Battletech Alpha Strike and Tacta

We had a total of five players for our August session, and we decided to play another multi-player game of Battletech Alpha Strike, which was always a crowd favourite since everyone loves to have a chance to field their mechs.

For my part I though it was a chance for me to field my ZOD force. I picked a few units from the Battletech Master Unit List that looked close to the models I have, and we just went head-to-head.

 

Afterwards, we played a game of Tacta, which I enjoyed so much that I think I will get a copy of.

Battlefleet Gothic

 

FG and I got together for a game of Battlefleet Gothic a couple of weeks back. I have always liked to try the game, but never got around to actually acquiring the stuff required for a game, so this was all FG's efforts.

He had printed an Imperial and a Chaos fleet at 50% scale, and painted them. I thought they looked very effective at this scale - they certainly are more in line with the sci-fi starships we already have in our collection.

The basic rules were easy to pick up, but no doubt there are depths to these rules that are beyond me now.

Conquerors & Kings and Kill Team

For the month of December we played the long-awaited battle between wahj's Late Romans vs Martin's Sassanid Persians. They were a matched pair of armies, but have not met in the field for many years.

Adrian and I played the Romans, and we managed to roll what I thought was a good terrain set-up for our predominantly infantry army. Our main line was anchored on two patches of rough ground, with the centre on a hill, and a small reserve force in the rear. Cavalry covered the extreme left flank.

Martin was worried about the deployment, but nevetheless decided launching cavalry charges on the flanks was the best option. On the Roman right the charge in the rough ground was repelled, but the troops in the open ground were routed by the Persian heavy cavalry, and the reserve force was unable to plug the gap.

On the Roman left there was a large cavalry melee, but Persian cataphracti triumphed against Goth and Roman cavalry. The Roman lines was thus cut up and surrounded.

Roman counter-attack on the left

This was the second game in a row where heavy cavalry settled the issue quite quickly and decisively. I wonder if this is a feature or bug of the game, as the lists do allow armies with historically large cavalry proportions to replicate that in the game. Or perhaps it is a matter of us not having figured out how to counter cavalry-heavy armies.

The next game should hopefully fit two infantry-dominant armies, and we'll see if they give a closer game.

For our second game we played Kill Team, pitting FG's newly-painted Ork Commandos versus Adrian's newly-painted Veteran Guardsmen. The figures were beautiful sculpts and the players did a great job with them, but I found the play rather complex and slow. Perhaps this is a game that requires investment on the part of the player to appreciate its full potential.

Kill Team

 Adrian hosted a game of the latest edition of Kill Team, where I pitted my warzone Bauhaus and Shieldwolf Miniatures figures against his Traitor Guard figures commanded by FG.

The rules are pretty standard to me, but the range is really helped by the beautiful figures and terrain. The gang have ordered several starter armies, but I have managed to pass the Saving Throw. I did scratch-build a Mekboy workshop shed for Adrian's terrain set, inspired by Orktober and GW's Mekboy Workshop terrain.

One peeve I do have with the system is the rather restrictive army lists, but hopefully that means that the lists have been playtested for balance.

I am tempted by the aesthetics of a Genestealer Cult army, so if we continue to play Kill Team, I may need to make another Saving Throw in the future.

Relief of Luckpore and Alpha Strike

Martin was back in town last weekend and six of us managed to get together for a couple of games, beers, pastries, and dinner.

The Luckpore game was a little lopsided, with the British side having too much of an advantage. This is likely due to us playing it as a once-off game instead of in the context of a campaign, where the British become saddled with Fatigue and low ammunition as the campaign progresses. I will need to make some tweaks to the game to make the contest more interesting for both sides. I have ordered a few packs of Essex Mughal musketeers to paint as matchlock men for an Indian prince, so we will visit these rules again once they are done.

For the second game we played a game of Alpha Strike. Now that we are more familiar with the rules, play is faster and more relaxed.

For the game in August I hope to run a game of Peter Pig's Conquerors and Kings, and maybe a game of Deth Wizards.

Battletech: Alpha Strike and Azul

Scheduling difficulties meant only Adrian and I were at this month's session, which was held at his place.

We played a game of Battletech: Alpha Strike, which was simple enough to set up and play to a conclusion within two hours. We hope to bring in more advanced rules in our future games.

We then played three games of Azul, which I have seen played before but had never learned the rules of. I really enjoyed it, and hope to be able to play it again.

A Trio of Titans

Not surprisingly, my group is planning to play some Epic sacle 40K games in the near future. Rick came into possession of several Epic 40K armies this year, and had passed some of the models out to be painted. My share of this assignment are a few titans from the earlier editions of the game. Here you can see the Reaver titan and a pair of Warhound titans I have painted. They are done in a simple scheme, and the bases are rather minimal.

They are a bit of a rush job as we are hoping to get a game in next month, and I may return to them to add some banners and scenic elements on the bases.

Savage Gamma World #12

Stronskey battles the HR's titan

For a few weeks afterwards our mutants busied themselves extracting and processing the yellow lava from the mining facility so they could refill Stronskey's circulation system, but they were no closer to reanimating the titan.

Things looked worse when Mama Clay arrived at the village one day, bringing them news that HR had indeed found a larger titan and are working to reanimate it. At the same time, news arrived that the mutants in the surrounding villages were being attacked by drones which injected the mutants with an agent that caused them to de-mutate. The mutants in these villages who did not de-mutate were captured by HR troopers and taken away. Ah Meng sent several of the mutants from the village to the surrounding ones, hoping to provide some protection against further attacks.

