Back in the saddle

After all that painting (every evening for a couple of hours) to get Mike's team finished in time for the GT (more on that in a few lines), I haven't felt like doing any active geeking until yesterday. I've sent off for a few supplies for basing miniatures etc, but no more than that. So yesterday evening I got the brushes out and painted up a squig (think toothy, psychotic space-hopper allied to orcs and goblins) as a turn counter for my Bloodbowl goblin team. It's not finished, was kinda rushed, and is pretty functional so I haven't bothered taking a picture, but it's got me back in the saddle.

So, the GT. Or, to give it its full title, the Blood Bowl Grand Tournament held in Lenton at Games Workshop's eagle-clad centre for world domination. I didn't take my camera (again - I'm rubbish, sorry), and all the ones I took on my phone came out as vaguely orange blobs. There were six games, three per day, and I took a team (Skaven) that I thought would be pretty good as a tournament team. Didn't quite work out like that, but I did finish 48th out of 170-odd, just outside the top quarter. For those not used to BloodBowl, the number in brackets is how many Casualties caused. I'll put my result first, then my opponent's.

Game 1
Opponent - Dwarfs
Score - 0(0)-2(3)

A nice bloke (Simon) as my opponent, so in that sense a pleasant start to the tournament. However, all my team got beaten up or killed, leaving me no way to defend. I was down to three players by turn 5 (of 8) of the first half. My notes for the game trail off at this point and just read 'oh dear oh dear oh dear'.

Game 2
Opponent - Norse
Score - 3(5)-1(3)

Incredibly random. BB is meant to be a game of barely controlled chaos, and this lived up to that billing. Every possible random event happened at least once and we laughed our way through those two hours. On top of that my team which had proved so fragile in game 1 came back with a vengeance - take that! Kerpow! My opponent Steve proved to be a top bloke, so the tourney continued well.

Game 3
Opponent - Lizards
Score - 1(2)-2(3)

Although highly amusing, every other dice-roll I made failed and led to a player of mine being sent off for fouling or breaking their neck while trying to dodge between enemy team members. Sigh. Dan (the other guy) played the advantages the dice gave him well, and we spent a chatty couple of hours across the table.

End of day one, and 1 win to 2 losses. I tried to be grown up about it, but couldn't help feeling a little frustrated over the way the (mis)fortunes of war(gaming) had conspired against me.

Game 4
Opponent - Halflings
Score - 1(2)-1(3)

I was delighted to see I had drawn 'flings as my first game of the day. They're basically a joke team, so I felt my luck had turned for the better. Not quite. For the first half I rolled a 1 or skull on over 2/3 of all dice rolls. I've blotted the horror from my mind, but I do know it ended with me 1-0 down after having received the ball at kick-off. The second half started in the same way but, turn by turn, it swang back to me and in the dying moments of the game, when it seemed I was fated to drown in a shallow muddy puddle of failure and self-pity, there came a spark of possibility. Knocking the ball free from grubby Halfling hands as they steam-rollered towards my end-zone, assisted by their treemen, I snatched at the ball, frantically pelted across the width of the pitch before launching a last gasp pass over half the length of the field. A fingertip catch, a scamper, lung bursting, and the draw (Draw?! Against 'flings?!) was mine.

Game 5
Opponent - Orcs
Score - 6(1)-2(1)

Now that is how skaven are meant to play. Every sniff of a ball, and I snatched it and speeded away to another touchdown. The balance of that speed is a certain fragility, but the greenskins obviously had forgotten their knuckle-dusters, and so I escaped almost unharmed. It seemed so unfair, in a way, and he took it in such good humour, that we took a longer break at half time and went to the bar so I could buy him a drink. Huge fun, great gaming companionship, and a much needed victory.

