December 2019 Games

PART ONE - BEFORE the HOLIDAZE

December got off to a slow start...



But there was enough stuff going on that I'm going to separate this month into two parts: pre-Holidaze, and HOLIDAZE! As HOLIDAZE officially begins this afternoon, this is what we got up to so far this month...


Sunday, 1 December 2019

I did kick off the month with a game of Necromunda..



Brent came by and tried the game out. You can read all about the game here:

El-Akarm Market Massacre

I'd hoped that this would be an EVERY SUNDAY thing... but have only gotten in games two of the four Sundays (so far!) this month. On the 8th we all had tickets to ELF! The Musical at the Persephone Theatre. All their musicals are just wonderful...

And Finnegan did get in a bunch of D&D games...

There was his bi-weekly Tuesday game on the 3rd (of which the last few sessions had been cancelled for one reason or another, so this was the first time they'd gotten together in over a month)


Friday, 6 December 2019



Friday evening he ran a one-shot for a friend and his son and the son of ANOTHER friend while Amanda and I were out. (This and all his D&D games aren't on the calendar above, because I don't log HIS games - not the ones I'm not playing in, at least!)


Saturday, 7 December 2019



Saturday afternoon he ran his regular game...



There was an epic sea battle/boarding action - which required busting out my half-built ships...



It looked like everyone was having fun.


Friday, 13 December 2019

The weekend of Friday the 13th is when things really got going for us...

well...

sort of...



Brent and Barb came by for supper and games. We ended up playing three rounds of Marrying Mr. Darcy - which was really fun, because I don't think we've gotten to play that all year..?



In the first round I played Lizzy Barret - but did NOT get to marry Mr. Darcy because my absolutely horrid sister, Jane (played by Barb), stole him away early in the game with a surprise engagement and I was left with Mr. Denny... Amanda played Georgiana Darcy - and married Mr. Wickham - much to the horror of her brother! Brent played my dear friend Charlotte Lucas, who did very well for herself and married Colonel Fitzwilliam! (Barb won the game - with 25 points)



In the second game I played Georgiana Darcy and (AGAIN!) she was wed to Mr. Wickham - with a scandalous elopement! I thought I did very well for myself scoring 27 points! But I was edged out by Barb, who again won - with 29 points! She'd been playing Elizabeth Barret and DID get to marry my brother, Mr. Darcy! It was a SUPER tight game, though - Amanda also scored 27 points - playing Lydia Barret and marrying Mr. Denny, and Brent was only just behind us with 26 points - having played Caroline Bingley and marrying Colonel Fitzwilliam!



In the third round we played with the Emma expansion. I have not read Emma - and am not terribly familiar with the story... (I feel like I HAVE read Pride and Prejudice... I know I've read one or two of Austen's books at one point or another... but mostly I remember the movie - with Keira Knightly -  and a stage play that was put on by a local theatre company a couple years ago). I played Harriet Smith, Amanda played Miss Bates, Brent played Anne Taylor, and Barb Played Emma Woodhouse. Now, this was just the first time we played it... but it seemed a just little like Emma really had things stacked in her favour... maybe it was just how all the cards played out...? I'll have to watch for that in future games and, if it happens again, know that the others really need to keep a watch on her and GANG UP!!!

As it turns out both Amanda and I ended up OLD MAIDS, scoring 15 and 23 points respectively (Miss Bates, played by Amanda - actually gets a few bonus points if she ends up an old maid - other wise we'd have been a bit close!) Brent managed to get Anne Taylor married off to Mr. Elton - and scored 21 points. But Barb won big, again, marrying Emma off to a certain Mr. knightly for a whopping 32 points!

I'd forgotten how fun this game can be - especially if playing with other people that are really INTO IT! We'll have to try and get this into more regular rotation!

Still haven't tried out the Undead expansion!


Saturday, 14 December 2019



Finnegan ran his regular D&D game in the afternoon. This week it was ALL THE GIRLS!? The party continued their journey by sea to the Island where the entire campaign is to reach it's ultimate conclusion.

In the evening, we had more friends over for supper and games. This time Amanda had invited one of her co-workers, Kathleen, and her sister Maureen.



We started off teaching them to play 7 Wonders. I played Babylone, Kathleen played Ephesos, Amanda played Giza, and Maureen played Rhodes. Maureen was just crushing it with the military - I totally thought she might win her very first game!



But then... SCIENCE! It really adds up!! I ended up winning - by just a few points (55). Amanda and Maureen were tied at 48, and Kathleen was just a bit behind at 37



WE played again and I decided to try something new - Stonehenge! I've never played it before. Amanda and Kathleen just flipped their Wonder cards and played on the B side and maureen just played Rhodes A again.