But then Dreadnought arrived soon after, bringing at last some good news. The AI-in-a-battlesuit had been traveling around the lands and had learned about HR and their attacks on mutants. To repay our mutants for freeing him from the facility, Dreadnought had come to help them reanimate Stronskey, to reactivate his weapon systems, and to convert the controls so they could be used by mutants. But all these would take time, and to reduce the chance that HR will be able to attack them with their titan before the work is complete, Ah Meng decided to send Batte, Kong, Ranggup, and Rex (see PC profiles here) to HR's titan to sabotage its repair.

Accompanied by Mama Clay, our heroes journeyed to the site where HR's titan was, buried in a hillside with only its head and right arm exposed. Dozens of tents were set up near its head - our mutants estimated some 500 HR troopers, along with many mutants, were encamped there. It would be impossible to enter the titan via its head, but Mama Clay knew a secret entrance located at the base of the hill, through the titan's left foot.

Our mutants entered the opening at the titan's foot, where they had to fight off a giant worm that had taken up residence there. After some exploration, they learned that a gravitic platform in the leg of the titan led from the foot to the hips of the titan, which appeared to be an assembly point for troops. From the hips a lift led to the upper levels of the titan.

Making their way to the titan's torso, our mutants reached the troop quarters, which was being made ready for occupation by mutants taken as slaves by HR. Our heroes overcame the troopers quickly, and were thanked by the dozens of mutants there. The mutants told our heroes that HR had killed all the mutants whom they thought had dangerous powers, and put leg shackles on the rest and forced them to help restore the titan. About a hundred mutants were enslaved by HR, and they were made to work to restore its controls, its engines, and its weapon and shield generators.

Knowing that they had little time before HR realised their presence, our mutants decided to disable the titan's weapon and shield generator. Traveling to the titan's shoulders using the lift, they split up, with Ranggup and Batte working to sabotage the weapon system, and Kong and Tom working to sabotage the shield generator.

Ranggup managed to sneak into the weapon arm of the titan and cut through several cables connecting the machines he found there. Kong and Tom made their way to the shield generator arm, but were discovered by HR troopers. In desperation Kong fired the anti-tank weapon he found at Dreadnought's facility at the shield generator. The resulting explosion killed all the HR troopers and technicians around the generator, and severely wounded Kong and Tom.

Batte, Ranggup and the other mutants rushed to drag Kong and Tom's unconscious bodies into the lift, and together they exited the titan through its foot again. But with leg shackles still around their ankles, the mutants knew they could not outrun the HR troops who will be sent to find them. In an act of self-sacrifice, the rescued mutants decided to split up and deliberately travel towards where the pursuing troopers would come from, hoping to lure them away from our heroes.

Two stronger mutants helped carry Kong and Tom away from the titan. Kong had lost his right arm in the explosion, and Tom suffered a leg injury that would make him lame, but they party managed to make it back to the village.

Our heroes' mission worked, for when HR's titan was spotted moving towards the village weeks later, it was missing its left forearm and hand. The weeks had given enough time for Dreadnought to complete his work, and Stronskey, piloted and crewed by our mutants, marched out to face the larger titan.

After a great battle, Stronskey managed to take the larger titan down at the river, and shot it through the stump of its forearm, bypassing its armour. The resulting explosion blew the upper part of the titan off. Hundreds of HR troopers who tried to escape the titan via its foot drowned in the river as they emerged. But Proteus' body was not among the dead counted by the mutants.

A few days later word would reach our mutants that the remaining HR troopers at their base camp dispersed, allowing the enslaved mutants to return to their homes. The threat of HR had been eliminated for now, but our heroes knew that as long as Proteus may still be out there, he would remain a threat to the zone...

Prepping and Running the Game

The plot for this session came organically from the sessions that came before. I knew my players wanted a titan vs. titan fight, but to make that the whole session would mean a very short game. I decided that a mission to sabotage the titan would allow a more traditional exploration format, while having an impact on the final confrontation.

The interior of the titan was based on The Fallen Titan.

I enjoyed running this campaign, but the format of the typical MCC module does get a but repetitive after a while. If we do return to the setting again, which I hope to, I will probably want to try a different style.

We will be taking break from our sessions until next year, when I hope to start running a Fantasy Age 2nd Edition campaign. Have a good year-end season.

Savage Gamma World #11

One late summer night the sky north of our mutants' village was lit up by a shooting star, and for the next three days a fire burned in the forest where it landed. A few weeks afterwards, a hunter from a village near the forest came to our heroes, telling a tale of cave entrances that appeared on the side of the crater made by the shooting star, and strange green mutants who attacked him.

Realising that the "cave entrances" may in fact be entrances to underground facilities of the Ancients exposed by the meteor strike, Ah Meng tasked our heroes to journey there and to learn where they lead to, and about the strange green mutants.

Ranggup, Rex, and Tom (see PC profiles here) followed the hunter to the crater in the forest. The crater was a quarter of a mile across. below the lip, almost directly across from each other, were two openings that lead into the earth. At both entrances were HR troopers, standing guard. Above the entrance across the crater from our mutants, they HR troopers have set up some sort of a hoist, and were lifting barrels that were being brought out of the entrance. 

Our mutants overcame the HR troopers guarding the entrance, and followed the passage that led from there to the ground below. It soon became clear that the facility was once a mining complex of sorts. While exploring the living quarters of the miners, our mutants noticed the strange green mutants whom the hunter spoke of, but managed to hide from them while they passed them, traveling in the opposite direction from our mutants.