Game 6
Opponent - Skaven
Score - 3(3)-2(2)

I was paired up against Frank, a rather well-known BB figure, a German who designs and produces the most incredible scratch-built stadiums for the game (and scenery for every game he plays). I was intrigued to see how a skaven-skaven game played out. In the end it was a bit one-sided (he grabbed a last turn TD which makes it look less one-sided than it felt in the game) as my bad luck from earlier in the tournament now struck my opponent, and I was (if I say so myself) 'in the zone' and seemed able to see how the game was going to play out better than him. He took it really well, and I think still had fun. I thanked him for the game, commiserating when things didn't work out, but underneath I was taking a savage delight in my triumph. Does that make me a bad person? Or overly geeky? Both?

I had umm-ed and ahh-ed over the pretty high fee for the weekend, but in the end it was worth every penny. Even in the games I lost, and the moments when I had to overcome an internal pettiness over failed dice-rolls, I loved the whole thing - the good-natured, easy comradeship that sprung up even more than in any other tourney I've been to. Hurrah for geeking, and bring on the next tournament at the beginning of July.

Da London Eye

Yay for me - I finished a project! With a mere 15 minutes before I had to set off for the BBGT, the varnish on Mike's team was dry and I could pack them up to hand them over. He seemed pleased with them (and promptly played them against Malc, leading them to a crushing victory), and I was satisfied with the result.

Rush job photos, but they're gone now, so this is the best you're gonna get:

lineorcs

throwers

black orc blockers

blitzers

troll and goblins

Team photo

I promise you that the red has more subtlety than it appears in the pictures.

Recruitment drive gathers pace

I got the remaining three blitzers painted for Mike's team last night, they just need their team 'eye' transfers adding - I'll varnish the whole team in one go once they're finished. We're heading up to the Blood Bowl Grand Tournament (BBGT) a week on Friday and I hope to have the whole lot done by then. Apart from anything else it means I'll be able to afford to pay for my room!

Once they're all done I'll put up a team photo and then I'll actually have completed a project!!!

New recruits for Da London Eye

Mike's team (currently known as Da London Eye) got its first regular players completed yesterday. Not varnished yet, but everything else is finished on them, I think. I won't varnish them until all figures are finished in case any touching up needs to be done.

I'm still playing with camera settings, and these have come out with the red looking a bit funny, and the rest a little dark. The quest for decent photos continues....

Black Orc Blocker, Thrower, Blitzer

Lineman, and the two goblins allowed

BB Skaven

I got home early from work tonight (it was too windy for the kids to do any archery, so I cancelled the club shoot), and knocked up a crude light tent out by cutting windows into a cardboard box and covering the holes with tissue paper. Here are the pictures of my initially victorious, but now a little battered, skaven team; the Cheesemongering Vermin...

Score marker, Apothecary, Turn marker, Reroll counters

Linerats (aka, cannon fodder)

The Gutter Runners - super speedy scoring machines

Thrower, Rat Ogre, Blitzers

I don't like the way I've done the bases (I painted these about four years ago when I was just getting back into gaming after a long hiatus), and may at some point strip and repaint them all. I do love these models and think I could do the sculpting much more justice now.

The bitter dregs of defeat

Like that last mouthful of coffee from a cafetiere with a dodgy plunger, today's gaming was a bitter pill to swallow :(

The Cheesemongering Vermin were confident after their triumphant last outing, but today was a different story. It turns out that relying on your opponent to fail the rolls needed to dump-tackle your ball-carrier is not a sufficiently tactical approach and I was punished for it, losing two of the three games and only just edging the third. Hey, ho.

Pictures of my team (not the games - left camera at home again) to follow.

Who are you calling a chicken?

Um, the chickens, actually.

Don't worry, I'm not going all surreal on you, and this isn't going to become a farming blog, but we've finally got some chickens. Three, in fact. They are ISA Browns and came from a battery-farm rescue run on Saturday. It was all very cloak-and-dagger, with texts telling me where to meet and when (the Carphone Warehouse car park at 1pm, in case you're interested), and what car they'd be driving. When I got there, there were little huddles of vaguely do-gooder looking middle-class folks (me included, despite the new thug look - see photo later) who would glance at each other and mutter "Chickens?" before the groups would coalesce.

