TNT: Post Apocalypse Scatter

Here's a few colored scatter pieces for post apocalypse games. These are gonna see the board of pretty much every game I play. Walking Dead, This Is Not A Test, Reality's Edge and Last Days.

A friend of mine pointed out, that I needed spot colors on my wasteland board - as it was pretty much brown and grey nuances. And that looks just like the wasteland I really want - but a few spot colors does a lot for the look.

The toilets are resin pieces from TTCombat, a great little set. I thought there was only one in the pack so I was presently surprised that I got four of them. A quick blue base coat, white roof and then some graffiti.Graffiti is made with Posca markers, excellent wet acrylic markers. A bit pricey, but great for making cool graffiti.

The other pieces are some barricades from zombicide. I got these in the 3d door pack, because I want to upgrade all my mdf buildings. The barricades are two piece sets and the connecting pieces have a nice traffic cone shape. So from four barricades, I managed to get 6 barricades. I filled the bottom of the mattresses with sprue and coffee stirrers. 

Ramshackle Games: Dungers

Dungers are a weird mutated bear/boar creature from Ramshackle Games. Curtis Fell have made a huge lot of different sizes and versions of these creatures. I've picked up a few different ones at a Black Friday sale - the meanest looking ones.

Painting and basing
I've painted these in the quickest possible way I could. Different brown base coats, drybrushing and wash - done. Super quick. I made some fairly neutral bases as well, dirt, grass and stones. I didn't put rusty junk on them or bright green colors. This way I can use the models across settings.

Here's the small herd of dungers - guarded by a dunger riding shephard. The start of a This Is Not A Test warband.

Here's a photo of them between regular green trees - fitting quite nicely in a fantasy setting as well. So I'll probably stick them in both Frostgrave and Ragnarok.

And then I've used the dungers for my TNT post apocalypse trader caravan.

Ghost Archipelago: Blood Totems

What follows here is an account (from a hazy memory) of the first game in a Ghost Archipelago campaign. We've been having the Ghost Archipelago rules since it was released. But there's so many games and so little time.

We've been making a lot of terrain for GA and various objectives, so we're always rolling for scenarios we have the needed stuff for. We won't be delving into the written campaigns at first, but play some of the core book scenarios.

You can check out step-by-steps for most terrain pieces here.

Setup
We set up an island map with this scenario. Playing 'Blood Totems' we used my Easter Island heads as the totems and scattered them through the dense jungle. We stuck a few Ulterior Motives objectives into the mix as well.

Report
It's actually quite hard writing a decent report for this game, as the actions is all in the dense jungle. But the overall lines were that both groups tried getting to the central totem first - getting the best loot. My opponent had much better luck with his Warden than I did.

In the end my warband had to pull out, retreat with a good amount of loot. My opponent had better control of the board - but his Heritor was wounded.

But I'll try and put some words to the photos.

My opponents Heritor flanked by different elite warriors.

My own Heritor Hector Fernandez getting ready to enter the jungle.

On one flank, a few crewmen and a savage is making their way towards a Drichean weapon depot (my Ulterior Motive), needed some brute strength to get it open.

A man-at-arms rushing towards the center of the board, to get to a totem first.

On one side of the map were some smaller islands with shipwrecks. These were dangerous areas, close to table edges (wandering and summoned monsters) and bad cover caused by the water. My opponent had his Warden and some crew for security taking control over these.

Sneaking through the jungle, staying in cover from the enemies archers, who took position on a hill fro

Getting close to the first blood totem.

There was a single swamp zombie on the board at the start. My men quickly put it down, turned out to be a red herring.

My Warden wasted the first many turns trying to summon an animal - that could attack my opponent in the flank. He failed - the first four turns.

I had a couple of guys on the small islands as well. There was also a blood totem for them. Trying to keep in cover, my archer started to shoot to the other small island. He managed to hurt a few enemy crewmen with arrows.

My enemy got on top of a hill from the start. Keeping his two archers in cover in the jungle, he then started firing arrows left and right. I was especially worried for my Warden and Heritor, having to keep them hidden and in cover.

The enemy Heritor making his way towards an small statue, his Ulterior Motive. But he had no gold to sacrifice at the alter (as it's our first game), he did get some extra XP though.

Treasure! After a few tried, the blood totem gives up the treasure hidden inside it.

We rolled poorly on the wandering monsters table. Always hoping to get some nice big monsters in, the first many treasure didn't summon any creatures. But a snapping turtle did enter the board, placed by my opponent - it's close to my Wardens group.

The enemy's savage - straight out of He-Man!

Welcome to the jungle! A nice shot of my Heritor.

