Gen Con 50 museum stuff

I thought this little "museum" of gaming history was kind of cool.
It was a little showcase of gaming through the ages and a rough history of  Gen Con.

However, seeing some of the games displayed made me feel old and drug up a lot of nostalgia.

Not sure who this sleepy guy is, but it he is huge.

Another horror icon gone......

Well another fan favorite horror director has passed.

Tobe Hooper.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Life Force and Poltergeist; three movies that he was a part of. Three movies that are favorites of mine. They all get air time in my house at least once every year.

Gen Con 2017 painting competition

A collection of the pretties that people painted for judging.

Star Wars tabletop mini game?

I see this at the Fantasy Flight booth.

What?

Why?

What?

A tabletop mini Star Wars wargame with pre-painted models?

What?

I don’t get this. I mean there is Imperial Assault which is already a strategy boardgame using Star Wars people places and know characters.

Now they are putting out a tabletop miniature wargame that isn’t X-Wing?

I get that they have a license and are using it for everything they can.

I get that Star Wars is popular.

I get that this will make money as it fulfills fans of Star Wars and mini wargames.

It does seem a bit off that this will probably cut into their Imperial Assault sales. I mean if I knew this was in the pipes a year plus ago, then I would have passed on Imperial Assault and just waited for Legion.

Sadly, I will not be getting this game as I have too much stuff to play already and Fantasy Flight has pillaged my wallet enough with tiny ships and models.

Gen Con 2017 Starfinder demo

Alright, Lew and myself got a demo of Starfinder in on Friday.

It was exactly what I thought it would be.

Alright so Starfinder. We sit down with four other people for a party of six. We are the only two at the table who have no real grasp of the Pathfinder system, but rolling a D20 is standard stuff.

I play some sort of bug, who happens to be the healer. At first I grabbed the little rat guy with a remote drone. Then I paused and asked if anyone else wanted to try this guy. Yes, I was hoping for a nope. Instead I got a guy who wanted to use it. I should have just held on to it, but I didn’t want to be “that guy” at the demo. Lew is some alien with four arms who was….I have no idea what class this thing was.

We were thrown into a scenario to retrieve Starfinder badges for some reason. We had no idea what that was about, nor was it explained to us. I guess everyone else knows about this kind of shit from playing Pathfinder? Do they hunt for Pathfinder badges?

Anyway we found those with a seamless and pretty pointless bit of dialogue with a space lizard guy. Then we were sent to look into rat men who were using dead bodies as fertilizer in some sort of greenhouse. I guess fertilizer is hard to come by on a space station. Oh and there was an undead lady who was involved with all this and the badges too. Why? Why not? The whole plot was skimmed over really fast and this is all I really remember about it.

So we go check out this greenhouse place and find the undead lady and some gardeners. They attack us and we have our combat encounter.

The tank is a lizard guy and he dives into melee combat. The rest of us hang back and shoot laser guns. It was now that the guy running the game said the lizard guy was the first to go down in all the games so far. Well I took that as a challenge. The bug cleric was not going to let that happen!

Lew did this attunement bit that let him do extra fire damage because four arm aliens do this. Well that or pull people toward them, which is what every other player had done so far according to our DM/GM or whatever they are officially called. We both were confused about why not choose to do more damage instead of movement shenanigans, but what do we know. We are D&D guys in a Pathfinder/Starfinder game.

We kill the undead lady and two of the three gardeners and win the scenario. I keep the lizard guy alive, so screw you guy running the game!

Gen Con stuff from the floor

Pics from the Privateer Press booth.

Soon to be out on table trolls.

Gen Con 2017 Loot

Well another long weekend of gaming, eating, walking and shopping.

The only 50th Anniversary button worth getting.

 My small pile of loot.

An adorable Friday 13th T-shirt.

Two monster/scenario packs for Shadows of Brimstone.

A new hero for Brimstone.

A new set of heroes for Last Night on Earth.

A box of Swine Cursed for Farrow "counts as."

A Death Star Droid pop to add to the collection.

I bought the stuff I was hoping to get and just a couple other bits.

A very low cost Gen Con for me.

I'll get more pics up tomorrow, that is if my dark powers don't manifest during the eclipse today......

Gen Con 2017- short term goals and plans

Starfinder

“Take your favorite fantasy RPG to the stars! Set thousands of years in Pathfinder's future, Starfinder is a stand-alone roleplaying game evolved from the Pathfinder rules and designed to bring you a whole new universe of science fantasy adventures. Play alien races both new and familiar as you explore the mysteries of a weird galaxy. Will you be an android assassin fulfilling corporate contracts, or a plucky ratfolk mechanic? A spellhacking lashunta technomancer, or a rakish human pilot? Uncountable worlds are waiting for you and your intrepid crew!”

