Perilous Tales: A Rough Night in Devil's Gulch

 I finally finished the Sarissa "Atomic Gas" gas station, and was eager to get it on the table, along with some recent scatter terrain I've done - some trash bags and a couple of pallets of cocaine from Miniature Building Authority and a humvee from Crooked Dice. Looking over the painted miniatures I had immediately available, a game of Perilous Tales began to present itself.

Years ago, I ran a B-horror movie review blog, watching and reviewing hundreds of horror movies over a period of about 7 years; why I stopped is too long a story to tell here, and not particularly interesting, but one thing I fell in love with during that project was 1970s made-for-TV movies. While the crown jewel of these is probably "The Night Stalker," starring Darren McGavin and introducing the world to Carl Kolchak, one that I really enjoyed was 1972's "Gargoyles," starring Cornell Wilde and Bernie Casey as the leader of the gargoyles. It's most notable for being the first film to feature the work of Stan Winston, who would go on to work on movies like "The Terminator," "Aliens," and "Jurassic Park." Now, Perilous Tales offers up Gargoyles as a villain for games; I had some gargoyles painted up. And I had some desert terrain pieces available. 

While the film mostly follows an academic as he races to prevent the gargoyles from producing an army, I decided the cartel members I'd recently painted from Brigade Games' "Drug War Z" line would be my protagonists this time around. 

So I had my set-up: a cadre of cartel soldiers, sent on what they believed would be a routine pick-up, instead encounter monstrous gargoyles at an isolated gas station in the American Southwest. Objectives would be Forbidden Knowledge (collect an esoteric artifact that one of the villains drops when slain), Flip the Switches, and Escape.

left to right: Marcus, Javier, Carlos, Ramon, Hector

The cartel members advanced slowly towards the abandoned humvee and scattered cargo of cocaine. As they began to fan out, Marcus spotted something beyond the cactus patch - a winged humanoid figure, standing stock-still.

He opened fire, but barely grazed the creature, which seemed to teleport closer in short bursts every time he blinked. Meanwhile, a ground tremor knocked Hector and Ramon off their feet.

The sound of gunfire brought out a crazed, sunburned man in a pith helmet - an archaeologist who had been working in the desert and fallen under the gargoyles' sway. He swung wildly at Marcus.

The crazed archaeologist eventually fell beneath the fists of Marcus, Javier and Hector as the gargoyle slowly advanced towards them. Meanwhile, Carlos and Ramon circled the back of the gas station, encountering another gargoyle, standing frozen, glowering at them, just as night fell.

Carlos knocked over a weird stone obelisk, the destruction of which seemed to bother the creature. He and Ramon then opened fire on the beast, wounding and eventually killing it; the creature dropped an odd golden statue depicting a four-winged demonic figure. Shoving the statue into Ramon's hands, Carlos told him to get out of here, and to take the statue back to the cartel.

Carlos then circled past the gas station towards the next strange obelisk, disturbing a swarm of bats in the process. To make matters worse, a second swarm almost immediately showed up. Weathering the bats' onslaught, once they'd had their fill Carlos pushed over the second obelisk and left, following Ramon back towards the cartel headquarters.The bats then moved on to harass Hector and Javier.

Marcus, Javier and Hector, meanwhile, were doing their best to kill the gargoyle crouching on a pallet of carefully-packaged bricks of cocaine, but were ineffectual at best; at least they had the benefit of the creature not being able to move while being observed, and even in the darkness of night they were close enough to keep the gargoyle contained. Eventually, however, the threat just became overwhelming, and the scene fades to black.

So that was a good time! We got two of the three switches flipped, and two heroes off the board, including one carrying the Esoteric Artifact; technically nobody died, so we scored some bonus victory points there. I'll be honest, when the second gargoyle and "Darkness Falls" both triggered at the same time I expect it to be a wash; the gargoyles are hard to kill because they have a lot of hit points, and darkness limits heroes' ability to observe (and thus control the movements of) the two gargoyles. Somehow I managed to keep at least two heroes close enough to pin the gargoyles down for the entire game. It was a nice hour and a half this afternoon and damn, that table set-up looks good if I do say so myself! I'm really pleased with the growth of my terrain collection, and this gas station is definitely worth the almost-four weeks I spent  slowly building and painting it.

