What's on your table right now?

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

I tried out the new Warhammer40K minis game, Kill Team tonight.  My gaming buddies are all going nuts over it and asked me to give it a go.  I've never been much of a 40K fan as I don't like the aesthetics or lore.  I haven't played the minis game since it was first released as I wasn't enamored with the rules.  I thought the LOS rules were silly and there was too much dice rolling.  Kill Team promised to address a lot of the issues and offer up a cheaper, quicker alternative to the full 40K game.

The map consists of a 3'x3' play area with some really nice 3D terrain that comes in the base kit.  I believe that squads are built on a points-based system but I'm not 100% on that as I was given a pre-built force of Imperial Guard (or whatever the Latin name they go by now is Astra militarium or somesuch) to fight against a squad of Orks and goblins.   Kill Team is smaller scale than 40K so you move each mini as an individual unit rather than squad by squad (you'll only have 12 or so minis on the table per side).  Line of sight is still a bit goofy to me in that you can shoot at an enemy as long as you can see the tiniest portion of the figure or base so there's a lot of fiddling with positioning and a lot of arguing back and forth about being able to see or not see.  At least when it's individual figures it's not nearly as silly as regular 40K where you can light up an entire squad if you can see one millimeter of a single mini.     

I still found that there was a lot of dice rolling required and much of it felt unnecessary.  Units have a base movement allowance of 6" or so (varies depending on type) but you roll a d6 and add that to the base movement allowance if you want to advance or 2d6 if you want to charge.  Shooting involves rolling to hit (with mods for range and cover), then rolling to wound, then the enemy rolling to save against the wound, then you rolling the wound severity if they fail to save and then finally rolling to see if they fall if they're on any terrain higher than ground level.  A lot of time is spent rolling dice to no effect.  I would have preferred a single roll using d100s with modifiers but I suppose it might take just as much time to read the charts and add up all the mods.  Oh well.

There is overwatch and initiative breaking "ready" fire but no opportunity fire.  That means an enemy can start behind cover and sprint across a a large distance of open terrain in full sight of your units, but if they're able to reach a spot out of LOS of your units, you can't shoot at them.    I found it counter-intuitive and made setting up a bit of a challenge as my initital instinct was to set up in defensive terrain with good, overlapping fire lanes.  Not much point in doing that here as you're better setting up out of charge range because if they reach you, you get no chance to fire at them while they're advancing on you (with a few exceptions such as snipers).

Each game only lasts 4 rounds so there isn't a lot of time for tactical nuance or maneuvering.  The attacking force really does have to go in hard and hope for the best with the dice rolling.  Each side does generate a number of command points per turn that they can spend on special, faction specific abilities which can add some variety though.

As you may have guessed, I'm still no fan of Warhammer minis but at least this one plays out rather quickly so it's not too bad.  I'll play again if asked but won't be buying into it myself.

Forgot to take photos so here are some random ones I grabbed off the web.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

I'm scheduled to run a demo game of Federation Commander at BottosCon in November this year so I strong-armed several "willing" participants into play-testing my scenario at the FLGS last night.   I need to tweak the balance a bit but happily everyone said they enjoyed the game and thought the scenario was interesting.  The game went a lot slower than I had anticipated as only one of the players had any previous experience with the game and it took everyone a while to get familiar with the movement system.  I had intended to take a lot more photos (especially more close ups) but I got wrapped up in the game and forgot.











I had a guy on Etsy make up some dial counters for me last week as I felt using dry erase pens to keep track of energy use on laminated sheets every turn was a bit of a chore and got kind of messy.  I'm quite happy with the work he did but I wish I'd asked for a slightly different design. That's on me though, not him.  He put together exactly what I'd asked for.

[Nefaro]

Nice dials.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Busted out LnL Heroes of Normandy yesterday.  Neither of us had played for a few months so we were both rusty on the rules and the first few impulses had a lot of mistakes.  Fun game though.  Scenario takes place on June 7th and has Brit airborne troops with a 57mm AT gun and a lone PIAT team trying to delay German armour pushing to the beachhead.  I played as the Brits.  While my AT gun wasn't able to inflict any casualties (it only got two rounds off and both bounced), I did succeed in pinning the Jerries down long enough to get the win condition.  As a bonus, a wounded Sgt managed to scramble up onto a StuG IIIG and take it out with grenades.  What a hero!

[Crossroads]

I finally got to play DVG's Modern Warfighter card game. I had never played it or the WW2 variant for that matter.

As I was the host, I prepared by reading the rules once, then watching a couple episodes of GimpyGamer's videos on it, and off we went. We picked a short mission first, then a longer one, and were able to finish to games in the time we had.

No pictures, but was great fun!

[Barthheart]

I finally got to play DVG's Modern Warfighter card game. I had never played it or the WW2 variant for that matter.

As I was the host, I prepared by reading the rules once, then watching a couple episodes of GimpyGamer's videos on it, and off we went. We picked a short mission first, then a longer one, and were able to finish to games in the time we had.

No pictures, but was great fun!

What were your missions? Which adversaries?

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Seems like a DVG kinda week.  I ended up playing a campaign game of the DVG version Down in Flames on Sunday.  We played the Battle of Britain campaign and used the Wingman expansion for the first time.  Adding in wingmen and doubling up on the number of bombers makes each engagement very deadly.  I don't think we had a single fight last more than 4 turns before one side or the other was swatted out of the skies.  Fun back and forth even though my RAF took a thorough beating at the hands of the Luftwaffe.

[Crossroads]

I finally got to play DVG's Modern Warfighter card game. I had never played it or the WW2 variant for that matter.

As I was the host, I prepared by reading the rules once, then watching a couple episodes of GimpyGamer's videos on it, and off we went. We picked a short mission first, then a longer one, and were able to finish to games in the time we had.

No pictures, but was great fun!

What were your missions? Which adversaries?

Our very first mission was against Middle East insurgents, we tried out the Short and Sweet mission, with objective on track #3, and only two team members with not a lot of resource points. Thought that would be a good one due to its small size. Going got tough immediately, we got duly roasted at location #2 with some bad dice and difficult enemies.

Then we tried out the High Impact Jungle mission with an objective of killing the kartel boss. There we fared better, got to location #4, where we got pinned down, with opponents stacking on us from previous locations as well us having bypassed them. It was good fun though.

I also finished watching Gimpys High Impact Jungle mission play through, and got a lot of ideas how to fare better next time. Oh, there will be a next time :)

[Crossroads]

I will be picking up Expansion #1 on my way home, too. Gotta have more gear! 

[Barthheart]

Get it all! You won't be disappointed. I just backed the Wave 3 KS...  :D

Play a couple of jungle missions to get good at eh game, they tend to be easier.
The mid-east are a large step up and need some real planning but the very rewarding when you win.
The Eastern Europe adversaries are really tough. Takes a lot of practice to win those.

[Crossroads]

Get it all!

Oh don't say that! I very much try not to.  :timeout: :D

[Crossroads]

Dammit, I went and looked at their Kickstarter page.

Kickstarter is the work of Satan himself, I tell you! No mere mortal can resist... for long... I try...

[Barthheart]

DO IT!  >:D

[Crossroads]

DO IT!  >:D

Well I already ordered the #2 Expansion pack...  :nerd:

[Crossroads]

Meanwhile, got an email that my Normandy: The Beginning of the End game has shipped from the Kickstarter. I already received the mounted X-MAPs, they look gorgeous. Can't wait for the game itself