Bored Games: The Return

Yeah so, as stated before I haven't been doing blog posts for a while, but I need to re-start the 'paint all the miniatures and post them' project. I have by no means been completely out of wargaming and hobbying: I've actually painted a few things, played quite a few games here and there, and done a few projects.

Hex & Counter Design

One of these projects has been making maps and counters for hex & counter wargames, which I have ideas to either upload to Vassal and play online that way, or else print out and DIY to play physically.

I've worked on various of these games, but mainly focussing on really excellent Multi-Man Publishing/The Gamers titles such as Tactical Combat Series (TCS) and Battalion Combat Series (BCS), which I think are works of genius rules-wise and have vast potential for customisation.

TCS 1980s US Marines.

TCS modern Australians.

Works in progress: TCS Guyanese counters. 

Experimenting with shaded '3D-ised' counters for BCS.

Tiny Printed Strength & Honour

I have also started putting together a very compact, portable and low-cost printed version of Reisswitz Press/Too Fat Lardies' Strength & Honour, which I want to get into and explore fully with a campaign or two.

Very simple counter art: units for the Nicopolis 48 BC introductory scenario. Nowhere near as good as some commercially available printable armies, let alone 2mm miniatures themselves, but good enough for trying out the rules. (These will be printed at 4cm x 2cm).

A stylised Roman marching camp, again 4cm x 2cm. The maps will also be printed, with 2.5cm squares.

Fallout Heavy Water Revival: Back in the Blog

Basically I haven't really had the cause and enthusiasm to post things to this blog for a really long time. However I thought I'd better get back to doing it, because apparently there are still more miniatures to paint, games to try and loose ends to be tied.

This is one of those loose ends

More than 12 months ago some people at the local club were getting into Fallout: Wasteland Warfare, painting up a lot of nice 28mm miniatures and some incredibly detailed terrain. I had a game and I think I posed something about it: it was a fun experience. Fallout I would describe as RPG-lite, with interesting and efficient combat rules and a humourous aspect.

So I figured that if my mates were enthusiastic about it, I should give it a go. Not having any suitable 28mm miniatures, I borrowed a mix of plastic parts from some other friends and put together a figure, promising these friends I would show them pictures of the miniature once it was done. A lot of stuff happened in the meantime, and I can't recall if I ever did show them the miniature.

Due to various scheduling conflicts, interstate travel etc. I never did get to use this character model, but maybe one day he will get on the table.

So anyway, here he is:

Waldemar "Darkness" Beauregard

Waldemar is a scout character with good night vision, which he keeps sharp with protective goggles. The basic model is a Warlord/Bolt Action US para with the head of a WH 40K Genestealer cultist. Someone said it might make people think he has slight radiation sickness.

He has a pipe rifle, which of course was a Sten gun (in the arms of a British para) with the magazine cut off (the Sten looks suitably low-tech and improvised).

I modelled on a Christmas scarf onto Waldemar from green stuff. Mainly this was to help join the head to the body, but I feel like it fits with the 'comfy 50s'/'post-apocalyptic zombie survival' aesthetic of Fallout (I really don't know much about Fallout, but this is the impression that I get). It's like a Coca-Cola advertisement painting of a family with an open fire, Christmas tree with presents, snow outside the window, father in the recliner smoking a pipe etc.

The camo pattern is just something made-up that looks cool and might have evolved from pea-dot or modern digi-cams or whatever they are called now. He starts as a deserter from The Brotherhood.

Waldemar is not a nice guy, but I gave him a base with some nice swampy grass clumps anyway, suitable to the table my friends made.