Finally, I have to room to do the many projects I've been collecting stuff for. No more putting stuff up every week because the wife needed the room for her projects. I am now the proud owner of my own mancave. Ha Ha Ha.

Unfortunately, during the move I found out how many projects I had gathered for but hadn't done much with. No matter, when faced with a big task you hammer it out one piece at a time. 

Task I- A VSF Ornithopter.

Having been impressed by anothers use of a Ral Partha Dwarf Ornitophter

http://www.lead-adventure.de/index.php?topic=14230.0

 

I decided to make my own. Out came the box of Ornithopters and much to my surprise I found each box held two. How wonderful. Then I noticed that they lacked landing gear. Expletive deleted, I bought the wrong kind.

What to do, What to do.

I remembered that I had a Fast Lane construction train and it came with a crane (I'd bought it just to have four more pieces of straight track, Fast Lane and Goldlock make nice cheap trains but they never come with enough straight track pieces).

I decided that my Ornithopters didn't take off from a landing field, no they were launched into by a steam catapult.

The crane as it was orginally.
Strip off the stickers, remove the line and hook, flip the crane upside down so it formed a trough.
To the parts boxes.
Needs rivets of course, but a good start.
Here it is with the Dwarven Flyer. Needs a proper pilot and that Dragon Head removed, but I think it has promise.
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Egyptian Wars 04/15/2012
 
Sorry about the delay in blogging, but the Mrs. and I (and a BANK) finally bought a house. Moving from the apartment to the house (Yes, I finally have my own Mancave) and filling out all the paperwork pretty well killed the month.

The 14th I did take some time off for the Egyptian War mini-con. Even smaller than Winter War, Egyptian War had a little roleplaying, some board games, a 40K tournament (about a dozen players), a good amount of Pathfinder players, and some Warmachine.

I made it to the finals in the Settlers of Catan tournament (by. 3 percent and then winning a die roll with the other two people I tied with). Got creamed in the finals (only had 4 lousy points) so I didn't get the free trip to Gencon.

I got in a nice game of old school Gamma World (with miniatures) that was really fun. I forgot how much fun the old 1st Ed. was. I "won" that game with my electric, flying, chameleon, teleporting, laid-back (I just want to bask in the sun, unless I smell blood in the water), telepathic, hippie crocodile. Yeah, it was that kind of over the top game. I'm pretty sure you couldn't get that many mutations in 1st Gen. Gamma World, I'll check when I dig my copy out, but the bad guys were badass to.

SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL GAMING CONVENTION
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Saturday evening I played in an ACW Ironclads game (1/1200 ships) using modified Smoke On the Waters rules. It was the basic Plum Point scenario. A lone Union Ironclad must fight off the River Defense fleet made up of a bunch of Cottonclad rams and defend the immobile mortar boats. More Union ships are on their way, but will take a few turns to get to the fight.
The Confederate Cottonclads approach.
The USS Cincinnati moves out to engage the oncoming fleet.
After multiple hits the Cincinnati catches on fire.
No sooner than the Cincinnati gets the fires out than two ships try to ram. One bounces, the Little Rebel (lower ship) hits home but return fire kills its Captain and jams its steering. The Cincinnati takes on water, but its skilled crew stops the flooding quickly.
On turn three help begins to arrive in the form of the USS Benton (the grey ship on the left). Followed quickly by the Lexington (Timberclad) and the Carondolet (Ironclad)
The Jeff Thompson rams but does no damage, and is set on fire by the return fire. The Cincinnati takes a pounding from the other ships guns and has its captain killed. Hurrah, the inept captain is replaced by an adequate one.
Another ram that the Cincinnati barely survives, but the guns of the oncoming Union ships catch another Confederate on fire. Meanwhile, a Confederate ship slips downstream with a mortar boat in tow.
The beginning of the end.
The Confederates finally lose a ship (the only one sunk the whole game). The Union warships begin the chase the Confederates down river. I didn't get to do much in this game. My ship, the USS Cardonolet was tail end charlie and the Lexington kept blocking my fire in order to shoot at the Confederates.
Who won?
The Cincinnati was shot to hell and the Confederates made off with a mortar boat (giving them the only 13 inch mortar that they would have had in the war). The Union finally sank a ship and was getting into postion to deal out real damage when time ran out. A good game but too close to call.
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Saturday afternoon the game was TUSK. Three groups of Victorian explorers and two groups of British soldiers had to escape the Forgotten Island before the volcano exploded and destroyed the island. The players had to cross a jungle, filled with prehistoric creatures, and make it to the beach where boats would pick them up and take them out to the ship.
My group was lead by that famed explorer Rhino Ryan. The lady in my group was rather lightly clothed by Victorian standards, something must have happened to her dress (A giant ape must have removed it earlier in the expedition).
A T Rex leaves off feasting on a dinosaur carcass to charge towards one of the groups.
Big Mistake, for he is going up against the Killer Kid. This six year old would tell dad where to move the figures, then handle the selection of targets and shooting himself. What a die roller. By the time the game ended he had killed nine dino's!!!
British soldiers, carefully using cover, sneak around undetected by another feasting group of carnivores. I didn't think that Brits were allowed to be stealthy. Aren't they suppose to advance in a line out in the open?
My group and the Killer Kid's is charged by a lone dino. Poor dino he never had a chance against the Killer's hot die rolling.
That's more like it. The Brits advance in line in the open and down a T Rex with a volley. None of that skulking around, by God. It just isn't British.
The second group of Brits quickly down two larger velociraptors, while a larger group of smaller raptors sneak up behind them.
The Killer Kid sees two and kills two more carnivorous dinosaurs (I only got to kill one dino the whole because the Kid never missed).
One Brit unit gets attacked by itty bitty killer chickensaurs, who because of sheer numbers actually survive lon enough to do a wound. The only wound the dinos scored all game.
One player ran the person with the proof that the island really existed (a dino egg or something like that) out ahead of his group. She was attacked by a dino, who of course missed, and said dino went down under a hail of gunfire before it could attack again.
There was a bit of trouble with a carnivorous plant, but it ended up being no more than a nuisance.
As the island slowly sank beneath the waves, drowning the dinosaurs that had survived on it for millions of years, everyone made it into the waiting boats. Not even a no name extra had died.
Sometimes when you run a game, it ends up being too hard and kills everyone. Sometimes you think no one can possibly survive, and it turns into a cakewalk.
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Saturday morning I played in a Game of Desperado. Three groups of cowboys, and one group of lawmen vs. three groups of bandits out to rob the bank.
Layout of the town. The Bank is the second building from the bottom on the left. One group of bandits started by the barn on the top left of the picture, the other two entered the board directly behind the bank. The bandits had to exit the table on the edge with the barn.
My boys, From left to right 2-Gun Bob, Billy Bob, and Just Plain Bob.
Things went bad for the bandits from the beginning. The cowboys by the barn opened up on them without warning (and without reason) tying up that group of bandits for the remainder of the game. The cowboys in the saloon and the lawmen by the jail had to react based on actual events, not just shoot whoever they felt like.
The other two groups of bandits made it to the back of the closed bank and tried repeatedly to kick in the door. The cowboys in the saloon opposite the bank moved to the windows or out on the porch to see what was going on down the street where the gunfight had broken out between the bandits and the cowboys. The lawmen left the jail and moved towards the shootout by the barn.
After several tries, the bandits finally kicked in the back door of the bank and blew the safe with their one and only stick on dynamite.
Before the lawmen could react, the sheriff (lower left) was shot in the leg and was left crawling for the rest of the game. A bandit dashing across an alley to cover didn't make it and is shot down. One thing I like about Desperado is that you never know exactly how far you'll move. You roll 1d6 for crawling, 2d6 fpor walking, and 3d6 for running. There were times you could walk fast than you could run and crawl fast than you could walk. Dashing from cover to cover was dangerous, a bad roll would leave you out in the open.
The bandits kill a deputy with a head shot.
A cowboy and a bandit blaze away at each other at short range, mainly misses and and a couple minor wounds, until the the bandit took a leg wound and went down. The wound dropped him but didn't take him out and the fight continued. This fight lasted for several cards.
Billy Bob exits the back of the saloon and is shot by a bandit. Just a graze to the head, and Billy Bob guns the bandit down after a couple of cards of shooting.
The bandits start grabbing the bags of money from the safe, run and go over the stone wall, and try to use that for cover to make it to the edge of the board by the barn.
One by one the bandits run down the wall, and one by one the get gunned down. Even with covering fire, no one made it. The guy who figured out you could crawl safely down the wall, still had to stand up and run at the end. In the end the cowboys and the lawmen won. Not a single bandit made it away, with or without money.

