12th April - Dreadball vs The Wife

It's been a while but we decided to dust off Dreadball and start up a family league of that as well as our Frostgrave campaign. So far only The Wife (Brokkrs) and I (Veer-myn) have begun but hopefully The Daughters can fit a game in this week around school and such. I also got another Infinity game in against The Youngest which you can read here, and I'm hoping The Eldest and I can fit another one in this week at some stage.

The Labrats (Veer-myn)

B Brokkrs (Brokkrs)

Player	Position	Player	Position
Push	Guard	Protor	Guard
Shove	Guard	Stone	Guard
Dash	Striker	Avalanche	Guard
Dodger	Striker	Brute	Guard
Ducker	Striker	Dribble	Jack
Weaver	Striker	Stubb	Jack
Scrounger	Striker	Brimir	Striker
Joe	Striker	Blainn	Striker

Hey there sport's fans and welcome to the first game of the season, pitting the home team The Labrats vs the B Brokkrs. There's the launch and we're off. Shove slams into Protor knocking him down over the waiting back of Joe and he's out looks like it'll be a few rushes before he returns. Oh the fans are going wild, they love this stuff. Weaver grabs the ball and sends a pass flying between the Brokkr players and.... it's caught by Joe absolutely flawless, something you don't often see with these Veer-myn players and he's heading down the pitch to the three point strike zone, but oooh yep that's more in line with what you'd expect it's off the rim and scattering down deep in Brokkr territory. 

Brimir enters the pitch scooping the ball with ease and motor's down the pitch..... well relatively quickly anyway. Brute charges into Push knocking the rat down and he's off, looks like a busted buckle so we'll be seeing him back soon. Stone rolls over Shove knocking the Veer-myn guard back a little. Blainn sprints ahead, the pass is good and the Brokkr's have penetrated the Veer-myn half.

Weaver moves up to Blainn and it look's like... oh yes he's got the ball. Joe is heading back up the pitch hoping for another attempt. Dodger heads up putting pressure on the now empty handed Brokkr. The pass is looking good... oh he's got it but that ball almost got away from Joe there. He steadies himself and yep he's headed back to that strike zone, he throws..... Bang! off the the rim again it's just not his day today.

Brute pushes Dodger back, Brimir sprints backfield towards the spilled ball. Stone slams Shove again but the rat finds some leverage and yep that's another Brokkr down and out, that Veer-myn is on fire today. Stubb takes the pitch giving the Brokkr's another pair of hands for the ball. Brute continues his assault on Dodger..... Ooooh!! That's going to hurt, wait, wait, yes! That's one dead rat, absolutely brutal play, the crowds on it's feet.

Shove comes across the pitch too late to save Dodger but the Brokkr braced and is only knocked back a couple of paces. Pusher streams back onto the pitch and hits Brute from behind and he's out... but he'll be back soon enough. Despite the added pressure from Brimir the ball just seemed to float into Joe's hands there, and he's going back for a third attempt....... It's in!! Hear that roar from the home crowd, three points for The Labrats!

Dribble sprints to pick up the freshly launched ball, but oh! The pressure has got the the diminutive player and he's fumbled the pick up!

The Labrats aren't going to let this opportunity go, Scrounger heads for the ball and it's shaky but yes, yes he's got it. Dasher is on the field now bringing the Veer-myn back to the full six players on the field. There seems to be some conferring in the Veer-myn coaching box and yes it looks like there's a new play on the board, let's see how this goes. Shove slams into Blainn knocking the Brokkr and he's off but it looks like just an equipment change, he'll be back. Scrounger's heading to the one point strike zone..... he's loading the ball into his tail!?! It's in!! Oh my god the crowd is going wild over this. Four points to the rats!!