WIP - Sarissa Precision "Atomic Gas"

 Call it a Gas Station, Petrol Station, Fuel Parlor (someone probably calls it that), it's a must for any urban or post-apocalyptic table. My wife was kind enough to get me Sarissa's "Atomic Gas" Gas Station for my birthday last month, and I've been slowly working on it over the past few days.

the catalog image, non-derelict version

 

I say slowly because the weather's been really uncooperative, with days and days of smothering humidity punctuated by torrential rainstorms. Which has made getting things primed extraordinarily annoying!

Worse, I'm nearing a point where I'm going to have no choice but to stop until the weather cooperates; I don't want to glue the walls together until I have plastic sheeting glued into place for the windows, and I don't want to glue the windows in until the walls are varnished (so that the varnish doesn't frost the windows). And I can't varnish the building when the humidity's sitting at 86% for 12-15 hours at a time. So I'm painting as much as I can, getting the paper flooring glued down, and obsessively rechecking how the parts fit together. 

I'm also working on some furnishings (purchased from Miniature Building Authority) as you can see here - out front there's a locked cage for propane tanks (not yet primed), as well as a reach-in freezer filled with bagged ice. Inside, I've got a top-down freezer filled with ice cream (placed in impulse-buy range of the front counter, just like in the gas station up the street from my apartment) and a vending machine:

There's a bit of a story here - "Big Red" is an American cream soda, only available in certain markets, mostly around Texas and Kentucky. The flavor is frequently mistaken for bubble gum, but is apparently a mix of lemon and orange oils and vanilla - and it's awful (or at least, a not-easily-acquired taste). My wife's father loved Big Red, and more than drinking it, he loved tricking other people into drinking it. I'll never forget his booming chuckle as he watched me take an unsuspecting sip of it. 

So presented with the flat expanse of the front of this vending machine, I knew I wanted to paint something, and while looking at photos of '90s era vending machines I remembered this syrupy nightmare drink, and decided it would be funny to have a vending machine filled with nothing but Big Red (and a discontinued variant, Big Blue) awaiting the unwary, thirsty customer. The red also pops against the green-and-white scheme I chose for the gas station as a whole, drawing even more attention to it. 

Looking at the weather forecast, I don't expect to be able to do any more priming or varnishing until Friday at the earliest; I might try assembling a delicate resin chair to put behind the counter, and I'm waiting on a resin cast toilet to arrive to put in the back room. I'm hoping I can maybe have *most* of the gas station done by next Monday.

Donut Worry

 For my birthday last month, my wonderful, lovely wife bought me a few pieces of modern terrain - a 3D-printed donut shop and a couple of MDF kits. I ordered some resin furniture from Miniature Building Authority to complement them, and started in on the donut shop, though found myself switching gears to paint orcs last month pretty vigorously. Picking up Majestic 13, and needing to be able to field urban tables, gave me the impetus to finish up the shop (and having a head cold that's left me too foggy-headed to play a game has certainly not impeded my painting either).

Two notes: One, I'm very grateful that Reaper Miniatures sends out free bottles of "Breast Cancer Awareness Pink" in every order during the month of October, because I'm pretty sure I went most of the way through one bottle painting the interior and the sign. 

Two, "Big Nick Was Here" is a bit of a personal in-joke. I didn't want to paint overly-raunchy graffiti in case I ever have occasion to set up and run a modern skirmish at a convention, and early in the Pandemic I was looking at playing Zona Alfa solo, re-localized from eastern Europe to the American Southwest (to better fit my collection of cacti and desert hills terrain). So Nicolai, the bandit leader from the first scenario in the book, became the American biker "Big Nick," with a Mark Copplestone biker figure painted as such. You can see him here. He's such a characterful figure that I'd welcome any opportunity to put him on the table. While it's hard to justify a group of player-character Hell's Angels in Majestic 13, and there's no option for civilians to be running around the table complicating fights, I'm sure Big Nick will find a way on to the table again soon - even if under a different ruleset. Either way, his mark's here. 

I'll get the building and furnishings varnished tomorrow afternoon, and then Tuesday I'll cut some clear plastic sheets to size and glue them into the windows and glue the furniture down. And then it's play time!

Majestic 13: Test Play #1, "Keel's Killers Vs. the Avenkian Shrieker"

The other day I picked up a new solo/co-op skirmish game called Majestic 13 from Snarling Badger Studios. Premise is you have a team of five operatives who belong to one of 13 organizations that have joined forces to protect the earth from an alien threat; in most games, this threat is made manifest as a single big, brutal monster with a lot of hit points. The video game series "X-COM" gets referenced quite a bit as a comparison, but I've never played it so I can't say much on that point. Realizing that I had everything I needed already painted, it was short work to print up the PDF, roll up my team, and get a test game on the table.

