A tale of two tables

(or: Linked Games at Chimaera Con)

Since I had fun running my first-ever convention game at Millennium Con back in November, I wanted to conduct another game at this year's Chimaera Con.  For a long time, I'd had the idea of running linked scenarios on two separate tables, with play results on one table affecting events in the other game.

I got together with Chip (da Baron), who agreed to run the groundside part using Future War Commander.  I would run Galactic Knights for the topside portion.  The concept was to have space forces trying to land more troops to take a landing area and capital city on a besieged planet.  

 

Never one to let background material go to waste (it pays to recycle!), I decided to make this game a sequel of sorts to the MillCon scenario.  Here's how the summary read:

Description

After its initial invasion failed, the Terran Transsolar Federation decided to take by stealth what it couldn´t take by strength. On the surface of Regulus IV, a small unit of Terran infiltrators captures the Nova Liberian spaceport for Terran reinforcements to land. Meanwhile, in space, the Nova Liberian revolutionary star guard must hold off the invaders´ transports to prevent more troops from flooding into the capital.

Instructions

The surface and space battles will take place at the same time on two separate tables. The chance to provide supporting fire like orbital bombardments or surface-to-orbit missiles mean players´ choices on their own table will affect the combat on the other table. Just make sure you communicate with your allies!

EDIT: Here are the scenario's special rules and the order of battle.

From orbit, capital ships could conduct planetary bombardment and fighters could make strafing runs.  From the planet, laser towers could rip anti-starship blasts into space and ECM interfered with ship-to-ground communications.  In addition, massive shield generators protected the city and its emplacements.

(for more details, see below)

It's finished!

I spent some time Friday evening painting up the pride of my fleet, the Terran Victory-class super galactic dreadnought.  FYI, I put this model on the kitchen scale before starting, and it weighed in at one pound!

Given the name of my blog, you'd think I would have completed this starship some time ago.  What can I say?  I procrastinate--just like I'm gonna procrastinate now and not put up step-by-step photos of my painting until later... 

But just to show y'all I'm not totally lazy, here's another shot of the Victory, with a Swiftsure-class stellar destroyer for scale:

Good Friday HotT Game

I wanted ckutalik of the Hill Cantons a break from his DMing duties, so I invited him out to Casa del Escriba this afternoon for some wargaming. I decided to introduce him to Hordes of the Things.

Although he has some DBA armies, Chris doesn't possess any army for HotT, so I let him chose between Surtr and the Sons of Muspel and the Nightmare Legion. He took the fire giants and won the roll for attacker. I set up the terrain as the defending skeletons.

As you can see from the photo at the top, I once again got really good milage out of my lurker--he took out a beasts element (doubled it!) and then tied up one more for most of the game. Although my opponent had some early losses, he came back to threaten my stronghold and my general. In the end, though, he lost his general and the game:

I almost feel bad for winning against an inexperienced opponent, but I did make recommendations on what to do and what not to do with his elements.  I'm sure (I hope) when (if?) we play again, he will eviscerate my army.  This game just came down to some really good die rolls on my part and some really poor ones on his part, such as when his behemoth attacked my stronghold and got doubled.

Instead of a play-by-play of the game, I've assembled some animated GIFs to show what happened. They're below the jump, so they don't distract people looking at other posts on the blog. Also, since the site I used to create them (Picasion) has a max of ten images per gif, I had to split the battle up into three parts. Have a look, and enjoy the Easter weekend.

(continued after the jump)

Another OGRE sighting

I just wanted to point my fellow treadheads to Command Post T.  It's a brand new blog (or an old blog with a new focus) by Toltrin (posting to the blog as HarmlessHamster), a long-time poster to the Steve Jackson Games OGRE/GEV forum.  He started putting up content this month, and there's already a wealth of information for fans of OGRE.   Go check it out, and give the guy some followers!

Speaking of OGRE, here's a shot of the three-dimensional Mk V counter for the upcoming sixth edition of the boardgame. 

Song of Stars and Silence

I heard about this a couple of weeks ago, but once again I procrastinated until now.  Turns out Ganesha Games, publisher of Song of Blades and Heroes, is coming out with its own set of starship combat rules. 

