The most accurately named boardgame of all time - OGRE.

It's not all 40k all the time around the Mordian 7th's HQ, and as I'd mentioned quite some time ago now, I'd backed the Kickstarter for Steve Jackson Games reboot of OGRE. This was back in May of 2012, and the packages finally delivered late last week - bit of a wait, that!

However, the long wait was worth it, as the game is absolutely MASSIVE. Weighing in at just shy of 30 pounds, it is truly an ogre of a box! The above picture is the box and just some of the interior stuffing laid out on the coffee table in my living room. The box is 24"x18"x8" and just to give a sense of scale, that's a sharpie laying on the box lid.

On the back of the box under the shrinkwrap holding all the counter sheets was the "Read Me First" page which definitely garnered a chuckle. They weren't kidding, there are over a thousand counters, and I very nearly did go mad!

Also included in the box was a reprint of the old-school Ogre Mk V cutaway poster, which I used to own waaaaaay back in the day, but was lost in a house move somewhere along the way. Really happy to have one again!

I started punching out counters and assembling cardboard pieces around 4 in the afternoon, and by the time I was finished it was almost 8:30 at night. Pretty crummy lighting for the next few pics, I'll try to get some better ones over the holiday weekend. The game includes several vaccu-formed plastic trays designed to hold all of the 3D counters, which was really a nice touch.

There is also a large tray in the bottom of the box designed to hold all of the flat counters, terrain overlays, maps, rules and whatnot. Very well thought-out design, and I couldn't be happier with it! Hoping to introduce my gaming group to it sometime in the next couple weeks - most of them have never played it before, which is a tragedy that I will rectify soon enough!

OGRE Miniatures - Basic scenario set painted

My hobby nostalgia got the better of me during the Kickstarter campaign to resurrect OGRE, and I picked up a few boxes of the miniatures they dragged out of the depths of Warehouse 23. Yesterday a few of the gaming group came by my place to teach one of them how to play 40k, and while one of the games was going on I painted these up. The intention was to paint up a set of minis sufficient to run the basic scenarios when the game (eventually) ships - a whole bushel of PanEuropean Alliance armor, and the North American Combine's Ogre Mk.IIIb.

I decided to start off with the basics, which includes the armies and their paint schemes. The PanEuropean Alliance is blue, while the North American Combine is red. I added some dirty white stripes for unit identification and to give them a little more visual pop, and went with a yellow spot color there and there. From primer to completion all this took about an hour and a half. A real nice change of pace from painting 40k!

 

The mainstay of the PanEuropean force are the swift and nimble GEVs (ground effect vehicles). They are able to make hit and run attacks where they dart in, make an attack, then arrow off out of their opponent's weapon range (hopefully).

 

The PanEuropeans also draw on vast armored regiments, ranging from the light scout tanks to front line heavy tanks.

 

Though nowhere near as formidable as the Combine's Ogres, the PanEuropean super heavy tanks are rightly feared. The missile tank, though lightly armored, packs a devastating punch.

 

The final line of defense is held by the mighty howitzers, lighter guns capable of being mounted on heavy crawlers gives them maneuverability at the cost of power, while the static emplacements are among the strongest weapons in the game.

Aside, of course, from the OGRE! This is a Mk.IIIb, one of the more common and extremely deadly variants to be found on the battlefields of The Last War. It's not all radioactive ash deserts however, and the Ogre occasionally feels the need to a swim (I loved that they include a 'swimming' Ogre model in the kit).

All right - got all that out of my system, the models will now get packed away in the Closet of Doom until November when OGRE ships. That's gonna be a bit of a wait...

A slight deviation - Last day for OGRE!

I try my best to keep this blog 40k-themed, but thought that this little deviation would be appropriate as it ties into how I got into the hobby in the first place...

Steve Jackson Games has a Kickstarter campaign going to release the 6th "Designers" Edition of his game from 35 years ago called OGRE. There was a resurgence in the mid-80's when I was in middle school, and it was there that I was first introduced to the nuclear wastelands of the Last War. My science teacher ran the school's Games Club (which ran the gamut from cards to chess to RPGs to minatures) and had several copies of the miniature based "Deluxe OGRE", which was my first introduction to miniature wargaming around '84 or so (several years prior to the release of the 1st edition 40k). I must have played hundreds of games of OGRE, GEV and Shockwave (the two expansions) during the mid 80's, though once 40k got its hooks into me I more or less jumped ship over to the grim darkness.

However, that old game still lurks in my hindbrain, kept alive by occasional re-reading of Kieth Laumer's Bolo books and it was a foregone conclusion that I'd be a backer for a project to bring OGRE back to life. And what a life it's returning to! It's gone from the original pocket box game (about the size of a DVD case today) to its new incarnation as a 15 pound, 21"x18"x5" monster... Only fitting for a game that has some of the biggest, baddest armored units ever to take to the battlefield! In addition, they have dug up a bunch of backstock of the old OGRE miniatures and made them available for sale on Warehouse 23, and I'm not ashamed to say that I jumped in and bought a mess of minis in anticipation of the release of the game! It'll be interesting to paint up some 1/256th scale minis after about 20 years of 28mm. Alas not every model that was made is still available, but I did pick up a couple OGRE Mk.IIIb's and a selection of the Paneuropean models sufficient to run the standard missions in miniature format....

The Kickstarter campaign ends (as of this writing) in about 26 hours. I heartily recommend at least giving it a look - the game is an absolute blast! For $100 you get a tremendous amount of game - due to the stretch goals being absolutely CRUSHED by the supporters (they are at $730k of an original $20k goal) they've added all sorts of extras to what you get in the box. Not only that, but the success of this project has convinced them to bring back Car Wars in 2013, which I am absolutely delighted to hear!

Anyway - chances are there will be another small diversion when the minis I'd ordered show up, but for now we return you to our regularly scheduled 40k programming...