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.

A look at a forgotten Minion model

As I sit cleaning flash off a model I stop to look and think about what I am about to start, a forgotten model.

A model that was passed upon during MKII.

A model that is still over looked in MKIII.

The Boneswarm.  A light warbeast that is a moving pile of bones. A great looking model for a gatorman bokur or a farrow bone grinding warlock.

Let us have a quick look at what a few of the stats of this pile of bones turned warbeast between editions.

War for Planet o' Apes

I may be in the minority, but I love me some Planet of Ape movies! Sure anything after the original doesn’t hold up well at all.

However, I really have enjoyed these new reboots of the series. Sure there are moments of beyond silly and holy unbelievable, but they are movies about intelligent apes. The premise itself is silly and unbelievable.

War for the Planet of the Apes.

A fifteen year plus time lapse has occurred after Rise of the Planet of the Apes, the human race ( at least in the U.S. ) is wrecked thanks to a human civil war and Simian Flu. Caesar and his band of not monkeys is hiding and trying to survive while being hunted by……a military organization called Alpha Omega. They are out to track down and kill the remaining apes led by Caesar (or do they have another nefarious scheme). Caesar wants to broker peace, but the evil human Colonel Woody Harrelson is having none of it. After a personal attack on him and his, Caesar sends his ape buddies away to greener pastures and leaves to seek bloody revenge on Colonel Woody Harrelson. This looks to lead to an  inevitable showdown that will decide if ape or man will rule what remains of the planet ( or does it ).

Right out the door this film is pretty heavy. A lot of emotion is beat over your head with the plight of Caesar. They really want you to feel for him and his ape buddies. Then they dump the emotional issues of Colonel Woody Harrelson on you and although he is the bad guy, you are made to feel sorry for him. Then there are the apes that have turned to help the humans hunt Caesar and you are supposed to feel sorry for them since their world was turned upside down with this war as well. Then there are all the regular apes just wanting to live free and you are made to feel for them with their horrible situation too. It is all pretty heavy.

Thankfully there is Steve Zahn. He voices an ape that escaped from a zoo and is living like a hermit in an abandoned ski resort. He is never named, but refers to himself as “bad ape.” He is not stupid, but is definitely dimmer than the apes we have seen in the previous two movies. This character also adds a bit to the story as he is the first ape from outside Caesar’s band that can talk, make fire, ride a horse and all that jazz. Plus he wear a stocking cap (with a pom-pom) and a vest when they travel in the mountains. That is just a big pile of win in my book! The broken speech and mannerisms of this guy give the film a bit of humor that is surprisingly alright. He keeps this movie from being too overly dark and heavy.