January Games

Whoopsie! Forgot to finish this up earlier this week... Here's what I got up to through the month of January...

Sunday, 1 January 2023

Kicked off 2023 the way we ended 2022 with a couple games of Splendor

Amanda won the first game, we BOTH got to 15 in the same round, but she did it with fewer development cards. 

The second game I won... by, like, LOTS... I ended the game with 19!? And took three top row development cards - which is unheard of, I usually just grab LOTS of the bottom row cards and get points from patrons... 

Keiran was especially excited because the last four games they've scored 10, 11, 12, 13, respectively. They see a trend developing and figure after their next game they are due to WIN again! 

Thursday-Friday, 5/6 January 2023

Finnegan ran another annual Birthday-RPG adventure for friends from the two weekly games he runs and even past players. This ended up being run over two days - five players ended up being involved - four each session (both days one player could not make it) (one is hiding off to the right) 

They are just a fantastic group of young humans that have been playing together for... three...? FOUR years now..? Some of them even longer, I think...?! They survived playing online through a few years of the pandemic. Two of them have even moved away for post-secondary school and are no longer involved in the current weekly games, but stayed in town few days extra, after returning for the holidaze to visit family, just to play in the Birthday Game!?

So thrilled this young man has found his element - and his people....

On the Friday evening, I made pizza and cupcakes for all (and veggie-pig-in-a-buns for Finnegan - his favourite meal, ever!?)

Saturday, 7 January 2023

Splendor again with Amanda and Keiran. Just made it to 15, Keiran and Amanda both ended with 14. I could have waited another round and picked up a different card (which had been my plan) which would have brought me to 17, but then realized how close Amanda and Keiran were and worried one of them might pick up a 5-point card and rocket past me! So I just ended it with 15 while I was ahead! 

Saturday, 14 January 2023

After years of meaning to try it out, I finally got around to playing a game of One-Hour Wargames by Neil Thomas.

There is a full report of the game here:

One Hour Wargames - Back of Beyond

So fun was this, I immediately set about organizing up an online campaign loosely based on a Back of Beyond Campaign I ran over a decade ago - but using rules based on De Bellis Antiquitatis! 

Saturday, 21 January 2023

I played the first game in the Back of Beyond Campaign: The Battle of Engelsk.

Sunday, 22 January 2023

Sunday I played the next two battles for the campaign. 

The Battle of Bashkent

The Battle of Stlojia 

You can read all about the first week/season of the campaign - including more details about the weekends battles on the game report:

Back of Beyond Campaign - Winter 1917

Saturday, 28 January 2023

I managed to get BOTH games for the next weeks of the campaign in on Saturday! 

The Second Battle of Stlojia

The Second Battle of Englesk

Again, a summary of the second week/season of the campaign can be found here:

Back of Beyond Campaign - Spring 1918

and that was it...

Games were played... 

• One-Hour Wargames x6
• Splendor x3

Well, I knocked off the One-Hour Wargames element of the Q1 Challenge. Not getting many OTHER games in, though... 

Genestealer Cultists

These are actually Finnegan's figures. He's picked up a few Genestealter Cult minis over the last year. He started with the Deathwatch: Overkill boardgame/box set, which he picked up at the Sentry Box in Calgary. Later, when the new Kill Team game came out, I gave him the Genestealer Cult Kill Team from the core box I'd picked up. He's done nothing with them since.

Recently, I convinced him to assemble a few and I thought I'd experiment with the new Contrast® Paints on a few. Once I figured out a quick way to do them I sat down and we tried to bang out a squad of them one afternoon. They've been sitting the last few weeks, languishing in a state of ever-so-nearly-completed. So, this afternoon, I decided to just finish them off for him. They only needed a few touch-ups - a few spots that were missed and a couple things that needed metallic paint...



Genestealer Kult Gang/Kill Team from Games Workshop/Citadel Miniatures.

I have no idea how many points these are or if it is enough to make use of as either a Kill Team or a Gang for Necromunda. But it's a START! Hopefully he'll sit down and cost them out and figure out if he needs any more before the Necromunda campaign(s) I'm starting at the end of August!

He's also got all the Pure Strain Genestealers from Space Hulk he could use with these...


Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog:

I should be able to finish up my own Adeptus Arbites in the next day or so, just a few finishing touches needed on them!

After that...? I've tried to arrange all the odd and sundry bits crowding my workbench into something resembling a queue of sorts - so I can focus on one thing at a time and get them DONE! So, after the Arbites (and the Delaque Leader, who is also very nearly done) I'm hoping to finish up some Escher Gangers, a handful of Spyrers, Karloth Valois and some zombies, four Howling Banshees, four Steel Legionaires, a few Underhive Scum and Bounty Hunters, some Asuryani Warlocks and Guardian gunners, two Imperial Assasins, John's Space Rats, Goblin Wizards, and some Dwarves and Skaven for Warhammer Underworlds....