Descending deeper into the complex, our mutants came across what must been the processing plant of the mining facility. A passage led deeper into the earth, and our mutants could feel heated air coming from there. Our mutants donned the protective gear that were in the processing plant (cutting holes in them to accommodate wings and large ears...), and entered the passage.

The passage opened into a large cavern whose floor was covered in a yellow lava. Across the pool of lava was a steel platform. A pipe connected to a pump on the platform was drawing the lava from the pool below. Standing next to the pump were several HR troopers, and a man Rex recognised: Proteus!

Proteus ordered the troopers to kill the mutants, then turned and left. Tom flew up across the pool of lava to attack the troopers, but was shot and fell into the lava. Rex and Ranggup made their way to the platform, and climbed up, all the while under enemy fire, and after a hard fight managed to take out the HR troopers.

But as they stood on the platform mourning the loss of Tom, the lava began to glow even brighter, and from the surface of the lava Tom emerged, his body shining. Reunited, our mutants chased after Proteus, but found that he and the HR troopers have left the complex.

Our mutants returned to complex and studied the processing plant more carefully. They soon realised that the plant processed the yellow lava into the yellow liquid that flowed in their dormant titan - with this source of yellow liquid, perhaps they can reactivate Stronskey the titan? Yet amidst their excitement, our mutants also had a worrying question: why was Proteus extracting the yellow lava?

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was based on the MCC module A Fallen Star for All. Once again I stripped most of the plot out and just used the basic premise and the maps for our game.

The death and resurrection of Tom was a railroaded event, as I wanted to give the character a new mutation to replace the one which he lost in the previous session. Once again I had the player draw a random mutation card, and the new power of Light Bearer just happened to fit the narrative.

The reappearance of Proteus and the hint of HR having a titan of their own sets up the next session of the campaign, which is the finale session.

Savage Gamma World #10

Once again, our mutants receive a call for help from another village. Pyr, a mutant groundhog, had come to seek the help of our heroes to find a cure for a deadly disease that had afflicted his village. The symptoms of the disease was documented in the records of the village, along with where the cure might be found. Seekers from the village had gone to search for a cure, but none had return.

At Pyr's advice our heroes followed him to the site mentioned in the record instead of heading to the village, to avoid catching the infection themselves.

When they arrived at the site, they saw only a field of tall grass and no building. Flying overhead, Tom (see PC profiles here) saw the dead body of a mutant goat (which they later identified as Koln, a seeker from the village), but was attacked by a giant owl, which our heroes managed to chase off. Exploring further, they found a hatch which led to an long flight of stairs that led deep underground. Leaving Pyr at the surface, our heroes ventured in.

At the foot of the stairs our heroes came upon an open door. Beside the door was a plan of the facility, although our mutants could not understand the symbols on the plan. Entering the facility, they saw two sets of footprints: one reptilian and one crustacean, corresponding to Prokk and Voov, the crab and alligator mutants from the village. They decided to make a systematic search of the facility to find the cure for the disease, which the records would bear certain symbols (a copy of which was given to them by Pyr)

They followed the footprints to a door, and realised that while two sets of footprints entered the room, on one set (the reptilian one) exited it. The room turned out to be a cryogenic chamber holding a number of mutants. One of the cryogenic chambers had broken open, and a large black slime organism hiding on the ceiling dropped down on Batte and began to digest him. Rex and Tom attacked the slime with fire, driving it off Batte, before the trio beat a hasty retreat out of the room.

Exploring further, our mutants found a lab containing several glass-fronted storage cupboard full of chemicals, including one with the symbol Pyr had shown them! Stuffing their bags full of the chemical, our heroes continued exploring the facility, following the reptilian footprint, they found that it led to a place in the corridor where there were signs of a struggle, and from there on the footprint appeared different.

The altered footprints led the quarters of the staff who once lived there. There, they found a dead alligator on one of the beds. The alligator was in animal form, but was clad in humanoid clothing that obviously did not fit it. Searching through the clothing, our mutants realised that the alligator was Voov, but "demutated".

The mystery of what attacked Voov and demutated him was soon solved, as our heroes were attacked by a security droid that grabbed Tom and injected him with a solution. Our mutants disabled the droid and broke it open, and found that the needle which the droid used to inject Tom was connected to a vial that bore the same symbols - DNAX - as the cure Pyr told them to find! At the same time, Tom realised that he had lost his mental mutation power!

Our heroes went on to explore the final room in the facility, which turned out to be the infirmary. Here, they encountered a medical droid, and questioned it. It turned out that the facility was a medical research lab, and DNAX was one of the compounds created by the scientists to reverse mutation. Our heroes described the symptoms of the illness to the droid, who told them that no cure to the disease had been made yet, but the droid was able to isolate the virus from Voov's body and synthesise a cure.

Our heroes emerged from the infirmary to see another security droid headed their way. The fled back to the lab, and for a while considered destroying the stock of DNAX in case they fell into the wrong hands, but eventually decided against it.

Returning to the surface, they were met by an eager Pyr, who was overjoyed that they had found DNAX, and asked that they be handed to him so he could teleport back to the village to save lives immediately. Our mutants were suspicious of Pyr by now, and when Pyr became agitated Batte injected him with a vial of DNAX. Pyr turned into a groundhog before their eyes, and scurried into the tall grass.

