Descent Miniatures: Merriod WIP

So cool!

The red tentacles help it stand out as the Master model

Howdy folks!

So today I got a chance to put some paint to plastic! I wanted to get started on significant work for my Descent miniatures. Although I've already painted the Zombies for the game as a test on basing I consider these Merriod models as my true first tries. The Zombies are absolutely hideous, the sculpts are some of the worst I've dealt with, and I lost a lot of motivation after trying those models out. Content-wise I can't complain about the Zombies, as you get a ton of cool stuff in the box and one batch of bad models doesn't ruin the whole thing (especially with cool models like the Merriod). Also, outside of the missions where they're mandatory, they aren't going to get any use so a bad paint job isn't the end of the world.

So as I was deciding on what to work on next my wife suggested the Merriods, as they're simply the coolest sculpt in the box tied with the Shadow Dragons. They are also my favorite monster in the base game due to their awesome abilities and annoying defense. So I got to laying some base coats on the guys, then after getting into the groove I found that I got almost the whole thing done in a sitting! All I have left to do is shade and highlight the blue skin, after that add the water effects and other basing elements and they're done. They're suitable enough to play as is in fact. If I'm not especially lazy I'll shade the grey on the stomach and tentacles.

It was also a cool coincidence that the base matched a tile in the game. I didn't plan on it matching, as I tried to do so with the Zombies and didn't do such a great job. I just wanted to make an interesting base and figured even if it didn't match it would look cool.

Overall it was a simple paint job, I didn't want to spend too much time on the monsters as I really am trying to follow through with having a fully painted set (at least of what I own). Lately I've been trying to keep in mind that not every model has to be perfect, and to try to get a standard that not only leaves me happy with the result but is also timely. I can't have every model done to the same 3-4 session standard, it's just not feasible especially with the new job demands.

Anyway, here are some more pics and WIP, when it's done I'll give an update!

Keep slinging paint!

Austin Malifaux Tourney 5/20/17

Good day internet!

Jeez, I've really neglected this blog as of late. My page views definitely show this, as I was going from 300 views a day down to 20 now. I'll do my best to keep this more up to date, especially now that I'm getting into my groove at work and don't have to stay so late anymore. Hopefully.

Earlier when I had heard the date for the upcoming tournament in Austin I started to do some real evaluation of my current lists and felt I needed to make some changes. I no longer felt any love for Leve, his nerf just sucked the fun right out of his play (not to mention his viability). I tried to branch out to other masters like Jack Daw and Parker Barrows, even made Parker get a win or two by making his lists semi-viable. I'm getting close to having an alternate master through Hamelin, as he's actually fun to play but still competetive. In the end, though, my attempts to find a second master to bring as a tech list made me start to think more about my main list, the Viktorias, and how to make it better.

Long story short: my disgusting dislike to the Hodgepodge Emissary's model kept me from actually reading the card until recently without realizing it. Once I'd read it I threw out my disdain for the thing and immediately swapped out the Strongarm Suit for it. A future post may come around explaining how he's absolutely perfect for the list, and how he's my favorite scheme runner in Outcasts.

So with the addition of the Hodgepodge Emissary I went to the tournament with only one list and no fears. Okay, some fears, but mostly confidence.

Game 1

Standard
Extraction

• Claim Jump
• Dig Their Graves
• Leave Your Mark
• Tail 'Em
• A Quick Murder

Opponent: Patrick (Molly - Rezzers)

Getting ready to rumble...

My first match was set up against Patrick, an awesome dude who has a great attitude about the game. I've faced his Molly before, using Leveticus I believe but I can't quite remember. Knowing what was across the table, I chose A Quick Murder on Phillip and Leave Your Mark. 

I deployed first and got my crew right in the middle bunched together. When he deployed he was right in the middle as well, except for three Crooligans he placed to my near a building. From what I could tell these three models were his main scheme runners and I immediately thought of aiming the Viks at them rather than the main crew in order to deny VP. The Viks are fast enough to get right back into the fight, but only if they can dispatch the Crooligans fast enough. I held off activating them until I saw what he planned on doing with the Crooligans and moved everyone else up the middle to entice him to leave the Crooligans unsupported as if they were unopposed.