A crew member from my ship got a treasure, started to run towards the board edge right away. It's a long way with all that difficult terrain and half movement.

My savage jumped right in to fight the snapping turtle. A good fight. My savage was wounded in the battle, but he did manage to take out the giant beast.

Disaster! A giant spider is summoned to the battlefield by the enemy Warden. My crew member was a tough guy though and killed it. He was however poisoned and had an even longer trip off the table.

My infantryman taking the fight to the enemy savage - the savage turned out to be a lot stronger and my infantryman went down. In the aftermath of the game he was declared dead - killed. In out next game he would count as a crewman.

Running away with a treasure, covered by an archer. The spear fighter is pushing forward - preventing me from making trouble and getting to attack the enemy warden.

The enemy warden had a great game. Pulling off spells nearly every turn. Making venemos weapons and summoning creatures.

The two savages tried to find out who the stronger one - I guess it was my enemy's. My savage was already wounded from taking down the snapping turtle, and after a round of combat - my savage had to withdraw. Unfortunately I never got to the Drichean weapon cash - as the enemy savage was guarding it.

In the end of the game my warden finally got off a few spells, didn't really impact the game at all. He just made some bark skin and strength spells - for the XP.

The annoying snipers - hurting my guys through the entire game.

End game
This was out first time playing Ghost Archipelago and we really liked it. The game changes a lot with hedge wizard Wardens and the fighter Heritors. Completly different to the way the frozen version plays out.

I lost my infantryman and found some nice items (that can be sold for good cash). Nothing very useful was found. My opponent got a men-at-arms missing his next game, but no deaths. He also got some items that's mostly junk - but they'll be good cash.

I found a quiver of arrows, they don't have much of an effect - but the are magical. Magical arrows would be good if we come across some ethereal creatures.

Review: Reality's Edge

Osprey Games are really bringing out some cool stuff these days - and I finally have Reality's Edge in my hands. This one have been a long way coming, since it was first mentioned on Lead Adventure.

I love the cyberpunk genre and the only type of gaming I really do is skirmish scale miniature games. So pre-ordering this one, my hope was to get:

1. A sandbox, to easy make scenarios and run long story driven campaigns.
2. Lot of options, for all the characters that I can think off. Covering my all time favorite Deus Ex characters.
3. A contained rule system.

There's a good amount of cyberpunk (or sci-fi titles close enough) titles out there. My problem with most are they are expensive. Expensive because of specific models, that come with specific cards and rules. And I have a limited budget and a tone of weird bits.

Reality's Edge looked like it might be the system I needed. For me the hype has been huge, as has my expectations. The expectations are high, because I played a lot of TNT and this will use the same core mechanics.

Shiny and chrome - the look, the fluff, the setting
The book looks good. As is custom in Osprey hardback books, the quality is super nice. There's a ton of cool original artwork, the pages have a nice layout and the paper quality is good. A thing that's important for me is the amount of text on each page.

And Reality's Edge is a nice read for my eyes, there's good space on the pages - not too cluttered.

Reality's Edge is not a locked setting - it's generic cyber punk, so you can use it to whatever specifics you like. In this regard it reminds me of Frostgrave, it sets up a frame and a theme - and it let you run with that.

There's no photos of miniatures in the book, no terrain. This is a new thing for me, it's always a part of these books. I would love to know the reasoning behind the descision. It's not really a problem for me, I don't really spend time looking at the photos in books. I'm constantly inspired by photos on the facebook groups for systems. For this book, it seems like a good choice.

A huge chunk of this book is 'the black market', the list of weapons, equipment, drones, apps and augmentations. It's a huge part of the 320 page book. One of the reasons this part is so huge, is item descriptions for all items. Small fluff pieces, that make up that cyberpunk frame while reading the book.

The rules
For people already used to TNT, the rules are an easy read. And only the new virtuel hacking layer might bring some confusion. I'll bring up a few key things in the game.

Tests: The game use two types of test. One is a "d10 + stat" test, with 10 being the target number to beat. The other is opposed test "d10 + stat" rolled for the models involved in actions. Pretty straight forward.

Activation: I really like skirmish games with switch activation, keeping people in the game. Reality's Edge up this a bit further. When activating a model, you'll do a stat test. The result will leave the model with one, two or three actions points. If you roll badly, the initiative will go to the opponent after activation. If you roll good, you get to activate another model.

Combined with the ability to put models on over watch and the fact that you'll resolve hits from shooting when initiative passes - there's some nice chaos to consider when making plans.

From TNT I know this is not something that makes the game confusing - but it brings a lot more 'Yes!' and 'Oh, no!' moments into the game.