The Bobs, those were my boys, got three kills and only took one wound, and that was only a 5 point graze, Another cowboy player got four kills and took only 15 points of damage. It was a real massacre of the bandits.

I really like the game Desparado, BUT it is easy to hit and easy to kill. Several times players were firing three or more shots. The first would be at 45%, the second at 35% and the last at 25% chance to hit. With those odds you are bound to get a hit. When you did, the hit location chart has plenty of auto kills and auto disables on it. I've noticed that Desperado tends to be a bloodbath every time you play it. It would be a hard system to campaign with, because you characters would rarely last two games. To fix this I propose letting all of the shots take the minuses for the number of shots fired. As it is now the first shot is at full %, the 2nd is at -10%, the 3rd is at -20%, and so forth. Instead, if you fire three shots you would be -20% to all of them (you aren't carefully aiming, you're just blazing away). I feel that this modification would tone down the bloodiness of the game.
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On Friday evening I ran a Gaslight game. It was suppose to be for six players, but only two showed up so I reduced the number of units. The scenario was called Gearson's Raid (named after the real Grierson's Raid of the Civil War). The Union mechanized Cavalry consisted of a unit on Mechanical Cavalry (mounted on Mageknight horses), two conventional cavalry squads, four steam-powered cycles with Gatling guns (from Deadlands), an Armored Landship with a Gatling guns, and a couple of officers. Their objective was to destroy a Confederate depot. The Confederates had two squads armed with muzzle-loading rifles, who were poor shots and had even worse morale (railroad workers and raw recuits), a Sniper with a repeating heavy rifle, a smoothbore cannon, a large Mechanical man and an officer. Their job was to defend the depot and wait for reinforcements (an armored train and a squad of cavalry that would arrive on a random turn).
On the left the Union advanced with two steam-cycles, the Landship, the Mechanical cavalry, and Colonel Gearson leading from the rear. The Mechanical cavalry has already lost a man to the Sniper.
On the right two squads of conventional cavalry advanced, accompanied by two steam-cycles and Captain Johnson who also lead from the rear.
The Confederates took cover behind a barricade of boxes, with a squad on the right and left, and the cannon, sniper and officer in the middle.
The Mechanical Man advanced and promptly broke down. The mechanics rushed out to restart him, but were stopped by charging Union cavalry. Those mechanics survived four turns out in the open, surrounded by cavalry and even killed several of the Union forces (they only had a 6 Scuffle and a 6 Save but the dice gods smiled upon them).
As the Union approached, the Major Jones charged the Landship, hitting it with a firebomb (I allow people to throw while moving otherwise thrown weapons are not much use). The bomb took out the Landships wheels, immobilzing it, and amazingly, the Major made it back to the barricades through a fusillade of bullets (a high Save and a good run of cards really helped him out).
The Confederates were reinforced with an armored train on the second turn.
The armed railroad workers squad on the right flank emptied the saddles of one of the Union cavalry squad, depite being poor shots. That unit retreated and Captain Johnson had to bring them back into the battle. Those railroad workers stayed longer than they should have been able to, they must have been inspired by the Major's daring attack on the landship.
On the left flank, the squad of raw recuits didn't do so good. After losing a couple of men to the Gatlings on the steam-cycles and immobalized Landship they skedaddled for home. The Mechanical Cavalry took loses from the Sniper, but still closed on the barricade. Since the Mechanical Horses couldn't jump the barricade they stayed on the other side and exchanged shots with the Sniper, Major Jones, and the Cannon Crew (who did more damage with their pistols than they did with the cannon).
Leaving a couple troopers behind to deal with the two surviving mechanics, one of the Union cavalry squads jumped the barricade and wiped out the railroad workers. The railroad workers bravely fought to the last man and even brought down a couple of Union cavalrymen.
Fire from the Gatling on the Armored Train, the Sniper and Major Jones dropped all of the Mechical Cavalry squad but the sergeant, who passed a morale test and was able to stay on the field.
The Confederate Cavalry finally arrived, but was quickly reduced in strength by Gatling and carbine fire. The Armored Train Moved forward to provide cover for the Confederate cavalrymen. The Union troopers threw firebomb after firebomb in attempt to damage the Locomotive and the Cannon Car, but the firebombs either failed to penetrate or did little damage when they did.

