Monday, August 31, 2020

August Games

Games we played in August! 



Things have kind of been trailing off over the summer... hopefully things will pick up in the fall... 

Traditionally we've tried to do a game-a-day challenge in September, but there has been no discussion about that so far. Maybe I should go talk to the kids. 



Saturday, 1 August 2020


These guys... I didn't have a Wrath & Glory game together... for... y'know... reasons... but these guys just showed up anyway and we had a chat for a few hours. Seriously, don't know what I'd do without them. 


Sunday, 2 August 2020

Starting something new this month... 


For some time now Finnegan has been suggesting that he would like to have some sort of family role-playing. Amanda hs forbidden ME from running a game, so I suggested Finnegan run one for the family. As no one had any strong feelings one way or the other about WHICH game to play, I also suggested, if he was willing to run a series of one-shots of games that he or other family members were interested in trying out. So, throughout the month of August, Finnegan will run a different role-playing game for the family to try out. 

This first Sunday of the month we tried out Mouse Guard! The system is apparently based on another game called The Burning Wheel. None of us have run or played either game, so this was a bit of work. I think there are definitely some interesting concepts going on here - though there were a few things we remained confused about. I'd give it a definite "MAYBE!" - if this is what Finnegan was ultimately most interested in running and/or the rest of the family were most interested in playing, I'd totally join in. But at this point I was still looking forward to trying out the other games. 


Monday 3 August 2020 

For those that have been following for sometime and actually read posts rather than just look at the pictures (It's okay... I usually just look at the pictures, too!) you'll have no doubt read over and over and over that a basement renovation was happening by X date... and then Y date... and then... you get the picture. Amanda has decided enough is enough and has booked plumbing and heating guys to come in at the end of the month, an Electrician for September, and a contractor for the new ceiling for October... so we have DEADLINES - like EXTERNAL deadlines by which stuff MUST be done... 


On Monday, the ceiling came down in the Game Room... or... what once was, and shall some day again be The Game Room! 


Tuesday, 4 August 2020

Sidereal Confluence


I got this game as a prize at Freezerburn a couple years ago - the last time I went. As with the previous year, I ended up with the game Brent had put into the prize pool, which, I swear, he puts in there just so other people will own a game he wants to play and then has an excuse to get them to play it!

This sat on our shelf for a year and a half and then Finnegan decided to pull it down and have a read through - and got pretty excited about it and offered to run it for the family. Originally the whole family was to play, but then Keira was having a bit of a sulk and we told her to go away. 


Turned out to be a really fun game! Lots of trading and deal making involved. 

I played the Caylion Plutocracy - a plant species that doesn't move (being rooted to the ground and all) but somehow advanced to the point of being an interstellar culture...? Amanda was the KT'ZR'KT'RTL... I can't remember what they were- but they sure had a lot of colonies! Finnegan was the KJASJAVIKALIMIN... which may have been lizard people with lots of space ships. 

It apparently plays up to NINE - which would just be MAD! I definitely wanted to try with a few more, though! 

Wednesday, 5 August 2020 


No game played today, but I did spend the day building a board for the upcoming Daemon World Campaign.  (and some other terrain bits!)   


I really wanted to make something otherworldly. 


This was a lot of fun making this. 

Friday, 7 August 2020

Friday afternoon we kicked off the Daemon World Narrative 40K campaign - using the new 9th edition rules and a modified version of the new Crusade Campaign Suystem. A full report (and loads more pictures can be found elsewhere on this blog:


Keira had originally suggested Unstable Unicorns for Family Game Night... but somehow the idea of playing the Big Bang Theory Party game came up, and even Finnegan joined in. 
It is SUPER fast and is basically Apples to Apples with a bolt on Big Band Theory theme... 
It was good for a few laughs - definitely worth the $5 we paid for it at Value Village! 


Saturday, 8 August 2020 
Wrath & Glory! Had a fifth player join us - Randy - playing a Lexmechanic that isn't part of the Inquidition, he's a local that's been assigned to assist them. They continued following up leads from evidence collected from the Tatalus Alms House.... so many leads... so many threads in this intricate web of conspiracy... I swear we spend half of each session just going over what we've figured out so far!? 

We moved the game to Discord this week, and that seems to be working out really well. I think we'll stick with that. 