Dribble is smacked in the back of the head by the launching ball sending the unfortunate players head, he's off to the bench and I bet he's seeing some flying Teraton's in his vision right now, haha! Brimir begins a slow rush up the pitch as Protor and Stone return to the field. Stubb moves up and collects the ball giving the B Brokkrs possession again!
Dasher moves up, yep another easily stripped ball for The Labrats. Joe again turns to receive and yes it looks like that hastily made play is coming into action as Dasher takes direction and heads up the pitch, it's an absolutely beauty of a pass people dead on and yes! Joe has the ball, and is heading back to his favourite strike zone! He throws the ball and..... it's in!! The Labrats win by a landslide, after the temporary shocked silence the crowd is on their feet again, just listen to them roar!!

It was great game, I'm quite happy we decided to pull it out. Both of us had the rules down again by the end of our first rushes. Hopefully the girls get right back into it as well and we can get a decent league happening.

26th June - 22nd June Dreadball vs The Wife

After a games night consisting of Dominion and Ancient Terrible Things, The Wife and I were still keen to play something else. So I figure with the upcoming league I should give her a chance to get some more practice in with her Brokkrs (although the minis are the Forge Fathers she decided to upgrade her team and will get the Brokkrs done once she finishes off her Shaltari).


The Wife grabbed the ball and set to attempting to clear the way for an early strike, but was unable to make enough headway with the combination of the space dwarves lack of speed and the Veer-myn's super human agility. The start of my first rush began with one of my guards putting her ball carrying striker into the dugout for two turns and one of my strikers picking up the ball with a surprising amount of co-ordination for a rat and rushing for the larger scoring strike zone. However upon arriving he performed about as well as can be expected from a Veer-myn striker and missed the target scattering the ball.

Rush three and The Wife decided on focusing on getting physical with my players, but apart from a getting a guard off for a single turn failed to do much. Again my 3+ speed for Dodge roles managed to keep me safe. She did managed to secure the ball down the end of the pitch but..... my rush began with my striker successfully stealing the ball from her. My remaining guard on the pitch then slammed her jack that was hassling one of my "defensive" strikers sending him to the injury bench for two. The now ball carrying striker then scurried around his Brokkr counterpart and despite moving in the same action managed to not only score the strike, but showboat while doing it giving me a nice three point lead in the first half of the match.


The Wife started to get really aggressive after this over the course of the next few rushes with most of her activations going toward her guards as she attempted to clean house. Mine consisted mostly of failing to pick up the damn ball. She did manage to put another guard off for a single turn, but despite her best efforts she was unable to clear a straight path for her striker to for for the bonus point on a close zone strike. I suggested she dash one hex for a shot but her poor speed stat put her off the risk and she decided it was safer to hold the ball and wait for the next turn.


This proved to be a poor choice with one of my guards, who had sprinted back on the turn before. He came running back down the pitch and slammed her striker not only managing to put her off the pitch but potentially killing the player as well. I then bought the other guard back on and attempted to sandwich her guard as well, but after three action the best I could do was get him off for two turns after an amazing armour roll. This left me with one action to pick up the ball which I barely managed to do leaving my striker still in my half of the pitch and with in range of another of her guards.




The Wife quickly capitalized on this and put my striker down but not out with another amazing armour roll. The ball scattered out to the centre of the pitch to be picked up by one of her jacks. My rush began with my striker picking himself up off the deck and rushing over to steal the ball back. This did not go to plan. I then bought across a guard and sent the jack off for a turn with one of my strikers again managing to pick up the ball, but only just so yet again no free action. My final action had my striker heading up the pitch as far from the dwarves as I could manage.

Her next rush didn't see too much happen with most of her players just coming on to the pitch even with sprinting they couldn't get into much of a position Mine was spent getting setup for a four point strike attempt for a last rush landslide, basically just getting my striker to the zone and setting up my guards to attempt to protect his flank and lay some threat hexes around. I got greedy. The ref movement check came up with the most annoying card possible for me. The Ball Shatters! This left us with the newly launched ball at her strikers feet and one of my strike zones wide open from a vicious slam from her guard earlier which had almost killed my striker.

The Wife of course chose to head for the other strike zone and attempted another striker kill, but while knocking him down the Brokkrs were unable to penetrate his armour and the rat was merely shoved down out of the way. Leaving her striker with a clear shot which she made bring the score back to a single point to me. I began my rush by attempting to pick up the ball but unfortunately his innate Veer-myn abilities came into play again and I fumbled ending my rush and the game.

