Oh Baltimore.

 

As I leave on a cruise for the Bahamas, I leave you with a picture of the boat escorting us out of Baltimore that not only has a .50 cal machine gun, but someone actively manning it. Fucking Baltimore.

Mage Wars: A Quick Review

Mage Wars released last week. I picked up a copy out of curiosity as I hadn't heard a lot about it. It's a pretty fun game. Plays a lot like Summoner Wars or Warhammer Invasion without card drawing. It reminds me a lot of MTG from the 90's. It also includes lists for sample starter decks that I currently have built for demo purposes, but I think the game really unlocks once people can customize their stuff.

The basic premise of the game is that it's a card game, and plays a lot like MTG. However, cards take positions on a simple 4x3 layout battlefield, and have ranges and line of sight like a tactical miniatures game.

This is the board used. As you can see, it's quite large.

Unlike most other games in this genre, you don't shuffle up and draw cards. You have access to your entire deck, and you pick which spells you want each turn. Each turn, you secretly select two spells to have access to that turn. You can cast one or both of them. If unused, they go back into you're spellbook. If you cast them, they are spent for the rest of the game.

Spellbook in action. Note that the card pockets fit sleeved cards!

 There's six different types of cards. You have creatures that you summon to the battlefield to fight for you. Conjurations are like structures that you build/summon. Anything from magical power sources to stone walls. Equipment lets your mage get into the fight himself. Enhancements either buff your allies or debuff your opponent. You pay half their cost upfront, placing them facedown on the target, and pay the rest when you reveal the spell. Incantations are general utility spells...from heals to teleports. And direct damage is pretty self explanatory...

From top left to bottom right, you have creatures,conjurations, equipment, enchantments, incantations, and direct damage spells. 

Combat uses a dice system. Attacks generally roll from 2-6 red combat dice, which can either miss, do damage, or do critical damage. Critical damage cannot be avoided with armor. Some attacks also roll the yellow D12 to see if they proc a secondary effect - a fireball causing long-term burning for example. 

The dice rolled. The damage dice is a d6 with two blanks, 1 damage, 2 damage, 1 critical damage, and two critical damage (not pictured)

Like all good Euro games, you get a nice like board with cubes to keep track of the vitals.

Board used to keep track of your current mana (resource to cast spells), channeling (how much mana you get a turn), and your max health/damage taken.

Hugely important to me, everything fits back in the box, included sleeved cards!

The Adventures of Action Jackson - Games and Stuff Sept 22

On Saturday, Alex and I traveled up to Games and Stuff for a 300pt ITS tournament for Infinity. I was actually pretty hesitant to go up, as I've been pretty focused on Flames of War and Torchlight 2 the past few days, but I was talked into it.

I took Aleph with me. My intended list was:

Achilles (LT)

Asura (Hacking plus)

Myrmidon Officer (Chain of Command, Combi Rifle)

Sophotect

Yudbot

Samekh (Guided missile launcher)

Dakini Tactbot (HMG)

3x Netrods

Upon arriving, it seemed there was some confusion upon proxies. Now, if you're not familiar with Infinity, you must realize it is very difficult to play the game with WYSIWYG. The Asura hacker is one of those models, not to mention the current model leaves a lot to be desired. So I was planning on using the new Chandra SpecOps figure in her place.

Quoting the Corbus Belli website:

Infinity Spec-Ops have no troop profile in the Army Lists, however they are the perfect proxies to be used in Infinity official tournaments of the ITS.

Apparently this wasn't good or clear enough, and myself, and several other players, were called out for using these models in our lists. So, I made a quick, on the fly adjustment and ended up playing a half-cheesy, half-horrible list instead:

Maruts (LT)

Achilles (Spitfire)

Myrmidon (Chain Rifle)

Myrmidon (Chain Rifle)

Sophotects

Yudbot

Dakini Tactbox (Combi Rifle)

3x Netrod

While is appears to be a simple 2 model swap, it changed the list drastically. I now have over 2/3 of my army points in two models - one super badass from the past, and a big stompy mecha robot. And I proceeded to pump almost every single order into them for the rest of the day...

Which now brings us to the meat and potatoes of the event. Four rounds of an ITS event using the YAMS system.

This is Action Jackson. The YAMS system requires you to bring a civilian model to be used in the games for various purposes and objectives.

Round One I played against Henry, who was playing a generic PanO list. Henry killed poor Action Jackson on turn one, but I took the game with a 5-2 in VP.

Action Jackson lost in a crystal field

Round Two I played against John, who ended up winning the event at the end of the day. Again, Action Jackson died on turn 1. My game with John ended up as a TAG vs TAG battle. Sadly, his came out on top, no thanks to me failing my repair rolls (needing a 1-15 on a d20...) A devastating 1-7 loss.

Action Jackson hiding behind a lush forest rock.

A Pan-O cutter. One of very few painted models I got to fight against.

Round Three I played against Chris, a newer player and Huzzah regular. He was playing Ariadna with 2748279789 camo markers. I "accidentally" killed Action Jackson on turn 2 with the splash damage from a heavy flamerthrower. I pulled out a 5-4 win.

Action Jackson visits a shany town.

 My last round was against Brian playing HaqqiIslam. Brian was gracious enough to give me my first fully painted opponent of the day. Sadly, he was also gracious enough to give me a 2-5 loss. In bright news, Action Jackson survived this game!

Action Jackson getting some soda.

My last opponent was the only one that greeted me with a fully painted army. Sadly, I was super tired going into the fourth round and didn't get a lot of pics.