And so ended the game.

We were out of time. The Union would have had to spent a few turns rounding up firebombs from fallen soldiers, while under fire from the armored train.

Please note the steam-cycles in the middle fleeing the Armored Train after receiving a spray of steam and boiling water from the Locomotive.

Also note, the last of the Mechanics locked in a struggle with Captain Johnson. That Mechanic survived hand-to-hand combat until the next to last turn.

It was a good game and both players had fun. I am personally amazed at the luck the Confederates had. The Major stopping the Landship in its tracks with his only bomb, the Railroad Workers staying and fighting despite loses (I treated them as counting half for morale purposes), the early arrival of the Armored Train, and incredible job the Mechanics did surviving as long as they did.
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The weekend was Winter War 39 In Champaign, IL. This makes at least the 15th time in the last 30 years that I have attended this Con. A small con by most standards (half-a-dozen dealers, an ASL tournament, and at least 15 RPGs, Boardgames, and Minatures games running in each time slot) I always have a good time and buy more stuff than I should. Much to my surprise, I did get the last of the vehicles and terrain for the GASLIGHT game I'm running ready.

SOME PICS OF GAMES I DIDN'T PLAY IN

A few picks from a huge VSF on Mars game.

Some from a Wings of War game that featured a very nice Zeppelin

I started the Con with a couple games of Betrayal at the House on the Hill. A nice game with random rooms and over 50 different "Haunts" (that's what they call it when the betrayal starts and the ghosts/monsters/demons/killer plants/whatever start attacking the rest of the players). It is hard to tell what the scenario will be (items useful in one scenario will be next to worthless in another). I've played this game several times before, but this is the first time I played two in a row with six players. Both times the betrayer lost and the "good" guys won (survived) and I learned that it really doesn't handle six players well. It is far easier than in a five player game for the "good" players to cooperate to beat the monsters and the betrayer.

For example, in one of the games the betrayer had killer vines that would grab hold of a victim and drag him or her to their death. The only thing that could kill it was a special plant poison that had to be made. One player (who was fast and tough but not smart enough) grabbed the book that was needed and ran it to the laboratory where (on the next player's turn) the smart but weak player whipped up the poison. One person would then carry it into a room kill one vine. Then another vine would grab that person causing them to drop the poison. The next player in the player order would run into the room, grab the poison and kill the vine holding the first player. Then the poison would go back to the first player and the cycle would repeat itself. With just three players working together (while the other two were trapped on the second floor) the vines did not stand a chance.
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It is a week until Winter War in Champaign, IL and I still don't have all my stuff ready for the GASLIGHT game I am running!!!! I have finished the tents and the animals. I put seven rows of rivets on the Artillery Car for the Armored Train tonight (only 11 to go!!!) and I still need to rivet up the Armored Steam Engine. I put things away for the Holidays (people were suppose to come overbut didn't) and put the project off. I'll finish in time, but I'll need to put in alot of work this weekend. Sigh. Next time I will finish the project and to heck with my wife fussing over the mess just because visitors might show up.