Still a one point victory for me and The Wife has definitely learned a few lessons on deployment and the vital need of the sprint action for either dwarf team which ever she settles on playing. I'll hopefully be getting a game of Bolt Action in this weekend and possibly a game of Saga. The Sister is also down from Rockhampton and we're attempting to organise a largish family games day on Monday with the various Nephews, Nieces and of course The Daughters so I'll most likely put up a few pics from that if it goes ahead.

Also don't forget to check out The Shattered Crown on kickstarter when it goes live later today (or possibly tomorrow depending on your timezone)

9th June - 8th June Public Holiday Dreadball Games

There's been a delay between my last post and this one, not that I haven't been getting anything done, I'm just having a small argument with the weather whenever I go to take a few photos of what I've finished off. I'm thinking once I finish off my UCM starter for Dropzone Commander that's on the table at the moment if it's not willing to compromise I'll just pull out the Foldio and take a few shots in it to get something up :).

Having a public holiday yesterday meant I could catch up with Toby and Mr Anon for a game during the day with The Wife and The Daughters, so we decided to play a mini Dreadball tournament. Looks like we're going to get the league off the ground in the next month too, hopefully with eight to ten players so not too bad for the beginning.

Competitors/Teams

The Wife - Brokkrs

The Youngest - Female Corporation

The Eldest - Teratons

Toby - Hobgoblins

Mr Anon - Robots

Me - Veer-myn

Round One

The first round saw The Wife vs The Eldest game finish with a narrow victory to the Teratons in a very bloody match up with three of the Brokkrs ending up dead in the 0 - 1 win after the full fourteen turns.

The Youngest held off the Mr Anon for almost the full game finally loosing to a landslide victory in turn fourteen. This is quite the achievement against him as most of his games are over fairly quickly so she's showing some promise there.

My game gave also ended in a landslide but turn twelve with my Veer-myn strikers finally managing to get the last three pointer I needed for the game. I also managed to put the Hulk off the board twice which I was happy with and as usual my rats danced around most of the offensive plays by Toby with only a couple hitting the injury bench for a turn or two.

Round 2

The Eldest squared off against Mr Anon. She went down in a landslide during rush eleven but managed to do a fair amount of damage against the bots, but was out maneuvered around the strike zones

Toby managed a win against The Wife but it was a hard fought game with both sides dishing out the damage.

I faced The Youngest but was unable to manage more than one point strikes for the entire game with the final score being 4 - 0 to me at the end of the final rush. I wasn't an overly bloody game but I did manage to kill one of her strikers early on. If it wasn't for the clumsiness of her team for this game it could have been a far different result.

Unfortunately The Youngest had some homework she had to get onto so we had to call it then with Mr Anon taking a technical victory for the day with the two landslide victories, though I like to think I would have taken him out in the final round had we got a chance to square off.

8th December - Bolt Action Game, Dreadball Match and the Return of Games Night

Quite the week for gaming this week. Left to our own devices on Sunday myself and The Youngest got a game of Dreadball in, no photos I'm afraid but a rather nail biting match with my Veer-myn managing to score the winning three point strike on the last action of the last turn of the match after failing to score for the three previous turns beating her Female Corp team two nil.

I've just finished packing up the first games night in two weeks after a work enforced hiatus and it was a great game of Betrayal at House on the Hill. A full six player game with the Haunt not triggering until after a massive nine omen rooms and another haunt that we hadn't seen before (no spoilers here but Haunt 32 for those that have the game).

Sunday night also saw The Wife's first game of Bolt Action with my
Germans and her Japanese teaming up against Toby's Americans and Mr Anon's Soviets. We called the game around 11:30pm deciding that next time if we attempt such an undertaking we'll begin early or limit the order dice per side to 50% of their total units to speed things up (We had 38 order dice in the bag each round :) ). The Allies got of to a reasonable start, but I think we'd evened up the odds by the end of the third turn and it was called amicably a draw. Not a proper AAR this time as I was helping The Wife with the rules and a bit of tactical advice, though she had the basics down by the second turn and made some decent calls herself tearing up Toby's US when the opportunities arose. It was also the first game on Toby's newly built table and terrain. I have to say it's pretty impressive consider the speed in which he's organised it all, not as impressive as I hope my tables to be once I get the gaming area setup early next year, but damn good regardless.