Sunday, 9 August 2020
For the second week of our Family RPG day on Sunday, we tried out Sentinel Comics RPG. Like Mouse Guard the week before, this seemed like a really interesting system - some really innovative, dynamic ideas going on - which I feel like I was just starting to get my head around by the end of the session. Finnegan says the six adventures in the starter kit seem like they were designed to slowly introduce all the concepts and different things you can do gradually - the Starter Kit itself seemed pretty slick - the expanded character sheets were really very handy... As with Sentinels of the Multiverse - the cooperative card game, I feel like I just don't care enough about superheroes to invest the time necessary to really figure it all out... If YOU like super heroes and role-playing, I'd definitely say Check it out! Amanda and Keira really seemed to like it, though, so I may end up having to figure it out if this is the game they decide they want to play in September. 


Monday, 10 August 2020


Daemon world Challenge #2 - today everyone was trying to desecrate each others monoliths. There was one for each of the Chaos Gods and everyone had to try to simultaneously defend their own, while vandalizing the others. 


A full report of the action can be found here: 



Thursday, 13 August 2020


Daemon World Challenge #3 - This time there was a trophy in the middle of the battlefield, protected by Flesh Hounds. 


Again, full report and more pictures can be found elsewhere:



Friday, 14 August 2020 


A THIRD game of 40K this week! Daemon World Challenge #4, wherein everyone was trying to drink of the magic pool of transformation! 

Full report of the carnage can be found here:



If that weren't enough for one day/week... Friday was originally supposed to be Family Game Night... but then the only other family member interested in playing games was Amanda. So we played a quick, two-player game of Castles of Burgundy! 


This game turned out a LOT closer than I expected - considering Amanda ended the first round with 57 points - to my 23... 

Oh, she still won... but the final score was 193-191!!!


Saturday, 15 August 2020 

I did run Wrath & Glory this week. I just didn't take a picture... The group continued with following up some investigations on Xoxigar Tertium. Then they booked passage to Xoxigar Prime - to follow up what seemed like some pretty solid leads there. They decided to do this incognito and travel under assumed identities (spice merchants!?). Part way through voyage told to turn back by Combined System Defence Fleet Command - enemy ships dropped out of the warp. They decided to play the Inquisitorial trump card and continue on anyway!


Sunday, 16 August 2020

This was supposed to be another one of Finnegan's Family RPG Nights, but it ended up being cancelled. At one point there had been discussion about trying Modern Age (modern version of Dragon Age/Fantasy Age) with a supernatural twist... but then it was going to be D&D5E with Cubicle 7's Middle Earth stuff... but then we got busy doing... Something...? There was talk of postponing it to Monday or Tuesday evening, but that didn't work out either and we decided to postpone until next Sudany. 


Monday, 17 August 2020


Daemon World Challenge #5 wherein the gang battle an assortment of Daemon Engines. 



Thursday, 20 August 2020


Thursday was the last game in the Daemon World Challenge...



In the evening we had another go at Sidereal Confluence - with two more players - Brent and Kurtis! 


I played the Caylion Plutocracy again - to see if I could finally wrap my head around how they work. I think I'm starting to figure it out - I ended up winning with 61points! 

Amanda played the Im'Dril Nomads - one of hte more challengind species and did really well with them, ending the game with 50.5 points! 



Finnegan decided to play the Kjasjavikalimm Directorate again - as he was teaching the game to two new people again, he decided to stick with what he knew. Despite having some familiarity with them, he had a hard time focusing on what he was really supposed to do (partly because everyone was bombarding him with questions about their own stuff...). He ended up in last place with 31.5 points

Brent played the Faderan Conclave. I can't mremem ber what their deal was...  He ended with 42 points. 

Kurtis played the Kt'Zr'KtRtl - which Amanda has played in our previous game. he came in second with 53.


Friday 21 August 2020

Finnegan has been really involved in Four Against Darkness for the last year or so. The game is a sort of a solo, dungeon-bashing game, where you make up four characters and take them through a series of dungeons randomly generated with loads and loads of tables. I can't remember when, but I picked up the original book for him a few years back and he's just run with it, picking up almost all of them as print editions. He's gotten really involved in the facebook group as well, and has even helped with playtesting and proofreading some of the more recent books! (he's his name in Wayfarers and AdventurersGreedy Gifts of the Guildmasters, and Fortress of the Warlord - and he's currently playtesting and helping out with at least a half-dozen others!) 

