Mr. Bigg's big supprise (AE Bounty game report for Station 42)

 The bounty hunting crew known as "The Valkyrie" were hired by an unknown employer to capture Mr. Biggs the boss of the Venture Star Prospecting Company.  They were also to capture Nancy his secretary and Karl Mason a scientist who works for Venture Star.  They were told Mr. Biggs would be inspecting a prospecting camp later that afternoon and that they might find it easier to take him there.
 

 The Venture Star Prospecting Team 1 were working at a site when they received a distress call from their base camp.  It was their boss Mr. Biggs who said he was under attack from bounty hunters.  Fearing for their paychecks the team headed back to base to try and stop the kidnappers. 

 The Venture Star base camp was small.  One large tent, a power generator, some fuel tanks, a few vehicles, and some other equipment.  Mr. Biggs has arrived in his flying sports car. 

 The prospecting team decided to split up and approach from several angles.  Victor the crew chief and Johnny the explosives expert would sneak up behind the camp with their backs to a large Mesa.  The security team Arnold and Joe would attack on one flank while the equipment operators Harry and Xavier would attack on the other flank.  The Valkyrie were getting the hostages together in the middle of the camp trying to figure out how to get them out of the area.

 Arnold and Joe began the shooting using suppressive fire to pin Alecia behind some fuel barrels.  Vera drug Karl away from the shooting around the back of the dump truck.  Kara ran up behind a car to get in a better position to shoot at the attackers while Valarie unloaded with her LRF slugthrower at Arnold and Joe.  Harry and Xavier tried to shoot Valarie but found they were out of range while Victor and Johnny moved in from behind.
 

 From her new position Kara was able to gun down Joe but Arnold still managed to pin down Alecia with more suppressive fire.  Victor moved up and took some shots at Valarie but missed.  The bounty hunter then returned the favor but her shots bounced harmlessly off the crew chief's personal magnetic field.  Valarie then decided that they needed to get Mr. Biggs out of there so she ran back and grabbed him.  Johnny wasn't able to find a clear path to charge Vera so he simply moved up and engaged her in hand to hand.  Harry and Xavier decided they needed to get closer so they move up towards some equipment crates.     

 Johnny and Vera traded blows.  Vera went down but managed to wound Johnny.  Valarie threatened Mr. Biggs to get him to sprint towards safety with her.  Alecia tried to drag Karl and Nancy out of the camp but was pinned again by suppressive fire from Arnold as well as Harry and Xavier.   

 Again Johnny couldn't get a clear path for a charge so he simply moved up to engage Alecia.  The two fought but neither damaged the other.  Kara moved up to grab Nancy. 

 Kara tried to move away with Nancy but was pinned by Harry and Xavier.  Johnny and Alecia kept fighting. 

 Alecia knocked Johnny out but both her and Kara came under suppressive fire from the prospecting crew so they were unable to move very far. 

 The prospecting crew continued to move in and try and pin down the bounty hunters.  Victor moved up and engaged Kara in hand to hand. 

 The bounty hunter made short work of the crew chief.  His personal magnetic field was of no use in hand to hand.  Alecia tried to run but was again pinned down. 

As the rest of the prospectors moved in Kara and Alecia decided that getting the boss was enough so they released their hostages and retreated. 

Notes:  We did a ton of things wrong in this game.  We forgot several special abilities during the play and we got the rules for suppressive fire wrong so it was a bit more effective than it should have been.  We counted it as a bounty hunter victory because they got both their faction objective and their secondary objective while the prospectors only got the primary objective.  It was still a fun fight but I didn't post a lot of the detail because we made so many mistakes.  The Valkyrie were bounty hunters and we used the mercenary list for the prospecting crew. 

New Game Room!

 The house we moved into has a full finished basement so of course we had to turn one of the room into a game room.  We've never really had a dedicated game space before so this is a very nice change.  As you can see in this picture we have three four foot square game tables set up with plenty of space in between.  You could probably set up two or three four by eight foot tables if you wanted to in this space.  The closets are very large and we have our terrain and quite a few of our supplies and unpainted minis in them. 

 Here is a shot from the other side.  We have a full sized fridge and a computer.  The doorway leads into our studio space which is close to the same size and the third finished room in the basement is a small bar so game nights should be pretty fun. 

Eventually we hope to organize some of our stuff better and add some decorations but I'm pretty happy that we have the space up and running.  Also all those years of having to use other spaces to play in has resulted in a pretty modular system of terrain and table space which I think will be an even greater asset with a dedicated game space. 

One last project day!

 Well we are moving out at the end of the week so we are packing everything in sight.  Today we packed up most of our game stuff but we also decided to finish up a couple last minute projects.  In truth we should have been packing but I've been wanting to paint really bad so I decided to knock out this astronaut from Reaper.  I'm pretty pleased with him.  Unfortunately most of my photo equipment is also packed so this is just a quick snap shot.  I'm using him as the company pilot for "Venture Star Prospecting" from Station 42.   

We also painted up some generic chemical storage tanks.  I painted the ones in the middle marked; 1,2, and, 3.  My wife painted the ones on the ends.  These are all scratch built from household junk. 

Browncoats Insurrection

I'm starting a new Savage Worlds campaign called "Browncoats" based on the Firefly setting created by Joss Whedon.  The first story arc will be titled "Insurrection.  Some of the characters from my short lived "Midnight Rider" campaign will be in this campaign.  This campaign will be set just after the Miranda broadcast from the Serenity film. 

I will be using quite a few of the generic sci-fi miniatures and buildings from our collection but I will also be adding new projects for this campaign.  I will have an in character blog for the game but the behind the scenes projects will be posted here.   

Hover Tank Finished!

