quality of victory for preserving your troops lives just like a real commander should. Points are awarded based on the victor’s losses. 6-1 for no losses, 5-2 for 1 platoon loss, 4-3 for two or more platoon losses. Its real strength lies in that it is extremely simple to figure out points at the end of a game.
The system works on a basic level, but falls apart when armies of varying composition are compared. A four platoon tank army will loose a quarter or more of its fighting strength before it gives up a victory point, while an infantry company might lose less than a tenth of its strength before giving up a victory point. It gets worse for company types with very small platoons, or fragile units like armored cars. This hardly seems fair. Read more…
Tags: Flames of War, FOW, Tournament, Victory Points
Posted by Brian on Aug 16, 2009 in
Editorial,
GenCon,
Tournament 
Just general impressions here, detailed after action report later with animated Gifs of my battles. Ironman was an interesting format that I enjoyed, but I think needs a few tweaks to work well. The general idea is that you need to win with economy of force. That winning a Pyrrhic victory isn’t a victory in the long run.
In order to be fair, non-killable assets need to degrade, or at least have a chance to go away. Planes were taken care of this time with plane dice not coming back. I might be tempted to give limited and priority planes some dice regeneration and see how it works. Sporadic would stay non-regenerating, limited would regenerate 1 die per game, and priority would regenerate two dice per game. Flamethrowers and other one use were allowed to come back, but flamers and other assets that are currently just removed need a bit of a change. Flamer teams that shoot should stay on the board and go to a 4+ save similar to empty vehicle flamer tanks being more dangerous. They could be run off the board on a friendly edge, but must obey command and otherwise act the same as they did before, but without the option to shoot of course. Either way the opponent should have a chance to kill the teams so you don’t end up with flamer death squads in subsequent games. I don’t think anyone brought a force with naval guns, but they really should be addressed as well. Perhaps every time you fire them, roll a d6 and on a 6+ the one of the guns goes away. Naval guns generally have 4 guns to start. You’d lose 1 gun in an average game. Of course the big issue is this only works in a short format tournament and would need to be adjusted for a longer series of games. If you had a longer series of games I might just change it to a roll for support similar to the scenario version of the guns in DDay. Read more…
Tags: Flames of War, FOW, GenCon, Ironman, Late War, Tournament
Posted by Brian on Aug 16, 2009 in
Editorial,
GenCon,
Tournament 
For a competitive event to run fairly and smoothly rules must be applied consistently and in accordance with the standards published ahead of time for the event. Competitors should be made aware of any deviations from the standard rules system by the organizing body so that they may adjust their forces and tactics to suit the different meta-game environment. Normally standards are set by the governing agency, or publisher including at least all official errata to their product and the latest updates to the rules system in effect. These updates should be publicly available either at retail for published goods or at the agency’s site. Changes by the organizing body should be available ahead of time via fliers, forum posts, official websites, or other readily available method of communication that non-local competitors would have access to.
It is the responsibility of a competitor to keep himself apprised of any and all rules changes and errata that he may face. This includes checking the agency’s latest updates, and checking the official posting sites of the organization running the event. Ignorance of a rule is not really an excuse. If a competitor chooses to not keep up to date they run the risk of having decisions or penalties called against them for violations. Read more…
Tags: Flames of War, FOW, GenCon, Rant, rules, Tournament
Posted by Brian on Aug 11, 2009 in
Editorial 
I’m off to GenCon Indy tomorrow! I know I’ve been tardy with making new posts, but most of the stuff I’ve been working on recently I’ve wanted to keep secret for the two big Flames of War tournaments. I’ll be playing in both the Ironman tourmanment and the Grand tourney this year. Last I heard there were over 40 people signed up so it should be quite a spectacle. There are some serious prizes this year, and nationals is a weird time and place so I expect that we’ll get some of the top competitors that normally goto nationals at Historicon most years. (Gencon and Historicon are only about 2 weeks apart normally.) Anyhow, expect updates on new paint jobs, unit histories, and after action reports when I get back.
Tags: Flames of War, FOW, GenCon, Tournament
Posted by Brian on Jul 16, 2009 in
Editorial 
Anyone who’s been around games is probably familar with the term ‘metagaming’ I like to think of it as gaming with the rules rather than with the game itself. In Flames of War this most often comes up as how you build your list for tournaments. Once you have a list of scenarios, and special rules you sit down and figure out what best takes advantage of those rules and scenarios. Additionally you want to think about what the average player will think is the best solution to the immediate problem and then what you can take that will easily defeat what you expect the majority of players will be taking. Of course there is the option of taking a force not only to counter the rules, but to counter the counter. Read more…
Tags: Flames of War, FOW, Metagame
Posted by Brian on Jun 15, 2009 in
Editorial 
At what level do you draw the line in a historical game? There has been alot of uproar over the announcement of Mid War Monsters by Battlefront for their game- Flames of War. I know there are the grognards that get in a tizzy if you don’t have the right number of rivets on your hull, or the wrong color of mud on your fenders for the theatre your armor is operating in. On the other hand there are some folks who are okay with walkers and zombie Nazis and still calling it a world war II game. Read more…
Tags: Midwar Monsters, Nazi, WWII, Zombies