Our mutants made their way to the village, and found that there had indeed been an infection, which the medicine they brought cured. Their mission completed, our heroes reevaluated the situation, and decided to return to the facility and destroy the remaining stock of DNAX. But when they arrived, they found that someone else had been there and taken away a number of vials while they were away. Dejected, they destroyed the remaining samples, and then concealed the entrance to the facility as best they could, and returned home.

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was based on the MCC module Phage from Below.

As with the other modules, the original plot was too complicated for me. I decided to substitute it with one of my own that would link the other NPCs and the villain of the series to a plot that will culminate in the finale.

Jaffar, as it turned out, was hired by Proteus - the villain from our previous season and now head of "Humanity's Restoration"- to recover DNAX from a the facility. Jaffar then colluded with Pyr to release a virus into the village to compel them to send their seekers to go into the facility - the bit about the ancient records were all made up by Pyr. When the seekers all died in their quest, Jaffar suggested that Pyr approach our PCs to get the job done. I imagined that Jaffar was waiting nearby when the PCs had their confrontation with Pyr, and that he afterwards sneaked into the facility and grabbed whatever DNAX he could carry.

I am not sure why my players decided against destroying all the DNAX once they realised something was off, but it does allow me to use that as a plot point for the finale.

Savage Gamma World #9

Our tale began when the mutants were visited by a human who called himself Jaffar. Jaffar claimed to be a traveling merchant, and possessed the knowledge to modify the rifles our mutants had looted from Humanity's Restoration (HR) so they could be used by mutants. He offered to "unlock" all the rifles they had collected in exchange for them recovering a piece of technology from a facility of the Ancients. To demonstrate his knowledge and sincerity, he unlocked a rifle, which Tom was afterwards able to use.

Kong, Ranggup, and Tom (see PC profiles here) traveled with Jaffar to the facility in the middle of the desert, but found that a Deathclaw - a carnivorous beast - had made its lair at its entrance. Tom was able to lure the Deathclaw into an area of soft sand, where the mutants managed to kill it, but when they made their way to the entrance they found two Deathclaw cubs there, which Ranggup decided he would adopt and bring back to the village.

Jaffar opened the door to the facility using a passkey, and our mutants found themselves in a lift that took them deep under the desert floor. When the loft door opened, they found themselves in a large, dimly lit room that was the scene of carnage - many skeletons and destroyed robots were strewn all over the floor. Our mutants found themselves being scanned by laser, and soon afterwards a voice spoke to them, informing them that they were trespassing on a United States Army facility, and asked them to identify themselves. Our mutants replied that they were there to recover a suit of armour, and after a long pause, the voice instructed them to proceed to a console and retrieve a widget there, and to proceed to a lift at the other end of the room.

The voice explained that its name was Dreadnought, and that it was the Artificial Intelligence in charge of the security of the facility. Many years ago, it explained, the security of of the facility was breached by enemies of the state, who tried to lock Dreadnought out of the system and corrupted the security droids, which then killed all the scientists and workers within the compound. Fortunately, Dreadnought retained control of the lobby level and its wall-mounted lasers, which it then used to destroyed the rogue security droids. It then placed the facility under lock-down until the proper authorities arrived, but they never did. Now, it requested the party to retrieve the weapon arms of the suit of armour from the various levels of the facility, and then to unite them with the main chassis of the armour, so it could leave the facility before the enemies of the state could arrive.

Our mutants followed the directions of the AI, and traveled to the manufacturing level and then the weapon range, overcame the surviving security droids there, and restored control of the levels to Dreadnought by inserting the widget into the consoles of each level. Finally, Dreadnought instructed our mutants to go to the research level, where they would retrieve the passkey from the dead body of the head of the facility, which would allow them to access the armour.

Our mutants followed the instructions, but when they entered the research level they were confronted by a droid that resembled a large mechanical spider. After ascertaining their identities, the spider droid revealed that it was an Artificial Intelligence that preserved the memories of Dr Martin, the head of the facility. Dr Martin told our mutants that Dreadnought was in fact the codename for the power armour and the Artificial Intelligence that inhabited it. Dreadnought was originally designed to take over the functions of the power armour in the event that its human operator was incapacitated so it could remove itself and its operator from the site of danger. However, the AI came to the conclusion that it could better protect its occupant if it was in charge of all of the suit's functions even while its occupant was fully competent. Realising this, Dr Martin decided to shut the AI down, and began to disarm Dreadnought under the pretext of upgrading its weapons. But Dreadnought soon saw through the ruse, and ordered the security droids to kill all the humans within the facility before they could disable it. Dr Martin was able to use the wall-mounted lasers to destroy most of the droids and to lock Dreadnought out of all of the levels except the lobby level. He hunkered down in the research level with a few of his colleagues and waited for help to arrive, but when it became clear that no help was coming, he transferred his memory to a separate AI which inhabited a spider droid, so he could warn anyone who came after his death of Dreadnought's intentions.

For a while our mutants wanted to help Dr Martin, but when they realised that they were at Dreadnought's mercy while they remained in the facility, they destroyed the spider droid and located Dr Martin's mortal remains, and took from it the passkey. They then took the precaution of disabling the weapon arms.

Once they restored control of the level to Dreadnought, they were instructed to bring the weapon arms and the passkey to the lowest level of the facility: the vault.

Our mutants used the passkey to enter the vault, and there they saw Dreadnought, a hulking suit of armour taller than a man. Robotic arms there affixed the weapon arms to the chassis, and Dreadnought awoke and started to move towards the lift. Our mutants followed it, and together they all traveled to the surface level.