Cyberspace / virtual: Cyberpunk needs hacking, apps and virtual reality. Reality's Edge does this by making a layer on the map being played. Virtual beings and programs are on the map, but only some models can interact with them.

I had to read this section a couple of times to make sense of it. It's a bit hard to grasp how it's meant to work in the game - and my mate (who hasn't played TNT) had an even harder time to get it.

Thinking in Frostgrave terms it became a bit easier. There's the real world and hacker's (wizards). Hackers can hack objectives (open lock spells), hack items and players (attack spells) or make virtual creatures (summon demons, that can only interact with other magical beings).

The sandbox
I like sandboxes, that's the reason I got Reality's Edge. A sandbox for me is easy to modify scenarios, lots of character options, lots of random enemies and a huge 'between games' play.

RE brings more characters options than you can field in a game, and each character options has multible options for varying skills and stats - making them highly unique. Your main character will even get a background and employer that impact the character.

All stuff that won't slow down the game, but does take time when starting out.

There's a good amount of scenarios in the book and the will vary as well. Each scenario will have some possible variables (often three) and twenty possible hitches (weather, protesters or other stuff). All in all there's a lot of variety - even if you don't make up your own stuff.

The campaign
According to the book, campaigns are going to be slow. Your crew will level slowly and you won't get rich. All characters start being freelancers, they'll ditch the crew if things don't go your way in games - and it'll cost money to make them stick around.

Everything costs money seems to be a theme in the game. Injuries can be mended (cost money) or let time heal (bad for morale - freelancers might quit). Captured models can be bailed out (cost money) or sit out time (bad for morale). Killed models (especially you main character) can be cloned (costs a lot of money).

Bringing a freelancer permanently (ignore morale, won't ditch the crew) will require a lucky roll or money.

I like this, games are not meant to be too easy. Cyberpunk for me is about scum - the guys who haven't made it. Reading the campaign system I'm thinking of the main character in Neuromancer and his hard work to make it.

I've already made various starting crews. A highly elite, well equipped team with only 4 guys. A medium armed and equipped team with 7 members. And now I've ended up with and build a medium armed 5 man team - with a lot of money in reserve. Money saved to see how the income vs upkeep will turn out in game.

Final thoughts
This is a good book, a good contained system that you can have lots of fun with for a long time. Just like TNT and Last Days - this is a sandbox I'll visit for many years and will continuously make new stuff for.

Another good miniature agnostic system, that will let you use whatever miniatures and conversions you might think off.

The author Joseph McGuire is talking of a possible solo/coop expansion. That would be awesome!

Make sure to check out the facebook community for cyberpunk miniature gaming - so much brilliant stuff. Character cards, tokens, printable terrain. And I've said a few things about my preparations for RE over at Ospreys blog.

I'm new a this review writing. Please let me know here or on Facebook, what you would like to see different of focus on in a written review.

Last Days: Seasons - Expansion review

Just got my hands on the first expansion for Last Days: Zombie Apocalypse. Paid and pre-ordered myself, so Osprey is not involved in the review in any way.

The expansion book is called 'Seasons' and gives rules for a 12 game campaign taking the survivors through a year.

Having played a lot of Last Days through the last year, this is exactly what the game needed. The base mechanics and options are cool and it's really easy to come up with scenarios. But after playing a lot of games, our gangs have yet to see a single dead character and a refuge overrun.

On the other hand the use of medkits, and buying new kits when buying new crew members, have seen us get lots of extra experience points from rolling good on injury tables.

Refuge upgrades wasn't really a priority for us, neat to have - but not really essential.

So being a zombie horror game - the vanilla campaigning is a bit too soft on the players.

The new campaign
The idea of running a 12 game campaign, each representing a month, is great. And after my first read of the book, it sure seems like it will become tough.

Now you have to manage conditions of your crew members. Each season will have different challenges - warmth, food, water, sickness. And after the games you'll have to prioritize which ressources you are looking for.

There's new refuge upgrades (and new refuges) that will help you survive. But crew members can get supplies and build. So the entire ressource / worker management is upgraded a lot. There's some tough calls incoming.

When rolling for supplies, you can also choose new tables. This will not bring in as many weapons - but can get you those essential supplies instead.

If you fail to need the requirements for a healthy group, they will suffer debuffs during games - and potentially die if left in a bad shape.

So my initial thought after reading is: There's gonna be really tough calls and you will suffer at some point. The need to scavenge essential supplies, will hugely limit the amount of guys you can put on guard duty for the zombie attack.