 Well this was a fast and dirty project so it got a fast and dirty paint job.  I'm really happy with the way it turned out since I didn't really put all that much into it.  I think it looks a lot better with paint.  It was just hard to see how it would look without it.  We got a lot done today.  We even assembled some terrain I haven't posted yet. 

Assault on the Redwing Farm (AE Bounty game report for Station 42)

 An unknown group of mercenaries have been attacking farms near Station 42.  Marshal, Malcom Reed of Pleasant Valley decided to gather a posse (large mercenary crew) to defend the farms from these mysterious attackers.  From left to right the posse consisted of; Scott and Marian Redwing (Fresh Meat), Marshal Reed (Sergent), Randall Donne (Sniper), Miles Anders (Fresh Meat), Remi Boutin (Fresh Meat), on the top row, and, Ludia Donne (Sniper), Ivar (Fresh Meat), and Cleatus (Fresh Meat), on the bottom row. 
 

 The 285th Mobile Infantry "Hell Knights" are one of the best equipped and best trained mercenary armies in the Solar System.  This private military company is usually retained by governments to engage in wars or serious police actions.  They will however work for anyone with the cash.  "No Conflict Too Large, No Operation Too Small" is their motto.  Several units of the Hell Knights elite heavy infantry had been hired to harass farmers on Titania by an anonymous employers.  They didn't know why they were there and they didn't care.  As long as the pay came through.  They had even been ensured that the government of Titania would turn a blind eye during the course of the operation and no Confederate troops would be involved.  Their mission was to make life "uncomfortable" for the farmers of Titania.  They were not to use excessive force unless met with organized resistance.  Two elite fire teams (veteran mercenary crew consisting of two elite old guard units) had been deployed to attack the Redwing Farmstead and kill the militia who had gathered to defend it.  They were also instructed to capture Marshal Reed who was leading the defenders.  This was to be a show of force to convince the locals to back down. 

 The mercenaries advanced on the farmhouse where they believed the Marshal was located.  One team took up a position behind the garage and the other behind the pig barn. 

 The squad behind the garage then moved into position inside one of the garage doors.  One of the mercs took a pop shot Marian Redwing but he was out of range.  Randall Donne stepped up into the open doorway of the farmhouse and quickly shot down one of the attackers despite the mercs armored suit and cover. 

 The other merc squad moved into position near the door of the pig barn.  One merc taking cover inside the door while another crouched behind the ramp.  The merc inside the door took a pop shot at Miles Anders who was taking cover behind one of the steel supports holding up the farm house.  The support was hit and absorbed the shot.  Lydia Doone took aim at the merc crouched behind the metal ramp to the pig barn and dropped him just as easily as her husband had.  Marshal Reed was beginning to wonder just who these people were.  Suddenly it seemed to make perfect sense to him that they showed up kitted out in full military gear. 

 Marshal Reed stepped up to the farmhouse window with his boosted light rapid fire particle beam pistol and snapped up a couple of burst at one of the last merc in the garage.  The merc slid down the door jam onto the floor apparently dead or too wounded to keep fighting. 

 Things were looking bad for the mercs.  Scott and Marian Redwing moved up to a position behind one of the supports to their house.  Unfortunately the last remaining merc gunned Scott down.  Marian fired back but missed. 

The merc inside the barn was surrounded but continued to fight.  Several shots were traded back and forth between the merc and the posse members.  Finally Randall Donne stepped into the doorway and dropped the last merc. 

Marshal Reed's posse had managed to stop the mercs without much of a fight.  Even they couldn't believe their luck.  Scott Redwing had been their only casualty and his wounds were serious but not life threatening.  One merc had been killed so Marshal Reed took the wounded mercs into custody. 

Notes:  Well that was perhaps the shortest battle of AE Bounty we have had.  It only lasted three turns.  For both forces we used the mercenaries crew.  I ran the mercs and I chose to build them using the veteran crew.  I chose two old guard squads and used my regular choices to make them "elite" grade.  This gave them four action points each turn which I figured would help negate the fact that I gave them Armored Suits which reduced their movement by 1 per turn.  I also armed them with powerful but short ranged particle beam rifles.  I figured when they got in range they would rain death down on their enemies.  Not so much. 


For the posse we used a large mercenary crew with; a sergent, two snipers, and three units of fresh meat.  Everyone except the marshal were armed with slugthrower rifles and armor piercing ammunition.  The Marshal had a boosted LRF particle beam and a personal energy screen.  What made the posse so deadly was that both the snipers had the ability "Hunter: human".  The Hunter X ability is extremely powerful in an all human setting.  Because of this we have decided as a house rule to restrict it to individuals only for this setting.  The snipers were able to completely negate the merc's cover and reduce their armor by 1 point with the AP rounds.  My wife also managed to roll an insane number of 6s.  In fact every sniper shot that hit was a 6 followed by a 6 damage roll.  Three of my guys went down by round two like chumps. 


It was fun to see the difference between a tweaked out veteran crew and a large crew.  Even with the amazing rolls I think this would have been a hard fight for the mercs.   

Hover Tank!

 A while back I picked up a military play set that scaled about right with 28mm.  One of the vehicles I got in the set was a simple little tank.  It is about the size as a Games Workshop Predator tank and I considered just painting it up as is.  Then I decided to make it look more futuristic so I added some bits from a 1/35 scale X-wing starfighter kit.  That looked ok but it still wasn't right. 
Then I decided to turn it into a hover tank by cutting the tracks off and adding some hover drives made from cheap razor handles.  I think this looks much better.  There are some areas I could cover up like the fact you can still see some wheels and track but I don't think it will look to bad with paint.  For a cheapo toy with some junk added to it I'm pretty happy with it as is.