Awhile back on that mailing list, the SoBaH author mentioned in passing that his company is working on a generic SF (presumably skirmish) game as well as a spaceship game.  I asked Andrea Sfiligoi for more details and learned the following:

• each player controls a small force (3-6 ships per player)
• games last about one hour
• comes with predesigned spaceships or players can build their own
• torpedoes, fighters, etc. are represented on the game table
• combat is two-dimensional
• damage system kept very simple to minimize use of counters (playtesters used puffs of colored smoke with different colors indicating different damage classes) 

I like the fast play, back-and-forth action, and customizable forces of Song of Blades and Heroes.  I will be interested in hearing more about how Ganesha ports those features into a spaceship game.  No word on what the game will be called, so I came up with Song of Stars and Silence.  What's your suggestion?

Campaign wishes

I want to run a campaign with battles like this on a regular basis.

Part of what makes spaceship combat gaming interesting to me is the backstories of the forces involved and the setting background.  That's why I like running scenarios--it gives me a chance to flex my creativity, and a story gets players more involved in the game than your typical equal-points-start-on-opposite-sides-of-the-map game.

I'd like to take that a step further and run a starship campaign--two or more players who not only have to make tactical decisions during a battle, but also must implement strategic choices amid a larger arena.  Deciding to hold your fire or release all your missiles at the start of the game is one decision point that can draw a player in.  Having to decide where to send your forces (and whether to split them up) to accomplish possibly mutually exclusive goals with incomplete information (if I were my opponent, where would I send my ships?) would also prove challenging.

I'd like to run a campaign where each player starts off with one small ship and can serve as a privateer, pirate, or patroller.  Players would make strategic moves on the sector map, and when two forces meet, they would play it out on the ol' hex mat.  As the GM, I would run "non-player characters" such as merchant ships or enemy space patrols.  Damage would carry over from game to game, making players possibly more cautious with their assets.  On the other hand, the possibility of loot, or capturing ships as prizes, would bring out the risk-takers.  This would necessitate a lot of bookkeeping, but I still think it would be fun.

I'm sure others have thought of this as well, so I'd like to ask readers their thoughts on a starship combat campaign.  Have you tried something like this before?  How'd it work out?  Any suggestions, examples, warnings?  I await your replies.

Opponent's armies: Empire and more

The Grand County of Stirland army includes a Mage Knight dragon.

 So one of the events I participated in at Chimaera Con was the Hordes of the Things Texas Championship.  I brought my own army, the Nightmare Legion, and most competitors had their own figures as well.  However, if they didn't, Blake, the tournament organizer had ten--TEN!--spare 25mm/28mm scale armies on hand.  

The City-State of Nuln has a steam tank behemoth, and snipers (behind the tree) act as lurkers.

I asked Blake how many armies he had, and he didn't even know for sure.  He began some years ago converting his old Warhammer Fantasy Battle Empire minis to HotT, and he's far from finished.  I think he has enough unfinished bases for pretty much every political subdivision on the Empire map, and I saw enough completed elements to fight a sizable civil war using just Empire armies.

The City-State of Middenheim army has two artillery elements.

The griffon rider area hero makes the Grand Barony of Nordland a tough army to face.

He brought armies from five Empire provinces, each with a variety of units.  The most notable to me is the Nordland army with its griffin rider, a Mage Knight prepaint.

I'd never heard of the Grand Duchy of Maroon, but as an Aggie I like the color scheme.

There were also some non-Empire armies, including a force of spider-riding goblins and a behemoth-having chaos army.  Blake also had some semi-historical Picts, as well as good-guy and bad-guy Greek myth troops.

The Spider Riders include two spider-mounted heroes, a flyer, and five stands of riders.

They were some fun armies to look at, and the use of collectible prepaints and craft-store figures gave me some inspiration as well.

The Chaos army includes a lot of GW figures, but the minotaur behemoth came from Michael's.

The Picts have a magician element with them, along with their ogre behemoth.

Good and evil Greek mythology armies--heroes on one side, cyclops on the other, lots of historical figs.