 I'd initially planned on playing out my first test game tomorrow, Sunday the 18th, as I was scheduled for two RPG sessions today - but I woke up feeling a head cold coming on, so I bowed out of my afternoon in-person game, and the online game I'd been scheduled for this evening was postponed by the GM. So, with my evening suddenly free, I figured I'd move up my first playtest to tonight.

 My group is "Keel's Killers" - a group of roughnecks (oil rig workers, industrial welders, etc.) given guns and told to stomp mudholes in monsters. Their leader, Johanna Keel, is a veteran of Majestic 13, having pulled this new group together after being the sole survivor of a previous team. 

Left to Right: Keel, Barker, Moseley, Arnold and Klass

Rolling a few dice, I determined they'd be fighting in a wilderness area and facing off against an Avenkian Shrieking Shock Trooper, one of 26 monster archetypes presented by the game. In this case it's a pretty straight-forward brawler type that also has an area of effect attack - by shrieking, it can deal damage over a 12" radius, which is quite a bit when you're playing on a 3'x3' board! I picked a Reaper Bones "Gloom Stalker" (or in D&D terms, a Hook Horror) to represent the monster.

"If you go down to the woods to-day..."

The monster activated first, and charged across the board into Moseley, scoring a critical hit, dealing (2D6+3)x2 damage which was...not great for Moseley. Pretty much everyone else moved in close and started shooting, which worked great until the monster took damage - another feature of its stat block is every time it takes damage, everyone within 12" needs to make a saving throw or take damage as well! After that everyone started spacing out and shooting from a distance, while Moseley tried to get away and maybe reach Barker or Arnold, both of whom were carrying medical kits. 

Unfortunately, while restrained in the monster's claws, Moseley fell victim to a flash bang grenade thrown by Keel, leaving him stunned as the monster finished him off. The Avenkian then turned it's attention to Barker while the team continued to (try to) shoot at it. Arnold never successfully put a round into the monster, despite having an average chance of success. 

 

The game has a FUBAR mechanic - each turn, a D6 is rolled and the current turn number added to it; on a result of 6+, something has gone wrong, ranging from civilians wandering on to the battlefield, another monster showing up, or in this case, an errant drone strike potentially hitting our heroes. On turn 5, Keel took 3D6 damage from said errant drone strike. 

Games end automatically after the end of Turn 5, and if you haven't killed the monster by then, you're SOL - team-members who are still alive flee the scene, and the monster becomes someone else's problem while you're debriefed and recover. At the end of Turn 5, I'd reduced the monster to half its starting hit points. Following this, there's a whole mini-game of seeing how your team-members recover (or if not, whether their cloned replacements are weird or not), and trying to requisition upgraded gear and improvement's to your team's base of operations from the bureaucracy. I haven't delved into that yet; I figure I'll play a couple of test games to get the feel of things and then maybe dive into the full campaign experience the game is geared towards. 

I don't have enough knowledge of game design to feel I can truly comment on the mechanics that much, but I will say that I really enjoyed how fast-paced the game is, and the 5-turn time limit keeps things from bogging down. I felt like I picked up and fully absorbed a lot of the mechanics very quickly. Also, with charts to roll on to randomly generate locales, terrain, threats and bureaucratic complications, I feel confident in saying that this is a game that can easily stay fresh for a very long time, with no two games being the same.

One thing that will take some getting used to for me is some of the spinning plates - for example, I think I forgot to roll a FUBAR check on turn 4, and I'm pretty sure I forgot about the monster's reactive area of effect ability on one of the turns where it received damage and there were team-members within 12". 

All that being said, I had a great time with my first play through, and making it through with three team members intact and the monster reduced to half-hit points feels like victory enough for a first play. I'm looking forward to rolling up another table's worth of terrain and a fresh monster tomorrow.

"Building a Dark Elf Army," White Dwarf #144 (Dec. 1991)

 No, I'm not switching gears and building a Dark Elf army. These scans from White Dwarf issue 144 (Dec. 1991 - I was 4 years old at the time) were posted in one of the Oldhammer groups on Facebook and I found them to be a really fascinating read and honestly, for me, thought-provoking.

