2015 And A Huge Catch Up!

So its 2015, which means I get to say, Happy New Year! Its been a hectic time lately for me, where I thought I'd be blogging every week and posting lots of interesting things, I've been busy working and when I've got some gaming time I've been too busy enjoying it to take pictures and write up about my experiences. But heres to a catch up!

 Xmas at the Gwent Reavers means some of the uni lads are back and we get some more gaming in. Alun came back for some 40k, a 1500 pt game between my marines and his guard that we played in less than two hours and resulted in a reasonably empty board and a win for me. 

 

Some Sons of Anarchy has been played, with a ridiculoulsy close game between myself, Gav and Bam just monday. Gav had $55k, Bam had $54, and I managed to get to $52. Such a good game! My obvious highlight is visiting Caracara Studios... Ahem...

On Xmas eve I'd been looking at getting Game of Thrones on the Xbox. I'd had a go of the trial, and thought seeing as the first episode was only £4 I'd get that and perhaps the season pass. I turn the xbox on, it slowly loads and I notice a sale. GoT first episode £2 and the season pass for almost half price. Snapped that up! The games pretty fun too.

By Telltale games, its an adventure game that follows in the same veins as many of their previous games, like Sam and Max, Back to the Future etc, where choices and reactions are gameplay and the story keeps you engrossed. You follow a new factin, the Forresters that become embroiled in a brutal situation and you get to converse with characters from the show and books, all voiced by the actual actors which helps submerse you into the setting. A good pickup and I'm looking forward to more episodes!

One club day, Gav excitedly came upto the studio with Pathfinder, Rise of the Runelods. Myself and Morgan were intrigued so we set it up and randomly had a go at a scenario. ROTR is a card adventure/roleplay game, where you choose a character and begin an adventure. Our test scenario was ill advised and we were thumped. Morg read a little more into it and we'd realised what we'd done so began again but this time, from the start. Cue a couple of full days soley playing this.

I chose Seoni, a rather wild looking sorcereress whose cleavage reminded me enough of Marg Tyrell that I didn't care about her stats or any advancements. Judge the book by the cover though, cause shes been awesome to play. Her spells have kicked some ass, and shes been the reason we've completed a couple of the harder scenarios. The last one we did, beating Mammy Graug was a nightmare but somehow I managed to roll just enough on a bazillion dice to beat the mother ogres insane boosted combat stat. It really felt like an achievement too, and its made me want to play a lot more of this type of game in the future.  

Did I mention that myself and Morg love a bit of Scrabble? Not as much as I like doing this kind of thing... But we did get a few games in and I managed to pip him to the post in a couple of close games while he destroyed me in another. I did give him a beating in another so the thrashing hurt a lot less, but sometimes you just get shit letters!

Oh X-Wing, I do love you so.

As you can see, I've been doing some customising, including the Rebels YT-2400 and three A-Wings I've got too. The grey and orange has been expanded upon with Thunderhawk Blue, which has added a little of variety without getting in the way of the main scheme. 

Oh, and this finally happened.

I've been tempted for a while, but over Xmas I finally spoiled myself (partly because my 4 Forward had disappeared) when I saw these Darksun templates from http://www.cogotwo.com/ and knew I needed them in my grasp. Delivery was quick, they're already masked off for you to paint and with some Thunderhawk Blue sploshed on they looked absolutely stunning. I cannot recommend getting some of these enough if you're into Xwing!

Lastly, we played a rather large game of Xwing between 5 players. Louis using a few headhunters from Scum and Villiany (we said he could have a go as hes hoping to get some of them when they're released so used the stats that FFG have shared) along with Bam and Josh using Imperial forces against myself and Gav with Rebels. I think there was 350 points on each side, including two YT-2400s, the Falcon, and three decimators. It turned out to be a brutal game, and came down to one Awing and a Decimator as the final two ships... pretty damn close when you consider how much was on the board! The Imperials edged it, bloody swines! Those decimators are big buggers fair play, but they're certainly not invincible! I also played a game against my nephew on Xmas day that he won, I did take a couple of pictures of the forces we used but havent got them to upload, but they are on my instagram which can be found right here!