Sorry so blurry, but you can see where the Crooligans were by where the Corpse Markers are...

When it came time for the Viks the Crooligans had already activated and got fairly close together. Using the Student I teleported Ashes closer, who then teleported Blood closer, walked, and teleported again. Blood then chain activated and killed two Crooligans, leaving the third for next turn. When my opponent saw that happen he started to realize his scheme running is going to be challenging, as I assumed he chose Leave Your Mark due to the proximity to my line.

The turn ended with Molly summoning a Necrotic Machine right in the middle of my main crew as a distraction as well as to throw some duels on me. One of his Crooligans got away from me, but I used the Winged Plague to get on top of the scheme marker to deny next turn.

Turn two is where the magic happened. I got initiative and went to work.

The Student walked and teleported Ashes closer to the fray in the middle. Ashes teleports Blood, buffs her, and unleashes her into the back area of his crew. I couldn't quite reach Phillip but got a few models taken down leaving Phillip vulnerable and not many models capable of killing Blood. 

There was a scuffle in the middle, but ultimately I didn't lose anyone. My Winged Plague ran up the right for Leave Your Mark, while the other one picked up the enemy marker and chased down the Crooligan to deny VP again.

Turn three saw the death of Phillip and me scoring for A Quick Murder, as well as a few other casualties. I had forgotten to take pictures at this point so I don't recall much. In the end the Hodgepodge had to replace the Winged Plague at scheme running because the Belle was doing a good job at denial, and the Hodgepodge was doing an excellent job at it. That guy is just so darn mobile in this crew and makes scheme running a breeze, not to mention the utility he brings to the crew.

At the end of turn 4 the game was over, I had won 7-5, with him surprising me by getting Dig Their Graves and Leave Your Mark. Considering I had his crew on the ropes for most of the game he had made it a much closer game than I would have anticipated on turn one.

Game 2

Flank
Guard the Stash

• Claim Jump
• Frame For Murder
• Accusation!
• Covert Breakthrough
• Mark For Death

Opponent: Hans (Lilith Neverborn)

Glorious!

So I had only taken one picture of this game, but it was a memorable one! I was facing Lilith, a bane for this list as Dreads has knocked my confidence of this match up. On top of that he was using Wicked Vines as his main ability, something I've never seen myself on the table but have read about. I ended up choosing Frame For Murder (Blood) thinking Lilith will certainly kill her, as well as Covert Breakthrough considering how close the deployment zones are in Flank Deployment.

We both creeped to the center, while Lilith used Tangled Shadows to place my Winged Plague near her and killed him for Mark For Death, which wasn't a good start. He also started placing markers from the Mysterious Emissary that would injure me when on or nearby. I could tell he was trying to bottleneck me from having a direct route to Lilith, and Lilith placed her forest markers right next to the Stash marker making it even harder to approach her.

On turn two he moved closer and bogged up my left lane up the center with Depleted. He placed more markers on the right center lane in front of my Viks to keep them from coming closer. When Lilith activated she managed to get Wicked Vines on both my Viktorias which was super frustrating, but when I asked about the ability he mentioned that the condition would go away if they're pushed which was something I forgot. When I heard that I remembered why Dreads prefers Tangle Shadows over Wicked Vines and had to do some clever stuff to get out of it. I had Big Jake charge Ashes to get his trigger to push her 3" getting rid of her Wicked Vines. Then I had the Hodgepodge use his (0) to push Blood 3" and both sisters were free to move, if a little bloodied by the end of it. I think Blood had 2 HP left while Ashes had 4, it was a bit scary.

With my sisters free I decided to go around the markers he made, something that surprised him as he didn't expect that mobility. Ashes, being pushed from Big Jake toward the left-center, moved and teleported Blood to the left side and buffed her damage. Blood, who was given Fast by the Student, let loose and Whirlwinded right into his main crew. This resulted in bloody glory, as Blood managed to kill the Emissary, two Changelings, a Tot (I think) and LILITH.

