Firestorm Armada: Battle table tops! Ready for battle!

Here is one battle table top. Ready for space combat! Pew pew pew. Thanks Ragna for helping out.

Space the next frontier! We have our Dystopian wars table top ready as well. Sorry I did not have a photo. 

Dystopian Wars: French Attack Flotilla

JYo, internets!  Welcome back. Normally I try to get my posts up in the evening time, but I was actually working for a

friend of mine in New York City; he runs a film production company.

We ended up shooting music video and spending a rather lengthy amount of time in Union Square, and a little bit in the Delancy St area. Notable areas of interest include the Bathroom from Hell. 

Those are glowing sigils. This was with the lights on...

Yes, that was legit. Anyway, I don't have hepatitis... The music video we shot will be up in late September/early Febtober; I'll be sure to include a link!

Onward, to today's post! I've been itching to unleash some Dystopian Wars mayhem on the podcast/gaming table, and what better way to start than to show off my new pretties!

Behold, ze Republique of France Attack Flotilla! 

Meh, glare...

But, so nice a present!  Super excited for these guys. 

The primary reason I took an interest in France, aside from the free Croissants and their sexy ship design, is the Heat Lances!!!  French ships do look particularly hawt on the tabletop, especially when done up in a nice design, but those lasers...

#changingmypantsnow

My primary draw was firepower, and boy do those lances pack a punch. I also enjoy the fact that several of their battleships are skimmers, that can also be equipped with Heat Lances. Even their cruisers in the Attack Flotilla have Heat Lancettes (I'm pretty sure those are female Heat Lances). I've heard how powerful and annoying French ships can be en masse, and I'm tempted to grab a Magenta mk II in the future, to continue building a Heal Lance Heavy build.

Currently, I have the 2 cruisers on the paint table.

  

Firestorm Armada: Dindrenzi black?? Flat or metallic?

Since my Jackson Pollack accident. I stopped by Michaels and bought two other blacks enamel paints. A flat black and a black metallic.

Comparing to three different blacks I am torn which to use from now on. I have accepted I do not want to use glossy black any more. But both the flat black and black metallic looks awesome.

You can see the gloss black is part of the main hull leading down to the turrets. I didn't like it not providing enough details. 

Looking at the flat black and metallic black. Shown here...

The main CIC is flat black. While the metallic black is painted on the left wing. 

Which black should i use from now on?

Metallic black or flat?

STUFF and THINGS!!!!!!!

Hello all 4 readers that will read this (well if like the podcast I will be the only one who will read this...),

This is Onyx, as I am sure you have gathered.  I will keep this post short (I hope at least.  I'm now home from the gym and wants to eat).  To be honest I have no clue what to write.  I had no clue that I was supposed to post tonight and the angry boss man is being a big meany and making me post whether I like it or not (damn you Ragna!!!!!).

So what fun stuffs have I been up to...getting ready to compete in Highland Games next year.  The gym has been taking up most of my time.  But, I get to wear a kilt so that makes me happy.  Side note, I totally get why girls wear skirts in the summer, its so much cooler and you get to show off your sexy legs.  Fuck Yeah Baby!!!!

But in my free time that I am not getting ready to throw trees, rocks, and pitch forks with bag of rope on the end (yup, thats an event), I have been squeezing in some painting.  I just finished an Earthbreaker!!!!  Its super sexy with its knock down shots, and rough terrain, and its soul stealing, lava bending, rock throwing, haduken aiming...ok, so the last part is a bit false, but a Onyx can dream right!  A picture will be added in a later blog because I am inept and don't understand how this technology works.  Mac is far too advanced for a person like myself (but is still betters...)

I have also became an addict to a new app.  Hi, I am Onxy.  "hi Onyx!"  I am addicted to Battle Cats and am becoming addicted to hearthstone :( I have to say, mobile games are the bane of existence.  Now I can game crappy games 24 hours a day.  This is not good for the man with ADHD.  I have to limit myself to the amount I play.  If I don't, I will never be able to post loverly things for you all to not read.

