Warhound Titan - 3d printed

 At work (at an elementary school) I've gotten to teach "Design and Crafts" and the school bought a couple of 3d printers. I've thrown a lot of freebie hours into learning how that stuff works and as part of the process I've printed up a Warhound Titan for my kid. He really wanted one for christmas. It was a nice project and good learning experience. 

My kid chose the colors for the titan. It's was base coated black, painted with regular acrylics and a ton of different washes. All the color trimmings were done with markers / felt pens, it worked allright but still needed a gold drybrush. 

There was no instruction to the ~100 parts, some of them pretty small. And I mistankly put the legs on backwards without noticing. Only when getting to the shin guards I remembered 'wooops, they have those weird reverrse legs'. Anyway - works well enought and it still a big stompy robot. 

I'm currently building all manner of 40k themed stuff. really into some inq28 looking types, it's nice kitbashing and will be entered into a community challenge on the Discord - why not come join it? 

Guilders: The Carriage

With the release of Guilders 1.6 Beta, we decided to start completely new guilds. We've been playtesting the game with the same guilds over a very long time. Since the game has seen so many tweaks (especially to injury) it was time to try out with some rookies. 

Heist
We rolled for a scenario and ended up with The Carriage heist. In this game the guilds must ambush a Carriage with loot. Loot will drop from the objective, but it will also cause Alarm. 

Since the last play of theis Heist, the rules have change. There's now rules for the carriage being able to run over characters in it's path. It's harder to block this way.

You can check out my new guild right here: The Rogue Circus. 

Complication

If that wasn't enough we rolled The Towncrier as a complication - an NPC that start every turn with automatically generating Alarm. 

This can be both a good and a bad thing. If the town crier moves away from the objective, he'll cause Alarm and draw the guards to him .. i he moves randomly towards the objective - that's bad. 

Setup

We made a city with a straight street through the middle, this is where the carriage will move through. We made sure the line the buildings with lots of ledges towards the main street, for some good action in the height. 

Here's a small film flying over the city, also filmed the miniatures after one round of movement. 

The start

The carriage with the high value loot enters the game in turn one, so the first turn is mostly the guidlers trying to move into advantage positions. Since these are all rookie guilds, they don't have many skills and such to help them yet. 

For both guilds we spread out thiefs and streets urchins. Moving toward doors and crowds for lockpicking and pickpocketing some Loot I, to pay the bills. 

I've also included a bunch of quarterstaffs, clubs and bolas in my gang - hoping for some easy violence. If someone is Knocked Out quickly they don't generate Alarm (draw in guards) and the character doesn't get Infamy (must pay the bailiff to not be wanted). 

Here's the Town Crier (an aigitator from King Games Dunkeldorf line), in the middle of the board.

The carriage entered the board and starts its trip through the main street.

A thief with lockpick moving towards a door that's locked TN/8. It's a 50:50 change for a rookie thief to unlock a normal door.

A street urchin entered a crowd. The character will just move along with the crowds random movement. For this game we raised civillian Savvy by 1, making it 50:50 for thiefs to steal from them. But street urchin have a bit lower chance of success as rookies. My kid got thrown from the crowd multible times, because he got caught. 

This civillian monk was walking around with some cheap Loot I. I decided to gang up on him with my scum and apothecary, both armed with Knockout weapons. They also support each other, so my bonus for wacking him is higher - and it dind't work. So the monk starts yelling and generating a bunch of Alarm. 

The crowds move randomly at the end of the turn and for this game all the civillians seemed to move towards the center of the board, this is good for out guilds as it will slow down the carriage. 

Here's an example of how characters can move with crowds. My street urchin entered a crowd in turn one and is now standing in the middle of the board in front of the carriage. The kids is not strong though, so he won't have much of a chance to knock high value loot of the carriage. 

Here you can see the townwatch having been brought to the center of the board as the town crier was making noise there last turn. The town crier then moved toward the carriage (randomly) - and generates alarm there. This is bad for our guilds, as the townwatch will now move directly towards our objective. 

