Asterion Debated Heavily in Washington

Is Using A Minotaur To Gore Detainees A Form Of Torture?

Such Hawks, Such Hounds

Andy had loaned me his DVD copy of Such Hawks Such Hounds, a documentary of the "American hard rock underground" music scene. That may seem like a mouthful for a genre, which you may know better as 'stoner rock', or 'doom'. If you're looking for a textbook definition of what exactly 'stoner rock' is, look no further:

It combines elements of psychedelic rock, blues-rock and doom metal. Stoner rock is typically slow-to-mid tempo and features low-tuned guitars, a bass-heavy sound,^[1] melodic vocals, and 'retro' production.^[2] The genre emerged during the early 1990s and was pioneered foremost by the Californian bands Kyuss^[3] and Sleep.

There's an obvious negative connotation to the term "stoner" when associated with this music genre, so "American hard rock underground" really sums it up better. It's not grunge, it's not heavy metal, it's just...rock. Take what was going on with bands like Black Sabbath in the 1970's and just extend to the modern era. It's not for everyone, but I love it.

Such Hawks does a wonderful job of documenting the stoner rock genre from its roots up to today. There were several bands featured that I recognized, but about double that number of bands I didn't recognize. A handful of bands were prominently featured, and each one kind of occupied their own niche of the overall stoner rock genre.

If you're a fan of music and culture in general, you'll enjoy this documentary. It's well shot and is very cohesive, not feeling 'choppy' or 'cut' at all. It allows the artists themselves to tell their story with very little (hardly any) dialog on the interviewers part. Now it you like the stoner rock scene on the other hand, then this is kind of a must see. If you head over to their official website, you can catch some clips and outtakes from the editing room floor.

Horror on Holbein

Planet: Holbein
Type: Pleasure Planet
Alien Threat Level: 5
Alien Type: Sharks
Alien Ability: Suicide
Primary Mission: Assault

"Ever haunted by the trappings of this life
Sweet redemption just in front of me
Well now it seems once again that I've lost another
One of the ones who have broke through the wall, damned
Fate won't compromise
I have sold my soul and now the devil's laughing"
-"Guarded", Disturbed

Holbein is the third planet from the central star. It is an Earth sized planet with large, arctic poles and a lush, tropical belt. The main industry of Holbein is that it is a pleasure planet, seeing to the needs of a host of alien beings. The beauty of Holbein is idyllic, and the planet boasts touch-sensitive rocks, attuned to the user's emotional levels. Plants resonate a low psionic frequency that responds to nearby lifeforms, enhancing a sense of calm. Massive circular cities sit atop large belts of coral reefs.

An impressively large number of the fleet from the 3:16 surrounds the planet's equatorial belt while maintaining high anchor. The planets orbital stations were disabled by ship=based EMP weapons. At the coordinated time, each warship will launch a host of dropships to make first assault contact. Once a perimeter has been established, support will follow.

Lieutenant Satan's dropship, the Hell Hound, has been fitted with four "bunker buster" deep penetrating missiles. Poseidon Company's primary targets are a series of domed complexes. Each domes houses three to six pool levels, each one with a transparent floor. The objective is to land the dropship through the primary dome, engage the hostiles, secure the perimeter, and wait for support from Proteus Platoon. Prior to breaching the main dome, the dropship will fire its "bunker buster" missiles into the dome. Recon photos show what could be a control room on the bottom level, secure that room and wait for support. Anomalous radar signatures show inconsistent patterns in the complex's sub-basement level.

Monday Update

No, this isn't another Space Hulk post, haha...

Things have been a tad quiet around Mik's Minis, but that doesn't mean I haven't been doing anything (but I'm not exactly busy either). I had mentioned a while back that the RPG's have really heating up around here, and that's been the bulk of it.


Part of our new world...Sarterra

We've had a couple of 4e games under our belts now, and so far it's been fun. Originally we were going to use Goodman Games Aerth setting with the PC races out of the PHB and PHB2. Then the idea of using the free PDF, Dawn of Worlds came up. Dawn of Worlds is a loose rules system that helps a group collaboratively build their own world, literally, from the ground up. It plays as an independent game and consists of three distinct phases; geography, races, and relations. Die rolls determine how many points each player gets per turn and then you buy options from there creating everything from Avatars, races, mountains, valleys, and the like. In each age, different items will cost more or less than they did in another age. We're about halfway through the second age and it's been a blast.