Stonehenge is kind of interesting... and tricky. When I pointed out that the third stage of my wonder gave me points for every stone I had (which, for some reason, didn't actually help me BUILD any part of my wonder!? Stonehenge is built of clay, Wood, Ore Papyrus and textiles, I guess...?) I guess everyone decided to not let me get any Stone - they also burried or discarded any science that came their way, suspecting I might do science again (seriously, there was hardly ANY science out there at the end of the game). I still won... well... tied with Amanda at 49. Kathleen was at 34 and Maureen was at 28 this time! (Both Amanda and I built up some actual military this time!)

Still, seemed like they really enjoyed it and were even talking about picking it up for themselves!



Afterwards we played Marrying Mr. Darcy - which is always great fun - but even more fun when people are really into it, and Maureen is a Jane Austen fan! I played Jane Bennet and Maureen played my sister Elizabeth. Kathleen played Lizzie's friend Charlotte Lucas, and Amanda played Caroline Bingley. Early in the game I had an elopement Mr. Wickham - which I got out of by discarding a pile of Character cards, I then was offered a surprise proposal from Mr. Darcy... which is stupidly TURNED DOWN, thinking I might still have a chance at landing the lovely Mr. Bingley! In the end I married... Mr. Collins.... Ended the game with a grand total of 15 points...

Amanda did even worse with Caroline Bingley - she ended up an Old Maid after turning down Mr. Wickham and scored only 13. Kathleen, playing Charlotte Lucas managed to marry Mr. Denny and scored 18 points. Maureen was the big winner landing Mr. Darcy and scoring 37 points!!! THIRTY SEVEN!!! Almost as much as the rest of us combined!!

I don't know why we don't play this game more!

Seriously, if you know any Jane Austen fans that don't really play games, but you'e LIKE them to start playing games - THIS is the one to get them playing!

Sunday, 15 December 2019



I actually had THREE people come over to play necromunda on Sunday evening!? You can read all about that game here:

The Ratskin Hoarde


Friday, 20 December 2019

Not a game, per se, but game-nerdy and mostly game buddies were invited... The kids and I Performed our Second (Hopefully) Annual Very Scary Solstice Concert (okay, it TECHNICALLY wasn't solstice until Saturday, but the kids wanted to do it Friday night so they could play their D&D game on Saturday without me rushing around like a Mad Bastard trying to clean up things around them...)

The concert is basically a bunch of traditional Xmas Carols arranged for two violins and a cello, with... alternative lyrics... based on the writings of Howard Phillip Lovecraft. A couple years ago we bought CDs and Song Books from the HPL Historical Society.

Last year we did two concerts - one Very Scary Solstice Concert and a second one two days later for people interested in singing traditional carols. The first was well attended and quite a riot - people singing and laughing. Only my family showed up for the second... and my sister wouldn't even sing. So the kids decided they only wanted to do ONE concert this year.



Some homemade cookies baked just for the occasion.



Cthulhu Cookies - Made by Keira.



Elder Sign Cookies - also made by Keira.



Us, playing the concert.

Over TWENTY people showed up and crammed themselves into our living and dining rooms. We ended up having to set up in the space between the two rooms - which was a little bit awkward... but worked out well enough in the end.

Again it was a riot of laughter and singing. I hope I can convince the kids to do it again next year!


Saturday, 21 December



Finnegan ran the final session in his D&D5E campaign that he's been running every Saturday since the beginning of September. All but one was able to make it! (He's actually been running RPGs for this group since the beginning of January - but it was Dungeon Crawl Classics to start with).

I think he originally intended for the campaign to run a little longer, but recognized there were some major problems with how was going and the group dynamic and after much thinking and postulating and bouncing ideas off of me, he decided to wrap it up - HARD REBOOT! Start again in the new year.

He had, briefly, even considered trying a completely new game system in the new year, but had decided to stick with D&D for now...



the final showdown with the big boss baddies.



It was pretty epic.


Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog:

In a week and a bit I'll have December Games Part Two - a wrap up of the rest of the month. Also around that time I'll have my traditional retrospective - looking back at the last year. Also I've been doing a lot of planning for 2020 - or, at least, the First Quarter of it! I also still have three posts about three of the Necromunda gangs I still need to finish up and post!? In addition to all that, I've been painting up Hellboy Miniatures - and am almost done enough to start playing TOMORROW!!!

For those celebrating Xmas today and tomorrow... and possibly the rest of the week - I hope you all have a very merry one. For those that aren't - I hope you all have an equally fabulous week/rest of your year!