I think thats most of whats been happening blogged about anyway, hopefully I can get back to being more regular with these posts, I want to do a more in depth look at Pathfinder, some more Xwing posts perhaps some tactics and batreps, some Necromunda things that may happen in the future and also any other games we get to play... And I'll also have to chat about Resistance.... 

But for now thanks for reading and I hope your 2015 is a cracker!

Dead of Winter

My love for board games has been increasing over the last few months. Being able to play different games brings variety, and it keeps things fresh. Do I miss nhot have a few weeks of 40k? Very much so, but there are some amazing board games out there, as evidenced by the Sons of Anarchy review I recently published and many other games we've played. From Risk, Gloom, and Firefly to Cards Against Humanity, Dominion and Carcarssonne, we're spoilt for choice.

At Mondays club night, Gavin mentioned he was bringing along a recent purchase called Dead of Winter. Myself and Louis had a little look to try get a rough idea of what it was about when we realised we'd seen it before. Counters, the board game cafe based in Pontypridd, and who had a delightful room at Dragondaze, had this there. The guys from Counters were raving about it, saying that its their current fave game to play so we started having high expectations. Disappointment, we did not get.

Theres a wealth of tokens and cards to the game, along with some location cards and the main board that houses some of the cards and the colony. Theres a good number of survivor and zombie counters, and we quickly found Bill Murray and Danny Devito. Oh and Madonna... I'll talk about her later. We got set up and began to play. 

You elect one of your two survivors to be your leader, and place them on your player cards. Here you house your dice, equipment and secret mission. Each player draws a secret objective, some of which can be betrayal cards. These give you your personal mission as well as a team one, and influences how you play. Theres some narrative to game too, as the Crossroads mecxhanic comes into play. When a player takes a turn, the player to their right draws a crossroads card. These are event cards that are either triggered through certain survivors being in play, locations being visited, or are instant. Many of them have options too that give you a benefit but can lead to negatives too and create more longevity for the game.

As we played, I gained a couple more survivors, a good thing as my personal mission was to have the most and complete the main objective. Louis however quickly overtook me with 6-7 survivors, which in turn means more mouths to feed or fuel to keep warm. The Crisis cards keep you on your toes, and can stall your main aims. Not only in the first turn did we have to feed the colony but we had a food crisis and needed to find one food for every person, we barely passed but lost morale due to not enough food being available for the colony. Its difficult to complete fair play! Moving to locations means you get to search for items, but the more you search the more noise you create and the more chance zombies will come looking for you, its another great mechanic that has a nice blend of gambling and chance to find the right items but potentiall lose a member of your survivors. Items that can be found range from food, fuel and medicince, to weapons and equipment. One of my members gained a cook book which allowed me to add a food counter to the colony every turn. Weapons are also found, a Sniper Rifle allows the player to kill a zombie at any location, and things like baseball bats and shotguns allow the killing of two zombies for one action. 

Even though new survivors can be picked up, sometimes you have to kill some off in order to meet the needs of all. The Waitress, who reminded of Madonna, was an easy sacrifice. The truck driving Rod however, was not! Louis with his many survivors was now beginning to make it difficult to feed everyone, so Gavin mentioned that Dead of Winter allows you to 'Exile' a player. This means all of his group can only be found at locations and not at the colony, and therefore no longer need to be fed. I had three members left, and Gavin had two, so it seemed to be a wise decision. Louis now had to change his personal objective to an exiled one, so it would be to either survive in the wilderness or stall us from winning. As it turned out, we all lost in the end! Well... Kind of. We'd managed to get the main objective of killing 9 zombies, but our morale was dropped to zero and we lost. Then Gavin showed his personal objective showing that he'd won his by completing the main objective and by having 2-3 medicine in his hand. Sneaky sod!

 Frustrating, but I can't wait to have another go, hopefully with a couple more players to the maximum of five, it was great with just three of us but with five there'll be more chances of finding items we need, as well as more mouths to feed!

So after just one game I can safely say its a cracker. With the many different survivors, objective and crossroads cards theres a lot of life to this game, and with how sometimes you'll be playing co-operatively or against each other depending on what your personal objectives are you're never quite sure if you should trust someone. This brings a great element of randomness that boardgames do well with. I heartily recommend this to anyone, even if, like myself, you're not a zombie fan. The zombies are on the outside looking in, its your fellow survivors you should be more weary of!