 View's of the table as we setup

The Wife's Chi-Ha takes out Toby's M3A1

View of the table after first round Axis side

Allied side after round one

The Sherman advances and fires in retaliation

Aaannnd the Chi-Ha is dead

After my Germans kill a squad and the supposed medic the Soviet's retaliate.
The unit of four is in the building I just didn't feel like fiddling with the floors

And we called it, the final move would be my HQ taking a shot at the exposed
Soviet squad and killing another three of them

Really good game I felt and I'd like to have another crack at it when we have more time at our disposal now we've got the base platoon's sorted we've got armour platoons on the back burner at the moment though we're all concentrating on catching up with what we have, though some of us with slight Kickstarter addictions have slightly more than others.

30th September - Finished Nameless Team

Another Dreadball team down, one to go. But it does look like I have indeed put it on the back burner. Spent the day cleaning up the minis out of Infinity Operation: Icestorm box, gluing them and then finally getting a primer coat on them. So I'll be knocking them over first then more than likely heading back to the Zees to finish off the current teams.

That's about really, just spent an hour or so making some more hedges for Bolt Action while The Wife attempts a bridge (which is coming along nicely in my opinion).

 Sticky Guard

Hard Guard

Strikers

Whole Team

I've also picked up another kickstarter, this one is molds for making your own base tops, worth a look at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2023606288/basius-2-the-deluxe-stamp-pad-terrain-tile-and-bas

16th September - Finished Dreadball Zzor and my first 4Ground kit

Obligatory Full team on the Pitch Shot 

Strikers

Jacks

Finished off the Zzor team for Dreadball this week. Did things a little differently building up from a Plastic Soldier Dunkelgelb spray base coat with a series of washes and dry brushed highlights. I've also used some Warlord Games soviet tank numbers for the teams rather than the Mantic Dreadball ones. All in all I'm happy with the way they've come out. While outside waiting for the varnish to dry one of the guards took a tumble and lost a leg, but I'm not too concerned again this just being a team I've painted up as free agents.

Gaurds, note the missing leg on the camera shy one

I also went out to have a look at The Last Stand over at Corinda and picked up a few bits a pieces. The new Tank Wars supplement for Bolt Action, another machine gun team for my Germans and my first 4Ground kit. I've been eyeing these off for the last six months or so but hadn't quite committed to buying one as I wanted to see what they looked like in the pack. I bought the Corner Ruins 2 kit and I've very happy with it. Everything went together without any issue and with the left overs in the sheets you can add a bit of clutter to the building. I'll definitely be adding more of these to the collection as time and pocket money permits

Finally a few Kickstarters worth having a look at:

Carnevale:  A  miniature skirmish game set in Venice during the late 1790s in an alternate timeline where a magical rift has opened up above the city with some interesting consequences. It seems to be quite interesting with options open to your characters such as running jumps from building to building while shooting your opponent below, rappelling down walls for dramatic entrances and even running along walls to get past those pesky blocking obstacles.

King Down:  A chess based game from Shar Shai who had the successful Agents campaign on kickstarter last year, which is a go to game in this house when we've got 30 minutes or so to kill. Gameplay video is coming this week but after a quick read of the rules it looks like it's going to be a good one.

Battle Systems Fantasy Dungeon Terrain:  I've got the Sci-Fi set sitting here at one and while I haven't put any together yet (space constraints atm {space constraints... you see what I did there}) the quality of the product is amazing. I'm looking at using this for my Brother's up coming family roleplay game (once our Castles&Crusades books arrive) but I can see some tie in Stargrunt games using this rather interesting round dimensional gate or possible "Star" gate add-on they've added as a strechgoal.