Easter Diversion

Many years ago (and by that I mean 15-20) I received a Lego X-Wing for Easter. It was a pretty awesome Easter gift then and is even more awesome now! Better yet, I still own the kit so thought what better to blog about today than a Lego-building trip back to my youth?

Here's the box:

And the bits (hope they are all there!):

After a few minutes of work I have assembled the maintenance vehicle:

I imagine when I was younger I would have balked at the idea of having to complete this vehicle first, before the 'main event'!

And here's the X-Wing!:

It's a very cool model and only took 20 mins to half an hour to build. Luckily all the bits were there! Now I have built it again, I think I'll have to find somewhere suitable to display it. 

So thanks to my parents for getting this for me all those years ago, and happy Easter!

Christmas Project Complete!

It's been a while since I've been able to post much of anything on my blog. The demands of fatherhood are many and varied so much of my energy over the last 6 months has been exerted elsewhere. But I've been making the most of minutes snatched here and there to progress my various projects. It's just that this level of activity doesn't lend itself to being posted about on a blog!

However, this week I am happy to say I have managed to compete my 2014 Christmas project, and only 4 months late!

15mm.co.uk do an excellent seasonal range of figures, only available over the festive period. Last year they added evil snowmen to the killer Christmas Trees from 2013 and I ended up deciding that I could use these as a decent basis for a Hordes of the Things army. So I bought a pack of each of them plus a Wraith on winged mount ( It's a bad pun you see... Christmas Wraith... Christmas Wreath... Never mind...). 

The pack of Christmas Trees gave me 5 elements of Beasts:

The snowmen pack provided 4 bases of Warband (you get some rifle-armed snowmen, but these I kept for modern horror games):

I picked the Wraith as it made up the points required for a typical HotT army and it fitted in okay with the theme:

Here's the army assembled and ready for battle:

One thing I like about the way 15mm.co.uk sell these packs is that each year I'll get a surprise new type of element to add to the army! 

So, having assembled the various elements it was time to test them on battle! Emerging from the winter wastes, the army first encountered the ratmen of the highland regions. This was a similar match up, with both sides having several stands of beasts and warband. 

The armies arrayed for battle!

A fierce melee in the centre of the table.

The Ratman line begins to break, leaving their general vulnerable.

The Ratman general falls just before his beasts can make contact

All in all it was a good little game. The main conflict was in the centre, with much to-ing and fro-ing between the warbands. The Wraith was able to fly behind the Ratman lines and pick off the odd exposed element, which helped. On the Ratman army's left flank the wolves managed to drive off the Xmas Trees, leaving them in a position to move to the centre and confront the snowmen, but it was too late by that point.

I'm loving these new figures and I look forward to finding out in Autumn what will be the next release!

More battles in posts to follow this one.

Thanks for reading. Comments welcome as always.

The Conflict Cornucopia on Twitter

I In a seemingly half-baked idea to promote my blog, The Conflict Cornucopia has taken to Twitter!

Follow @concornblog for updates, if you are into that kind of thing. 

A VSF Diversion

I'm making some progress with my four assigned projects for the year. But not a lot. Actually, it's more like very little progress. It's been a busy few months and I didn't really believe te warnings that new parents pick up every illness their baby brings home. 

Here's a quick summary of where I am at:

Judge Dredd

No progress

Slaughterloo

No progress

Muskets and Tomahawks

No progress

Star Wars

No progress (well, I bought lots more figures and organised my collection...)

So, yeah, not the greatest of starts to the year! And to compound it all I've been circling the idea of 2mm VSF using Areonef, Land Ironclads and the hex based Space 1889 skyship rules. Of course, the plus side is that it isn't necessarily an expensive diversion!

I ended up buying PDF versions of all the above rules and printed off Aeronef and Land Ironclads. I don't know why, but I have never used the booklet printing option on my printer before. So I tried it out and ended up with some nifty A5 rule booklets. Much better than a pile of A4 printed on one side. 

Then, with the aid of a Battletech map and some home-made counters, I was ready to give Land Ironclads a go. True, the rules are not written for hex maps, but it was easy to convert them. I set a 200 point British force against a pair of Martian Tripods. 

Above is the initial set up. Two tripods are at the top. The British have two lines of infantry and then three artillery batteries and a unit of tank contraptions. 

