Battle Report - The Hunt for the Serene Ocean

So I meant to do this a looong time ago, but it sat unfinished in the bowels of my laptop for ages, so I thought I'd beter finish it and get it posted.

The Hunt for the Serene Ocean is the sequel narrative battle report to The Charter of Might. Enjoy!

Car Wars - A blast from the past!

So before we moved, I picked up Car Wars Deluxe from ebay for a few pounds, and it re-surfaced from one of the many still-remaining boxes around our new house this last weekend. I last played Car Wars when I was only a couple of years older then Oscar, back in th '80s, and I remembered it being fun then, so guessed Oscar would also like it. Sure enough, a couple of test games later, and he loves it!

One of the great things about Car Wars was the car design element - you could create something small and nimble, or a lumbering behometh - all up to you. It's also not something you need to invest hours and hours in like AD&D, which was my big thing when I was a teenager at school. There's lots of guns, fast cars, explosions and silliness - it's not really a serious game that people get upset about when their car erupts into a tumbling fireball (if you do, then you really have lost touch!).

Another great thing is that you don't need a full 6*4 table to play it on - half of a dining table or a space on the floor is fine, you use cardboard cars and normal dice so it's all very cheap and cheerful. It has complex elements, but much of this can be eliminated with modern aids (PC-based car designers etc) - all the toys I didn't have when I was a kid!

In many ways I think some of the tabletop games and RPGs out there today have lost their way a bit, taking themselves far too seriously. At the end of the day, these are games - things to enjoy, not to stress over and become weirdly obsessive about. Going back to a game like Car Wars has reminded me of that once again, which is something many people would do well to remember too.

Back to 40K...

After the Spartan community debacle, I couldn't bring myself to look at any FSA models at the weekend, so I thought I'd get back to sorting out my Hellhammer and painting up a landraider. The Hellhammer has sat around for ages - I've always intended to sell it, but other things have always been more important/distracting. Anyway, I need the money so that's always a push in the right direction. First up, I needed to spray the sponsons, and then go over the whole thing paint chipping with a Karisma silver pencil. Here's progress to date...

Next up is to do the detail painting on the sponsons and weathering, then she's done. Then it will be ebay and off to it's new home!

Next up was a landraider, which on a whim I decided to paint up as a Blood Angels vehicle (I'm normally an Ultramarines man). So, a base coat of Mechrite red, followed by Blood Red and Blood Red/Blazing Orange sprayed highlights;

An overall wash of green for contrast (still wet in the photo)...

...and then drybrushed with Blood Red and then Blazing Orange;

Lots of specific painting to go now - lascannons, exhausts, bolters, tracks, emblems, lights....then more washing & drybrushing, followed by weathering & paint chipping. Seems like a long way off but getting the base colour sprayed is always the biggy, as I don;t seem to get the time to spray as much as I should or would like.

Old Terran Ships

On the Spartan Games Community recently, I posted a few designs for older Terran ships - The Thorn Class Battleship, The Guardsman Cruiser and the Missionary II Frigate. One poster remarked that it wasn't paper designs they wanted to see, but actual physical ships.


As Spartan are frankly unlikely to create such retro-engineered designs, I thought I'd give it a go myself. I picked up a Terran fleet cheaply on ebay (which had the Razorthorn in three sections - front, middle and engines, plus the multi-part resin cruisers and frigates), and set about creating the predecessors to the standard Terran ships that I'd already crafted using my Excel version of Spartan's custom ship generator protocols.


First up was the Thorn Class Battleship, here are the stats I came up with for the ship;


DR: 6 CR: 8 Mv: 6" HP: 7 CP: 4 AP: 4 PD: 6 SH: 1 Mn: 0 FW: 0

Fore Fixed: 5/6/4/3
Fore: 6/8/3/0
Port: 6/8/3/0
Starboard 6/8/3/0

Torpedoes (any arc): 2/3/4/5

So reduced long-range firepower in Port & Starboard arcs, lowered FF and no turrets, but a fore arc (same as port/starboard) instead, torpedo effectiveness considerable reduced and only a single shield. I wanted a substantial and dangerous ship, but showing older technology - so still lots of guns, but not as effective over range.
So, some of these mods are easy to show on the model - no turrets being the obvious one. I also removed the extreme fore of the front of the Razorthorn and added a thorn-like "nose" of green stuff, which also double as a shroud over the twin linear accelerators I would add later. In order to get sufficient area for the fore arc (in addition to the Fixed Fore LAs), I planned to add some raised platforms on the first and last broadside positions of the Razorthorn. These were built up from green stuff and then cut back with a scalpel to provide a nice clean edge. Here she is at that stage;

Next I would need guns...so I made simple push moulds from FIMO and baked these for 30 minutes until hard and allowed to cool. after that, wetting the moulds and pushing them on to soft greenstuff produced sufficient guns for the new weapons fit.

Now I just have to decide what weapons fit to go with...

 

Orders Received! Excel Generator

Just coded the 1.5 version of Ravagers Orders Received battle generator for FSA. Here's the link;

Excel 2007 Version
Excel 97-2003 Version

Enjoy!

Battle Report - Assault on Peredith

I've been meaning to post this for a while, the first part of a battle report form Oscar & I's latest game. I won't spoil the end for you by telling you the result, but it was very close!

Assault on Peredith Part 1.pdf

In other news, I've been doing a lot of coding for the FSA Army Builder files with Chris (veritechc) from The Black Ocean - check out the website if you get a chance, it's got a whole heap of interesting goodies on there. I've also coded an updated version of the FSA Custom Ship Creator in Excel to make it easier to crank out your own ships for the game and get the right cost for it.

Very little else happening on the modelling/gaming front - hopefully will get some bits done at the weekend. Until next time....

Oscar's Aquans Expand...

So it was Oscar's birthday last Friday - last week involving a lot of preparations for that (as one of his presents was a small aquarium with a Malabar pufferfish - not that easy to hide!). On the FS:A side he received a Manta MkII battleship and his Medusa for his good school report, then earned his Mk II Barracudas and got a pair of Stingray Destroyers for his birthday. all in all quite a big boost for his Aquan force...expect to see a clash of them with my forces of evil soon.

Also on the FS:A side I wrote the rules for Firestorm: Marine! (downloadable link by clicking on that) - an alternative card-based way of determining boarding actions in Firestorm Armada, inspired by Captain Dan and Ravager from the Spartan Games Community. I also completed the update to the Excel-based version of Ravager's Orders Received! 1.20 scenery and battle generator. Finally, I've been doing a bit of coding for the Army Builder files with Chris of The Black Ocean, trying to get some of the more difficult bits to work properly (easier said than done)!

In real life, I've been hunting down a new job, and also a new place to live, as we were given notice on our house (as we rent at the moment). More unnecessary stress for the family we could all do without...but what can you do but roll with the punches?