The carriage is a stretch goal from the Dungeons and Lasers encounters kickstarter, it was a nice kit to paint. 

The drunken monk really shouldn't get away, so my scum and apothecary try once more to beat him down - and once again he dodges their attacks. Knockout doesn't generate Alarm if succesfull, but the monk starts yelling if he can. So already by turn 2 we have a bunch of Alarm - which goes to Overall Alertness at the end of turn. 

And at Overall Alertness 10+ the guards turn hostile towards the guilders. So you really want to avoid this until you have enough Loot secured.

The street urchin is failing his pickpocket attemt and is thrown out  from the crowd and also generates alarm. Guards will never beat a kid unless they are carrying stolen goods though. 

A thing we've been working on and tweaking a lot of the rules for hiding. There's some skills that let's a character do much more damage if hidden, better to steal and lockpick. Before this game the guards were tweaked, so it's a bit harder to spot someone hidden.

Here Bolin from my opponents team, hiding in a crowd (even harder to spot) hoping the crowd will randomly move here towards a target of opportunity. 

... The plan about knocking out that monk for some cheap loot has backfired spectacularly and I've only generated a bunch of Alarm, raising the Overall Alertness to turn the guards hostile. And being completely rookie guilds, they really don't have much of a chance against all those guards.

Loot will bring you money and items, but they also offer XP for the character who ends up securing them. So having thiefs and street urchin steal loot and then handing it off to others is a good way to spread out XP. Wanting my guild master to gain some, the urchin is handing him here treasure. 

Finally after a ton of rounds I managed to knock down the monk, now more on principle than to get the loot, I simply couldn't let him get away. Loot I is the worst loot and will often only pay for the upkeep of 1 or 2 cheap characters.

All the violence and noise is bringing the guards closer. And when Overall Alertness hits 10+ the guards turn hostile - and we still ahave absolutely nothing to show for it. 

The cutthroat Bolin was hiding inside a crowd, but with hostile guards they start looking for hidden characters - if there's no other obvious targets. The guard manages to spot bolin and then attack her. Crowds and civilians are always on the side of the guards and will help stomp any guilder near them. So down goes Bolin. 

The character being beaten by only a town watch (easiests guards) will not roll for injkury after the game, but only captured (risking jail time). 

The town watch with alarm have just beaten my courtesan. She tried dodging but got knocked to the ground hard.

Neither guild have really been close to getting any good loot of the actual target, but have generated so much trouble trying to knock out civilians. It really became clear how terrible these rookies were compared to our 10+ games experienced guilds. 

The annoying town crier have been moving close to the carriage, and because of it have drawn a ton of guards towards it, making it even riskier to go and try knocking loot from it. 

In the end my thiefs have managed to gain a bit of Loot I from pickpocketing and lockpicking and running towards the board edge with guards on their heels. 

The towncrier surronded by townwatchmen from all his screaming. 

In the end this was a very nice first game. Both guilds managed to just pay their upkeeps from Loot I, while we weren't succesful getting any from the carriage. We both agreed, we should have taken a stealthier approac and keeping our eyes on the target. 

Loot II and Loot III is so much better than Loot I. So next time we'll focus on that juicy target. Since we didn't get much loot, no characters managed to gain any levels after our first game. 

Rule changes

After this game we tweaked the rules for smashing (breaking doors, knocking loot of the carriage). The rules went from '1 Alarm on unsuccesful and 2 alarm on succesful attempts' to 'smashing cause 1 alarm', This also cleaned up two heists (For Whom The Bell Tolls and The Carriage), for cleaner heist descriptions and easier targets, as you can know use crowbar items in the heist. 

Play the game

Wanna check out Guilders? Go get the rules on my LinkTree also join and follow some SoMe, help my reach grow. The game is nearly finished and should be released in 2023. 

Linktree

Guilders: The Rogue Circus

 This is the third guild I'm building for Guilders: A Life In Shadows. With the release of 1.6 we decided to start over with completely fresh guilds. The old guilds had done 10 games with no problems, so now it's time to start something new. 