My first visit to a Games Workshop store came almost a decade later, in August 2001. Warhammer Fantasy Battles 6th edition was in full swing and I loved the idea of building an army. However, the messaging I got at the time - less so from the staff at that Games Workshop store, but from other patrons of the store as well as message boards online - was that 2000 points was the absolute minimum army size that a game could be played with, and there was no point in me showing up for games with anything less than that.

Being a 14 year old who only really had spending money in the summer and after Christmas, and with an oversized case of "Ooh! Shiny!" syndrome, building a 2000 point army was daunting to the point of being out of the question. I built a couple regiments of plastic figures - Night Goblins, then Skeletons, Orcs, then the hunchbacked 6th edition Chaos Warriors - but eventually felt like I'd never get anywhere and moved on to other games.

I wonder what my hobby/gaming trajectory would have looked like if someone had sat down with me and said, "Let's make a plan to get you started with a basic, well-balanced 1000 point army, and then build from there if you want to continue"?

State of the Orc Army - Memorial Day 2023

 Afternoon all, today is a federal holiday in the United States and so I had the day off work. Having gotten quite a bit of work done on my Oldhammer Orc project this month, I decided to unpack everything and get it on the table - see what I've done since the last review, and get a sense of what I want to add. Not to toot my own horn too hard here, but I'm honestly impressed to see what I've done so far:

All total, that's 115 Orcs, 47 Goblins, 15 Hobgoblins, 4 Trolls, 5 "Hobhounds," 5 Boars and 6 Wolves. A unit-by-unit breakdown (mostly) follows:

A unit of Goblin Wolf Riders with bows, joined by a Goblin Big Boss. A second unit of these is in my project box, waiting to be assembled and painted.

Harboth's Orc Archers, a classic regiment from 1987. I still need to do shields for them, and I have a large number of these in my closet that I could strip 30-year old enamel paints off and paint up if I so desired. Behind them is a Doom Diver catapult, ready to fling goblins across the battlefield. 

Da Red Bastids tribe, with a unit of Bog Trolls behind them. Da Bastids are done, I have four unpainted trolls in my project box awaiting painting.

The Black Fire Boyz, a unit of orcs that have begun wearing stolen Averland uniforms and imitating pike and shotte tactics. This unit is complete - I don't want to paint more puff and slash.

The first regiment painted back in 2019, these Black Orcs will be expanded out to 15 and given new shields. Behind them is Mighty Epigruel's Slop 'n' Go Chuck Wagon. I wish baggage trains had persisted in WHFB past 3rd edition. 

The Kingbreakers, my second block of 25 orcs. 

Some characters - a classic Orc Boar Boy, an Orc Commander from Knightmare Miniatures, an Orc Shaman and an early 2000s Games Workshop Savage Orc Shaman. Behind them are a block of Goblin Archers. The orc shaman's staff has a crack on the shaft, and I'm concerned it's going to snap off right above his hand. I've tried wicking some superglue into the crack to bond it, but if that proves to not be enough I'll replace it with a skull just above his hand - turning the staff into a shorter walking stick. 

A unit of Knightmare Miniatures' goblins up front, and behind them an Orc chariot converted from a Foundry Beastman chariot, and in the back "The Old Guard," my Orc Big'uns regiment (joined by the Battle Standard Bearer). I have enough goblins, from a couple manufacturers, rattling around in a box to where I could bulk this unit out to 40, maybe even almost 50 if I really wanted to, but it's not the highest priority.

The Old Guard are all sculpts first released between 1985 and 1996, mostly Citadel, but there are a few Heartbreaker figures in there as well. I've got 19 figures painted, and it will be bulked up to a 36-figure block. I've got more Citadel and Heartbreaker, as well as some Marauder and Alternative Armies figures in the project box waiting to be cleaned, based and painted; I think I still need to buy just 3 more figures to complete the unit. 

My Hobgoblin Mercenary Contingent, not fieldable in any edition of Warhammer Fantasy Battles more recent than 3rd. I've got a dozen Mourngul Renegades, along with a Shaman and a Contingent Commander riding a Temple Dog (represented by a Reaper Krung Beast). In front, a Hobgoblin Beastmaster drives a herd of Hobhounds (represented by Knightmare Gnashers) before him. 

A better look at the Baggage Train. Part of me wants to add a couple more wagons (a torturer's cart and maybe a mobile shrine to Gork and/or Mork), but again, not a very high priority. 