You can also create different orders, religions, and sects within the same race, or create sub-races as you like. You can corrupt your own race, (or someone else's), or consequently purify someone's race, city, land, etc. I loved Legend of the Five Rings back in the day, so I made some of the first races I created be the Naga and the Nezumi. Since I've rolled up a couple of Half-Orcs to play in the campaign, I made sure to give them a rich background as well. So far we have put together six avatars, sixteen races/sub-races, a dozen order/sects, and have also fleshed out another dozen cities as well. All of this took place after we took turns and created just the layout and geography of the world. I've been having so much fun writing fluff, backgrounds, and planning races, I almost forgot that we were actually building a world for a DnD campaign. The rules are free, and are definitely worth trying out. I'll start a series of posts about the new and tweaked races I've been putting forth.


We also kicked off a new Dark Heresy game. We have a large group of players for this game, seven in fact, so I thought I'd try to go for a non-combat type character. I chose Adept and will try to be as hands-off in combat situations as I can. Witha seven part group, sure, no problem. Of course when we played our first game the other day, ahem, a whopping four weren't able to make it. My knowledgeable Adpet had to learn how to shoot...quick! It was a good game, I love the Dark Heresy genre and setting, and I'm getting better acquainted with the rules and think I sold them a bit short before, it really is a great system.


I haven't mentioned 3:16 Carnage Amongst the Stars in a bit, but I'm happy to say the troops should, barring any interruptions, hit dirtside in just a couple of days. I'll try to get up a mission report once the dust has cleared. I've also got all those new Brickarms guns to break in too, so it should be an all around good time, I've got some nifty bad guy aliens on the first planet to harangue the troopers with.

So that's about all I've got for now. I've got a desk full of minis in the queue to paint up, but ugh, I've not been motivated at all to get to work. I also started reading False Gods, the second book of the Horus Heresy series, so I should wrap that up soon.

Fires of Mount Doom Salsa

the garden continues to bear fruit...

So I've made this salsa the last couple of game nights now and thought I'd share the recipe here. My favorite thing about this tasty condiment is that it comes entirely out of my backyard, save for a single onion. I also warn ya, it is a hot salsa, very spicy (hence the name). It's not atomic, but if you're not fan of heat, it may not be for you. I made the recipe so it escalates up in the ingredient count, alter as you like to make it less (or more) spicy. The larger the tomatoes, the less spicy it will be. Same thing goes for the onion.

Mik's Minis Fires of Mount Doom Salsa
Ingredients:
x1 small to medium white onion
x2 medium to large tomatoes
x3 habañero peppers
x4 jalapeño pepper
x5 cayenne peppers

x1 tablespoon of olive oil
x2 pinches of coarse salt
x3 pinches of ground pepper
x4 pinches of cilantro

Method:
1. Dice the tomatoes and onions into pieces and put into medium bowl. Dice habañero and cayenne peppers very fine and put into bowl. Slice and quarter the jalapeños and also put into bowl.

2. Add remaining ingredients to the bowl. With a wooden spoon, mix ingredients thoroughly. Immediately drain the juice at the bottom of the bowl. This will be the only time you do this part, don't worry, more juice will accumulate later.

3. Cover and refrigerate at least one hour prior to serving (the longer the better however, even overnight). Once uncovered, remix the ingredients then serve.

EDIT: My buddy Andy made a pretty funny comment forver linking the name of this salsa with the blazing Eye of Sauron and the next morning...

Lego Rock Band...of Course

Alive in Joberg

When I was looking up District 9's director, Neill Blomkamp to see what else he had done, his resume was fairly small, but did list "Alive in Joburg", a film short. I didn't think anything of it, except District 9 also took place in Johannesburg, South Africa. I had no idea Alive in Joburg is what District 9 was based off of. In fact, you could view it as a prequel given that it takes place in 1990. It's really a great short, and all of the feel and vibe of the motion picture is neatly packed into just a six minute short. The whole of it is above, enjoy!