I wanted to make a complete guild using only Dungeons and Laser miniatures. I have two kickstarters from them, just lying around and haven't gotten around to using them. 

Second it was nice to check just how well these miniatures fit. And I'm happy to show that with Woodhaven 3 you'll be able to make absolutely everything needed for the game. Guilders, civillians and guards. 

I'm really impressed with the Archon Studios miniatures, their design is very well thought out. There's very little visble mold lines and most connection points are very well hidden, due to smart sculpting. 

The Rogue Circus

I just picked some cool miniatures I liked and then made the guild afterwards, taking profiles that would fit the miniatures well. In the end I've ended up with a Rogue Circus, a guild of artists and circus workers. They are all following the Guild Master, a retired acrobat. 

Painting

I've base coated all brown from below and white from above. Then washed in some areas. Low points in cloaks, a light tone wash on all faces (I really don't think speed paint crusader skins works otherwise), around belts and such. All it then painted in speed paint colors. 

Bases

I use the same bases for all my miniatures in Guilders. Only metal miniatures are on 1mm renedra pre-made bases. All the others are 1mm XPS foam on 1mm bases, textured with a green stuff world roller and sealed with mod podge. The plastic bases from Dungeons and Lasers are simply going on sale, to bring down the price on the actual miniatures. 

Guild Master and Enforcer

My Guild Master is the famous and now retired acrobat Baron von Fox the Red! A master acrobat, turned thief as his star and fame started to fade. He has a medium armor and a one-handed weapon. I've given him climber skill (two move actions for climbing) and dive attack (a powerful attack, that gives more bonus the longer the dropdown). 

The enfocer is the old beast hunter from the circus. An experienced big game hunter, she is armed with a harpoon (halberd) and hand crossbow. She also have a medium armor (you can only buy 1 at the start of the game, but I quickly found one after a game). 

Fortune Teller (Courtesan) and Charlatan

I've never tried using the courtesan in the game before, the courtesan can do a special job between games 'working the streets' and generate more income for the guild. It's nice, as you're often poor especially early on. 

The charlatan is a hedge magician, having the 'control crowd' cantrip, to make sure the people in the circus was doing alright. The control crowd cantrip lets a player move around the civillian 3" crowds on the board, neat for blocking off guards. 

Apothecary

The apothecary is a nice character to have in the guild. They start with the doctor skill (reroll injuries or cure bedridden characters) or the can use the alchemy skill to generate more items for the guild. Potions, medicine, poisons and bombs is always nice.

The apothecary worked at the circus making drinks for sale to the crowd, cure ailments with the artists and such. 

Thieves

These two miniatures are also called thieves in the actual kickstarter. I reckon these have been regular stage hands at the circus, not artists really. I've added stripes to their pants, as they add so much detail to a mini with little work. It also gives them a really nice lego pirate look. 

In guilders I've chosen lockpick skill for both of them. Also gave them bolas, so they can try an knockout some enemies, to take their stuff. 

Scum and brute

This have been workers at the circus. A scum is a cheap guy to add to the guild, can't really do anything well. I've used given mine a club, to bonk some guys and take their stuff. The brute starts with a lot of strength and I've given him a crowbar. Break into house, fill the backpack with loot and get out. 

Street Urchin

These are super cheap characters, that can't do many tricks. They do however have some nice rules. Two children count for one character (so you can come above 10 on the board) and guards ignore them until they carry loot. 

Both my street urchin start with the pickpocket skill.

Guilders: A Life in Shadows is a 28mm skirmish campaign game, it's miniatures agnostic - so use whatever you find cool. There's large TTRPG elements to the campaign part of the game. You play as thief guilds trying to make it in a big city. There's rules for civillians and guards, that the game controls based on player actions. 

You can find the beta rules (and a Lite version), starting warbands and similar stuff right here: Google Drive.

And please check out my LinkTree: I use all the SoMe different, post dfferent stuff and such. Drop a few follows and come join the awesome Discord community.