Outside the facility, they were met by Jaffar, who was ecstatic when he saw Dreadnought. However, his joy soon turned into panic as Dreadnought refused to follow any of his instructions, but simply walked into the desert. Jaffar followed the walking armour, all the while yelling orders at it, and left our mutants behind.

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was based on the Fallout: The Roleplaying Game module Fully Operational.

I followed the basic premise of the module rather closely, but changed certain elements that did not fit my vision of the post-apocalyptic world, and streamlined it. There was a little more role-playing this session that the others, but once again there was no "right answer" to the situation.

Jaffar was of course a reference to Jafar in Aladdin - I had the idea that in the even the PCs refused to hand over Dreadnought to him, he would leave them locked within the facility.

Following the original module, I had Dreadnought walk off into the sunset to enjoy its newfound freedom. I do hope to bring him back in a future session though.

Savage Gamma World #8

Once again our mutants were called to eliminate a threat to peaceful mutants. This time, they investigated rumours of the Locust People, a race of cannibalistic humanoid mutants that lived in a 'hive' society. It was believed that a Locust People queen would lay dozens of eggs before she died, and when those eggs hatched some of them would become new queens-in-waiting, while the rest would become warriors; the warriors would range far and wide to gather food for their queen, chiefly in the form of the flesh of other mutants! When they had been sufficiently fed, the queens would disperse and find new lands where they would lay their eggs and then die, starting another cycle of carnage.

The last appearance of the Locust People had been a few decades ago, and the memory of their destructiveness still remained in the minds of many elderly mutants, who feared the reports of new Locust warriors ranging about would mean another calamity for the zone.

Following the information provided by the hunters who spotted the Locust warriors, Kong, Ranggup, Rex, Tom, and Vik (see PC profiles here) ventured into the cave complex where the Locust People made their lair, and fought and killed a number of the warriors, from which they looted shiny pieces of card which the warriors wore around their necks. However, when they delved deeper into the caves, they were attacked by the enormous queen of the Locust People, and had to flee through a metal door that incongruently stood at the side of a cave.

One through the metal door, they found themselves in a well-appointed room. They were greeted by a holographic human, who welcomed them "back onboard" - the holo-conductor had mistaken our mutants as passengers of the train based on the cards they were carrying - and informed them that the train would depart immediately so as to make sure it could "make up for lost time".

Sure enough the whole room the mutants were in began to lurch and then move, and after a short while light came through the windows on the sides of the room: the train had exited the caves and was now moving north at great speed! As the train passed through a forest there was a sudden loud bang and shaking of the cabin, as if the train had collided with something. As the train sped on, our mutants noticed that every so often the train would lurch dangerously and threaten to throw them around the cabin. It was obvious that there was something wrong with the train, but the holo-conductor was mum, and would only assure them that the passengers' safety were his utmost priority.

As the train gained speed the lurching would occur more frequently be come more and more violent. Our mutants realsied that their lives would be in danger if they did not leave the train or stop it. At first they tried to open the doors or windows on the train so they could leave, but the holo-conductor informed them that the doors and windows were secured while the train was in motion for the passengers' safety. Our mutants then tried to make their way to the front of the train to stop it, but found their way blocked by a jammed door between the dining car and the lounge car. Through the bent door they could hear a growling sound. Climbing through the vent in the kitchen car to the roof of the trains, Ranggup crawled forward to the lounge car, which had an observation dome of glass. Here he saw that the dome was broken at the front, as if it had struck something. No doubt it was this impact that cause a malfunction in the lounge car that led to the train's periodic lurching. Crawling through the broken dome, Ranggup saw what was making the growling sound: a large, six-legged plant-beast that had most likely been struck by the dome and fallen through. Ranggup was able to calm the beast, and open the jammed door from the other side to allow our mutants to continue forward.

Finally our mutants came to the door to the pilot's coach, but found that they could not access it. The holo-conductor once more appeared and informed them that the pilot's car was out of bounds to the passengers for their safety. Our mutants were able to convince the holo-conductor that their safety was at risk if they could not enter the pilot's car and stop the train, and after some calculation the holo-conductor agreed with them, and allowed them through.

There, in the pilot's car, our mutants overcame the security droid guarding the controls, and finally managed to put the train to a stop.

When they had left the train, Rex's unerring sense of direction told them that they were a ten-day's walk from the cave!

When they finally made their way back to their village, our mutants found a shrine for them in outside the titan which they had made their home - the villagers had thought that they had perished fighting the Locust People, and in response the surrounding villages banded together to avenge them and to end the Locust People threat.

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was based on the Mutant Crawl Classic module Mayhem on the Magtrain. Once again I found the module to be a little more complicated than necessary (although it was thematic), but was able to take the central premise of the story and have a fun, full session.

When first told about the Locust People my players took the threat seriously, and the first hour of the session was spent gathering information, scouting, and making a plan of attack. Knowing that the Locust People were in fact just an excuse for the PCs to enter a cave and be forced into a runaway train, I briefly contemplated making the whole session about fighting the Locust People instead, but decided to stick to the plan. In my defence, I had informed them that the session would be "a bit rail-roady" in advance, which one of the players took to mean that it would take place on a train.

The players were a little concerned and disappointed that their characters were not the ones to end the Locust People threat, and I had to comfort them by telling them that there isn't always a "right way" to "solve" an adventure, and that sometimes the game was just to explore and deal with whatever happens. That's the OSR way.