The Ravenor Omnibus

Dan Abnett's Ravenor Trilogy

I devoured through this omnibus, 900 pages, like a rabid warp daemon in just barely a week. Following up the excellent Eisenhorn omnibus not that long ago, I plopped down for this one as soon as I heard it was coming out confident it'd also be a good read. Also for a mere ten bucks (or so), it's an even better deal than most.

I'm going to not draw too many comparisons between this trilogy and Eisenhorn. With all of their similarities, very similar, they read very differently. Eisenhorn focused mainly on the man himself, his rise and fall as an Inquisitor. Now about Ravenor, yes it is largely about Gideon Ravenor, but moreso about his acolytes and retinue.

The time frame across the trilogy at its core is just about a year at most, but a good six months of that time is spent in transit, or recuperating, or the like. There is a definite plot that weaves through each novel, and instead of each novel reading on its own, they weave together nicely for a much larger tale. The acolytes are great, and Abnett really delves into each and every one of them. At first, I thought it would suffer from 'Lost' syndrome, and have way too many main characters, but he handled them well and the number was just right.

As far as a primer goes for a 40k newbie goes getting into Dark Heresy, I would recommend this trilogy over Eisenhorn actually. The chemistry and skills of the team work together in harmony to infiltrate criminal underworlds, hack systems, fight heretics, and basically kick arse in the name of the Emperor. Through these very skilled, but also much human characters, you feel closer to the action, and the danger threat is much more real. The big draw to the trilogy for me was also how almost nothing ever went according to plan. Seriously, I wouldn't call Ravenor and his crew "bumbling", but man, every time they had a plan, it got screwed up...bad. This usually meant someone getting the jump on them in a very bad way. Speaking of which, Abnett doesn't pull any punches with his characters. His portrayal of life in the Inquisition is hard and fast, and often it is very gritty and brutal.

If you read Eisenhorn, you've probably already read these, if not, it's no big deal, Eisenhorn is not a prerequisite. The action is well written, and there is a great cop-drama vibe throughout with a hefty helping of dark occult activity. You'll be invested in the myriad of characters, and though I've understated him somewhat, the namesake character, Ravenor, is pretty darn cool. It's a good read, and even though it's as thick as a phonebook, it's a surprisingly fast read to boot. A couple of short stories bookend the middle book, and each one really added to the overall story. One was an origin story of one Ravenor's trusted acolytes, and the other one takes place chronologically between the first and second book and has a surprising guest star in it. It's a great journey furthering the world of the Inquisitor and their fight against the ruinous powers, I highly recommend it for casual and hardcore fans alike.

PKowboys Trio

The town of Whitewash, just outside Crater Lake

We played three games of PKowboys last week over at Andy's and had a great time, you can see his pre-post here, in fact I lifted these pics from his Flikr account, haha). If you haven't heard of PKowboys, it's not too surprising, it's a genre that's still got plenty of uncharted territory to claim, and the game itself (came out in 2004) wasn't widely distributed. Now, on the other hand, if you've ever heard of, played, etc. about Piquet, then you most certainly have heard of PKowboys. The latter was written as a skirmish level supplement to the widely (wildly?) popular Piquet system which is used from anything from ancients, through historicals, and up to the modern era. It's main draw is that is uses cards to represent actions that simulate the unpredictable nature of war, fog of battle, and all of that good stuff. You're not guaranteed to move every turn (or even in five turns), and things you take for granted like reloading your guns are also luck of the draw. In the end, a game takes on a cinematic feel and battles have brilliant narratives once the smoke has cleared.


Apaches in the midst!

There's not any factions or armies, it's just all "cowboys", what you do with the stats is up to you. Quality of figs on the table pretty much determine what they are. Low fighting ability but high morale might represent the townfolk; they're no gunfighters but they have heart and are defending their home. High skill and low morale on the other hand might be grizzled hired guns who might run off if the fighting gets too dangerous, not being paid quite enough to put their actual lives on the line. There's a ton of companies out there producing cowboys of all types and in all sizes. I'd like to paint up a troupe of Mexicanos myself.