A turn into the game and the Martians have eliminated one artillery battery. They have chosen to ignore the infantry entirely  as they can pass through them and are almost impervious to their fire. 

During the following turn, the Martians eliminate the tank contraptions. The human infantry have tried to wheel round and face their foes, but it has not helped much. Artillery fire was moderately successful, but only inflicted a couple of points of damage. 

Unfortunately I caught a stomach bug soon after this point, so I have not continued. That said, I think it would have been a clear Martian victory. The cannon would have been next to feel the heat rays and the infantry really weren't up to much. 

In the plus side, I think the rules worked very well and gave a game with a good feel to it. I think I might have to pick up a few bits and play with proper miniatures. I can see myself playing alternate history games, using Land Ironclads during the ACW or staging a joint French/German invasion of Britain. But also I like the background of All Quiet On The Martian Front, which sees a second Martian invasion take place in 1910, so I'd like to develop some good Martian and Human forces for that. Then, of course, there is the option for Space 1889 type adventures with skyships flying across Mars. So lots of potential!

WEG Star Wars Figures

Part of the reason I have selected Star Wars for one of my four 2015 projects is the fact that I was recently able to retrieve my old metal figures from my parent's place. That, combined with a sense of nostalgia after reading the original rules again, has really made me want to play more SW games this year (and I have an overview for a campaign that I am working on too! ).

For those who don't know, before WotC produced the collectible miniatures game, West End Games had a license to produce a range of metal Star Wars Miniatures back in the early 90s. The first edition of the game won an Origins Award in 1991 and was followed by a 2nd Edition in 1993. I started with the second edition, so must have been no younger than 13 at the time.

A classic set of rules

Before I go on to the pictures, please remember this was probably my first effort at painting, in my early teens, and at that point I didn't even have my own paints. I was using my Dad's Humbrol acrylics I believe! I'm planning on re-painting most of them, but I thought I'd post some pictures of the figures in their current state before I do. Also, I took the rules very seriously when they specified the angles for line-of-sight, to the extent that I spent ages cutting out one inch discs of card and making the appropriate markings on them! Apparently I hadn't heard about basing materials at that time either!

Right, on with the show!:

Wookies

Rebel Commandos

Bobba Fett, IG-88 and Zuckuss

3 characters from the Darkstryder RPG campaign. Useful in a variety of roles in the miniatures game

3 more Darkstryder characters. The Rodian with the repeating blaster was always one of my favourites.

Stormtroopers

Imperial commanders

Imperial Navy Troopers with an E-Web Heavy Blaster

More Navy Troopers.

Rebels with blaster rifles and one with a repeating blaster

More rebels

And a few more Rebels with blaster pistols

These are nice. Mon Calamari Rebel Troopers and a commander

And to finish the pictures on a humorous note,  this photo is of my first ever 'conversion'... I wanted to have the Emperor in my games and so got hold of a model of a lich, which I superglued a pin to (painted it red) to represent a lightsaber. I have many memories of pricking myself on the end of the thing!

The 'Emperor'

So what have I learnt about my teenage gaming from this nostalgia trip?

1) I seem to have gravitated towards figures with repeating blasters! Nothing like a bit of firepower!
2) I clearly didn't have a concept of planning an army and then buying the figures for it. 3 Mon-Calamari?! Surely 6 minimum for a squad? Still, they can be mixed in to my regular rebels for some variation.
3) It seems I only had access to gloss versions of green and black paints!
4) It doesn't look like I had much disposable income to spend on this collection! Probably explains why I never took up Warhammer 40K!
5) I really, really wish someone made metal Star Wars Figures again....

I'm now feeling really torn about repainting these. I know I could do better now, but there is something about having these figures in the same state they were in 20 years ago that appeals to me. Maybe I could just dip them and redo the bases?

What would you do in this situation? And do you have any old collections of figures from when you were young and first getting interested in wargaming? These are some figures I will never be putting on eBay!

Taking stock and a focus for 2015

2014 was an interesting one. I seem to have been working on quite a few different projects, but getting very little in the way of gaming done. Looking back over my blog posts I have very little in the way of Bat Reps up there last year. Probably the most significant of those was a game of Slaughterloo, which I'd say was one of the highlights of the last twelve months. (Note: I did also become a Dad, which is obviously THE highlight of the year, but this is a gaming blog, not a parenting one).