Xenos Rampant and Space Hulk again

For the September session we played two games of Xenos Rampant, followed by a game of Space Hulk.

We decided to make up lists of set points and then roll for scenarios.

The first game saw me fielding 36 points of Space Marines vs Rick's Necrons in the Diversion scenario. The game ended in a draw.

For the second game Adrian's Eldar defended against Rick's Tyranids in the Orbital Drop scenario.

We wrapped up the afternoon with a big game of Space Hulk.

For the October session I am planning to return to some historicals with a game of Napoleonics.

Savage Gamma World #6

A few weeks after their return, our heroes received disturbing news regarding the army that they had encountered at Titan's Beach - another band of the soldiers, calling themselves "Humanity's Restoration" (HR), had taken over the mutant village of Gundity, driven the older and weaker mutants out, and enslaved the adults, forcing them to work and threatening to harm their children if they refused.

Batte, Kong, Rangup, Rex, and Xi Xi (see PC profiles here) were sent to rescue the villagers.

Arriving at the walled village at night, our mutants infiltrated the village and established contact with the captives using Batte's telepathy power. Together, they planned a multi-prong attack, with Xi Xi sneaking into the army's leader's house to incapacitate him, while would neutralise the soldiers in the barracks, while Rangup and Kong would take out the guards at the gate so allow everyone to make a quick escape.

However, the plan fell apart as Xi Xi was detected by the soldiers' leader, who shot and wounded the mutant. The gunshot raised an alarm, and our mutants were forced to launch  their attack prematurely. Fortunately, forewarned by Batte's communication, the captured villagers rose against their captors, and all the soldiers were overpowered and killed, with only one managing to escape.

Our mutants then learned that the soldiers had been using the villagers as labourers as they worked to restored a cable car that led into the mountain above the village. Our mutants decided to take the cable car and explore where it led to, thinking that they may be able to find some technology or weapons that will aid them in the future conflict with the HR.

The cable car took the party high up into the mountain, eventually arriving at set of steel doors set in the side of the mountain. Using the access card they took from the soldiers at the Titan, they were able to open the door. The door led into a corridor with steel walls and floor, which led to what appeared to be a long-abandoned research facility. The floors of the facility was curiously clean, and our mutants soon found the reason: a functioning cleaning robot had carried on its duties despite the disappearance of its previous masters.

Exploring deeper into the facility, our mutants found a set of broken steel doors, seemingly forced open from within. Inside they found a large number of cages, now all open and empty. Nearby was another set of broken steel doors, this time forced open from the outside, and again leading into a room full of empty cages.

At this point another robot appeared - but this one was a security-bot, which began attacking the party with laser guns mounted on the ends of its arms. It was soon joined by the cleaning robot, which grappled Rangup. After a short fight, our mutants managed to put both robots out of commission.

Further exploration led to a garbage pit in the deepest recess of the facility, where the party found old human and animal bones.

With no weapons or tech to salvage, our mutants returned to the cable car, and made their way back.

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was a mash-up of two scenarios from Gamma Zine. The liberation of the village was supposed to be just the opening encounter for the scenario, but as the players took a long time in planning their attack, it took almost half the session before they decided on a plan... which fell apart because Xi Xi's player, a total newbie at RPGs, failed his Stealth roll despite using up all his Bennies, and nearly lost his character.

I had to drop a few of the combat encounters I had prepared for the rest of the session to allow time for the party to explore the facility.

There wasn't much loot to be had from the session, but during play one of the players asked to use a dead/dying soldier's hand to fire his rifle, and I ruled that that would work, which effectively gave the mutants one way to bypass the "mutant lock" on the rifles.

Although we are only two sessions into the campaign, I am enjoying how the players are engaging with the setting.

Savage Gamma World #5

After the defeat of the Army of Dawn, our mutant heroes returned to their village and led them across the Barrier Peaks to set up camp near Truffaut's bar.

Not long afterwards, mutants from nearby villages reported being attacked by human raiders with firearms, who would drive the villagers off before seizing their food and materials - those who resisted were killed. Some mutants tracked the raiders back to their lair, and learned that they were based inside a half-buried metal giant at the place the locals named Titan's Beach. At Traffaut's request, Ah Meng, the head of the mutants, sent Kong, Rangup, Rex, Tom, and Vik (see PC profiles here) to eliminate the threat of the raiders.

After traveling for two days, our mutants arrived at Titan's beach as the sun was setting. There they found a metal giant, perhaps a hundred yards tall if he stood on his feet, almost completely buried in the sands of the beach, leaving only his head and two hands exposed. A semi-circle of stone obelisks surrounded the Titan. As they watched from the distance, a patrol of a dozen soldiers exited the mouth of the Titan via a rope bridge, and began their trek north.

As the mutants planned their next move, they were approached by an old woman, who called herself Mama Clay. Mama Clay told them that she had lived at Titan's beach for many years, and her peace and quiet were broken by the arrival of the humans a few weeks ago. When she learned that our mutants were here to get rid of the humans, she offered them a healing potion, and information about the newcomers.

Out mutants neutralised the two soldiers guarding the mouth of the Titan by means of distraction and surprise, but found that their rifles were locked from use by mutants. Vik began to get a throbbing headache, which he knew was caused by the proximity to non-organic source of energy. The mutants descended the ladder that led from the Titan's mouth down its throat. The ladder led to a large chamber with a glowing glyph on the floor; a large metal beam around a foot wide pierced the ceiling of the chamber and entered the floor, piecing through the middle of the glyph. Two mechanical creatures in the shape of spiders were working at the beam, trying to cut through it with some sort of tool that formed their mandible that emitted a bright light. When they noticed our mutants, they stopped their work and attacked, but were quickly disabled.