This Friday evening, one of the writers invited Finnegan - and a few others in the group - to play a game of Four Against Darkness as a regular Role-playing Game, online, with five others... so.. I guess it was SIX Against Darkness. They played on Discord. Sounded like they had a lot of fun. 


Saturday, 22 August 2020

Wrath & Glory again! 


As this weeks game invovled a space battle... I tried playing that out with Battlefleet Gothic - with one of our computers pointed at the game table... There's actually a full report of the game elsewhere:



Sunday, 23 August 2020 

Again we'd planned to do the Cubicle 7/Middle Earth/D&D5E thing... but again it was cancelled as we were busy trying to get things ready for the Plumbing and heating guys that were coming in just over a week.

Like, TODAY, the day I'm writing this! 

In fact we decided to put the whole Family RPG night on Hiatus until September to get some work done on the basement. 


The rest of the week I was wrecking stuff in the basement and cleaning it all up again and shuffling stuff in the basement from room ot room or about the house to make space for the plumbing and heating work... 


Friday, 28 August 2020 


Finnegan got in another game of 4-6 Against Darkness this week. Seems like this might become a regular thing! 


Saturday , 29 August


Finnegan's been running a D&D5E campaign since January. it started off with the same group of people that had finished up a previous D&D campaign at the end of last year, which was mostly the same people that had played in his Dungeon Crawl Classics game the previous year. 

The game changed over the year. Keira dropped out. Then the game went online when everyone went into isolation due to the Pandemic in March... then two of the players dropped out - mostly because Finnegan had to keep KICKING them out of the game because they were just too disruptive. Over the summer he's been trying to wrap up the campaign so he could start something new... Tehre was one last session to play ... but then one of the players just stopped showing up - said he "forgot" there was a game (because there was just SO MUCH OTHER STUFF GOING ON IN ISOLATION!?) and they kept waiting and waiting for a weekend when he'd show up to play the last game - sometimes they did something elese, sometimes they just cancelled... Eventually he admitted he just wasn't interested anymore and dropped out... a game he'd been playing in weekly since January... that he skipped otehr things to play in...  seems like watching every episode of an entire TV series... but then not bothering to watch the Series Finale!? But Whatevs... THEN he had trouble with the remaining two not being able to show up one week or another through August...!? 

FINALLY, on this, the LAST Saturday in August, he finished up the campaign with an epic battle against the Big Bad Guy - which wrapped up the campaign nice and neatly with a Total Party Kill... (The character of the dude who dropped out was the first to die!) 

They are already discussing what they might do for the fall. They are considering playing the Dresden Files Role-Playing Game - and Keira is even considering rejoining! It'll be exciting to see what they come up with. One of the current players has a friend that might be joining. Finnegan could be running a game for four girls. He's, like, seriously, living my teenage dream!? If another joins he might run TWO games - one D&D, one Dresden Files - with some of them playing in two games... 


GAME PLAN

One more month of the 2020-Q3 Game Plan... looking back at that... well... Things were pretty up in the air in June. Nothing was concrete. I'd suggested playing 5 games each of:

Warhammer Quest: Blackstone Fortress
Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay: Wrath & Glory
#New40K
OTHER GW/40K games (Necromunda, Kill Team, Aeronautica Imperialis)
(Some other To Be Determined Board Game?)

So far In July and August I've played...

Warhammer 40,000 (Eighth Edition)x 8
Warhammer 40,000 (Ninth Edition) x8
Wrath & Glory x6
The Big Bang Theory: The Party Game x3
Sidereal Confluence: Remastered Edition x2
Abyss x1
Battlefleet Gothic x1
The Castles of Burgundy x1
Century: Golem Edition x1
Dogs x1
Monarch x1
Mouse Guard Roleplaying Game x1 
Sentinel Comics: The Roleplaying Game x1
Star Trek: Five-Year Mission x1
Terraforming Mars x1

So... definitley got the #New40K an dWrath & Glory locked down... the other stuff... not so much... I mean, two more rounds of Big Bang Theory could finish off the "Some other To Be Determined Board Game"... Or... I could just say "Hey, I played five other board games"... and call it DONE! 