So what about 2015? I think I need to pick up some slack in terms of what I have been posting. From looking at what people comment on and view, more games are the order of the day, perhaps along with some reviews of rules and other products. That seems to be what gathers the most interest and comment.

But I will also have a lot less hobby time. So what to do about that? Well, I have had a long, hard think about it and decided that I need to dedicate most of my time of a limited number of projects. That's not to say I limit what games I am playing, but that my limited time should be focused on a few key games rather than being split between too many, which will only result in fewer games and less productivity overall. So what to choose? Well, I have thought about that as well.

1) Slaughterloo



This is going to be my main 'massed battle' game of the year. I've been dipping into Warhammer on and off and meaning to paint more for it, but that always seems to be sidetracked by other projects. And, as mentioned earlier, I had great fun playing Slaughterloo last summer. I'm also planning for the future and think the miniatures might appeal to my son as he grows, so I fully hope to complete a couple of armies and start on a Burrovian force of rabbit men for him.

2) Muskets and Tomahawks



I picked up the rules for this at the end of last year, as well as some figures, and have no intention of letting this be another unfinished project that falls by the wayside. I also want to get more historical gaming done. As this will be a 15mm project it should also not be too demanding of my time in terms of painting.

3) Judge Dredd



I've recently finished reading the second in the series of 'Complete Case Files' collections of Judge Dredd Comics. I think when I was younger the humour and satire of the comics didn't appeal, but the more I read now, the more of a fan I become. So it was natural that this might lead to me wanting to play some games. I already have figures for several forces and just need to get on and paint them. Now, the official figures are way too expensive for my taste, so this is going to be another 15mm project. It would need fewer figures that M&T as well, so as you can see, I am 'staggering' these projects in terms of the level of effort they require to get them on the table!

4) Star Wars



This should really have been a no-brainer for 2014. I have plenty of the figures but I think it is the rules that have been stopping me as, like many others, I am looking for the 'ideal' set for this 'period'. As I posted last year, I have been looking to use 5150: Star Army from Two Hour Wargames to play Star Wars games. But a few days ago I was overcome with nostalgia and dug out my copies of the books published by West End Games. Reading them really took me back, as did getting my hands on my old metal Star Wars figures from the time. So this became project number 4 as the figures are pre-painted and just need the bases flocked before I can play with them. If time permits I can also repaint the metal SW figures I have, as they would be great to use again.


So that pretty much sums up my plans for 2015. Of course, I can't rule out other distractions, the big contender for this will be Wild West games, especially as 4Ground have told me they are going to be producing 15mm versions of their excellent Wild West buildings towards the end of the year. But distractions aside, I intend to post some good reports for the above games and hope to stay on target with my efforts by and large. The main problem with making a list like this is that a few hours later I will always think to myself... oh, but what about this game, or that half-finished project. But I have to be tough with myself!

Whatever you are planning for 2015, good luck with it!

Doctor Who Advent: Day 24

Well, we are finally here! The last day of the Doctor Who Monster Advent Calendar. Can't quite believe I've posted every day for the best part of the month about this, but there you go!

Let's open the final door and see what we've got:

A white Dalek! A perfectly good way to end the 24 days. Let's take a look at the final list!:

Final Results:

Day 1: Blue Dalek

Day 2: Child-bearing Cyberman

Day 3: Shy Weeping Angel

Day 4: Tiny Zygon

Day 5: Red Dalek

Day 6: Skinny Silurian

Day 7: Well-proportioned Ood

Day 8: Unseemly Sontaran

Day 9: Lanky Silence

Day 10: Orange Dalek

Day 11: Diminutive Ice Warrior

Day 12: Twin Sister Angel

Day 13: Unlucky Zygon

Day 14: Second Silurian

Day 15: Duplicate Dalek

Day 16: Dissapointing Cyberman 

Day 17: The sound of Silence 

Day 18: Irritating Sontaran

Day 19: Ood have thought it?

Day 20: Yellow Dalek

Day 21: Another little Ice Warrior

Day 22: Wonky Angel

Day 23: Irritating Cyberman

Day 24: Snowy white Dalek

So there were two of most aliens, with some extras of others. It's a good thing that there were plenty of Daleks! And some interesting additions to my collection that might see some use in the future. 

Just to wrap up, here is a group shot of the whole lot:

This will probably be my last post of the year, so Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all my readers!

Take it easy

Chris