Props:

Four great opponents for putting up with my semi-knowledge of the Infinity rules

Some great terrain, considering a lot of it was built the night before!

Slops: 

The proxy drama

Opponents with unpainted armies. Seriously guys? Who still takes unpainted figures to TOURNAMENTS?

I495 for being standstill at 9am on a Saturday'

Last, but not least, I leave you with a picture from the place we ate lunch. Apparently, their idea of artwork on the walls was ripping a page from a calendar and taping it to a picture frame with black electrical tape.

Post event edit: Apparently the folks and Games and Stuff determined mid-event that proxies and conversion were in fact legit, provided they fit within certain criteria, and enhanced the army rather than taking away from it.

Infinity - 300pt Aleph

So this past weekend has gotten me working on some Infinity figures. I'm currently building up my Aleph. The Aleph are basically Skynet - AI controlled super humans that are out to save mankind (or possibly destroy it, depending on whose point of view you have). Infinity is true skirmish - each figure is their own, and has literally dozens of actions you can take on both your turn and your opponents.

Being super-elite, the Aleph are pretty low in model count. Here is a 300 pt army in eight figures. For reference, I'd put 300 pts of
Infinity at the same level as 2500 for 40k, 1750 for Flames of War, 6 pts for Saga, etc. The "book" paint scheme is the standard white and muted tones you'd expect from a post-human race. I decided to go with a more sinister color scheme. 

The first figures from this army were actually commissioned out to a local friend at 13th Hour Miniatures. I did end up changing the color scheme and a few parts on the models to better match what I can do for all of the new additions.

Below the pics you'll find my current 300pt list. As I get a few more models in, it will change pretty drastically. I'm going to drop all the standard Myrmidons, add a Doctor/Engineer, some repair bots, a guided missile launcher, and some cheap order drones.

The current list gets to abuse smoke grenades with the Myrmidons throwing smoke, and the Asura being able to see out of it with her Multispectral Visor (but bad guys can't see her back!) The Asura is a top of the line hacker, able to steal peoples remotes, redirect their guided missiles, hack out airborne drops, etc. Achilles is just a close range monster with the Spitfire, and if necessary, close combat.

Disclaimer: Still can't get my camera to focus well....

Box art from the Aleph starter set.

Army shot thus far.

Myrmidon Officer - a closeup of the original paint scheme.

This is the new SpecOps figure. I am going to use it as a proxy for my Asura.

Achilles

Scott's Current 300 pt Aleph

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

 GROUP 1 (Regs: 7/Irrs: 0):

  ASURA Hacker  Combi Rifle, Nanopulser / Pistol, AP CCW (77 | 0.5)

    MOV:4-4  CC:16  BS:14  PH:14  WIP:15  ARM:5  BTS:-6  W:2  

    Regular, Not Impetuous, Cube

    V: No Wound Incapacitation, Multispectral Visor L3, Hacking Device Plus

  MYRMIDON  Combi Rifle, Nanopulser, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, AP CCW (39 | 1)

    MOV:4-4  CC:17  BS:12  PH:13  WIP:14  ARM:2  BTS:-3  W:1  

    Regular, Frenzy, Cube

    Martial Arts L3, ODD: Optical Disruptor, V: No Wound Incapacitation, Chain of Command

  ACHILLES Lieutenant Spitfire, Nanopulser / Pistol, EXP CCW (81 | 2)

    MOV:6-4  CC:20  BS:15  PH:16  WIP:15  ARM:6  BTS:-6  W:3  

    Regular, Frenzy, Cube

    Martial Arts L4, ODD: Optical Disruptor, Multiterrain, Lieutenant

  4x MYRMIDON Combi Rifle, Nanopulser, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, AP CCW (25)

    MOV:4-4  CC:17  BS:12  PH:13  WIP:13  ARM:2  BTS:0  W:1  

    Regular, Frenzy, Cube

    Martial Arts L3, ODD: Optical Disruptor

 297 Points | SWC: 3.5

ARMY CODE: eNozM1Q1UTNSM6yxVDMEkkaGaqZAykLNABsJAOF/Ceg=

Army Infinity v.3.0. - http://www.devilteam.com

Some Bolt Action pics

Jay and I got a chance to play some Bolt Action today. It was his first time with the ruleset, and my first time with these figures. They are the Plastic Solider Company [edit: removed link as it appears PSC's website has been hacked by Islamic extremists? wtf lol?) 28mm Soviets. I'm really not thrilled with how they turned out. I kinda rushed through them, and the bases are pretty horrible. But they'll do to learn the game with.

We played the mission Annihilation. I certainly got annihilated...something like 6VP to 2VP. I took a lot of 2 man teams (ATR, 2 diff mortar teams, a HMG, and an ATG). I'm not so sure about them. They seemed inferior to just taking more squads of rifles. The tank also did nothing. Neither of our tanks did anything expect roll around stalking each other. But they certainly looked cool!

Soviet boots with 6 SMG and an LMG

Grenadiers move up with a Stug

Germans advance under cover

Soviet boots move forward

Open fire!

Conscripts FUBAR their test at shoot (and kill) the ATG

A glancing hit doesnt harm the T34, but pins it down for the turn

These flamers hurt. Bad.

Tank explodes to a panzershreck shot and pins down everyone!

This conscripts are not going to do anything..ever...

So..many...SMG...

I'm not so sure about these mortars, but they did plant and one shot the flamer team....

This is about all I had left at the end....

What's next on my table? Some Infinity models next, followed by some more FoW Americans. I've also got some more DZC Terrans, but need to get some good pictures.