Sons of Anarchy and the 50k

Greetings overlords, to another DBD post. Yes, two in one week, tis madness! First of all however, I have to thank you all for this.

My humble blog about gaming, whether it is war or board based, has reached 50,000 views. I'm a little surprised as it wasn't long ago I posted about the 40,000 views and I'v ebeen to busy over the last few months to be that active, but still people come from far and wide to look at some of the oddities I've posted, and I cannot thank you enough. 

A quick pic of the grots I took to Dragondaze, largely done bar a few details and I will prob do bases at some point too. Better pictures will come when they're finished!

But now for the main event of this post! 

As I mentioned on the Dragondaze post, I'd bought myself a new game, Sons of Anarchy. I absolutely love the show, so the game was appealing to me immensely. 

You start off with a screen, with which to hide your stash behind, your club house with the basic rules and what you have, and then a series of locations across which you ride and exploit via specific area traits. For example, one location may allow you to buy 2 guns and 2 contraband for four cash, then another will allow you to sell one gun for four cash. Did I mention that cash is key? Well whoever ends up with the most cash wins the game, so combo-ing these deals is key to getting the most cash. 

Obviously. if you're a fan of SoA like myself you know that this game sounds a little too quiet for a Men of Mayhem game... well thats where the throwdowns come in. If two gangs are in a location, that area cannot be exploited. A throwdown however can be ordered where the two games go at it in a fight. Prospects give you +1, Members give you +2, and if you choose to use a gun, they can give you +3/ Also, if guns are used and whether you win or lose the dice roll, players choose which of their members go to hospital and potentially die. Theres an ER room and St Thomas location cards for a reason! You also gain heat for such actions, which can lead to you finding it harder to deal drugs in the contraband phase. Here, players secretly hold how many drugs they wish to deal, and depending on the combined total you get different amounts for each contraband. The less, the more its worth, where as if a lot of drugs are being sold you flood the market and make them worth less.

Its a great little game that takes little more than an hour, although now we know how to play it'll take even less. Above you can see how my stash was hidden, and I ended up winning the game too, think watching the show gave me an edge! I thoroughly enjoyed playing the game tho and look forward to a full four player game. Even if you're not a fan of the series I think people will enjoy playing this, so its a great little game to mix in with other games you play. And for £30-35 its a good price point. 

We also cracked out Munchkin to give a new member an intro to tabletop gaming, and he ended up with the best starting hand I've ever seen. At level 3 he had a level 16 combat capability... lucky sod! He ended up winning too so he was well chuffed with himself. I'm hoping next monday some X-wing will be played, having some withdrawel symptoms so hopefully a member will be looking for a game. Thats all for now though!

New Era and Batrep 4k 40k!

New Era? 4k 40k? What? Well first of all, the newly renamed Gwent Reavers have had their first two gamign sessions at its new venue in Abertillery. We've seen the numbers stay steady, but with more time to play and do hobby things people sem a lot happier. Not having to rely on buses or lift has certainly lifted my spirits! We've had some interest from potential new members too, which is most excellent. 

Secondly, Alun aka Elfboy is going back to university, so a big game of 40k was needed before he departs to sunny Lampeter. 4k? Well it was supposed to be, but someone made an army list on the day and went 500pts over. 'Have to cut things out mate'... No Alun, everything I have is here, I'll simply add 500 points! 

I won't go into lists, but notable additions include...

For Alun:

5 Leman Russ

an HQ with far too much goodness, Stracken, Yarrick, Nork

3 Assassins, one each of Callidus, Vindicare and Eversor

Approx 70-80 Storm Troopers.

For myself:

Squat Cyber Slayer with honour guard (Squat is a captain with power axe, thats it!)

Stormwing detachment

2 Assassins, one Callidus and one Vindicare

4 Full Tactical Squads

Ten man Bike Squad with Khan in a White Scars detachment.

After a trip to the near neighbouring Wetherspoons where no beef burgers were available, we deployed our large armies and got to some dice rolling. With 5 assassins on the table, infiltrate was a tacticall important part which I won and got to deploy these first although Alun deployed first and would get first turn. Wityh 6 objectives, 2 in each deployment and 2 in the main field I'd need to be aggressive to get those cards from holding objectives. The first turn went well as I stole initiative and set about missions...

