Counters for OGRE Nightfall

Nearly seven months after I ordered them, my counter sheets for OGRE: Nightfall arrived in the mail.  This is one of the sponsored counter sheets for the game that came about as part of the Ogre Designer's Edition Kickstarter campaign.  The theme is that of rogue Ogres taking on the last of the humans in an apocalyptic battle.

This set comes with three counter sheets: one holding conventional forces, one of black Ogres and laser emplacements (not shown, since the sheets are still in the shrinkwrap), and one with black buildings and a destroyed Ogre. 

What's missing, however, is the "16-page booklet of new scenarios forming a linked campaign" that was promised and was the reason I purchased this set.  Instead, we have a sticker on the shrinkwrap stating that they're sending the books out in another mailing.  Considering how people have complained about lengthy shipping delays and the publisher's lack of communication regarding this product, I'm not too optimistic.

The ginormous OGRE DE box comes with more Ogres than I can ever use at one time, so I didn't buy this to collect more counters.  Instead, I liked the idea of a linked campaign that can be played over several games.  I hope we actually get to see the book published.  Either way, though, the civilian counters (medical and refugee vehicles) make a nice addition to the mix, and will come in handy for other scenarios as well.

New Ogre map sketch

I wasn't satisfied with my previous Monopolis scenario map, so I sketched another version on paper.  I decided to flip the map to landscape mode instead of portrait--in other words, the river now runs along the short axis of the map instead of the long axis.  I'm going to use this drawing to lay out the terrain for my scenario on my Corsec hex mat.  

The attackers will come in on the left side, meaning it will take several turns before they're in range of the city.  The symbols above are pretty self-explanatory for gamers and include the terrain types on my other map.  I added some more terrain to the left side of the board to slow down the invaders.  I also included a new terrain type for this map, swamp, as it's the only thing other than rivers and towns that slow down Ogres.   Any suggestions on how to easily and cheaply model swamp terrain?

Starting an Oldhammer army

Now that I have my Warhammer Fantasy Battle third edition rulebook, I need to think about the miniatures I will use.  To me, the Oldhammer ethos doesn't necessarily involve vintage figures, but instead revolves around using minis to build the army you want.  That said, I still have a ton of old GW plastics from their Skeleton Army boxed set.  I can use these to build two or three units with the minimum number of figures.  (I still have plenty of metal castings as well, but most of those are destined to expand my Nightmare Legion army for Hordes of the Things.)

Besides, I think it will be fun to build an army using all these plastics.  In addition to the foot soldiers, I have enough skeletal riders for a cavalry unit, as well as a chariot or two.  My plan is to keep this army as simple as possible, attaching banners to indicate leaders, unless I want to include a metal mini as champion or general.  Since they're skeletons, they're pretty easy to paint, and detailing should be simple as well.

This will be a long-term project, however.  I have a move to get through next week, and then I'm concentrating on finishing the terrain and miniatures for an Ogre scenario I'm running at MillenniumCon this November. But after that, I plan to start on this army and find me some opponents for some third edition Warhammer.  Who wants to join me?

Ral Partha Ogre booklet

Going through my gaming stuff, I found these old booklets that came with the blister packs of Ogre miniatures from Ral Partha back in the day.  Here's the front of this tiny publication, with the other pages folded up:

Here's the eight-page booklet all unfolded (four pages per side), with the front of the booklet on the top row and the reverse side on the bottom..

I can't remember if I saw any other minis, like GEVs, depicted in one of these booklets.  And note that these designs are all PanEuropean; although Ral Partha made Combine minis, I don't know if they were ever mentioned in a booklet like this one.

Oldhammer in the house!

After several months, I finally scored a copy of Third Edition Warhammer Fantasy Battle.  I've been reading about the Oldhammer movement, and it's philosophy is similar to that of the Old School Renaissance: a do-it-yourself vibe, with heavy reliance on a referee instead of a rulebook.  The book has some wear, but it isn't falling apart.

This is the edition that got me started in fantasy gaming back in the late 1980s.  Although I'd been playing D&D for  quite awhile, when it came to wargaming I was sci-fi only--Ogre, Battletech, and Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader, which eventually led me around to Warhammer Fantasy Battle. 

Since I worked in a game store around this time, my employee discount resulted in the acquisition of  a whole bunch of undead miniatures (that being my favorite army).  However, I never really got to use them on the battlefield until I started playing Hordes of the Things.  However, the idea of quickly painting up a couple of units and a champion or two for a quick battle has me excited.  And now I have the rules, so I can get those skellies on the table for some Oldhammer!