So what's left to add?

There's a couple additional units I want to add:

• 10 Orc Boar Riders. I collected these and made a few conversions (a standard bearer, musician, and a couple of weapon swaps), and they've been sitting primed and ready to go waiting for me to get a storage case to put them in afterwards. I've got the case now so these might be next on the table.
• Another unit of five Goblin Wolf Riders, plus a Boss. I have these in the project box, I just need to get a Boss figure.
• 15 Savage Orcs, to be fielded with the Savage Orc Shaman seen above attached. I've got 13 of the Mark Bedford-sculpted Savage Orcs from 2000, a few of which need some stripping, including a full command. Just need to collect two more. 
• A Rock Lobber - this will be proxied with a Foundry/Warmonger "Mercenary Great Orc" carrying a gigantic medieval firearm (the "Orquebus"), surrounded by a crew of goblins ready to clean and reload between shots. This is already in my project box, though I might still add a Warmonger "Orcling" holding a telescope as a spotter. 
• Mangler Squig. I don't know if I'll ever play 8th edition WHFB, which introduced this unit, but I have the Knightmare "Giant Gnasher" and I'm looking forward to making a diorama base for it. 
  

And a couple units that need expansion:

• Another 5 Black Orcs painted, plus shields. I've got two in my project box, I just need to pick up three more. Shields will be the kite-shaped face shields from Foundry/Warmonger. 
• At least two more Trolls painted.
• 17 more Orcs for the Old Guard. I think I've got 14 in my project box, so I'll need to source three more.
   

 This project has given me a lot of joy since I started it in 2019, and also a lot to think about. One thing I've noticed in social media spaces devoted to miniature painting and wargaming, as well as in the language used to market products to us, is an emphasis on "spend less time painting" and "get [y]our army on the table faster." Faster, faster, faster - always faster! Does 21st century life not move fast enough already?

I've absolutely and categorically rejected this messaging. Being thoughtful and methodical in every aspect of this project has been the key to my enjoyment. Browsing manufacturers' websites, supporting small businesses, and taking the time to base coat, wash, highlight every figure...I have an army that is entirely my own, painted in my own style. I've gotten faster at it through dint of practice, rather than using tools and techniques designed to speed up the process. 

Something I've seen a lot of among people playing the latest edition of Warhammer 40K or Age of Sigmar is buying an army, speed painting it, playing with it for a season, then selling it to pay for next year's army. And that's just not for me; in ten years' time I expect to still be admiring this army in a lit display case in my home. It's been an investment in my own happiness and honestly, my health (I had my annual physical last week, and I attribute my improved blood pressure to spending less time on social media and more time painting orcs), and I'm far richer for having taken the route I did with them.

The Kingbreakers - 25 Orc Boyz

 I'm absolutely chuffed that I can say I've finished my second big block of Orc Boyz for my Oldhammer Orc Project. Again, the first 12 of these were painted in 2021 for the Old World Army Challenge; however, rather than using the standard bearer I'd originally painted for the unit (his banner made him effectively impossible to rank up unless I put him on the end of a row), I used the fellow I'd painted in April 2021 as a possible Battle Standard Bearer for the army as a whole. His standard - a couple of halberds and swords lashed together, topped by a skull wearing a crown - gave me the identity for this regiment once the last 13 figures were painted.

 

These are the Kingbreaker Tribe - years ago they ambushed and butchered a king and his retinue as they crossed the badlands, and now they wander the Old World, looking for his kingdom, now theirs by right. At least, this is what they believe to be the case. In truth, they ambushed a traveling theater troupe and killed an actor who happened to be wearing a painted cardboard crown at the time. His skull and crown now sit atop the Kingbreakers' standard pole. Everywhere they go, they point at the skull and ask "Was dis your king?"

This unit also contains my first "unit filler" base, if it can be called that; it's two figures based together on a 25x50mm base instead of individually on 25x25s to form a little vignette that sits in the last rank. I call it, "Performance Review."

Yes, the orc in the red vest is vigorously picking his nose, while the orc in blue looks on contemplatively; this is the third nose-picking figure I've painted for this army, and I think the fourth with a booger hanging out of his nose. It's part of the Oldhammer charm on display here; these are oafish orcs, essentially soccer hooligans with tusks, instead of lean, mean killing machines. These are orcs who are going to forget about the enemy regiment right in front of them to get into a shoving match among themselves, and that's something that's important to me with this project.