Got my three 'girls', all moth-eaten from the cages, and brought them home to their new and freshly finished palace. They settled in straight away and have given us our first two eggs. I'm a happy hen-keeper :)

The palace, inhabited at last, and all my own work

Me (newly and mistakenly shaven-headed) introducing son and heir to layers

The first egg; beautiful, isn't it?

No rest for the geeky

Just added my 'Unfinished Projects' list to the sidebar on the right. Blimey - that's a lot of painting still to do!

I have to get that one remaining pesky skaven finished by the Blood Bowl Grand Tournament (BBGT) on the final weekend of May, and really want to get Mike's stuff finished by then as well.

I think I'll add a 'Painted Mininatures' bit as well to cheer me up!

Carcassone

I managed to get a full refund in vouchers for a duplicate copy of The Great Warbow by Robert Hardy that I got as a present, so today I snapped up a copy of the award-winning Carcassone. It's been like one of those films you know you must see, but never have: a game I've never played and always felt I should.

It looks really good. Lots of beautiful tiles, and on a first read-through it would appear to have fairly simple gameplay, but room for cunning thought.

Cheesemongering vermin

Before I start, apologies that there are no photos of the games for this entry - I forgot my camera.

The day began dark and wet, but thanks to Chris', erm, "assertive" driving we were soon over at Dan's for a hot breakfast to set us up for Fenbowl II - a full day of league Bloodbowl play. We're running the league standings on percentage win, with a draw counting as half a win, and a minimum number of games having to be played to be in for a chance at the league title.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I missed the first league date because of my mother's 60th, so I was keen to get a couple of good results under my belt to catch me up. Having chosen the speedy but fragile Skaven (think bad-tempered, short rat-men), I was also hoping not to lose too many players. I was successful on all counts :)

Game 1:

I drew Dan's Wood Elf team first up. I knew this would be a potentially high-scoring game, with both our teams being quick and designed for ball-handling, not bashing. Dan's also got plenty of Woody experience. I was glad I'd chosen all four available Gutter Runners (the fastest players in the whole game) to boost my attack as it was end-to-end play for the whole match, with me edging the win at 4-3 by pulling off a ridiculous move that involved about twenty dodge rolls, picking up the ball in a tackle zone, passing the longest pass possible needing a 5+ (on a d6), catching, dodging a bit more and then having to Go For It (sort of like an afterburner that lets you go up to two extra squares dependent on a dice roll) to score. I like speed, especially after playing a couple of slow teams recently.

Game 2:

Mike's Humans. Mike plays a determined, driving game; a bit like a rolling maul in rugby union. I knew this would be tricky, and after I lost the ball immediately after having been kicked off to, I figured I'd thrown it away. Fortunately, by continuously chucking expendable linerats under the feet of his maul for the remaining seven turns of the first half I managed to shut him out. 0-0 at the half. I kicked to him at the beginning of the 2nd half, and prepared for another desperate 8 turns of defence. Luckily, forcing Mike to pass from an awkward position spilled the ball for me to very quickly counter and score. It's what Skaven do. Lots and lots more defence later, and a bit of unlucky dice for the Humans kept it at 1-0. Phew!

Game 3:

Chris and his Amazons. An unusual team in that they all have the same basic stats, all can Dodge but only have average Agility, are all moderately fragile, none are particularly quick. I've only played against them once before. It was at a tournament, when I smashed them, so was feeling fairly confident. It started evenly enough, but a couple of turns it all went my way, dice-wise. I didn't really have to do anything tactical - just pounce whenever the ball came loose, rely on being able to pull off ridiculous strings of dice-rolls to dodge anywhere I chose, and then score. 4-0. 

So, I now have a 100% win record which puts me top of the table and two of my gutter runners rolled Movement stat increases, making them MA=10. Nice!

The only downside to the whole day was giving myself mild concussion getting back into the car by smacking the back of my head into the door-frame hard enough to make the whole vehicle rock noticeably. I've never been concussed before and it was a bit like being seventeen again and trying desperately to hide from my parents that I had been to the pub on the way home from school for a beer, only without the pleasure of drinking the beer. Ouch!