Battle Fleet Gothic

I managed to sneak in just a little bit of nerdery before the end of the holidays with a game of BFG against a friend who is getting back into it. This was my first game.

Lets just fly two fleets at each other and see what happens

Insert you own Space Balls joke

There were a lot of criticals in this game. Things started off pretty well for me, when I nailed Peter's flagship with both my nova cannons (not pictured), leaving it crippled and with its port weapons non-functional.

Things went down hill from there...

Peters bombing run strikes home

Having lost a capital ship to a cheeky bombing run I also quickly ran out of escorts.

EXPLOSIONS!

Things started to look up again after I annihilated another enemy capital, and the energies of the warp did a number on an adjacent vessel.

I finally killed Peters flagship (again not pictured) with a critical hit to the plasma reactors which this time did a lot of damage to my adjacent (and unshielded) flagship

The models are just lovely

In the end both fleets were whittled down to the point where my one capital was facing off against 2 of Peters, one of them heavily damaged.

We also broke open my new copy of Scythe, which not only lives up to the hype, but is surprisingly simple to play once you get past the bewildering number of counters and cards.

Technology cubes...

2016 roundup

2016 wasn't a great year for painting or gaming as far as I was concerned; I just had far too much on.

This year should be better though, especially since moving is out of the way and I'm not committing to Salute again.

I've certainly committed to sampling a lot of different systems this year, with Frostgrave, Kings of War, Mechwarrior, Saga, Team Yankee and a number of special ops rulesets in the pipeline.

Flames is still going to be my focus though, with the remainder of the French up first.

Things will go a little slower on All That Remains. Over the holidays I was thinking of how I can streamline and simplify both the suppression mechanic and the army building rules.

At some point during the year, I decided that keeping a record of figures in/out would be a good idea, despite some insistence that "this way madness lay."

A net of 67

I was actually doing pretty well, with the numbers neck and neck, until these babies came in...

... right before the New Year, and very, very late.

The sculpts are amazing though! These will be forming the core of any forays I make into Kings of War.

5k Flames of War battle

Some photos of other people's work to tide us over until I can post my own stuff again.

Some friends were playing a 5000pt game of Flames of War over the holidays. I turned up to spectate, at least for the first part.

Part of the Soviet force - the Shermans are proxying for more T26's

The other half - all Fearless Veterans...

Half of the German force

The other half

The Battlefield

Alex forms his favourite armoured snake on one flank

The Soviet artillery park

The battlefield post setup

Things get a bit Kursk-y

When I left, things were not going well for the Germans, having vastly underestimated the potency of the AT5 FP1+ bombardment guns. A lot of German armour went up in flames in the first turn, including the King Tiger.

I heard later that the game was called before the end of the day - the players had scheduled a second just in case. As the game setup was non-standard, they agreed that if such a game was repeated, there should be some thought put into using reserves rules in order to avoid the same thing happening again.

Flames of War - The Snows of Erzurum

We recently fought our alt-history mid war Flames of War tournament, over the oil fields of the Caucasus.

I managed to pull of a victory in my first round match, admittedly against an opponent who hadn't played in a while. It was still a close run battle.

The important part of the battle was fought along this rail line.

While my reserves advanced along it from the North

The final assaults were bloody, but well executed - especially by my standards.

We skipped the second match and decided to play a large battle royal, where British and Soviet forces managed to put aside the differences which had plagued the campaign, and faced off against three German companies.

Panorama time!

A close up of Stus massive soviet blob. I believe most of the infantry in the centre is one unit.

The whole field. Left to right, my previous opponent, another soviet player, me.

A close-up from my guns

From the German side

My paras begin their advance up the rubble strewn streets

More blobbiness on the right. Everyone was very closely packed.

The Soviets in the centre set up a firing line/meat shield.

Soviets advance on the left flank. (The red gems are SMGs)

Both armies meet in the centre of the board.

Losses begin to mount on the left flank

The centre left has a lot of clear ground

The Soviet blob seizes the centre

While my spotter (building right) calls down the pain on bunched up German troops

My advance slows to a crawl as I encounter an impenetrable looted KV1 and German infantry readying themselves in buildings

While the left flank cleans up and closes the distance

Not pictured; the German forces facing me getting nailed by British and Soviet artillery, pushed back by paras and routing piecemeal.

There were ticking victory points available throughout the battle, and although I didn't manage to contribute much in the early game, by early late game we were comfortably ahead. This, combined with the fact that I was the only one on my side to win their first round, led me to an overall win!

Swag.

On the objective I took on the last turn - mostly for showboating reasons...

1st for being more or less worthless

My troops that linked up with the Soviets on my left, in order to attack the final German troops holding the centre.

My extreme right flank; the unit that pushed through ready to attack the German rear area.

Thing a Week 21

Emergency mortars!

I realised two days ago that I was short two mortars for the company HQ attachment so I knocked these out in a few hours.

Thing a Week 20

So I managed to push out three and a half platoons in four days. I hate painting at the best of times, but more so when I have to do so industrially, under a deadline, and when it eats up my entire bank holiday.

I watched 3 seasons of Cougartown (now 100% cougar free) the latest season of Ripper Street and hours of YouTube lets plays while painting these bastards.

In any case I am now ready for our Midwar alt-history game on Saturday.

The final 2 MG's for my para MG platoon

A full 25pdr battery

I've got to interject at this point. The rifle platoon consisted of the worst moulds I have ever received from Battlefront. Details were muggy or non-existent in places - one command figure was missing his face.

Front and centre. That's not just blurriness. He has no face.

I will seriously be looking at PCS plastics when I get round to my D-Day company.

And finally some Matildas to round out the force