On another club outing with Stargrave Jeremey ran a game set on the legendary planet of Fenris, with Stephen providing a dramatic write up of the game …
The game was set up in the ruins of a city with the robots of Fenris on patrol throughout the region. The crews of four ships arrive to search for loot.
The Robots of Fenris patrolling through the ruins
Each crew was given a random mission brief providing additional bonuses to be had based on those missions. Stephen ended up with a mission that allowed the crew to pick a rival crew and gain extra credits for any kills against that crew.
The Seedy Dive Space Bar
“100 Credits!? You gotta be kidding me. I want 200.” Kersh Wilson banged his fist on the table for emphasis.
His opposite number leaned forward. Only now did Kersh get an idea of his features in the half-light of the smoke-filled room – the flattened nose, the red skin and ritual scarring. Kersh was dealing with a Creduxian.
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do, Kid,” said the Creduxian. “What I’ll do for you is make it 150 credits for a kill. Just 75 for a hit. Do we have a deal?”
Kersh leaned back, trying to recover his composure, remember the calm and measure he’d been taught as a young student by his masters.
“150 for a kill, huh? Yeah, OK – we got a deal.”
“Good. Good. I’ve made it easy for you. The hit’s name is Offler dZuk – she killed my kinsman. She’s a crew member on a ship called The Troubadour. The captain’s name is Ash de Vere. I’ve had one of my cronies slip Ash some information about some ruins on Fenris. Told him there was money to be made. So I’ve got ‘em off-planet for ya’, somewhere quiet, somewhere away from the eyes of the lawmen. Who knows, maybe you can make some extra loot out of it yourself…”
Kersh and his crew, as well as trying to collect loot tokens, had a special mission – extra money for taking an opposing player’s crew down to zero Health.
Fenris was an area of ruins and covered in undergrowth. Also present were some battle droids, so they’d have to take it careful. I had to choose which player I would have to try and shoot. It would have to be either Andy or Phil, as they were either side of me. I looked at where the loot tokens were and I reckoned that I was more likely to bump into Andy, so it would make sense to have him as my target since there was every chance we’d exchange gunfire anyway. Where I deployed there were two tokens that shouldn’t be too difficult to grab. I pretty much split my force in three – crew Captain Kersh Wilson (a mystic) led a couple of his crew after one token. Shoggoth (a biomorph), the first mate, led some crew after another. I had two raw recruits who I decided I’d send after the furthest away, but also with an eye on the possibility of taking a pop at Andy’s crew if the opportunity presented itself.
The Recruits sent out to scout the area
Oh yeah, I also had a pathfinder and used his extra speed to lead the way, draw any fire, see what droids were about etc.
I took the first token without too much difficulty. At that point Phil rolled a bad initiative roll (any roll of 4 or under meant a random droid would appear – Phil proved good at rolling low…) and a droid appeared near my crew. Kersh took out his lightsabre (sorry, ‘void blade’ *ahem*). The droid took a shot and Kersh deflected the shots with his blade. He then concentrated carefully and caused psionic flames to shoot from his hand and engulf the droid. Didn’t do too much. So he drew his blaster pistol and let off a couple of shots. Down went the droid.
Fire fight with a robot sentry
The two recruits – a robot called 2B-55 and a pale-skinned alien called Ronnock Crowder – advanced through the ruins. Not too far behind was Shoggoth and Yammet Lament, an ex-commando. TwoBee and Ronnock by-passed a loot token, leaving it for Shoggoth, and took position behind some ruins. Because on the opposite side of the road two of Andy’s crew could be seen trying to unlock a loot token.
Laying down some fire
Both TwoBee and Ronnock drew their pistols and started shooting. Down went one of Andy’s crew – Offler dZuk. She was only wounded, so on Andy’s activation he decided to pull her back. But TwoBee and Ronnock let rip again, and this time she wouldn’t get up – down to zero health. But was it a kill?
With three loot tokens, and having successfully completed their special mission, I decided discretion was the better part of valour and got my crew off with all their loot.
It had been a very successful first mission for Kersh and his crew.
