Famine, Sword, & Fire: Lady Azorius Rescued!

In game eight or nine(?) of my two buddies and their narrative campaign...Lady Azorius of Bretonnia finds herself pursued by the Undead, with mercenary forces rushing to her rescue.  In a very deadly, shooty, cagey, crazy game...the Bretonnian/Mercenary alliance managed to steal a 9-7 victory over the Undead.  Sadly I only took four pictures!  We were too involved in the gameplay...

 

 

More Night Goblins...

 Finished up another six bases of the excellent monoposed Night Goblins I got off eBay a while ago.  This gives me two basic blocks of eight, so I can move onto some archers next.  This will be a small narrative army, so this is significant progress towards that goal.

 

 

Famine, Sword, & Fire: Dwarfs vs. Chaos Dwarfs.

Our sixth game in our campaign went thusly:

 

Summary: A Chaos Dwarf column is on the march when its Hobgoblin scouting party gets too far ahead...the opposing Dwarfs take advantage and launch an ambush as the column reaches a bridge.  The weather is spring flooding, so the river is dangerous terrain to pass over...the Dwarfs launch an ambush and smash several units, but the Hobgoblin reinforcements arrive and the rest of the column is able to re-form into fighting order.  The Dwarf ambushers end up being caught between the two forces and lose the game 8 VP's to the Chaos Dwarf 9 VPS.

 

 

Night Goblins, a humble beginning.

Since we're doing a lot of Famine, Sword, & Fire lately - and we're doing some narrative campaigns, I've decided to start assembling some "single box" armies to use.  These will give us some more narrative options, allies, and unique units for various scenarios.  The idea is that each of these armies will fit in a single 11L "RUB" (Really Useful Box)...whereas my real armies (Chaos Dwarfs and Mercenaries) will end up with 3-4 boxes apiece.

 

These smaller forces will also be there to loan out to new players, etc.  The first unit is done, and I'm mainly rescuing eBay lots for this army.  It'll feature 3-4 units of night goblins, some trolls, maybe some squigs and a shaman or two.

 

 

The Myth of the 'Dead Game'...

I don't normally post about simple frustrations I have as a gamer, but watching a few videos about the demise of a few big IP products (mainly Star Wars related) it struck home how many people believe in the concept of the "dead game".

 

It shows how many people have fallen for the GW style of manipulation.  Newer or younger gamers are growing up thinking that a "game" is something which needs models, updates, FAQ's, erratas, books, novels, and teasers every month.  That you need organized play packs for tournaments (a niche community in the wider wargaming community), etc.

 

When a company like Atomic Mass Games announces they're ditching Star Wars Armada...it doesn't mean you suddenly can never play the game again.  You may be out of luck if you just started and don't own anything, as prices will tend to spike on remaining stocks as people panic-buy, etc.  However, if you own and play the game...and you think it's a good game, just keep playing it.

 

You don't need new ships, new cards, etc.  A game should be a well-designed and thorough product when launched, not a subscription service of mediocre tat.  If your game needs a full re-design every three years, it's bad on purpose (see GW's business model).  If you need new ships and tokens and cards every month to stay interested - the core product is poor.

 

Unless your game requires some kind of software interface (which does happen with increasing frequency, sadly) you don't "need" anything.  With the advent of 3D printing you can continue to get ships...new ships if you need 'em, and if there is a strong enough community dedicated to the game you can even get new cards etc.

 

There is no such thing as a "dead game" unless you're a dedicated tournament player or someone who runs tournament events.  Even then, you could continue to run the tournaments..you simply won't have any product support from the company, etc.

 

There are millions of wargamers around the world playing wargames every weekend from rules written in the 1970's, and 1980's, etc. There are huge dedicated communities supporting even GW products from the 1990's, etc.  There are more people playing Mordheim than any modern GW fantasy skirmish game - by a large margin.  That game's been out of print for 20+ years.

 

There are huge dedicated forums and fan communities for the original Warhammer Quest...and no one cares about the lack-lustre board game sequels released in the past 10 years.

 

If you like a game...keep playing it.  You don't need drip feed dopamine machinery to enjoy a tabletop wargame.  Stop punishing yourself for a business's decision to stop supporting a product.

Bretonnians vs. the Undead in Famine, Sword, & Fire

 Today saw the...sixth(?) or sevent(?) narrative game in a campaign running between my two buddies.  The short version: Bretonnian Lady Azorius was meeting with an Elf envoy who possessed a crystal ball which was showing a future battle...while examining it and trying to make heads or tails of the vision, the undead detected it...and set out to stop her.

 

Protected only by a small bodyguard, Azorius was quickly cut off by a huge undead army, and despite a valiant charge of knights and their squires...Azorius was forced to run into the wilderness and escape (even after having a mage duel with an enemy necromancer!).