Yeah......Right......That's going to happen
At least I have the cards ready. This time I used a Magic Card creator to make a card(s) for each unit. Each card has all the info on it for the unit. Instead of drawing a playing card, I just draw the unit card and hand it to the player. In my previous attempts at running the game, I found that players would forget which cards were their's and then be forced to dig through sheets to find the units stats. I am hoping that if there is a picture of the unit on the card and the stats right in front of them the game will flow better.
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Napoleon's Other Wars by Mike Broers
ISBN: 9781906165116
Publisher: Peter Lang Ltd

I have always avoided gaming the Napoleonic Wars. I've played the occasional miniatures battle set in them at a Con, but they games never seemed to actually finish in time. This is mainly because of the thousands of figures you need for most battles. It just takes a long time to push that much lead around the table. No one I knew had a Napoleonic army (even in 10mm it would cost alot and would take forever to paint). With all the different uniforms, which constantly changed during the time period, it seemed to me to be a lot of work to paint a couple armies that would only be in the right uniform for a couple battles.

Then I read this book. I knew a little about the Spanish Ulcer, had heard of the Tyrollean revolt, and knew the Vendee exsisted, but I never knew how many little wars Napoleon had to deal with. There were many uprisings in even France, and that doesn't even count the many bandit/disserter bands. The official French history was that everyone loved Napoleon, when in fact many fought him, rebelled against him, stole from him (once the entire payroll for the Army of Italy was robbed!!!!), and did whatever they could to avoid being in the army. Tyrol, Italy, even Belgium gave him plenty of problems you rarely hear about in regular histories. Most of the more successful uprisings (none actually won, not even in Spain) used tactics developd by bandits and smugglers. Spain, of course is covered, as is the wars in Latin America. My only complaint about the book is that after it covered France, Tyrol and Italy the coverage thinned out. It really needed another 100 or so pages, to give me the details I'd have liked to have on Spain and Latin America. He could have dropped the whole section on Ali Pasha and it would have been fine with me (though it was a good section also).

The small battles and skirmishes he covered interest me as a gamer. A couple hundred figures would cover everything you need for a dozen battles or even a campaign. Many games could be handled with just 6 figures on each side. Some of the rebel/bandits would be hard to find figures for (Tyroleans in Lederhosen), but others could be just generic 18th century/early 19th century peasants and armed riff-raff.
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I'm in charge of a library in Southern Illinois. Since I, my assistant, and one of the Library Board members are gamers (they mainly RPG, me whatever I can get) the library has started having a monthly Game Day on the last Saturday of the Month. I had hoped to get people into miniatures gaming, but that just didn't work out. Still we get to play a variety of board games (Settlers of Catan, Bang, Betrayal at the House on the Hill, Puerto Rico, and others) and at least one RPG usually DC Superheroes. Since some of the attendees are families with small children my wife (god love her) spends her time doing Chutes and Ladders, Ants in the Pants, and other kiddy games (she is not really a gamer and works at a daycare so she's good with kids). Since Saturday this year fell on New Year's Eve we decided to have all night Gaming New Year's Eve (started at 10PM and finished at 6AM). Since it was so late at night we were able to say no kids, for which my wife was very happy. I brought the miniatures and terrain to do a Where Heroes Dare pirate game, but once again no one was really interested. Instead we played Betrayal on the House on the Hill, I'm the Boss, The Werewolves of Miller's Hollow, two sessions of DC Superheroes, Bang and many other games (I think someone even dragged out the Spongebob Operation game from the kid's games box). We had thirty to start with and a good 20 made it until 6AM.
Lots of Gaming and lots of food and drink (you know gamers, and their fondness for eating).
Of course, we had to have party hats and noise-makers to bring in the New Year's with.
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