D is for Dungeon

Dungeon Adventures, to be exact. What some people call "Dungeon Crawling".You might think: "Dungeons and Dragons" and you'd be partly right. What I've been slanting towards for several years now is some sort of tabletop Dungeon Adventure game. Not quite a full fledged RPG like D&D, or maybe something like D&D that isn't D&D.

I mean, D&D is fine as a concept and I've been following the whole Old School Renaissance D&D retro-clones for a while now. Swords and Wizardry, Labyrinth Lord, Dungeon Crawl Classics, etc. The problem is that I keep coming back to the basic mechanisms of level, and ep, Armour Classes, etc, which I rejected the first time back in the late 70's. (About the first time I played RuneQuest, to be precise). And I'm not interested in full fledged role-playing anyhow. What I want is some sort of fantasy wargame that can be run with continuing characters. A sort of RPG-lite.

Part of what is spurring this on is that, back when the Canadian dollar climbed way up with respect to the US dollar and at the same time Dwarven Forge switched the format of their product, they put all their old stuff on at 40% off.  And I bought up a ton of it. Enough to fill ten foot of wall shelving floor to ceiling. :-)

Ever since then I've been looking for the best system to use it with. I've toyed with Broadsword Adventure, by Rattrap Productions, and even tried to shoe horn a D&D-like magic system onto it. I've also tried Barbarians of Lemuria. I've considered Pendragon and In the Labyrinth/TFT and some of the Two Hour Wargames offerings. Recently I have considered Osprey's new "Ronin" rules. And even more recently I've considered RuneQuest, either 2nd edition or the new 6th edition.

Now I am considering going back and trying Ganesha Games "Song of Blood and Heroes" again. I had tried it for a few games several years ago but found that some aspects were too simplistic and that I immediately started to tinker with it. And then my PC crashed and since it was a PDF it was lost back into the ether. Now I'm thinking that maybe tinkering isn't so bad, as I seem to have to tinker with every rule set. I just have to make sure I get a printed copy this time...

N is for Night Ops

Wot I'm backing this month!

What the heck, I know today isn't supposed to be "N" - at least I suspect not - but this year I am so messed up with "Blogging A-to-Z" thing anyway. So - what the heck, eh? Sick the Alphabet Cops and Grammar Nazis on me! :-P

But, back to the point. I just backed a cool new Kickstarter by the fine folks at "Open Fire Figures". It is for some pretty sharp looking sci/fi figures, "Night OPs" Adam calls them. I guess b/c they have night vision helmets though to me they are just "cool sci/fi helmets." :-)

Check it out here: Night OPs

They remind me a bit of the cops in the Fifth Element - not same helmets, but all bulked up with armour and equipment. They will make a fine faction for my retro-sci/fi games. Mining Company guards, maybe, on Criticorium? Or Guild Mercenaries on one of the smaller worlds...

C is for Cave Girls!

Cave Girls sure have a hard time of it, don't they! ;-)

These are by Frank Cho, BTW.

B is for Bacteria!

The sort that cause stomach flu in this case.

This A to Z Challenge started off on the wrong foot for me anyway: two days after it started my computer died. The next day I had to leave on a trip and it was the middle of the following week before I could buy a replacement: the cheapest laptop I could find, which is what I am hunting and pecking at now.

THEN I came down with this damn stomach flu. Dire Rear, as they say. :-(

It had cleared up, and I went back to work but now it seems to be rearing its ugly head again! Grrr! Not so bad this time, so maybe it is just lingering effects. It certainly is causing me to narrow down the source of the problem: work or McDonald's where I grabbed breakfast on Monday. Nobody else at home is sick, so I am ruling that out.

A is for Apocrita

According to Wikipedia, Apocrita is a suborder of insects that includes wasp, bees and ants.

To quote: "The term wasp is typically defined as any insect of the order Hymenoptera and suborder Apocrita that is neither a bee nor an ant."

The picture is of a giant wasp, formerly sold by Mega Miniatures as part of one of their sci-fi ranges. Last year the molds were sold off and while someone else bought the sci/fi range, they did not want the wasp so I picked up that.

I am intending on doing some fantasy riders...

S is for Scauweg

Three Scauweg, shown with Bronze Age Miniatures Dead Earth figures

The Scauweg are fantasy monsters available from Slap Miniatures:

"The Scauweg is intended to be the antithesis to the heroic and pure stereotype of fantasy beasts such as gryphons, unicorns and the like.

Despite its appearance being reminiscent of a scavenger, scauwegs will hunt their prey providing they are in packs, making use of their razor sharp claws and beaks.

Although intended for a fantasy setting, we think these beasts would make great mutants in a post -apocalyptic setting as well."

They are quite large models, as can be seen here comparing them with a couple of Bronze Age Miniatures' new Dead Earth figures.

They are large enough almost to act as mounts...

R is for Resolute

 Hal Foster's Prince Valiant (June 19, 1938)

res·o·lute

Adjective

Admirably purposeful, determined, and unwavering.

Synonyms:

determined - firm - decided - resolved - decisive

Q is for Quantum...

According to Wikipedia (so it must be true!) a quantum "is the minimum amount of any physical entity involved in an interaction."