Gunfight!

My rolls were laughably abysmal. Although I'm not plagued too often by this malady, it can make a fun night quite frustrating. Throw in the fact that simple mechanics like moving and reloading are kind of random, well the night can quickly spiral out of control. Rolls aren't everything though (but they help). The game moves in "bullet time", where three hours around the tabletop might only represent three and half minutes in game. The placement of the figs is almost abstract too, you might only be two inches from your adversary, wanting to close the distance and brawl with them, but it could take you a while to actually engage. This might take a while standing around the table, but in game it could represent the two circling one another, waiting for the other to strike and see who would give advantage first.


Action inside and outside the saloon

For the buildings Andy used .PDF templates that constructed easily enough into a great looking town. The neat thing is that each building came with its own floor plan too. If your guys take refuge in the saloon (or general store, etc.) just lift up the building and reveal the detailed floor plan underneath. There's a lot of variety in what you can build as well.


Man down!

You can get wounded easily enough, and each time you take a hit, there's a scary 1-in-6 chance that your wound will be the death of you! Like with the other stats of your characters, health (or wound) boxes vary from the puny to the very tough. Morale is another stat to track as well as leadership, and your fighting skills. Like I said, we had a fun time with it. We used to play a lot more in the past, but cowboys haven't been on the agenda the last few years. PKowboys did show its age just a tad however, and there's numerous things we talked about afterwards (we played over the course of two days) about what could improve, if nothing else, the speed of the overall game play. It's a good game if you like a unique system and are looking for a fun cowboy game played with as little as two or three figs per player.

In the cold depths of space...

I opened up my dashboard this morning to take a look-see at the headlines from around my favorite blogs and there seems to be quite a stir over...Space Hulk! I played Space Hulk back in the day (moreso than 1st edition 40k actually) and surprisingly I still have a lot of the floor tiles, the rulebooks, and a handful of the Terminators. It was a fun game, we got a lot of mileage out of it, but moved on. Now, as it would seem, it's back for more!

Now this. "Wow" is all I can say, I could almost go as far as saying I'm stunned. The board pieces look great, high quality and all that. The bulkheads, counter blips, and everything else look great too, then there's the minis (more of those in a minute). The real winner is how closely it resembles the original. In this day and age where every reboot and do-over ends up with a result that looks nothing like its predecessor, the new Space Hulk still looks like its retained the spirit of the old, if you squint just right, it is the old set.



Click to enlarge the goodness!

Looking at the large pic up top, you can see the figs included with the set are solid sculpts (maybe you peg on an arm or so) and made from a different kind of plastic than the stuff we've been using on the tabletop. Plastics have come a long way though, even "game piece" type sculpts as these, and painted up they look beautiful. Mind you, these are studio paint jobs, but I'm not too shabby, I feel I could give them a decent go at it.

One of the rumors was that a new marine chapter would be featured in the game, well no, these are clearly Blood Angels, which is cool. I'm no Blood Angel fan, but it's nice they're getting a little limelight here, it's also a nice detail to show the vampire fangs on Captain Lorenzo. Another rumor was the terminators would just be the stock ones out of the Black Reach box, again, nope, these are all new sculpts and look a thousand times more detailed and full of character. Maybe not poseable and such, but they look great.

The Genestealers steal the show, umm, no pun intended. Just look at them; climbing down bulkheads, leaping off structures...they finally embody the carapace-clacking, horror filled monsters lurking in the shadows on a long-dead, drifting ship.


It all sounds really good doesn't it? For those who didn't get in on it the first time, now's their chance. For those wishing to relive the fun of years past and gain a truly impressive looking reboot to a loved classic...hop on board. The game is a hundred bucks, and by today's standards that is not a bad price (I believe I paid sixty for the original). But where Games Workshop truly fails is that this new edition of Space Hulk is "while stocks last". That's right, this is a limited edition run, once it's gone, that's it, and the only place to get a copy will be off eBay at insulting prices. This, put ever so mildly, is quite disappointing.

Props to Dark Reign, the Iron Legion, Warhammer Tau, and On the Painting Table for blogging out there, posting about this early, and getting the word out.

