Giant Killer Robots!

I just stumbled across "Giant Killer Robots" a new game from Weta Workshop and it looks amazing!  I'm probably going to go broke.

Wargames Unlimited has moved! A new home for No Limits and No Quarter.

If you have be following my gaming blog for a while now you know that I have been using the free No Limits rules from Wargames Unlimited for my science fiction miniature games.  After several years at the same web page the owner of the Wargames Unlimited site had decided to move his content to a blog format.  There are now two blogs to cover the Science Fiction rules No Limits and the Fantasy Battle rules No Quarter.

No Limits Blog

No Quarter Blog

The Wargames Unlimited forums will remain at the same address.

If you haven't tried either of these excellent game systems you should give them a shot.  They are very fun and flexible systems suitable for somewhat experienced table top gamers who prefer to design armies they are interested instead of being told to choose from a list.

It's like Christmas in August!

So today the delivery guy dropped off what may be must last serious game purchase in a while. My shiny new copy of AE Bounty and a box of Wargames Factory Shock Troopers. I'm not normally one to pick up things brand new to the market but like many burnt out fans of a certain company and game who will remain nameless I was eager for some new Sci-Fi gaming alternatives. Something less Gothic and more space opera. :) Although you could argue that the Shock Troopers are kinda Gothic at least they aren't dripping with spiky bits and skulls.

The first thing I did was un-box the Shock Troopers. The pictures on the web do not do them justice. They are solidly in the 28-30mm category. Not too big or too small. Just about average in size and they look quite compatible with many of the other Sci-Fi lines. I was concerned about this because I had picked up a package of Wargames Factory Zombies a while back and felt they were under scale compared to most of the lines I use. The box comes with six sprues that each have three troopers and a ton of options.

Just check out all these heads. A couple of helmet options, several gas mask heads. A sergeant head with a side cap and even one head with just hair. There is also the alien head option which looks very Cthulhu inspired.

Here is a shot of two sprues from both sides. I like the level of detail Wargames Factory achieved on this set. Seems pretty crisp and comparable with some of the better multi part plastics out there.

I haven't really had a chance to read the AE Bounty book. I'm writing this blog entry perhaps 45 minutes after the box hit my door step. The book however looks nice. It's got full color illustrations and several nice shots of miniatures from the AE Bounty line although the game makers stress that you can use these rules with any minis and any setting. Darkson Designs do provide a setting for the rules and their miniatures which seems interesting and well thought out but the rules are designed to be generic. I've very excited to see how this game plays out and I hope to have a battle report and better review in a couple of days.

Technical Difficulties.

I've been having computer problems lately so I haven't been able to update anything. I think I've got things figured out so I should be able to add some new post soon. Stay Tuned.

Moving Day!

Well today is the day we move from Warsaw Missouri to Warrensburg Missouri. I'm pretty excited though we still don't have jobs. There are two game stores in Warrensburg and we already have a game group there to play in. Our miniature studio space is much smaller but I think that is a good thing. In the old studio we had too much room to spread out so we had a lot of unfinished projects laying around. Hopefully this smaller space will keep us focused on projects until we finish them.

Here are a few shots of our new workspace.

Well I've been eyeballing the plastic Minotaur of the Maze since I first saw him at a game shop. I must admit my first reaction to Reaper's Legendary Encounters was highly negative and I still don't care for a lot of the first round releases. I really don't care for the Orcs and Skeletons that were chosen for the first batch. They aren't bad minis in pewter at all but I don't think they translate well and I think reaper has some better sculpts for those particular creatures. Seems to me the somewhat bolder and chunkier sculpts with more robust details look better in this format. The second batch minis do look like better choices all around and i am looking forward to picking some of them up. The big monsters however are great all around. Their paint jobs look ok. Much better than a lot of other pre paints and they look like they could be easily over painted or spruced up. Also they paint didn't look as thick in person as it did in some of the photographs.

About the Minotaur specifically. I'm pretty pleased with him. He's definitely a great sculpt. Much better than other pre-paints that I have seen. His pose and attitude and the heft of his weapons lend very well to the material he was cast in. The paint job is not bad either. Somewhat above average and a good foundation for over painting which is what I plan to do with mine. I'm just going to clean him up and add some highlights and shadows using his existing paint job as my base cote. I'm also going to base him on a round metal washer which will add some weight to him so he won't tip over easily. Of course I'll finish up his base a bit more. The paint is thin enough I could even prime him lightly and start with an entirely new paint scheme but I think I'll try that on the ogre chief instead because I don't like his yellowish skin anyway.
There are a couple big advantages to this model over the metal version. He's much cheaper. $5.99 for the plastic version or $13.99 for the metal version. That $8.00 I saved can be used to buy a couple regular humanoid minis. The other advantage is that he's already put together so no difficult pinning work on a large mini and because he's plastic he probably won't break apart in a fall from the table. Big minis are hard to assemble and it can take quite a while to pin several heavy joints. That's going to save me time and get this guy on the table faster.
The one disadvantage to this guy is that he's already assembled. Yup that was also an advantage. Basically it's a problem but not a major one. Of course because these guys are mass produced they are not going to come assembled with carefully puttied joints and all the mold lines removed. There are gaps in the assembly you can clearly see in these photos.

There are also mold lines including a kinda bad one on his face. If I'm going to the trouble to spend additional time painting on this guy that's something I'm going to have to fix. Then I'm going to have to match colors although since I'm only using the existing paint job for the base cote it doesn't have to be perfect. It would be nice however to know what Reaper colors were used to paint each mini so people could color match perfectly is they wanted to.
All and all I'm pretty happy with my purchase. I saved a chunk of money and a bit of time and i think these figures could easily be touched up and enhanced by a skilled painter quicker than painting up a figure from scratch. So I save time and money and I don't have to cringe when a big model falls off the table. I think I'm a convert. I'll be looking forward to future releases especially the larger monsters!

Link Changes

Just thought I would post that The Lead Adventrue Forum has moved. I've updated my link. This is one of the best game communities I've seen and it's not totally dominated by Game Workshop gamers or really anal historic gamers.

Also I fixed my link to Matakishi's Tea House and it now links to the home page and not the Outpost Gamma page.

Reaper Chronoscope!

Reaper Miniatures just announced a new line of miniatures! You can find their announcement here.

I'm quite excited about this. Reaper is my favorite miniature company but for the last several years my interest in the Fantasy genre' has be waning. I was somewhat excited when Reaper started talking about a 28mm version of their CAV game but that never materialized. Fortunately rather than abandon some great sculpts they have decided to use Chronoscope to release not only these figs but also as a test bed for new ideas. This kind of fresh change of pace is something you usually only expect from single sculptor lines and I think it's great to see such a well established company branching out and looking at new things. The great thing about Reaper picking up new genre' is that you can find Reaper figures in local shops alongside Games Workshop and some of the other bigger labels but there isn't a lot of variety as those games seem to copy each other. If the figure above is any indicator we can look forward to Sci-Fi figs that aren't slathered in gothic iconography and that's quite refreshing!