The first I had was three or more units in my deployment and no enemy... awesome for a first turn, except an enemy Callidus assassin was right in the corner sitting underneath a Thunderfire Cannon, Vindicare, and Master of the Forge. Sternguard duty changed from popping tanks to killing this 'orrid little lass! And they did it well. Poison ammo is amazing!

Aluns Vindicare was slapped with 4 krak missiles, one killing him outright killing Aluns second assassin. The Eversor was hidden by the landing pad, so my White Scars detachment aggressivelysurged forward and unleashed bolter fire at him. This did the job as out of the 8 saves Alun failed three. Good work lads! My own Callidus shredded some Storm Troopers making them fail their save with the lone survior running, but rallying next turn on a double one. Good start though, now to face the incoming barrage...

Which never really came.

Aluns battlecannons didn't roll a hit all game, despite firing three shots a turn. He cause some damage but nowhere near as much as I'd expected, the White Scars increased jink save doing wondrous things over the course of the game! Both having Callidus assassins meant reserves would be hard work to gain, as they grant a minus 3 to the opposing force, and we'd both taken one! Aluns Chimeras surged forward, doing minimal amounts of damage here and there but nothing too damaging. He did stop my two vindicators from firing which was a nuisance but they do absorb a lot of attention!

As the game progressed it was becoming noticeable that my luck was proving me well while Aluns had abandoned him. He did whittle down a lot of my forces but you know the opponent has had a bad game when a few of your squads remain untouched at the end of the game. The Legion of the Damned arrived on the landing pad, but their firepower wasn't needed. Leman Russes were destroyed in combat, either by a flanking Tactical Squad in a Rhino or by the bikers, who ran rampant throughout. My right flank was more messy, my flyers coming on and the Stormraven being crippled but not before dropping off its payload of Chapter Master and Termies who also blew up a Leman Russ and then fought with the uber command squad the Guard had brought. 

In the end I'd grabbed a lot of objectives, getting cards that were either easy to grab or I'd already held certain objectives. Aluns luck had totally deserted him however and he struggled to get acheivable missiosn. I didn't complain though, its always nice to kick your mates ass!

So 16 points to 3 was pretty one sided, and another turn may have seen Alun wiped off the board... that'll teach him for going over the points limit! 

We'll be looking to get some board games out and look for some X-wing battel reports too as my nephew and Bam look to try and kick my arse, which is easy to do to be fair. We may have a couple of other members who want to join in with X-wing too so some more players will spice things up. I also need to mention Dragondaze is happening on Saturday in Newport South Wales, which I'll be running a demo game of Gorkamorka at with Louis. I've kept it simple so we'll see how it goes, as setting up the business and moving the club has just taken all my time. Should be a good laugh and I've saved a few pennies to go down with so may ad something to my hobby collection. Thats all for now anyways, more soon!

40k Batrep: The Decider

So the time had come. The big one. The decider. Crow Valley Crusaders vs Tredeager Reavers. Best of three, first two games split, only one left and everything to play for. Alun had informed me that we'd have 3k pts. Each. This would be a chunky game! Alun was taking Guard this time, using the Militarum codex that had been released just the week before. On one hand, it was fresh and Alun hadn't used Guard before, but on the other I don't think Mike or Shaun expected Guard... lets see how it goes. 

Upon arriving, Mike and Shaun tell us we'll be facing 4 Chapter Masters. Shocking!

I'd decided not to take one, and had plumped for Tigurius and a Captain (aka Squat Slayer). Alun had taken Stracken as his warlord, with Tiggy as mine. We got first turn and set up. Most of our units were on the right flank, which, in hindsight, not a good idea to bunch things up.

Then 'IT' happened. One of the most devastating first turns I've ever seen. Unfortunately it was from Mike and Shaun who seized the initiative. 3 orbital bombardments later and 2 leman russ tanks, 2 chimeras and a vindicator were blown to pieces. Alun, who had also taken some Grey Knight allies, lost his Vindicare to an unlucky roll of '1' to save him. I think the boys said they had around 27 blasts to come down on the first turn. Needless to say, they got first blood. It did not look good. Shauns sternguard drop pod down beside my plasma cannon devastator squad and only a couple are lost.