New scenarios and weather
The book contains a few special scenarios for specific seasons, good to change things up a bit and they don't require special terrain. Another addition to regular game play is seasonal weather conditions - that can both impact the current scenario (low visibility for example) and/or your crew conditions (heat that causes more thirst to be managed).

Crew members and gear
There's a big host of new survivors to choose from, many of these survivors start with abilities that have practical implications when scavenging supplies between games. So these might be good to pick if starting a campaign fresh.

As for gear there's some neat small items, mostly gear for managing weather conditions and ressource management. There's only a few new weapons to chose from, but the standard ones pretty much covers all weapons - so that's okay.

Coop and solo
There's now rules for coop scenarios and some solo rules. This is an excellent addition to nay game and I'm a big fan of it. ... Though in reality I'm not in place where I get around to solo gaming yet - I know that one day I will.

The coop brings three scenarios to the pick, limiting the amount of models per side to a maximum level count (a fine way to roughly measure group power).  All scenarios are putting old enemies in situations where they must work together or die.

I'm looking forward to trying these games with my regular gaming buddy.

Solo rules are tough to do. I think The Walking Dead does it really well with the event deck. Last Days does something similar with a table of events, getting worse as the game progresses. I will be modding the rules for solo gaming - but it gives a good outline.

There's a rule that models armed with a ranged weapon, have to shoot and use all possible rate of fire. This I don't like. Because this will highly limit the possible ways to play - killing any options of playing stealthy. But I will use the written rules for choosing targets - when I shoot.

Instead I will try and play with sometimes reacting better to noise, moving towards noise tokens from farther away - even when not having line of sight. I also want to play with doors being broken making noise, breaking windows making noise and so on. Quickly getting into positions, where shooting is necessary but done by choice.

Last words
Osprey Games bring out some great product. This is a good sized expansion book and it's a nice hardback (would love to see Frostgrave books that way). The artwork is still top notch and there's around 20 full page paintings - a lot of art for 80 pages of book. Nice!

After playing Last Days for a year it felt like the game needing an expansion exactly like this. Ash suggest to start new groups for the campaign, but we'll try continuing with experienced survivors. If anything it'll be a harder challenge - because we haven't chosen smart skills or refuge upgrades.

With this expansion I think Last Days seems like a top survival campaign game. I love huge between-game sequences and there's a lot of it in the game now. And there will be dilemmas - that's fitting for a zombie game. Will you burn fuel during the summer to purify water - or save it for winter warmth and run a risk of sickness from unclean water. Lovely stuff.

Wasteland / Cyberpunk NPCs

Here's a couple of models I painted for caravan NPC guards in this game of This Is Not A Test. One models is from a random trade, an old metal miniature - I've only added a backpack to him. I think it's a bit from 40k Adeptus Mechanicus.

The other model is an unconverted Ramshackle Games miniature - part of a Mini Gang set. I have some other in the same cloaked style - want to paint a clan like them.

Besides working for the wasteland both of these are good for Reality's Edge. I think both of these will be used as bystanders in my market place. The guy with the staff could also work as a Street Doc.

This guy is also from Ramshackle Games, actually a small goblin riding a Dunger. But I've been painting him up to also be a member of my Dunger Herder Clan project. I've giving this guy a 40k Kroot rifle - a bit that I really love. That rifle is simply great for so many post apoc conversions.

In the caracvan scenario (linked above) he just acted as a beast pulling a cart - same stats as the dungers without riders.

Tutorial: Jungle Island Felt Mat

I've become very happy with using homemade felt maps for my games. They're cheap and easy to do - check out my earlier ones here.

Now that we wanted to take up Ghost Archipelago it was time to make some new ones. Felt is obviously not as cool as a well done 3d board - but I don't have the space for something like that.

I had the idea for this a long time ago, the steåp-by-step is at the end of the article - let's start with the result.

The idea is a 3'x3' island, cut into four pieces - for a lot of possible variations. Combined with a few smaller Islands, I'll have all the Ghost Archipelago setup I want.

Water

Bought some light blue 3'x4' felt. Then I went over it with different nuances of blue spray paint (the cheap cans) and a bit of green as well. There's two blue and one green, beside the color of the felt. This one I just leave wrinkled, as it adds a nice effect. 

The Island
Take the 3'x3 piece of felt. Mark out the middle and the center of the edges. This is important, so the four pieces will line up no matter how you turn them.

Cut out a nice island shape. I had 1'x3' of extra felt, so made that into smaller islands.

First paint the island with different greens and browns. Cheap spray paint once again.

For sand I bought a bit more expensive effect paint. the on that sprays a sand stone effect. Go around the edges with brown paint first, then add a layer of effect paint. This will have to dry for quite a while.