Well that is a description with a lot of words that mean nothing to me. As a D&D guy I have no clue about the Pathfinder worlds. I did try it once and wasn’t super impressed. Since everyone said it was D&D 3.5, it turned me away quite easily. 3.5 to many was the pinnacle of the game. 3.5 for me was too much skill, modifier, rule and book bloat. Pathfinder, after a long demo adventure had a similar feel of modifier and skill check bloat but with less books.

Starfinder will probably be the same, but I really would like a good dice rolling sci-fi RPG. I have tried……

Star Wars from Fantasy Flight is too narrative and their dice are beyond stupid. I know people love it, but after two tries I would never want to run it and didn’t love playing it.

Shadow Run is just a mess. A great sci-fi universe, but the rule system is beyond clunky and feels pretty unfriendly to new players.

My scope of sci-fi RPG is limited, but so are the mainstream choices.

Maybe Starfinder will be neat.

Maybe it will just be pathfinder in space and I already can guess that outcome.

Maybe I’ll tire of waiting in a line, skip the game and forget about it.

I know that they are running demos all weekend and it will probably be stupid busy, but I am hoping to get a demo of this RPG.

Last Night on Earth / Shadows Brimstone

Our household are big fans of Flying Frog Publications. Last Night on Earth was released 10 years ago and I jumped into hat game with the proverbial two feet. This year they are releasing an anniversary box set. I’ll probably skip that, but they are rumored to be releasing more heroes. Those I’ll probably nab.

Shadows of Brimstone is their other game we have spent unknown hours upon. I am hoping they have a some new monsters. We can always use more threats in the swamps and mines. I am also hoping they have  the darkstone shaman character. There was also talk of scenario packs dealing with werewolves, vampires, demons and an undead army. If some of these are available I might grab a couple boxes.

I can guess Flying Frog will get a sizeable chunk of my Gen Con savings this year.

GEN CON 2017

Gen Con 50 in Indy this weekend!

We know the last few years they have warned of possible sellout.

People scoffed.

This year they warned again and again.

People scoffed.

Then Friday-Sunday and the 4 Day badges sold out.

I didn’t think that would happen, but it did. Hell it sounds like a lot of people didn’t think a sellout would happen either.

Just glad I’m able to attend Friday and Saturday this year.

I am not looking forward to Saturday as much this year . The last three years Saturday has only gotten busier, crazier and harder to navigate.

I still welcome the yearly pilgrimage to the convention center fully of fellow nerds, dweebs, gamers, dorks and cosplayers.

Now I just have to decide what to try and what to purchase……

D&D post game 8-12-17

I had started a scenario for the party’s paladin to take the lead. Then it looks like the paladin could possibly be busy with real life for the foreseeable future.

I then (hastily) threw together something with river pirates. It was mostly a passing plot point/rumor recently, but it was turned into a game.

Yup pirates have been hitting all manner of ships up and down the Meterdas River. After some foot dragging, the party decided to hop a barge headed south and see if they could wrangle up some pirates.

Three days later, they did just that.

 

Not one but two small ships approached, one from down one from upstream, their small ship and attached barge. As the distance closed, the two ships unfurled pirate flags and then launched large ceramic pots. Upon impact a think noxious gas spread over the deck. It caused horrible fits of coughing, watery eyes, mucus production and eventually uncontrolled vomiting. While the ship crew avoided the gas, the boats moved ever closer.

Eventually, the dragonborn and ½ orc began to fire arrows at the approaching southern pirate ship. The ship returned fire and riddled the dragonborn thief with arrows. He limped toward the back of the ship in need of healing. The pirate vessels then uncovered their next weapon, ballista that fired chain harpoons. Two of the bolts were fired and struck true. One ballista bolt hit the ship the second struck the trailing barge. They were trying to slow and keep the boat/ barge from escaping. For the pirates, it was looking to be a successful attack. Well…that was until Morgan “The Greaser” unleashed destruction upon the ships!

The mage quickly ran to the front of the ship and cast a spell of unmending on the ballista chain. A large link broke and the boat was free from that chain. He then launched a fireball at the southern pirate vessel and obliterated the sails, rigging and most of the mast. Plus it began a small fire as well. The barbarian kept launching arrows at the now on fire pirate ship to keep their ballista crew from getting a second shot.

D&D pre-game 8-12-17

We open on a small tower in the middle of an open field.

A few small trees surround the structure.

A small set of standing stones sits about fifty yards off to the North.