Oh, and there are an assortment of Imperial Guard items that seem to  be one the workbench and I just can't seem to bring myself to put them away into storage, including; a half-dozen Commissars, a Tallarn Mortar Squad (to finish up a Spearhead Detachment of them!), Assorted Valhallans, a dozen Catachans (to COMPLETELY finish off that entire force... again... it's been re-orged slightly for Apocalypse gaming!), MORE Tallarn vehicles (Taurox and four or five Leman Russ tanks).

Space Hulk: Exterminate

On Sunday, Finnegan set up a game of Space Hulk for us to play while Amanda and The Girl were out. We had another go at Scenario #3: Exterminate. We played this back in August with me playing the Blood Angels Terminators and Finnegan playing the Genestealers. This time we switched things up and I played the Genestealers and he played the Terminators.

SCENARIO

This scenario is played in up to fifteen rounds. To win the Genestealers have to kill all the Marines before the end of round fifteen. For the Marines to win, they have to either kill all Genestealers by the end of round fifteen or clear the board and be in position to block genestealers from coming onto the board (if a marine is positioned within 6 spaces of a Genestealer entry point, no Genestealers may be brought on at that point.


FORCES

The Genestealers started with two blips on the table and got two per turn until they run out (10 turns - as there are 22 blip tokens).

The Marines get one squad of five terminators including
Sergeant Gideon (Thunder Hammer and Storm Shield)
Brother Leon (Assault Cannon and Power Fist)
Brother Noctis (Stormbolter and Power Fist)
Brother Scipio (Stormbolter and Power Fist)
Brother Omnio (Stormbolter and Power Fist)


THE GAME



The Lad getting things set up.



Battle Brothers Scipio and Omnio detect movement in their zone and set up overwatch positions.



Sergeant Gideon figures he and Brother Leon have things locked down in their sector and sends Brother Noctis to help Brothers Scipio and Omnio.



The Genestealers make their move - Brother Scipio mows them down with his storm bolter!



Detecting movement in their sector, Sergeant Gideon and Battle Brother Leon set up defensive positions.



"Prepare yourself, Brother! The enemy comes!" 



Brother Scipio is overwhelmed and lost...



Brother Omnio is also taken down just as Brother Noctis arrives. His situation looks dire.



After felling a half-dozen of the foul Genestealers, Sergeant Gideon is lost and Brother Leon is all alone in his sector....



This is less than halfway through the 15 turns, and I'm still getting reinforcements. I though the game would be all over... But Brother Leon held on - he began marching up and down the corridor - blasting all in his path...



...before turning and blasting all the Genestealers sneaking up behind him...



Genestealers coming at Brother Noctis from two directions!



Click! Click! Click! Brother Noctis' stormbolter jams!!



Brother Noctis quickly cleared the jam and tried to back into a room, so as to form a bottleneck through which the Genestealers would have to come at him one at a time.



Though he stood his ground bravely and slew many (well... a few...) Genestealers, Brother Noctis was eventually overwhelmed.



So it all came down to Brother Leon. AT this point, Finnegan's best hope was to bring it to a draw by surviving to the end of Turn 15... I think, at this point, we were at Turn Nine...



Bother Leon's Assault Cannon Buzzed loudly as it mowed down entire lines of Genestealers.



Having finished off Bother Noctis, the remaining Genestealers from that sector start moving up towards Brother Leon.



BZZZZZZZZT! Another line of Genestealers are mowed down in one direction, while another group tries to sneaky up behind Bother Leon....



Then Brother Leon turns to deal with those that would attack him from behind...



There were more than a few times I thought he was done for, but he just kept mowing down all that stood before him... !



Getting low on ammunition, and the genestealers just keep coming!

 

CLICK! CLICK! CLICK! CLICK! Eventually Brother Leon ran out of ammo for his assault cannon and the Genestealers finally got him!! I think it was Turn Thirteen!



In the game I believe 27 genestealers were killed - and Brother Leon accounted for 18 of those! I had only six left when we finally finished him off!

Another hard scenario for the Marines!


Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog: 

Things have been dragging on the painting front. I haven't been super motivated to do much - a little tuned out from the last couple months of frenetic painting! I did finally assemble the Gellerpox Infected from the Rogue Trader Box and Magos Dalathrust, which I picked up, along with the Commanders Expansion for Kill Team on Saturday. I also have one of John's warbands for Shadespire on the workbench, which has been sitting half-painted for months now...

I've been wanting to get a little campaign for Kill Team started up, but life just keeps getting in the way. If not earlier, perhaps on Friday (If Wrath & Glory doesn't show up - the owner of my FLGS said he was given next Friday as a release date!!)

We have gotten in a few other games - so in a week I'll probably post a report of the other games we've played this month.

40K Day with The Boy

No, not THAT kind of 40K...

...THIS kind of 40K!

In other news... I did finish up the cavalry for my Scots Government/Covanenteer force. I've also finished up a bunch of 70s/80s British and some armed civilians/insurgent types. I'll hopefully get to posting some pictures of those later today or tomorrow.