Two of my drop pods entered play, and I attempted to assassinate Mikes Warlord. 10 combi grav shots later and I butcher the tactical squad he was accompanying but he loses just one wound... and gets it back later on from it will not die. Oh well, worth a go! Elsewhere we take a couple of hullpoints off a contemptor, stop one of the plasma preds from firing and I blow on of the other ones up, although this enrages a nearby contemptor who comes charging back to deal with my tactical squad in the next phase. The plasma cannon squad, lead by Tiggy take aim at the Imperial Fists Sternguard and wipe them out. Presciene and Perfect timing working incredibly well together!

Turn of the flyers! Most of the flyers enter play except for Shauns Fireraptor. We take more losses this turn, a combat squad is wiped out from Mikes huge terminator squad in the spartan, the Guardsmen behind the Aegis Defence Line take a hammering and the plasma cannon devs are reduced significantly. Not as bad as that first turn though!

Aluns surviving Leman Russ takes position to cover the Relic, its battle cannon threatening to any infantry looking to capture the objective. I drop pod nearby the Relic and attempt to run onto it to capture, but roll dismally and fail to reach it. After some concentrated fire, Shauns Warlord is left alone after his accompanying tactical squad were blown apart by rockets and battle cannon.  A missile launcher toting Krohmus Guard tactical member takes aim and looses off a krak missile. The missile hits home and Shaun fails his save, giving us a vital victory point. With the objective in the middle of a killing zone we realise that the objective wont be held by anyone and its via bonus VP's this game will be won. We'd already lost out on First Blood and Linebreaker looked likely to be held by both sides, so Slay the Warlords would be huge. 

More of the Iron Hands and Fists units deepstrike onto our right flank, and guardsmen are hit by fire, although not before a demolition charge is thrown at Shauns terminators, but Alun misses and only catches four in the explosion. My plasma cannon devs are wiped out, and Tiggy is left on one wound after fire from umpteen sources. Off he hides! Shauns Stormtalons are wiped out in retaliation and it seems the right flank is safe, despite not much being left. The Techmarine and Thunderfire weather the storm and are left on one wound. 

The Fireraptor also gets dealth with thankfully, although my Stormraven gets battered and left with one hullpoint. Aluns Inquisitor deepstrikes down and takes so much firepower yet still a few survive! And then get charged by a contemptor... Mikes Warlord hides in some ruins with another Tactical Squad, and this now is our prime target. Both of my Storm Talons swoop over and manage to kill a few of the squad. Aluns Valkyrie also flies over into a position to drop off his stormtroopers for a fusilade in the final turn. 

Becoming fed up of Mikes plamsa pred getting fixed up all the time the Stormraven destroys it before the thunderhammer termies assault wrecking the third and final one. Noll the Squat Cyber Slayer also launches himself into the other thunderfire cannon, easily dispatching the Techmarine. The heavy flamer dread torches three of the marines but leaves himself out of range when he assaults... oops! 

With both of our Warlords safe, the score stands at 2-2. Mikes Warlord is now the only thing we kill to earn us victory, the Relic seemingly secondry to killing people! The stormtalons go into hover mode as the Stormtroopers disembark and loose off a hail of fire, taking down the last few of the tactical squad guarding the (one of many HA) Chapter Masters. Alun also manages to take off a wound from the Warlord and the Stormtalons open up finally killing the stubborn sod! With that, we edge out a win 3-2, although I'm still not sure how after that first turn!

So what a game and what a way to end this best of three series against Mike and Shaun. Both were awesome opponents and I can't wait to play more games against this scheming duo. I'm sure many more interclub games will be held, if they're half as fun as these three games have been they'll have an awesome time playing! 

Coming up is a game against Aluns Daemons that was again, incredibly close, and also some WIPs of projects I'm working on. This Saturday too I'm going to Warhammer World with a few of the CVC lads to the GCN EGM, so that should be a great day out and it'll be awesome to meet some of the people involved at the GCN. Its a shame I never got to meet Anthony Barnes who passed away recently, and was the president of the GCN. Whoever takes over has some big shoes to fill, but I'm sure they'll be upto the task. I'm also looking at perhaps a couple of Forge World additions....

International Tabletop Day at the Reavers!