I promise next time I will come more prepared for this fun adventure.  I am signing off for now, maybe I will be back later in the week to actually put something up with substance.  I promise, hand over my heart, I will be better at this in the future (so glad you did not see my fingers crossed behind my back hehehehe).

Good night, so long, what ever...

Onyx

Whoops! Oh wait!?!

While painting some Dindrenzi warships. I accidentally knocked over my black enamel paint and created art on my carpet. Still pissed. I need more black paint.

A little mineral spirit, scrubbing and I think I made it worse. Jackson Pollack art!

Pirates: Sailing the High Seas!

First post!  Woohoo!

Alright that aside, weekends are a great time to spend with the kids.  So after running my two little guys ragged in the wilds of Jersey with Onyx, what better way to spend the afternoon than enjoying a nice board game with my kids?

Except my kids don't want to do anything inside except drain their little minds playing their iPhones.

So after several attempts at a board game, Onyx and I caved (they were beat from running around for 3+ hours anyway) and decided to play a  game ourselves.

Now, this game definitely merits an episode on the podcast itself.  It's called Pirates of the Spanish Main, by Wizkids.

Now some of you out there in Blog-land may say, "Ragna, that company is extinct."  And you would be correct, my insightful minions readers!  Wizkids went out of business a few years back.  It's a shame really.  Their mini games were actually quite fun.

A few months ago, my young one began to develop an interest in board/tabletop gaming.  He often sees my room/workbench laden with minis, and he's  always interested in what's on the paining table.

What's on the painting table.

Anyways, he's only 6; a bit too young for Warmahordes, despite the fact that he's brighter than my 9 year old.  I didn't want to pass up this chance to corrupt lovingly expose my darling son to the wonders of minis...

Pirates is/was a nice easy game that he can understand which also doesn't require a huge investment of time or money. It's also kind to those with short attention spans (Onyx).  

So despite the allures of iPhoney goodness, Onyx and I got a several games of Pirates in.  I'll save more of the actual rules for our podcast on the subject matter, but for now, we'll focus on the game at hand.

Pirates is easily adaptable to a wide variety of mods beyond its original rules.  The game's inherent systems are based on a simple 1d6 roll, and thus, easily incorporate cool additions and fun terrain.  Our game used the Armada mod:

To play you need generous amounts of terrain and access to a wide number of ships.  Each player starts with a new pack, or if you have an existing lot of ships, a selected ship and a randomly assigned ship.

Terrain is placed to quarter off portions of the table.  We ended up using "impassable" mountainous terrain (read: pieces of other board games) as well as 5 islands.  Treasure pieces are scattered at random on the island.  Turn order is Firestorm Armada style: you move one ship, then he moves one, and so forth until the round is completed.

I hear pirates are into booty.

In this mode, a ship's cargo stat is ignored, and all treasure earned is put into a player "bank." (immune to treasure raiding) Gathering treasure will yield the treasure piece's value +1d6.  At any point during an player's turn, a player may spend treasure in their "bank" to purchase a ship from a reserve.  In our game, we had a pool of 15+ ships to choose from.

Aside from getting dice stomped our first game, the game is really fast paced and fun, with a lot of firepower getting on board really quickly.  At one point, we had about 15 ships on the field.

This is where stuff went down...

Good times, good times.  Shame the kids didn't want in.  My son is a powerhouse fleet commander.

If you have the time and the money, and don't mind doing some digging, Pirates is a fun game to unearth from the depths of the internet.  Good luck and Happy sailing!

- Ragna

30mm's back!

Strong words. I've heard them before. From a thousand Ragnas across a thousand worlds. And now...they are all Borg. 

Wait, wrong topic. Welcome back inter-webs! As promised, our blog is up and running and we'll start having content several times a week. We'll be posting our game updates, podcasty goodness, painting updates (not that any of us can paint), and of course, our entire AAR for our Dystopian Wars campaign!  (Details in the coming weeks). 

Super excite!

Laters!