Wednesday 29 August 2012

Scum and Villainy (Part 4) Two More SciFi Rogues

In the shady parts of the galaxy, like seedy bars and dark ally ways, there are always those men who survive by their own wits, who use their skill and skulduggery to earn a credit or two.
Handle Rex and Emilio Smith are good examples of just such men.

Handle Rex is a ruffian and a thief. He has a reputation for getting the job done; wither that is steeling a cargo ship or collecting an unpaid debt. Working as a freelancer, he has hired himself out to a number of criminal organisations that find his particular skill set an asset to their operations. 


Emilio Smith is a drifter and a gambler, who is often found frequenting the drinking holes and chance-dens on the outer rim worlds. He is quick witted, but is equally quick with his gold plated pistol, and many a fool who has mistaken him for some over -dressed dandy, has found that was the last mistake they made.
  

I was rummaging around in a box of old figures, looking for something to paint for the blog, when I came across a few likely candidates for my scifi campaign. The theme for my campaign is ‘Scum and Villainy’ and is inspired by the many oddball residents of Mos Eisley, and of the scifi/western setting of Firefly and Serenity.

Handle Rex is a Games Workshop Necromunda gang member, and Emilio Smith is a cowboy form Artizan Designs. I have already painted on of these cowboys for my western campaign, and rather than convert him or paint a duplicate, I thought I would rebase him and use him for my scifi collection. As usual the bases are resin and made by Fenris Games. 

Sunday 26 August 2012

Flint Strong, On Her Magesty's Secret Service

Flint Strong, one of Her Majesty's most trusted spies, is a veteran with many years service under his belt. What he might have lost in vigour he more than makes up in experience and expertise.
Flint’s regular clashes with evil business tycoon Ezekiel Maxell are almost legendary amongst the British espionage community. Maxwell has placed a bounty on Strong’s head of one million dollars!



This figure is on of the retro Spy-fi Kiss Kiss Bang Bang range. Mark Copplestone of Copplestone Castings sculpts this one. Again I went for the vibrant psychedelic colours reminiscent of Austin Powers. I enjoyed painting this one. 




Friday 24 August 2012

VBCW Supply Train

Sometimes you just can’t beet the old ways.

In 1938: A Very British Civil War, the conflict has enveloped the whole of the United Kingdom (and a good number of the colonies too) and so inevitable there are shortages in supplies. During the Siege of Liverpool, one of the critical shortages came from not having enough petrol. Various innovative solutions were tried, including stream power, gas and even sail power, but none of them could compare with the use of mules, donkeys and horses to shift men and equipment around.
This picture shows a muleteer leading a train of five mules, carrying supplies to the fornt line of the siege. Such a site had become commonplace all over the country, on both all sides of the conflict.


I am not sure who makes these models, but I have got a feeling it was Tiger Miniatures. The Muleteer is by Gripping Beasts.  I picked the pack mules up at the Wolverhampton Show a couple of years ago, and finally got round to painting them. Obviously they will fit in to my VBCW world, and could be used as an objective or something. I could also use them if I ever do a WW1 or a Chindits campaign, as they are generic enough for many different settings.  




Thursday 23 August 2012

Ape Ambush! Pulp City Battle Report

This week I managed to get to my mate Leon’s (A.K.A PulpCitizen) to play a game of Pulp City, the Superhero Skirmish game. We climbed up into his newly fitted games room in his loft and had a cracking game.
  We were play-testing some proposed new rules for the game, and I have to say they made the game even more dynamic and fast paced, while freeing up the possible actions the Supremes could perform, so that the game play had a distinct four-colour-comic-book feel. Obviously I can’t go into the rules, as it’s all tiptop secret at this stage, but I love the direction this game is going in.
  I played ARC, a bunch of super intelligent mutant primates, while Leon played a fairly random bunch of Superheroes. I had a cunning plan to lure Leon’s heroes into an ambush is a predetermined killing zone. The plan basically worked, but some poor judgment and even poorer dice rolling cost me the game. Given the low ceilings in the Pulp Citizen Man-Cave, and the fact that Leon is almost a foot shorter than me, I also think that the gaming environment was carefully engineered to give him a home-ground advantage.
  Or at least that is my excuse.

  All these figures are made for the Pulp City game, and all figures and scenery belong to Leon- so I can't claim any credit. 