Yes, I finally managed to kill Lilith, which is a tall order to fill considering how hard Lilith is to kill traditionally.

In the end, though, it wasn't enough and I lost 8-9. It was mostly due to screw ups on my part because I was so focused on killing Lilith that I made some dumb decisions that made me miss some Strategy VP for being out of position. Had I just made some clear decisions with Hannah and the Hodgepodge I would have gotten all my VP and won the game, or at least tie it. Oh well, lessons learned, and dead Lilith.

Game 3

Close

Reconnoiter

• Claim Jump
• Eliminate the Leadership
• Accusation!
• Search the Ruins
• Undercover Entourage

Opponent: Josh (Marcus Arcanists)

This is gonna get messy...

My last game proved to be very interesting. With Close deployment I saw an advantage, but then he decided to use Marcus and I saw that Close can work for either of us and would come down to positioning and initiative. While I was very comfortable with my crew and he was unfamiliar with Viks I felt more confident but still wary. He initially had his crew right on the line all bunched up, but then asked me what my crew did and decided to spread out rightfully. Because I chose Eliminate the Leadership and Search The Ruins I knew it would be a toss up if I didn't kill Marcus fast, and I was really relying on the Hodgepodge living long enough to place markers for Search the Ruins.

Marcus' ridiculous walk range...

With close deployment I knew the action was going to start right away, and after a few moves to throw out activations we started getting to it. He moved Cojo right into my lines with Marcus in tow close behind to the right. I threw Blood right into them, killed Cojo, but didn't manage to hurt Marcus as he passed off all the damage onto his nearby friendlies. As predicted, this game is going to go down to initiative.

Needless to say I lost initiative... 

Long story short, Marcus killed Blood. I thought I had the resources to weather the storm, I had 3 stones for damage prevention, the Red Joker to stop at least one attack, positives to defense to have him cheat first for the most part, everything was in order. In his last attack I had only two damage left and flipped the Black Joker for damage prevention. If only a moderate card showed up, which was a decent chance considering my hand and how many weak cards were flipped, I would have lived through it and just went to town. Alas, it didn't, and I had to become creative.

I had Ashes eventually get in there and do the work Blood usually did. She managed to kill Marcus at the end of turn two. Throughout the game I had dominated Reconnoiter, something I don't think I would have been able to do without the Hodgepodge and Big Jake - the newest additions to my Viks crew. 

Despite losing Blood early on I managed to get a win 7-3! It was a great game full of surprises, with our best fights happening to our worst models - a Winged Plague and Jackalope were flipping face cards like it was going out of style.

At the end of the tournament I found that I had reached 3rd place, not bad at all! I used my store credit to buy more Descent stuff, for some reason I'd reawakened my love for the game and want to get it on the table.

Speaking of Descent...

I've finally started to get this game organized and easier to get on the table. I consolidated all my Descent stuff, putting expansion cards and stuff with my main box and got all the minis together. I took a container I bought with this idea in mind, cut some magnetic sheets I bought a while back on Amazon for cheap, and placed it in the container. The sheet is adhesive so no gluing was needed.

I had the idea to put some small rare earth magnets on the bottom of the bases, but saw that it would be more of a chore than I anticipated. I'd need to drill holes for every model to place the magnets, and it didn't seem to be a strong magnet considering how small it was. Being that a bigger magnet wouldn't be as universal depending on the model size and it would elevate the base way more than I wanted I had to think of a better solution. I remembered seeing people use washers, and it was kind of like how I used nickels for my old Orks, and thought that would be a good solution. I traced each different sized base and went to Home Depot, bought some washers and glued them on.

Success!

It worked like a charm! I've got most of the models magnetized, but the ones I bought for the heroes turned out to be too large and I'll have to figure out a different sized washer for them. The big models have warped bases, which normally don't matter for the smaller bases but these ones look like floppy pizzas. I'll have to fix them before I place washers on them in order for the base to be flush with the washers.