Blackstone Fortress was put on hiatus over the summer, initially so Amanda could work on some Yoga stuff on Monday evenings... which... didn't happen... and then in stayed on hiatus... because... renovations... though it's not like we were doing much of THAT on Monday evenings, per se... The plan IS to pick it up again in the fall - and I DO have Spousal Approval to go and pick up Warhammer Quest: Blackstone Fortress – Ascension - the FINAL expansion for Warhammer Quest: Blackstone Fortress, in expectation that we will finish playing through the remainign campaigns this fall and winter. So... we COULD conceivably get through five games in September. 

Other GW/40K games... boggeddown on the Aeronautica Imperialis and never quite finished off the Ork Dakkajets... I DID try out Battlefleet Gothic! Not sure I'm going to get in 5 more games of that. I COULD get in a mix of Kill Team and Necromunda through September... or I could just say the OTHER 40K game was 8th edition... and call that done too! 

Whatever happens, SOME games will be played in September. I have a feeling there will be some more 40K9E - as finnegan's gotten excited about the idea of getting a Crusade game going on - with his Death Watch! There will definietly be some more Wrath & glory. I hope we get back to playing Blackstone Fortress... but who knows... Things are STILL really up in the air - with isolation carrying on - and likely to ramp up as I expect a huge spike in cases here in Saskatchewan with kids all going back to school with alarmingly little guidance from our Provincial Government. (The schoolboards are doing the best they can, but without guidance - or support - from the government... I don't know... it doesn't look good...). 

The painting station has been shut down and I'm not sure if I'll be doing much painting at all over the next month or so, until the renovations in the basement stop and I can set up down there again - note, I didn't say "complete"... There is still so much more that needs to be doen down there... but we are getting SOEM of it done now, and the rest... well... that'll be for another year - once the ceiling is back in again (In October some time!) we'll be able to move all the stuff back down there again and start the process of sorting it all out. 

Might be December before it's really all set up for gaming and painting... 


Coming Soon to Tim's Minaiture Wargaming Blog:

Maybe soem games... I don't know... 

Sunday, August 23, 2020

The Battle off Xoxigar Prime

I've been running a Wrath & Glory game for the last few months on Saturday evenings for friends now living across Canada (and more recently the U.S. too!). The campaign is taking place in the same setting I've been using for a number of my narrative 40K games; The Xoxigar System. They are Inquisition Acolytes working for an Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor who sent them there after an Adeptus Arbites contact had sent a message suggesting he'd stumbled onto some evidence of potential HERESY!

They've been mostly working on Xoxigar Tertium, but last week they decided to head to Xoxigar Prime to follow up on yet another lead in what it turning out to be a bewildering web of deceit and corruption! They actually tried to do this incognito, booking passage under false identities on a bulk hauler.  Part way there, however, they were informed that the CSDFC (Combined System Defence Fleet Command) had ordered the ship to turn back and return to Xoxigar Tertium. Certain that this was a sign that something was up, they playing the Inquisitorial Trump Card and did some questioning and discovered hostile ships had dropped out of the Warp and were headed to Xoxigar Prime. Even MORE certain that this was all part of the plot, they countermanded the CSDFC order and continued on their merry way. 

Originally it was thought they would get there well in advance of the intruders, but after a day or so, the Auspex reports from the CSDFC were suggesting otherwise... 

I've had a copy of the Battlefleet Gothic rules for... oh... a decade or more and always wanted to try them out... and I figured NOW was the time! 

Of course, as the game is played online, this presented some challenges. 

It probably would have been smarter to just play it out on Roll20 or some other online virtual tabletop with it all laid out with counters and on a black or starry background... But I'm never one to tale the smarter/easier path when miniatures could be involved!? 

Part way through the journey the transport they were on was joined by a small escort vessel - the Sword of Damocles. A small squadron of three other escorts were en route to meet them; The Thone's Revenge, the Carbine of the Catechism, and the Light of the Emperor - bold names for small escort vessels (destroyers and frigates)!  

 Arrayed against this small force was a Chaos Cruiser - The Discordant - and three escort raiders; the Decadent, the Dissident, and the Despondent - the Dentite Squadron! (Little "in-joke" involved there - early in the campaign, Christian's character Basileus got a complication on a roll to determine the purpose of a machine. The machine was a medical scanner that the baddies were using to scan locales passing by for some sort of medical information - but Basileus mistook it for a Dental Scanner and has since been certain that the conspiracy is a plot to ruin the dental health of the citizens of the system and possibly the imperium - he has dubbed this cult "The Dentites"... so when I told them that the squadron that had arrived was called The Dentites he shouted "I KNEW IT!")