Captain Kersh collects some loot
Or was it? The story will to Return to Fenris for a different perspective …
First up this week Eric has painted two more Stargrave crew members, I could be wrong but these have the look of cannon fodder.
Next up Andy continues to wade through more of his medieval miniatures, this time with some progress on horses.
Mark has made some 6mm progress with his Spanish Napoleonic era forces.
Two cavalry units, a mixture of heavy cavalry, dragoons, hussars.
Mark also sent us progress his son Felix has made on his first Imperial guardsman.
Warhammer 40K Imperial Guardsman
And lastly this week, with the shows starting again Marcus has turned his attention back to the clubs current (Last seen at Cavalier 2020!) show game, first up some Yeti’s.
Copplestone Yeti’s
and some snow scenery made out of expanding foam.
Expanding foam terrain
That’s it for this week, catch you next Wednesday.
Here we are with another selection of pictures from the club showing what we’ve up to. With the return of club meetings, projects are turning to the various games we have managed to start playing again.
First up Tony has been painting up some 15mm Brigadier characters, strangely enough from Brigade Models. He has also managed to complete another dwarf for his LOTR’s collection.
Kili the Dwarf
Next up I’ve been painting up some crates from the Mantic Dreadball range for use in various sci-fi games.
The selection of crates from the Dreadball Extreme box set
John has been painting up some 10mm Chilean and Peruvian Cavalry.
Regiments of Cavalry on the way
Lastly for this week Stephen has used up some old EM4 Colonial Marines miniatures and a bit of kit bashing to create some additional crew/gang members for use in games like Stargrave.
Effective bit of kit bashing to bring some old figure to life
Jeremey takes us through the various times club members have used actual toys for games.
Recently Tony posted pictures of a toy Millennium Falcon he bought for his current 15mm Star Wars project. This was a Hasbro Millennium Falcon toy measuring 9.5 inches x 7 inches.
Checking the toy for size
All Tony did to this toy was to give it a wash of black acrylic paint thinned with Johnson’s floor polish followed by a heavy light grey drybrush.
Picking out the details
As you can see the end results were quite impressive for such a simple technique.
When the Stargate rules came out Stephen decided to paint up a spaceship to act as scenery. Again going for a toy Stephen bought a strange looking spaceship from something called the Starlink range.
Starlink Neptune Ship
From what I can tell you can connect this toy up to a games console for added features. Stephen converted a few bits of the original toy to turn it into a craft for his bounty hunter.
This is the notorious bounty hunter, Boone Sadist, with his ship Scourge Reaper…
I also got in on the toy action a number of years ago for my Fenris Descending game. I dug out one of my old Star Wars toys, namely this PDT-8 transport toy.
The old Mini-Rig range dating back to the early 1980’s
For this I did need to cover over the compartments you put the action figures in and went for a complete paint job, but that was still just a simple primer of grey, dry brushed silver and a black ink wash applied.
The shuttle craft from Fenris Descending
Again the level of detail on the original toy made it a good choice to use for wargaming. You can often pick up such toys for a bargain price on Ebay or in the toy store clearance bin. A purpose built wargaming spaceship of the same size (although likely better detailed) would be quite expensive.
I can see my self doing this again if I spot the right toy.
We’re back for another look at progress from the club members.
Above we have Mark having painted old stoney face himself who is just about done, just the base to be completed. Also Mark has completed more of the Pontic army with some swordsmen.
Mark’s youngest has also been slapping on some paint (mainly contrast paints) to a block gang to go up against Dredd.
Start of a brightly coloured block gang
Next up I’ve been working on a piece of old wood I found to make a giant tree terrain piece.
The giant ancient tree 21cm tall and 7cm wide
The tree currently has a glossy finish because to help preserve the wood I applied a watered down coat of PVA glue.
Next up Tony has completed another dwarf to add to his ranks of LOTR’s miniatures.
Another dwarf in the war of the ring
Eric has also completed his Inquisitor Greyfax who will act as a Captain or first mate for Eric’s Stargrave crew.