Our mutants found two doors that led from the chamber, one with the symbol of a helmet upon it, and the other one with a hexagon upon it. They decided to go through the door with the helmet symbol.

The door opened into a corridor that led to a smaller chamber whose floor was crisscrossed by a number of metal pipes, some of which are leaking a warm, opaque yellow liquid. A rhythmic, whooshing sound could be heard coming from the pipes, and more yellow liquid would leak from the pipes with each "whoosh". Two doors led from this room. Our mutants split up to explore: one door led to a ladder that led to a small room where there was a throne-like chair and a helmet suspended above it by a cord hanging from the ceiling; the other door led to a corridor that led to the soldiers' barrack.

Our mutants decided to try wearing the helmet, but as it was designed for humans, only Tom could wear it. As soon as he put the helmet on, Tom's body became paralysed, and his vision went dark; but as his eyes adjusted he realised that he was looking through the eye of the Titan! He found that he could move his eyes to look around, but not his body. The other mutants managed to rouse Tom by removing the helmet.

Our mutatns then made their plans to attack the six soldiers resting in their barracks. Rex charged into their room and leapt onto the table where the soldiers were sitting around and released his paralysing gas; all but one of the soldiers were felled by the gas, and when he tried to reach for his rifle he was knocked out by Rangup, who wore a gas mask he scavenged earlier. After searching the belongings of the soldiers for loot, our mutants exited the chamber from the door at the other side of the barrack.

The door led to a long corridor that led to a large chamber with a domed roof. Here they could see the metal beam once more piercing the roof of the chamber and through a large machine on the floor of the room. Pipes led from the walls to and out of the machine, which a few soldiers were repairing. When they noticed the mutants, the leader of the officer cried out an order for his men to attack.

Vik charged into the chamber first, and using his mutant power disintegrated the leader, and then fell unconscious himself from exhaustion. The other mutants followed, and after a hard fight managed to dispatch all the soldiers.

But before they could rest, the chamber began to lurch as the machine on the floor began to hum rhythmically. As our mutants struggled to keep their footing, they realised that the Titan was moving!

Kong hoisted the unconscious Vik over his shoulder, and together the party returned to the helmet room, where Tom once again put on the helmet. Once more he saw through the eyes of the Titan, and found that the Titan had waded into the sea. But as soon as the helmet had rested on Tom's head, the Titan stopped moving. This time, Tom found that he could control the movement of the Titan. He turned the Titan around, and walked back to shore. It took the mutants no time to decide that they should walk the Titan all the way back to their village, and use it as their new base.

Prepping and Running the Game

As Season 3 of our Savage Gamma World campaign follows the story of our previous campaign closely, I have decided to continue the numbering for our session reports.

One new thing I am trying out for this season is the use of a Mutation Deck to quick-generate new characters for players joining the campaign. I give a player a choice of playing a mutant human or a mutated animal, and a choice of psychic or elemental power (those are the choices provided in the cards). They draw two cards for the base mutation type and have the choice of one, then a choice of drawing two power cards in any combination and keeping one.

The scenario is from the OSR zine Knock! #1, and was originally more fantasy in flavour than sci-fi, but as with Expeditions to the Barrier Peaks showed us, genre-mixing was present in the early days of the hobby, and is something embraced by the current OSR community.

I was quite happy that the players managed to gain control of the Titan at the end of the session and wanted to use it as a home base for their village. However, they understood that a fully functional mecha will make them overpowered, and accepted it when I said that the Titan will run out of power once it reaches their village. They did ask about finding someone with the knowledge of reactivating the Titan and bypassing the lock on the rifles, which delighted me as now I have two story hooks and threads to use for future sessions.

Xenos Rampant and Space Hulk

For our monthly session we played a 4-player game of Xenos Rampant. The centrepiece of the game was Rick's Upzone terrain. The scenario had an Eldar force (commanded by Adrian and me) trying to destroy a Necron pyramid (defended by Rick and FG). A series of poor command rolls on the part of the Eldar players and excellent rolls by the Necron players made it a rather one-sided affair.

We then played two games of 1st Edition Space Hulk, with FG and I each taking turns to play the Space Marines. It's a testament to the quality of the scenario designers that both games pretty much came down to one die roll during the final turn. We hope to play more Space Hulk during our next session on September.

Legion Mk VI Tactical Squad

I have done pretty well this year (so far) in terms of not buying more new figures; I did buy and convert and paint a couple of sci-fi models, but since these were meant for the collection of my friends, it doesn't really count. But I had to make an exception for the new Warhammer The Horus Heresy Mk VI Space Marines figures.

My first Warhammer 40K figures were the plastic "beakie" space marines box set, which I split with wahj; we painted them for use with the Battlesuit board game; mine were painted in white, while his were painted in black. Good times.

Years later, when the multi-part plastic Mk VII space marines became available, I decided to start expanding my army, but not wanting to paint a whole new army in white again, I decided to go for an easier paint scheme of Dark Angels green. The old beakies went to Adrian, but I've always had a soft spot for them.

So when the new "true scale" Mk VI marines were released, I decided to get them, and once again I split the box, this time with FG. In my fluff they represent the Veteran Squad in my chapter, and have the same colour scheme as the rest of the chapter. I did however give them the classic 80s stripe down the middle of the helmet.