New monster: Gelatinous Rubik's Cube

Found one of these old puzzle toys, and inspiration struck:  It's the right size to fit on the table among all the player character miniatures, so why not make a monster out of it?  So I give you (for Holmes Basic):

Gelatinous Rubik's Cube
Move: 60 feet/turn
Hit Dice: 4
Armor Class: 8
Treasure Type: variable
Alignment: neutral
Attacks: 1
Damage: see below
Similar to its more common cousin, the Gelatinous Rubik's Cube serves the role of scavenger in the dungeon.  However this monster is  easily distinguished by the fact that each surface of this creature has a different color.  Moreover, the various magic the Gelatinous Rubik's Cube has devoured gives it certain powers.  Roll a die to determine which side is attacking and apply the result to the target:
     Die Roll  Color         Effect
       1            Red            2-8 fire damage, any flammables ignited
       2            Yellow      1-4 damage, causes blindness
       3            Orange      immobilized as per Web spell
       4            Green        1-4 damage, causes rotting mummy disease
       5            Blue          heals 1-4 points of damage
       6            White        2-8 cold damage, any armor frozen into immobility

My HeroScape collection

We're in the process of moving, so I'm having to rearrange and rebox some of my gaming materials.

Behold, all of my HeroScape stuff, meaning the terrain tiles from the first two master sets, the superhero set, the Dungeons & Dragons set, the forest expansion, the jungle expansion, the glacier expansion, and the volcano expansion.

In order to conserve space, I have most of the tiles in a storage bin.  I did keep the two master set boxes out of nostalgia, and I use them to store some of the terrain.  Oh, I also have two castle sets and their boxes.  The figures and additional terrain (trees and ruins) are stored separately, since I use them for other games as well, like D&D or Song of Blades and Heroes. 

Looking through this stuff, I suddenly have the desire to put together some HeroScape maps.  While it's a fun game in and of itself, I'm also thinking that it could be used for D&D instead of a dry erase board.  Something to consider when I host my next campaign session.

More craters

Found some more sanding discs to use as craters for my Ogre minis games on a large-hex map.  Unlike the previous craters I showed you, the surface of these is entirely covered by bits of finer sand.

I figure I can use the one for newer, just detonated craters, and the other for older craters where nature has had some time to fill them in. What do you think?

An egg timer?

I came across a mention of Dungeons & Dragons in an old issue of the science fiction/fantasy comic anthology published by Marvel Comics in the 1980s called Epic Illustrated.  The description of D&D is in a column called Gameview by Steven Grant that is sort of an overview of fantasy and sci-fi gaming, and I have to quote part of it for you:

"The game [Dungeons & Dragons] is played with a rule book, an egg timer, an unusual pair of dice, and the imagination of the players."

Egg timer?  The rest of the review is pretty spot-on, talking about how "survivors of one game simply take their characters on to a new level."  The game was still relatively obscure when this issue came out in June 1981, so the author might not be familiar with how D&D is played, but where the hell did the egg timer come from?

Monopolis scenario map

I came up with this using Hexographer.  Looks a little bare right now, doesn't it?  OK, I printed out the blank map, got out the colored pencils, and came up with this sketch for my large-hex Ogre scenario, which involves the attempted capture of the huge city of  Monopolis.

Pretty easy to figure out the map: green = forest; blue = stream or river; T = town; scribbles = rubble; crater = crater.  I think I need some swamp in there as well to help slow down any Ogres that may happen along.  And I will probably need to playtest this more than once.  Meanwhile, any suggestions regarding this map?

Mobile CP for Ogre

Behold the newest addition to my collection of Ogre/GEV minis.  OK, it's actually a Battletech design, but it will work just fine in battles of Ogre as well.

The BT designation is "Mobile Headquarters," which means it's not a stretch to use it as a mobile command post in Ogre.

I realize the canon mobile CP is a tracked, not a wheeled, vehicle.  But it's my game, and I'm gonna go with this mini.  In particular, this unit will lead one side in my Siege of Monopolis scenario that I'm working on.

As you can see, it scales nicely with the official miniatures from the game, and it will fit in even better once I paint it.  Anyone else use other lines of minis with Ogre, or vice-versa?

No GuadaComaCon this year

Due to some events in real life, I will not be putting on GuadaComaCon this year.  I'm disappointed the convention won't take place in August, but I have some things to take care of.  I do plan on attending MillenniumCon in the fall, and I hope we can hold GuadaComaCon once more in 2015.

Terrain for the lazy (and cheap) wargamer

Thinking about terrain for my large-hex game mat, I was wandering around the hardware store downtown when I came across this package of extra coarse sanding discs.  Instead of attempting to sculpt and then paint craters like I've seen others do, and because I don't want to put forth the cash for manufactured scenery, I decided to see how these will look on the playing surface.

Likewise, instead of sawing and painting strips of balsa to represent a network of roads, I could just cut up this wet/dry sandpaper to use as sections of pavement.  Here it is front and back:

Here's the crater for giant games of Ogre laid out on the game mat with four-inch hexes.  Not bad, and I'm fine with using the five-inch circle to represent the hole dug by a cruise missile during the game.  I don't have to worry about it overlapping other terrain, since it turns towns and forest up to three hexes away into rubble.

And the roads look decent as well on the Corsec mat, although I'll need to use sticky tac or something else to keep them in place during game play.  I still need to work on getting the angles correct, but the straight-line sections of highway look fine.

So, I have roads, craters, town hexes and forest hexes for my massive Ogre games.  Now to figure out rivers and swamps ....

Hey, baby, it's the 4th of July*

Happy Independence Day!  Have a safe holiday, everyone.

*headline is a Robert Earl Keen song reference