1 Gigasun

The spaceship combat game A Billion Suns finally arrived at my local game store. I'm looking forward to trying this game out; the resource management (starting with no ships on the table and giving a limited number of orders each turn--not to mention trying to win the game while expending as little as possible) looks extremely interesting. The rules can accomodate two to four players, and there is a campaign system as well. This book is from the author of Gaslands, but the combat engine is completely different, and there are no specially marked dice or templates required. The scenarios (multiple for a single game) look interesting and play out on separate maps, with players having the option to jump fleets between the game boards. Now that we're getting ready to start in-person gaming soon, I can't wait to introduce A Billion Suns to my group.

"Space ships for your space war"

Browsing online for cheap toys to use in Stargrave, I came across the Space Union line of sci-fi sets, advertised as "Space ships for your space war." According to the packaging, this toy line is made by Peng Rong out of China. I found two items, once looking like a SHIELD helicarrier, and the other like a more conventional science fictional vessel.  

Each was under twenty bucks, and free shipping. I got a whole lot of toys for my $40. Not only were they large models, suitable for use in 28mm skirmish games, but each big ship carried several smaller toys, a mix of flying and ground vehicles. 

The set incuded a couple of scale-indeterminate winged craft that could do in a spaceship game, a tracked tank that might work in Ogre, and even a die-cast sedan. While the car is too small for 28mm, the construction-type hover vehicle and the four-legged walker (which will make a nice robot guardian) are the perfect size for Stargrave and other sci-fi games, like Mutants & Death Ray Guns.

These toys have a lot of potential in my scenarios as objective, opponents, opportunities, or even just scatter terrain. Unfortunately, the low price of these sets means the undersides of most of these vehicles are hollow, but that won't be an issue in most games. 

Still, it's a lot of bang for your gaming bucks. These spaceships just need some new paint jobs, and they'll be ready for use as terrain features or objectives. Their size means they will block line-of-sight and provide vantage points, which will make tactical situations interesting. All in all, I'm happy with my purchase.

Now I'm off to work on my space ships for my space war. 

3D tiles for Terraforming Mars

So I got my Big Box expansion for Terraforming Mars recently, and it is certainly big. I had pledged for the small box, with just the 3D tiles, but instead they sent the Big Box, with the tiles, storage containers for various game tokens, and boxes for the cards, all designed to fit in the huge box that's big enough to hold all the expansions. Like I said, this expansion is large--more than twice as deep as the box for the original game. I have plenty of room for all the expansions I own (Prelude, Colonies, Venus Next, and the extra maps). 

The storage is pretty well thought out, and it's easy and quick to pack and unpack the game. The box with all the stuff is kinda heavy, though. And while the 3D terrain tiles don't affect game play, they certainly do enhance it. I like the way the greenery and city markers, as well as the special project tiles, look on the game board. I also got the transparent plastic domes as an add-on, because they look cool, too. 

This product also came with some promotional cards: 18 new projects and two new corporations. So I played some solo games, using each of the new corporations on each of the three maps (six games in all), and succeeded in terraforming Mars each time! It was fun to have this new terain out on the map, and I'm looking forward to playing this with live opponents once our group starts face-to-face gaming again.

Stargrave is here

 

I just got my copy of the Stargrave rulebook, and after hearing about it for so long, I'm looking forward to playing a few games. With more people vaccinated, it looks like in-person gaming will pick up again, so I need to star assembling my crew. 

While the official Stargrave minis look cool, I have a bunch of old Rogue Trader figures I plan to dust off and get on the table.  Here are a few of them, which I used in Hordes of the Things until the Great Lead Avalanche of 2010. Not sure exactly how I will stat them out, but it will be fun playing once more.

Another bookcase

Some more scatter terrain as part of my quest to apply pigment to castings, this time a bookcase from the Reaper Bones line. I don't feel as guilty not doing a traditional human/humanoid figure, because I feel like I put nearly the same amount of work into this piece of furniture (what with painting all the individual books and all). 

Plenty of detailing on this casting, although I'm not a fan of the company name and copyright symbol on the back of the thing (which now that I think about, I could have sanded down). Paint, wash, and drybrush really brings out the wood grain.

Because the bottom of this piece isn't flat, even after some sanding, I glued a small section of actual wood to the model to keep it steady and upright. As you can see, it goes well with 28mm figures.

Another addition for my skirmish games (D&D, Frostgrave, Melee/Wizard, Song of Blades & Heroes, etc.). And as you can see, it's part of a matching set--although I painted this slightly different than the first one I did.

I'm very pleased with how this model came out, and I like it better than my initial version. But I want to ask people veiwing this blog, does it look like there is that much of a difference? Please let me know.

Some furniture

I've been behind on my self-imposed schedule of At Least One Miniature A Week (thanks to a difficult spaceship build and videogames), but these two packages from the Reaper Bones line, the bed and the set of table & benches, should nearly catch me up. Very easy to paint, thanks to washes and drybrushing, and I've got two more (or four, if you count the parts of the kitchen set separately) items ready for the game table.

If you run skirmish games or roleplaying games, you can always use more set dressing, and these pieces will come in handy across a variety of rules. As you can see, they're approximately 28mm scale and will work in my games of D&D, Frostgrave, Melee/Wizard, Song of Blades & Heroes, and so on. Meanwhile, I will start sorting through my pile of bare casting for the next mini to paint.

Mining exploration ship

At long last, the newest addition to my merchant fleets is complete: This decommissioned warship is now being used as a mobile prospecting base and processing facility.   

Originally a Federation attack carrier built by the Valiant Enterprises shipyards, this vessel was commissioned during the Third Interstellar War and served for more than two centuries after that conflict ended. 

Now designated as the MV Dorsey, this ship retains its launch/recovery platforms, but the hangars that once held Shooting Star- and Solar Flare-class fighters now house single crew mining and prospecting vehicles, and weapons bays now contain industrial laboratories and processing equipment.  

The starship still retains the fore-mounted twin railguns, which have been modified to accelerate small ore shipments into transfer orbits.  

This is a neat model, but I can't say it was fun to put together. It came in four hull sections that I had to pin together to make sure they didn't come apart, and the various superstructure pieces and landing pads. The latter were problematic because they did not fit cleanly, and it took a lot of scraping to fit them into their slots.

Still, that's one more mini (and a spaceship, even!) that's done, and it will make a nice target for raiders in a future scenario. Till next time!