These models are not exactly easy to build. The pauldrons with the studs actually come in two pieces and have to be glued together - you can see the seam in the photo if you look closely. The arms and weapons come in three pieces: left arm, right arm, and both hands holding the bolter; it took a bit of fiddling to make everything line up. The models are "true scale", and therefore stand taller than the Mk VII models, especially the earlier Mk VII models. The box comes with 32mm round bases, but I based them on some thinner 25mm round bases I had from another purchase, which compensated a little. They are built pretty much as is, "out of the box", but I replaced the sergeant's plasma pistol arm with a "modern" one to make him look more in line with the rest of the force.

I am very pleased with how they turned out, and hope to filed them in a game of Grimdark Future or Xenos Rampant soon.

Hasegawa Egg MiG-15 Ork Dakkajet Conversion

It all started when Adrian posted about the McDonnell Goblin fighter on the group chat. I was reminded of the Hasegawa Egg Planes series, and had the idea that I could convert one into an Ork Dakkajet. I looked at some photos of the Dakkajet, and realised that it was probably based on the MiG-15, which was one of the planes in the Egg series.

To give the plane an orky look I dug up the bits from an Ork Killa Kan I bought a long time ago but never ended up using - I was planning to make a model using a film cannister. I add some orky weapons, I ordered a pack of Orc HMG Tips and a pack of Orc Biker Heads from Puppets War.

For the construction I decided to clip off the wheels so I could fit these horns to the front of the plane and weapons under the wings.

A Gork head adorns the nose of the plane.

I glued the orc biker head to the torso of a Mad Puppet infantry trooper, and used some 2-part epoxy to sculpt a fur-lined collar and upper arms to the jacket.

After I was satisfied with the set-up, I sprayed the main parts of the model red, and then glued the weapons and orky embellishment to the fuselage and wings.

The plane was pretty plain, so I added checks to the rim of the intake and the tail, and some wedge-shaped decals from the Space Wolves sheet the the wings. I then weathered the model.

This was a fun little project, and I am tempted to do another conversion with an Egg plane soon.

Grimdark Future Game - Infected Colonies vs Orc Marauders

The battlefield. Spot the Tehnolog tank!

Rick and I happened to have the Sunday open up last-minute, so I traveled down to his place to pass him the dropship and tank I painted for his Traitor Guard army, and to give his terrain set their first bloodying.

I made up two lists of about 1500 pts in Grimdark Future, and Rick played the orcs while I played the Traitor Guards using the Infected Colonies list. For the scenario I had the Guards defend a city-block, while the orcs would come in from any table edge.

Rick opened the battle by charging his Trukk right at the tank and disgorging a unit of Boyz, which proceeded to close-assault the tank.

While this occupied the attention of the tank and half my forces, his Bikes and two units of Boyz attacked from the other end of the battlefield.

I ordered the Guards defending that flank to give ground and fall back...

The dropship - now featuring twin-linked lascannons!

Then sent in the dropship/gunship to strafe the Bikes.

Some of the Boyz did make it into close-combat and eventually gain a foothold in one of the buildings, but the Orcs have taken a beating from the gunship and could not hope to take the whole block.

It was a short game, but we both had fun shoving figures across the nice terrain, rolling lots of dice, and making pew pew noises. Grimdark Future is a fun set of rules for this kind of thing, but the lack of suppression and morale rules does make it a bit simplistic. Perhaps we will give Xenos Rampant another spin in the near future; after all, Rick's collection of second-hand 40K figures is huge, and hopefully I will be able to feature more of them on this blog soon.

Tehnolog Bronekorpus Main Battle Tank

So a long time ago, before the war in Ukraine, I bought a Tehnolog heavy tank model when I bought their smaller-scaled ZOD tank company to check out the size. It was a pretty crude model, and it didn't really fit with the aesthetics of any of the forces I had, and I kept the model in my bits box.

Since then, Rick joined our group, and we started looking at Grimdark Future, and I decided to finally get the model built and painted for his traitor Imperial Guard force.

To maximise the use of the model I magnetised two of the main gun options from the kit, and added a twin-link lascannon Nowfel printed for me. To give the model a more GW look, I used an Imperial vehicle cupola I had in my bits box.

I sprayed everything with my usual grey primer.

For the paint scheme I decided to go for a two-tone urban camouflage based on the Japanese Self-Defence Force pattern. I applied masking tape to the model to give vertical and horizontal lines, and then sprayed the model with a lighter grey paint.

Once the paint has dried I removed the tape and applied some decals. The turret numbers came from some WW2 tank decals I had, and the Imperial Aquila and the Chaos symbol were GW 40K decals. In my mind the Chaos cultists painted Chaos symbols over the Imperial Aquila when they turned traitor.

I painted the tracks a dark grey, and then started the weathering process by creating a muddied look for the dozer blade. I did this by dabbing red-brown craft paint to the bottom of the blade, then a lighter brown paint at the middle part of the blade, and then mixing the two paints to form a in-between colour to blend the two parts together. This gives the appearance of the mud drying around the edges of the business end of the dozer blade.

I then did weathering to the rest of the tank by chipping, washing, and dabbing brown paint over the tracks, wheels, and the lower parts of the vehicle. The vision ports were painted in blue.

I tried my hand at painting the heated metal effect on the melta gun.

And also the plasma glow effect on the plasma cannon, which didn't really work.

All in all it was a simple project. I hope to see this guy in action soon.