 Iron Train and some vigilantes prepare for battle


Skyline and Androida lurk in an alleyway- all part of the 
heroes 'cunning plan'


Guerilla acts as bait for the ambush- shooting, then falling back while the heroes advance



Apebot waiting patiently to ambush any heroes foolish enough to enter the ARC kill-zone


Too late for Iron Train! 
The hero realises that the cunning and sneaky elements of ARC have out flanked him- the metal-clad Supreme prepares to go down fighting!

Thursday 16 August 2012

Land Shark

No one knows the origins of the fearsome Land Shark. There are those who maintain that the vile supervillain is a mutant, while others claim he is the embodiment of a hunger spirit, or even a were-shark. One thing is certain: there are few opponents more vicious or deadly in a fight.
The Land Shark is no evil master mind- he is content to hire out his particular talents to the highest bidder. He seems unmoved by remorse or compassion- caring only when and where his next meal is.
  As well as typical feral abilities- enhanced speed, strength and reflexes- Land Shark has demonstrated an uncanny knack of sensing his prey’s weaknesses. He has also shown that he is all but impossible to kill. He can recover from even the most life threatening injuries in just a few hours so long as he can feed on fresh meet- the fresher the better!



I have been conscious that the blog has had a distinct lack of ‘Four Colour’ superheroes this year. This is largely because my paining time has been split between my modern African stuff and my Kiss Kiss Bang Bang project. This has been compounded by a lack of cash, which has restricted my ability to buy more miniatures. I love the Reaper Chronoscope and Pulp City but the minis are expensive, and when it comes down to buying a single mini for £6 for a blister pack of 4 Africans for the same price it becomes hard to justify the expense. 
This mini has been kicking around in a ‘to do’ pile since my old mucka Leon (Pulp Citizen) gave me it- he doesn't like minis with integral bases. I dusted it off and based it on a resin base by Fenris Games. I have no idea who made it, but it’s characterful enough to fit in with my Four Colour Supers campaign. 


Thursday 9 August 2012

The Fanno Cassa Raid (Force on Force)

My son Charlie and I finally got round to playing our first game of Force on Force some 9 months after I started the project, building an African shanty town. We played the game out of the rules called ‘A Few Blocks of Hell’ but as it was set in my fictional West African country, Zugando, we substituted the US army for SAS and Delta forces, and changed the insurgents to rebel militia and Zugando Peoples Resistance Army.

Charlie took command of the coalition Special Forces, while I played the Africans.
The main mission was for the SF to get into the target buildings (the watch tower and the ruined church) by the end of turn 4, and hold them until the end of turn 6).

SAS forces, under Captain Price, intercepted information that the PRA forces were massing for an offensive. The PRA has been stockpiling weapons and fuel in the village of Fanno Casa. Their intelligence suggests that the stockpile is in either the ruined church mission or in the guard station in the centre of the village. A squad of PRA soldiers were protecting the site from thieves, but intelligence suggest that the village also has a sizable number of militiamen loyal to the PRA who will no doubt come out to fight too.


A combined force of 18 special forces men drawn from SAS and Delta Force were tasked to locate and destroy the supply dump to delay the PRA attack. They were supported by a SAS light mortar crew firing form the jungle. They would approach the village from the south, through the jungle under the cover of darkness, and attack just before dawn. 

PRA soldiers form the 'elite' part of the rebel army

Militiamen congregate in the market place of Fanno Casa

Spud is down!
Early in the battle the Delta Force took a casualty

Captain Price leads his men onto a roof top from where they provide
overwach and he directs deadly accurate mortar fire.  

An overview of the market place of Fanno Cassa. The church and
watchtower are on the left hands side in this photograph.

The local PRA commander directs the battle from the balcony of a  small hotel,
until he is shot and wounded by one of Captain Price's team.

Having fought their way through the market place of Fanno Casa, the Delta  Force fire team
stack up on the ruined church, ready to breach. 
Following a vicious street batle the Special Forces overwhelmed the PRA men, and captured the church and eventually the watch tower. The supply dumps were destroyed and the SF were extracted by helicopter  along with five prisoners, including a PRA officer. Unfortunately two of the Delta Force were KIA and three of the SF were seriously wounded, although by delaying the PRA offensive, their sacrifice saved countless lives.