I really want to get working on these guys because I absolutely love this game, it's by far my favorite board game and is the closest offering to a light RPG as I've seen. The rules are very approachable and every game has a memorable moment. I'll keep this blog posted as to my progress, I feel that this project will have me much more motivated to finish than usual!

Until next time, keep gaming!

Blood Bowl Commission

Holy crap, two months?!

What the heck, man...

So why the long absence? Well, firstly I got a promotion at work and with that came lots of training and more responsibilities, so this obviously came into conflict with extracurricular stuff like hobbies. Also, because I was working on the commission, I stopped any projects that were personal to ensure it got done, so it became a standstill for my own work.

Although once I got done with that stuff I was out of the groove in terms of upkeep for the blog. Now that I've gathered my wits I'll make sure to get this back up and running regularly.

So with that I present the completed commission:

(So it turned out really grainy and looked much better on my phone/computer, but in the future I'd be using a camcorder and not a phone!)

This video was slapped together haphazardly, so it's not really a reflection of what I'd want to eventually do with the hobby in regards to making videos. I just thought it would be cool to try out, and I did so immediately after getting the painting done so I was extremely tired. Anyway, thought you'd enjoy it!

So what about pics?

Here's the Ork team in all its completed glory. As stated earlier I was tired, it was around 1AM on a worknight, and I couldn't find my usual camera to take photos of the job. I had to use my phone, which doesn't have a white balance option and doesn't take macro photos, so bear with me with the yellow pics.

Like I said, they're really yellow...

Initially these guys were a lot more vibrant, but due to the matte varnish it knocked the oranges down a lot and made them more muted. It did a great job blending the decals into the paint job though, and it's crucial when working with decals to have a painted-on look.

Although this guy was my test model for the Orks it shows a bit more on its vibrancy, although I had others that looked better.

The team on the field...

Now for the humans, the Reikland Reavers!

These guys turned out way better than I anticipated, and turned out to be one of my favorite paint jobs! It was a breath of fresh air painting these guys after the Orks, they have more unanimous shapes for the armor plating and the blue turned out spectacular. I had also finally worked out an effective assembly line schedule for painting and got them done much faster than I had with the Orks.

I have a ton of WIP photos for both teams, but figured it's not a crucial item to display.

I learned a ton from this commission! I finally figured out how to paint black in a way I'm satisfied with, as it's a color I struggled with much like brown a few years back. I couldn't figure out how to highlight the color without making it look too much like the highlight being the main color, for this instance grey. I also learned how to do a very vibrant blue. And although I've done green skin numerous times this is my first foray into blending it smoother, and I learned to love the new GW Glaze line they offer (it's amazing for glazing!). The most important thing I learned though was organization and learning how to effectively paint in an assembly line, since I hadn't done that since around 2007. I really prefer painting one model at a time, though, as I tend to sacrifice a tiny bit of quality for quantity.

Let me know what you think, and if you have any questions on paint recipes I'll be happy to share them! For the next update I'll post on my last two Malifaux tournaments along with a few items I've learned from them, as well as progress regarding Parker Barrows in my recent experiments!

Tail Feathers Review

He's on my tail... this time literally

Hey-oooooo internet!

So last night Kristy and I got to try out my latest game, Tail Feathers!

This is a beautiful game made by Plaid Hat Games that takes place in the Mice and Mystics world, one that is reminiscent of Mouse Guard. In Tail Feathers you control a force of military mice that are just hell bent on wrecking that pretty tree of yours in the name of cuteness. The way they go about this destruction involves ground forces scurrying on branches and missions as well as piloting small birds that take to the skies to wreak havoc on each other. On the surface this is a cute game that appears to be a re-skinned take on pilot games like X-Wing and D&D Attack Wing, but once you dive deep into the cheese wheel you can see that it's got so much more going for it.

This battle is about to get... bird pun here

Before we got into this game we watched a video describing how to play the game. I highly suggest it because although it's a board game it is heavily influenced by wargame and dogfight mechanics, something that may not always be your cup of tea. Even for me it seemed tough to read through, not due to the instructions being terrible or anything, but because I already had preconceptions of how wargames work and it's like relearning how to ride a bike but you're given a unicycle.