And so International Tabletop Day has come and gone, and my word was it a cracking event. Not only did we have members from the Tredegar Reavers and the Crow Valley Crusaders as usual, but we had a good dozen or so people who weren't members of a gaming club come for a visit to try some tabletop goodness, and judging from the comments everyone had a great time!

Above we have Morgan, Gareth and Alun playing some Magic the Gathering, of which I had a go later on in the day and although I'm still unsure of how it works, did enjoy and wouldn't mind a few more games to see if its something I want to get into. Excuse Morg scoffing his face, breakfast pizza. Lucky bastard!

The Crow Valley Crusaders brought some games and tables up, and set up this awesome looking Infinity display. The bottletop barrels were great, as were the use of toys for vehicles. 

Heres one of their members setting up Deadzone, a game I really wanted to try but didn't get a chance too. The scenery looks pretty cool and I've noticed Mantic have announced that they'll be bringing it out more widely soon... interesting!

One of my favourite board games of all time, Scrabble, got plenty of use and there must have been 5 or 6 games played in total. I lost one and won a game, but enjoyed both immensely. 

Of course No Quarter was played, Huw putting on another great game that got plenty of peoples attention. Huw scowling while mentioning Mikes name could become a new tradition at club!

Chaos in the old world, with a daemon dice!

The aim of CITOW is to get your Greater Daemons together for an intense hugging battle where the softest yet firm hugs win out. In truth, Morgan played a card from the Khorne deck making all the greater darmons in play jump to the same region to do battle... but before a weapon was swung I used a card to get my Lord of Change out of there! 

Scuse the mug, but my mate Louise... I mean Lewis popped over with his lady for a visit. 

Things getting serious as Byron and Shaun look to be in a good postion to win.... but who does?

Heres how the hall looked at mid afternoon, we had people come in and out all day, such a good turnout!

More No Quarter, but with a new cappin' on board! 

Dungeon Petz, a strange game that I didn't quite understand but the players seemed to be loving it. There were different counters for sand, grass, food, and poo. Yes, they were brown! I think you had to look after the pets and nurture them to sell them on. I could be wrong, but thats the sense I got. Louis and his lovely other half also brought Ticket to Ride which I didn't get to play and I really wanted, dabnammit!

So CITOW ended with Byron almost winning, only for Shaun to steal victory from him. The Skaven expansion added some cool elements to this and was a great laugh.

These guys were also part of Dungeon Petz, and I think they either help you or they live in the dungeons that the game takes place in. Cool little counters though thats for sure!

I pulled CubeQuest out for Alun to try, and it wasn't long before EVERYONE was having a go. We tried to set a league but ran out of time, it was hilarious though watching people going from just flicking the cubes over to them actually trying serious tactics out, some great moments fair play.

Five of our visitors had a great time playing Guards! Guards! I really like the look of the hexagonal board and even though I'm not sure what was happening, they players were well into the game and you could see them schemeing over their cards!

As you can see, getting down low to line up a shot in CubeQuest became a nessecity!

More Magic being played, this time between Byron and Morgan.

More hardcore Scrabble action, defiantely an all time classic!

Just some of the games that people brought to play. This isn't even half of them, we had over 30 games for people to choose from!

Heres my hand while playing Gloom, one of my favourite games to play with people new to tabletop gaming. My friend Cassie brought a couple of her mates over as they were interested, so I took them through a game. Some of the little stories that were told were fantastic, and a copy was bought on amazing when the game had finished!

More CITOW

More of Gloom being played by some of our guests.

You can tell when Louis forms a plan, he has that evil smile on his face! Probably about to make someones character happy in Gloom, devious man! 

Without a doubt, the most concentration I've ever seen on Byrons face was when we played CubeQuest. Such a great game, and its quick to play!

All in all then a great day, and one I feel should happen more than just once a year. Everyone seemed to have had a great time and so many games were played! It was incredibly rewarding seeing everyone enjoy themselves and be inspired by new games and meeting new people, and I can't wait til we put on another event like this. I have to thank not just our members but also the Crow Valley Crusaders, especially Byron who helped coordinate the event, organising these things are half the battle! Mainly though I have to thank every person who came and rolled a dice, drew a card, or flicked a cube at me from across the table, it was an amazing day and one we'll be having again!

For more info on our clubs, visit the Tredegar Reavers and the Crow Valley Crusaders or just give me a shout on here. Thanks for reading!