Example: this post, as an effort to catch up with my "Blogging A to Z" Challenge. ;-)

Now you understand the meaning of the title of the second Daniel Craig Bond movie: "Quantum of Solace."

P is for Pessimist!

For them that think I might not get back in the "Blogging A to Z" thing...

O is for Optimist!

That is, whoever thought I would be able to keep up with this "Blogging A to Z" stuff!

N is for Nagasaki

M is for Madknight

Troll Mantis Rider.

Madknight Miniatures, that is! Madknight are manufacturers of 28mm figures for Greg Stafford's Glorantha setting. You remember Runequest, right? Well, these are the figures you want!

They have a Kickstarter coming up in May and Andrew has kindly given me permission to preview some of the miniatures it will be featuring:

Agrimori (aka "the Men-and-a-Half") Pikemen.

Various...

Hell Sisters, with Chaos Creatures behind.

All painted by Roy Duffy

L is for Lemuria...

 ...well, Barbarians of Lemuria anyway.

Barbarians of Lemuria is a neat little role-playing game that allows one to play the likes of Conan the Barbarian, Red Sonja, Kull, Throngar, etc. Or Sinbad, for that matter. It is rules-lite (which I like) and the magic system allows for player input without (it seems) much opportunity for abuse. I haven't entirely decided whether to use the setting described in the game or do one of my own. I'm teetering - it's about 60/40 now, in favour of the setting in the rules.

Tweaked, of course. :-)

K is for the Garden of Kama

All work on the Garden seems to have ground to a halt. I am waiting...waiting for resin hulls of the galleys and canoes to send to sculptors; waiting for those with sculptors to get worked on; waiting for Mara to be cast up and mailed to me, waiting for the first figures to be sculpted (they are in the queue), waiting, waiting, waiting... *sigh* ;-)

J is for Jefferies Tubes

I was wracking my brain for a "J" topic and the only thing I could think of was "Jefferies Tubes". As any Star Trek fan should know these are the narrow access tunnels in the starships. As the wiki article mentions, they are named after the designer of the original Enterprise, Matt Jefferies.

I'm an equal opportunity geek, however, so J is also for Jedi Mind Tricks... :-)

I is for Indus Miniatures

Indus Miniatures is a small company producing excellent 28mm figures of the Wars in India during the period 1500-1800. Pictured above are Rajputs (top) and Indian Religious Men (below.) Both images are copyrighted Indus Miniatures and owned by them.

This month is Indus Miniatures 2nd anniversary and to celebrate Ashok is offering 20% off all codes.

H is for Halle Berry

Is it possible to have too much of Halle Berry?

No, I didn't think so either! ;-)

G is for Gringo 40's

28mm Mayan Warriors, sculpted by Mr. Judd

Gringo 40's is a company that until recently specialized in 40mm figures, covering American and Mexican conflicts such as the Alamo. Recently, however, he has branched out into 28mm figures with a new range of Meso-Americans and their Conquistador foes. On the Meso-American side he has started with some mighty fine Mayans, some of which can be seen above.

These are a "must buy" as far as I am concerned!

The photos are from the Gringo 40's website and all copyrights are owned by him.

F is for Fantastic Worlds

Fantastic Worlds is a miniatures skirmish game of retro-sci/fi adventure. The publisher is Rattrap Productions and it is part of a series of games using the same basic mechanisms. The games are set in different eras allowing one to play Gangster pulp-era games, Weird WW2 or even visit Conan the Barbarian's Hyboria.

A good friend of nibe rubs a retro-sci/fi campaign using these rules. Captain Zap Adams and his fearless crew battle the minions of Drang the Dreadful! Will the Rebellion survive! Tune in next week... ;-)

E is for Estavia

Estavia

Soldier King is a game by Frank Chadwick and published by GDW. It is a board game that uses a similar sstem to GDW's excellent "A House Divided" game, but set in a generic Horse and Musket setting rather than American Civil War. It is based loosely on the War of the Austrian Succession and Seven Years War. There are four players, each taking the role of a Elector from Arcadia, Argozia, Hravatska or Bravance, who are vying for control the the overall realm: Estavia.

The illustration above is my reproduction of the map that comes with the board game. Movement is box to box along main roads (red), secondary roads (brown), or rivers (blue.) The river boxes have a line indicating which side of the river the town is on. Those with crenelations are fortresses. The boxes are colour coded to show who owns what at the start.

We have used it once to fight a War of the Estavian Succession campaign that stalled primarily because the rules we were using to fight the battles were not very good. Then my computer crashed and I lost most of my campaign information so we couldn't continue. At the time we were playing a two player campaign: Arcadia and Bravance vs Argozia and Hrvatska. Arcadia had a very British flavour, Bravance was France, Argozia was Prussia and Hrvatska was Austria-Hungary. In our campaign Bravance was reeling under attacks from both Hrvatska and Argozia, but their ally Arcadia was about to invade Argozia with a massive army estimated at about twice her strength (such was the recruiting power of the Arcadian territories!)

I have often though about doing an "Estavia through the ages" sort of thing, setting games in different eras on the same map, or roughly the same map.