Inquisitor Greyfax
And last but not least this week Stephen has made more progress on his Saracen army, this time some light Saracen cavalry.
Sometimes you have to admit your hobby space needs a good tidy. Jeremey takes us through his latest tidy attempt and subsequent creation.
If I spent as much time actually painting as I did tidying up my hobby desk I would have defeated the lead pile by now.
My current hobby desk is a 1940’s bureau I got from the local charity shop. It has a number of spaces for putting your letter writing paraphernalia, but plenty of potential for hobby related equipment.
I originally bought a couple of desk tidy/pen holders for my paint brushes, files and sculpting tools. They worked but as you can see there was a lot of wasted space in the desk.
The original desk tidy units
During the latest desk tidy session I suddenly hit on the idea of getting something that made better use of the desk spaces. I tried finding other pen style holders that would fit better but couldn’t find anything suitable.
Interlocking EVA foam floor mats
It was at that point I decided to make my own. I decided to make some boxes out of foam floor mats since the contents would not be that heavy and the desk tidy pieces themselves didn’t need to be too robust, just survive being pulled out like draws.
The finished boxes loaded with paintbrushes, files, sculpting tools, knives, cutters, basically everything I need at my finger tips
I started by making simple boxes and stuck them together using the hot glue gun. I measured the space available to ensure the boxes used up all the space available. Once that was done I got out all of the items I wanted to store and cut internal foam pieces (again stuck on with the hot glue gun) to create the various spaces for my equipment. The last thing was to add a handle so I could pull out the boxes.
The first one worked so well I made a second (slightly better than the first, shown on the left), which meant I could have on the desk even more equipment I’d previously put away in other draws. I’m now wondering if I can build myself a rack for my paint pots out of the foam!
Club member Jeremey takes us through construction of his new measure for the game Saga.
I’ve been playing Saga for a number of years now. My original cardboard measuring rulers are long since gone being old and tatty; so needed to either buy new ones or make my own. I had some 5mm thick foam card that seemed ideal for the job.
I created a simple set of measuring sticks in a similar way to the official ones. A 12″ ruler with Long and Medium distances and a second showing Short and Very Short measurements, these served me well for quite a while; but during a moment of boredom I felt I could come up with something more visually pleasing.
The new Spear blank next to my early measuring stick attempts
I still had some of the 5mm foam card so dug out a piece and cut it to the standard 12″ length. I had already decided to create a spear as a measuring stick and cut a piece wide enough for the spear blade.
The basic spear shape
I then cut out the spear shape after measuring the foam so that the blade was the same length as the normal ‘Short’ measure. I didn’t try doing any fancy curved lines for the blade spear, I kept it simple.
Thin EVA foam wrapped round the shaft
Next to provide a way of measuring the ‘Very Short’ length I decided to use a thin EVA foam sheet cut into strips. I superglued the end to the spear piece and stretched the foam round the shaft.
The strapping in place
I now had a way of measuring all of the distances required. The strapping for ‘Very Short’, the blade for ‘Short’, the remaining shaft for ‘Medium’ and the entire spear length for ‘Long’.
Painting of the blade
Next up I turned to painting the spear, the blade was painted with a standard Silver colour with a splash of black ink to give some contrast to the flat silver blade.
For the shaft I painted it dark brown and then with increasing lighter brown shades drew lines down it like wood grain. Finally I decided to paint the strapping as well, I used the darker brown paint watered down to add some shade.
The finished Spear
Here we have the finished spear next to the old rulers. As this would be handled during games I also covered the whole spear with a brush on Matt Varnish.
The Spear in action
With luck the spear went into action sooner than I expected with the re-opening of the club. It also worked as a good omen with me winning both games of Saga played on the day.
During a recent discussion over Stagrave and making scenery Marcus mentioned a cheap set of terrain available from Mantic Games for the game Dreadball. Further browsing of the Mantic Games site showed a box set called Dreadball Xtreme for £9.99.