The beginnings of wooden structure sit a few hundred yards to the South.

A small dirt road lead to and from the tower.  Along said road, a lone rider approaches.

A robed figure sits murmuring a series of ancient words as he sits upon the ground  on a cool summer morning. He doesn’t seem to notice the approaching warhorse with a  heavily armored warrior atop it.

 

As the rider slows his mount the sitting figure addresses him without opening his eyes.

 

“Do not mistake temptation for opportunity!” The sitting figure says as the armored warrior approaches. “August, you have brought news and the usual missives? “

 

August Moon, paladin of Helm, dismounts and approaches the sitting figure. He pulls a small stack of parchment from his pack.

 

“Yes I have. We have the standard weekly request to meet with a member of Lord Faruth’s staff. I imagine that will go unanswered. There is a second appeal from the ship yards that probably ties in with Lord Faruth’s request. The council is asking when the guild hall will officially open. They want to use the space if and are willing to purchase the property if we are not going to use the building.”

 

The sitting figure continues his chanting as the armored warrior flips through several pieces of paper.

 

“Varis has sent word from his travel to Wychlight. He made it safely to the town and is doing well. It seems he has even found a semi-lucrative job as a minstrel for a local tavern.”

“The Bastion has sent word that the Fey kin to the North have not been seen for several weeks. It has been even longer since they have lead a raid against the troops posted there. The rest…well is just local gossip and rumors from the realm. August folds the remaining documents and returns them to his pack. “Ren, is he still in a mood?”

 

The sitting figure stops his chant and looks up at paladin.

 

I am made to play Dixit

I was "give" the chance to play  a game called Dixit. at the local library game night.

A quick rundown of what it about from the interweb......

"One player is the storyteller for the turn and looks at the images on the 6 cards in her hand. From one of these, she makes up a sentence and says it out loud (without showing the card to the other players).

Each other player selects the card in their hands which best matches the sentence and gives the selected card to the storyteller, without showing it to the others.

The storyteller shuffles her card with all the received cards. All pictures are shown face up and every player has to bet upon which picture was the storyteller's.

If nobody or everybody finds the correct card, the storyteller scores 0, and each of the other players scores 2. Otherwise the storyteller and whoever found the correct answer score 3. Players score 1 point for every vote for their own card.

The game ends when the deck is empty or if a player scores 30 points. In either case, the player with the most points wins the game."

Infinity...I try space apes?!

Well another run at Infinity. 

The table is set.

I chose the Morat from the Combine Army this time.

Why? 

I have no idea. I just know I haven't tried them yet.

Well that and they look like apes in power armor with guns that go "FRAKA, FRAKA, FRAKA!"

Once again these are lists put together from what Todd has available.

They are not optimized.

hell, I don't know if they are even legal?

My force's weapons and gear stats.

Quick Heresy book report

Back to the Heresy novels!

Angels of Caliban

A Dark Angels story? Now? Why now?

Everything that the previous Hersey  White Scar novel sets up, Angels of Caliban ruins. We wer finally moving toward Terra and then this novel drops and stops that story advancement in its tracks.

Plus, this is a two stories in one novel situation here. Neither story is long enough for a full book and too long for a short story in a compendium

First story.

Here we are back dealing with Ultramar and their little Imperium lead by Robert Gulliman. Here the Lion, primarch of the Dark Angels is the Lord Protector here. He is often hunting Konrad Kruze since he is still terrorizing the system. Well that is until the events of the Pharos novel. Then the Lion gets a bit nuts with dealing with some post Night Lord fallout and almost starts a civil war in the Imperium Secondus. There is also a showdown between the Lion and the Night Haunter that is fun, but predictable if you know anything about 30K-40K lore.

Then there is the second half of this novel.

This deals with the characters left on Caliban from the two Dark Angel novels that came out forever ago. I really didn’t remember anyone sans Luther and the unnamed Cypher so the characters I’m supposed to care about I remember nothing about. It has just been to long to remember  a Caliban story arc I was never super pumped about in the first place. Ugh!

Still this tale basically tells how the chapter split and I have been curious about that for a while. We see the being of the Fallen that have been bandied about forever in 40K lore. It is a good political intrigue story but with really no action. I know a Space Marine story without a ton of bolter fire?  Who knew that could happen? Seeing the origin of the Fallen is the best part of this novel. The whole Lion, Gulliman and Imperium Secondus is drek and I am so over reading about it.

Having a previous novel move toward Terra only to pull back and force more of the Ultramar stuff is terrible! Having a Dark Angel follow up novel after 30 novels in between is just poor planning too.