I felt that I got the gist of how the game operates from it and set up the board using the first scenario, which is just a pitched battle with the single goal being to destroy each others' nests. We eliminated almost all the optional rules so that we could get a grip on the core concepts and introduce these rules bit by bit into future games. It's already a bit much to take in with just the core rules, but if you've played any wargames it is actually not difficult to go through, just difficult to put all together for your first turn. After the first turn though we went through it with ease.

In a nutshell the game consists of several phases. The first one involves selecting a mission that your ground forces will take part in. These missions range from infiltrating the enemy tree, shooting down birds in the sky, attacking other missions to keep them from succeeding and even a decoy mission meant to draw resources from your opponent. Once selected you place them close to the center of the board and dedicate a few ground forces to ensure that the mission succeeds.

The next phase involves activating your models. Tail Feathers uses an alternating activation system like Malifaux, with the exception being that if you have a unit with multiple models they all activate at once. This is where the bulk of the game takes place. You'll move around ground units on tree branches to prepare to shoot from them when enemies are in range, or move them close to the trunk to prepare for a possible invasion. Your birds and their pilots are moving around using templates (similar to X-Wing) and are a huge influence on the battlefield. These big guys are capable of attacking missions, ground units and other birds. 

The last phases involve resolving your missions and end of turn cleanup. Once you're done with all of that you restart from the beginning until you have a winner.

This turned into an epic chase to save the nest

At first it felt a bit overwhelming for me to grasp everything just from reading. Although I am a fan of having Intro and Advanced rules sets to introduce new players into a game, I hate the format for how it orders things in a rulebook. This tends to force you to flip back and forth throughout the book even when they are related rules. Tail Feathers tends to do a better job of this but it still made it hard for me to wrap my head around. It's a personal issue I believe as some people can learn the game faster that way, I just prefer to have everything in the order you should be experiencing it on the table. If a rule is involved with movement it should be in the movement section, but because mechanics like the Death Spiral are in optional advanced rules they are not together with the normal movement section. Although the format works to introduce players this makes it annoying to reference in future games sometimes. Like I said earlier, though, Tail Feathers does this much better than some rules I've read, like almost any game made by Fantasy Flight Games. FFG makes some of the most entertaining games, but man their rules love to hide important bits in random places. I'd say that Tail Feathers is definitely easier to learn by diving in rather than trying to understand every rule through reading before you play, and the video we watched helped that out immensely.

So now that I've gotten that bit out of the way, what are some good points? Well for starters this game is dripping with theme. And it's not just superficial to me either, some mechanics are simply brilliant as a game implementation and I get the impression that those mechanics were created to convey the theme rather than the other way around. Take falling leaves, for example. It's an advanced rule, and one we hadn't included yet in our game, but it is a very cool mechanic. The whole game revolves around your home tree, and what cooler way is there for mice to travel from tree to tree other than cutting off leaves and using them to float over the battlefield? The only other cooler way would be to hijack a bird and joust with him, but all the cool rats took those. Well this game took a concept that sounds like two kids are talking about what would be a cool game and made it functional with the tools they include.

This theme permeates the entirety of the game, and although it can be judged as form over function it really is the opposite. In recent discussions it has come up that a game, when wiped away of all its aesthetics, it should function as a fun game still. This game is a good example of aesthetics elevating the gameplay. Yes, the mechanics function well enough without all the shine added and would still be a very deep game without it, but cute little birds and mice fighting over trees while collecting berries and cheese makes it that much better, unlike using wood blocks and meeples or something.