Club member Jeremey took the plunge and bought a set for evaluation:
This all started when I saw the Dreadball set of Free Agents that I thought would be good for converting into a Stargrave crew. The Free Agents set was £9.99 but I discovered the Dreadball Xtreme set for £9.99 included the Free Agents set, it also contained some terrain in the form of crates, perfect terrain for any Sci-fi games; so I thought I might as well pick up a set.
I had to pay postage so the whole thing cost me £16.99, and this is what I got.
Contents of the complete set
I will say straight away this is not a review of the actual game. I had no interest in playing it. I bought the set for use in other games.
This is what you get in the set. First up were the 9 Free Agent miniatures that first led me to the set. The miniatures in the game are all hard plastic. The quality varied, some had sharp details others were very soft. Also the painted miniature pictures on the Mantic Games site gave me the impression that some of the miniatures were larger. For example the Treeman looked tall but is the same height as the other humanoid miniatures. Mould lines were quite pronounced on some of the miniatures, those needed to be cut off, filing on this type of plastic just roughs up the surface of the miniature.
The Free Agents
Next came the female team for the game. The miniatures are quite slight and of all the miniatures these were the softest and worst mould lines.
First team in the set, Female players
This was a shame because I wanted a number of female characters in my Stargrave crew. You get two copies of five different miniatures in this set, although two are wounded. But these could be good for rescue scenarios in games.
Here is a close up showing the size of the mould lines on the female miniatures.
Some figures are very slight compared to other sci-fi miniatures
The second team are convicts and these had better castings. You get more variety with this team (they are convicts apparently), they are nice post apocalyptic looking. there are three miniatures where you get two copies. One pose being wounded as with the female team. There are two other miniatures and then the larger ogre/thug miniatures that come with different arms and heads so they don’t have to look the same.
Second team from the set
The Dreadball Xtreme set comes with two figures to represent team sponsors. The suited miniature would be good as a boss to be protected or assassinated in games, with the other one potentially being a gang leader.
The team Sponsors
Now we come to the terrain which is one of the reasons I wanted to get the set. These are quite good with four power unit pieces, six square crates, four lighting units and 16 hexagonal crates. These were all nice clean castings with few mould lines.
The terrain set
I should also mention the other bits from the box that I might find a use for. The rules, counters and cards for the game don’t hold much use for me. But the game mat from the set is about 24″ x 24″ and a hefty piece of rubber (mousemat?) style fabric. You could probably use it as a door mat it feels so tough. But I’m probably going to cut it up as the design will work for landing pads, storage areas or to represent the interior of a starship. There were also 24 plastic hex bases in two colours. These could be good for various terrain projects of bases for other miniatures.
So was it all worth it? I must say I was hoping for more from this set, the casting is a bit poor on some of the miniatures and the detail very soft. I will have to see how these look once I apply the spray undercoat. That often highlights the detail a bit better. But for my £16.99 I got enough miniatures to create a fairly good crew of 8 or so miniatures, some creatures and characters for scenarios, 30 terrain objects and a mat that will make several pieces for games/terrain, all that considered it was probably worth it. But I do wonder why the Dreadball Xtreme set is £9.99 when the contents if bought separately on the Mantic Games site would be over £60 just for the miniatures. Are the individual team sets at £25 each better cast? Who knows the reason behind it. But I’m happy enough with the amount of material I got from this set.
It’s Wednesday again and we have another selection from the club members.
This week we will start with Tony since he has been very productive, above we have Tom Bombadil to go with last weeks painting of Goldberry and below Tony has some more Rohirrim with some Helmingas.
Helmingas command figures
For the last contribution from Tony I’ll let his own words speak; “a small utility building made from an electrical pattress (the sort that fit into hollow partition walls – £1 from Wilko) dressed up with resin doors/windows/vents and other bits.”
Inventive use of other parts for a sci-fi building
Next up Mark has on his work table the last of his Pontic army, the fleshy bits done just the rest to go. Also recently purchased Judge Dredd miniatures have been started.
An eclectic mix from Mark
Any Finally this week John has made a start on Allies for Pacific war with some 10mm Peruvians from Pendraken figures.
Peruvian Foot
See you next week when Andy will be sitting in for me.
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