Teh Transport and the Sword of Damocles approach Xoxigar Prime.  

The Dentite Squadron pealed off from the Cruiser and angled to meet the approaching Imperial Navy squadron. Volleys of weapon battery and lance fire were exchanged, torpedoes launched. 

Ground-based fighter and bomber squadrons from Xoxigar Prime were launched and went after the Squadron of Escorts as we figured they would have little chance of doing much damage to the Cruiser (we later discovered I'd misread how bombers worked and realized they really COULD do some serious damage to cruisers!)

Fighter squadrons, launched from the Discordant, engage the Imperial fighters in a desperate dogfight in space! One squadron of bombers slipped through, though. All of the others were destroyed or returned to their respective bases for repair, refueling or rearming. 

The transport and it's escort get closer. 

The first ship casualty - the Throne's Revenge - was taken out of action by torpedoes from one of the Despondent. 

the remaining members of the Imperial Navy squadron have their revenge - lance batteries from the Carbine of the Catechism sliced the Despondent in two while the weapons batteries of the Light of Terra pound into the wreckage from the other side. 

The bomber squadron from Xoxigar Prime catches up with The Dissident and delivers a crippling blow! 

More fighters and bombers launched from Xoxigar Prime.  This time they are going after the cruiser! 

The Transport and the Sword of Damocles making their approach to enter orbit around Xoxigar Prime. 

The Discordant failed to launch its fighters to counter the Imperial ones launched from Xoxigar Prime, but they made some lucky shots with their point-defence turrets and took out the bombers! 

The Transport made it into orbit around Xoxigar Prime and the Sword of Damocles continued around the planet to take a few pot-shots at the cruiser. After unloading one volley and realizing there was NOTHING they could do on their own that would have any hope of even lightly damaging the cruiser, they turned adn ran! 

The battle between the escorts continues out in space. The Carbine of the Catechism and the Light of Terra try to turn and chase down The Decadent. 

But the Decadent caught the Light of Terra in its sights and launched a spread of torpedoes which destroyed the Light of Terra!

The Carbine of the Catechism crossed the rear of the Decadent and shredded it with fire from it's lance batteries. 

The Sword of Damocles heads for deep space to rendezvous with the Carbine of the Catechism - and escape the wrath of the Chaos cruiser. 

The Discordant also dropped into orbit around Xoxigar Prime opposite the transport (the look closer here because the transport just finished its move in orbit - the cruiser, on its turn, would move around to the other side before the shooting phase). 

The player's characters boarded a small Arvis Lighter and made planetfall. Thankfully, due to a number of command failures aboard the Discordant, the chaos cruiser did NOT launch any more fighters - which would have spelled the doom of the characters in their light, unarmoured, unarmed transport to the surface. I guess the crew on the Discordant were busy doing... whatever it is that worshipers of Slaanesh do...? 

The Transport then blasted out of orbit and made a run for it! The Sword of Damocles and the Carbine of the Catechism, after checking for survivors among the wreckage of their sister ships, caught up with the transport to escort it back to Xoxigar Tertium. 

The Chaos Cruiser did not blast the Knights compound from orbit, they simply launched a few dropships and then left orbit - to see what they might find among the wreckage of their own escorts. 

As the Characters approached their destination, they started to wonder if they'd fallen out of the fire pan and into the fire. They'd survived the space battle - only to discover a ground battle taking place where they were hoping to land! Contact was eventually made with ground forces and a platoon of Valhallans stationed on the planet cleared and secured a landing zone for them. Teh Valhallans were VERY disappointed to discover that the ship that contacted them was NOT a drop ship full of reinforcements! 

And that's where we left it off! 

As I said... it probably would have worked out better doing this on Roll20 - as I'm not sure how well the players were able to SEE much of the action. Ah, well... 

I do like Battlefleet Gothic. I'd love to play it some more - wether using it to play out future space engagements in the campaign or other battles in the Xoxigar system - but I could probably do with a few more IMPERIAL ships! And I won't be picking them up any time soon... 


Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog: 

Might be a week before I post anything else as we are ramping up the work in the basement - as I type this Amanda is giving me the stink-eye for not being down there right now working on it - plumbing and heating guys are showing up a week from tomorrow, she keeps reminding me!