31 October 2015

"It's all true"

Oh my, how exciting is the new Star Wars trailer? The first new films set in a galaxy far, far away since 1983...


As a warm up, the two Academy Pilots and I had a dogfight through an asteroid field. I had Han Solo flying the Millennium Falcon, with Chewie as co-pilot. They had five Ties between them, split into two flights (one of three Black Squadron pilots, one of two Obsidian Squadron). This gave them 61 points and me 51 points - a reasonable handicap as it would turn out. I had to collect three containers using the Steal action before leaving from my starting corner without being destroyed. To keep them interested, we decided that if all their own squadron was destroyed, they'd get two back at their original entry point as reinforcements.


Piloting was difficult (we had two starter sets worth of 'roids), and it was the first time I'd flown the Falcon, usually being relegated to the role of faceless baddies being vaporised by the named heroes of the Rebel Alliance. That big base makes skipping around obstacles rather tricky and I was rather embarrassingly grounded a couple of times.


"Alright, Chewie, pun...." *fizz* *crackle* 

The handicap proved perfect, with only some expert and self-sacrificial flying from the sole survivor of Black Sqdn allowing the last Black Sqdn pilot to get the final shot required to blow the old girl to pieces.

Some good flying from the little tykes, over what was quite a long game, including a couple of really neat pincer movements. Next time's handicap will be smaller....

From reggiestake.com


May the force be with you,
Rab

30 October 2015

Mapping Corcelle

This drawing maps lark, made to look so effortless by the likes of Dyson, Matt Jackson and Michael Wenham, turns out to be both tricky and time consuming! Who'd have thought?

Anyway, here's my progress on mapping Corcelle so far, heavily influenced by the styles of the three gentlemen listed above. Town walls, the main temple, guild houses, fountains, a wizarding college, marketplaces, river chains and a pair of bridges so far...



No corrections made yet, and I need to find a more satisfactory way of getting the scanned image into a pure black and white, line-art style.

Comments, criticisms and advice very gratefully received.
Rab

29 October 2015

Thursday roundup

Yeah, Thursday roundup! It's definitely a thing. Here goes...

This week I have:
  • played Keys to the Kingdom once (escaped but wasn't the player with the Key)
  • played three games of Hurry'Cup (a win and two 3rd places)
  • become a patreon! Specifically, I've dropped a few copper pieces into the online hats of two very creative chappies, Dyson Logos and Matt Jackson

  • started to learn to use watercolours
  • written one-page DM summaries for two major deities (one which the players don't know about yet muahahaa!) and one now-minor deity
  • written a one-page DM/player summary for the big town that will prove... important in our campaign
  • started a map of said town

  • not painted any miniatures or played the next episode of Knights' Quest - can't do it all, I guess!

I hope your half-term holiday offspring aren't being as mental as mine,
Rab

24 October 2015

Averaigne campaign - session 02


[The story so far]

Session 02 - From road, to inn, to gully... via financial disagreement

After a night disturbed by the howling of wolves, and a pep talk from Berignon to reassure Bregans that smiting the evil and chaotic was an acceptable action for a cleric of Alathea, the party set out again along the king's road towards the city of Corcelle through a very foggy and miserably wet spring morning.

18 October 2015

Averaigne campaign - session 01


[The story so far]

Session 01 - Ambush on the King's Road

The three carts trundled on slowly through the weak early spring sunshine. The monotonous creak of the wagons and occasional snort of the pairs of oxen drawing the carts had lulled carters and passengers into a waking torpor, conversation had faded some time ago and all were looking forward to arriving at a decent inn to make their final overnight stop before Corcelle and the delights of its Vernalia equinox festival.

17 October 2015

Averaigne campaign - session 00



As I mentioned earlier in the week, I've allowed myself to be talked into running an introductory mini-campaign of "proper old roleplaying with loads of different dice" for five 6th formers and on Friday afternoon we had our first session, chucking their characters (which they'd rolled up 3d6 in order under my supervision on Wednesday at the end of the school day) in at the deep end.

It was the first time I'd done any roleplaying since I was about ten, when I'd run the introductory adventure (B11 The King's Feast) with Red Box Basic D&D back in the late 80s. I was worried I'd be a bit rusty and the whole thing could fall flat - blind leading the blind! But I relied upon my trusty parent/teacher/DM skills of "if you sound convincing, no-one will ask awkward questions" and all the mistakes I'm sure I made became unimportant.

This is the Session 00 post, though, in which I introduce the characters and the world in which my campaign will run....

11 October 2015

Keep out!

Getting myself in the mood for DMing on Friday for the first time in TWENTY-FIVE years (goodness, I'm starting to pile on the birthdays...), I was pointed in the direction of this fun little browser dungeon-crawl by Billiam Babble of Inked Adventures fame.


It's called "Keep Out!" and can be found >here<

Enjoy!
Rab

10 October 2015

Good friends are good

Or should that be "mates" given the nautical nature of part of this post?

Work has been well and truly claiming its pound of flesh over the past couple of weeks as departmental analysis reports, performance management, and budget cuts have had me scurrying around much more than usual. Not even a sniff of eight hours rest each day, never mind eight hours of leisure!

As an aside, workers of the world, we should still be fighting for this!

7 October 2015

The costs of gaming - September 2015

Jan 2015  -  £00.00 (0/0/0)

Feb 2015  -  £24.99 (5/5/0)
Mar 2015  -  £46.11 (20/7/-13)
Apr 2015  -  £06.40 (2/12/10)
May 2015 -  £07.07 (-25/2/27)
Jun 2015  -  £34.00 (25/0/-25)
Jul 2015   -  £00.00   (-2/3/5)
Aug 2015  -  £00.00   (1/0/-1)


September 2015


  • BOUGHT - 
  • TRADED - received a chaos warrior from Asslessman (and I've already painted it!)
  • SOLD - 
  • TOTAL for September - £00.00   (1/3/2)


Total net. expenditure for 2015 to date         = £118.57
Remaining acceptable expenditure for 2015 = £32.43

In something similar to the LAF lead-hoarders vow, I'm also recording the number of figures purchased versus the number painted, which is what the numbers in brackets after each month's total represents - (net unpainted acquired/painted/net total for the month). So, here you go:

Net. unpainted figures acquired in 2015   = 26
Of which, painted to date        = 2
Total no. figures painted         = 32

Net. hoarding status 6

As I said last month, I should admit that I've spent a bit on the table I built, and am about to spend more on blue foam and other bits to create terrain boards. I'm not including it, though, because I sold all my re-enactment armour - thus one hobby funds another and still leaves me in the black...

2 October 2015

Welcome

I noticed that my follower count has crept up over the last month or so and thought this would be a good point to welcome you. I'm glad you have enjoyed my recent output enough to let me clutter up your news feeds. The picture below is a good example of the sort of feel I want in my fantasy games - mostly medieval, with a hint of the wild and magical (for good or evil!). It's from the short-lived Red Giant magazine by Gary Chalk and comrades. Most of the figures are early 80s Citadel as far as I can tell; I know I've painted some of them myself!


What perils await them? Or indeed, you, new readers?

Wait and see,
Rab