The other great thing about this game is its depth and layers. In our game there was only one true goal, which was to destroy the other nest. How we went about it, though, is what made this a game that was very tense and filled with measures and counter measures. Kristy decided to go for the jugular from the start and chose the Siege mission, which if successful allows for a few of her ground mice to pop up directly on another tree. I decided to start withering away her flyers as soon as possible by using the Patrol mission, which if successful allows you to attack any flyer you want - which was important as she had three flyers to my two. On turn one she was immediately pushing the pace as my home tree was invaded, and the risk I took didn't pay off as it failed to injure my target, and I felt the pressure from the start. From that point I was desperately trying to fend off the birds from getting close by colliding with them and initiating Death Spirals, and ground forces couldn't be dedicated to missions as they needed to defend the home nest. My birds also had to try to stop missions from succeeding by swooping in attacking them, and it ended up being a wasted effort as Kristy used a decoy perfectly.

It felt like you had to stretch your resources to cover as many of your bases as possible, and you can never have enough coverage. This created way more tension than I've felt in an X-Wing game, because there were so many approaches you had to consider. If you considered the three main approaches - Birds, Ground, and Missions - it always felt like you only had enough to deal with two of the three at any time, which is a great thing. There may be some players who suffer from analysis paralysis when confronted with all the options you have, and Kristy was definitely getting a headache from all the decisions you had to consider. I would think that once you get through a few games the better options become more clear, or at least you develop a style you like that doesn't need to engage every option, so that your playing can become more streamlined and easier to think about.

Things are not looking good for these vermin

A lot of the gaps in gameplay get filled with the advanced rules set. Using leaves for transportation solves the issue of moving your models to other trees outside of a mission, and this adds a further wrinkle in what you dedicate your resources to during the turn (do I attack the mission or the rats on a leaf?). Dropped feathers help defend the model from additional ranged attacks, which is something desperately needed as I found ranged attacks to be very powerful and flexible. Action cards are probably a huge addition we need to add next, as they can possibly help balance the scales if things don't go your way.

So, enough glowing about, what are the issues?

For starters there are the flyers. They are beautiful models, and the pilots fit very well with each bird. But the tilting that's necessary for their movement can be cumbersome throughout the game. A few times they came off their stand and had to be reattached, and while tilting them you have to be very careful. When you're getting in a tight bunch there's a guarantee that you won't be able to place them perfectly where they should be, and god forbid you do a Death Spiral in the middle of a bunch of models and stuff.

The movement templates can also get in the way when you move through several other flyers. This issue happens in X-Wing, but in that game there are a few elegant solutions for placing the template accurately. But because they are on round bases it's a little tougher to get around, and they will definitely not be perfectly placed all the time. It's going to be tough to get exactly movements when you're flying between a lot of other models, and you'll have to hope your wings don't tip over other flyers. Between that, physically tilting the model, Death Spirals, etc., you're definitely going to have to be okay with models not being perfectly undisturbed. I don't see this becoming a tournament game or anything, so usually you're playing with friends who don't accuse you of cheating because when a model fell over you weren't facing exactly northeast by 2 degrees or something.

Another issue I had was with a few components. The tokens and templates printed on thick board were excellent and numerous, that's a good thing. The card stock they used for the mission cards is ridiculously thin. I dropped one on the floor and it took me a bit to be able to pick it back up again. These are cards you'll be using every turn of the game, I wish they printed them on the thick board instead. Other components were used with that same stock and it is terrible.

Also they only give you enough for a small two player game, If you're wanting to expand they give you the extra cards that are compatible with models from their other game, Mice and Mystics. As far as I can tell these are all ground units, meaning you are pretty limited on your bird and pilot options. If you're looking for a more grand scale of battle, or even just go beyond the one ground unit you have for one of the factions, you'll not be able to do so out of the box and will definitely have to buy something else. Since there aren't any released expansions for Tail Feathers yet your variety is limited to ground units, and buying another core set doesn't help as your heroes are unique and can't be duplicated from what I can tell.

I can't say anything about other flaws as I've only gotten one game under my belt. These flaws, however, do not detract from how excellent this game is and how much potential it has. It's definitely a brain bender as it gives you plenty of strategy to muck about in. It takes this strategy and wraps it in a clever aesthetic under the guise of a wargame. In our game Kristy didn't let up the pressure and ended up destroying my nest with hers untouched and we both had a blast with it. I highly suggest giving it a try!