D9 = A+

There seems to be a good deal of buzz surrounding the latest sci-fi flick District 9. Having gone to a matinée this afternoon, I can tell you it's well deserved buzz. Without giving away any spoilers or major plot twists, I'll give a good ole rundown.

The time period is present day Earth (actually it's 2010, but close enough) and a huge alien mothership has been stalled over the South African city of Johannesburg for the past twenty years. The alien refugees, over a million of them, have overstayed the human's patience and have been rounded up into the fenced shantytown known as District 9.

Living conditions are deplorable and what you would expect from any real world snapshot of impoverished, third world citizens scavenging through garbage just to stay alive. Human tolerance treats these aliens as less than equal, to put it kindly. Heavily controlled, monitored, and policed by a corporation, the aliens have lost all traces of their 'humanity'. The social satire is not lost here with the actions of the human government on the non-humans echoing many minority groups around the world today being subjugated.

The movie largely consists of television news coverage and the like, lending a very documentary feel overall. Even flashbacks and the like are handled by handy cam, interviews, and more news reels. There is action involved, you've seen the commercials, but it's minuscule and takes a backseat to the story itself. The special effects are done well, and they have gone to great lengths to make the alien technology incredibly fantastic while simultaneously being both believable and sublime; it's not an alien tech flaunt-fest.

The main character gets special mention. You really become invested in Wikus Van De Merwe, at first he's a joke, then a jerk, and then hero. You're either laughing at him, or hating him...at first. Then events start unfolding, and he grows on you, and before you know it, you're looking at the primary protagonist of the movie which kind of came out of nowhere. This is his acting debut as well, so that was refreshing to see as well.

I could go on and on, but I feel I've slipped too many details already. I will say it's graphic at times, so don't take the squeamish (or kids!), and there is a very dark and gritty manner in which the aliens are mistreated by the humans, it's not a popcorn fest. Oddly, for a movie about a mothership and its castaway aliens, it's very believable on every facet (and it has many facets), which lends a somber undercurrent to everything else. It's intelligent, well acted, a unique vision, and certainly worth getting out there and watching.

Squat Sighting?

This post is double, probably triple, dipping from some other sites out there that have already mentioned this and speculated on exactly what is going on in the above pic. Keeping with my own trend of Space Dwarf sightings, I just had to include it here for posterity. The pic and the quoted text are from the BoLS boys and girls. Enjoy!

Also breaking over the last couple of days is this intriguing picture. Its anyone's guess as to what this is or if it has anything to do with Space Hulk the Mystery Box. It looks like a Demiurge, the Fenksworld Pit Thing, and a Stench Beast of Strank from Dark Heresy. FFG did say they had a big release to unveil at Gen-con so perhaps this is it. -BoLS

Brütal Legend Soundtrack

Recently the soundtrack to upcoming Brütal Legend was announced...and it's easily the greatest metal soundtrack ever to grace a video game! I love music, I love metal, I love this soundtrack. It's a whopping 108 songs long, and as you read through the list, you can tell they really love their craft. Sure, you've got some some of the metal staples in there that form the foundation, but there's also a lot of metal nuggets hidden in there as well. At the bottom of this post is the game's designer, Tim Schafer, solving a Rubik's Cube racing music director Emily Ridgeway while she reads the expansive tracklist. This is awesome, rock on...

3 Inches of Blood - Deadly Sinners
3 Inches of Blood - Destroy The Orcs
Accept - Fast As A Shark
Angel Witch - Angel Witch
Anthrax - Metal Thrashing Mad
Anvil - March of the Crabs
Anvil - Tag Team
Apostas - Sulphur Injection
Bishop of Hexen - A Serpentine Grave
Bishop of Hexen - The Somber Grounds of Truth
Black Sabbath - Children of the Grave
Black Sabbath - Symptom of the Universe
Black Sabbath - Never Say Die
Brocas Helm - Cry of the Banshee
Brocas Helm - Drink the Blood of the Priest
Budgie - Breadfan
Budgie - Zoom Club
Candlemass - Witches
Carcass - No Love Lost
Cloven Hoof - Nightstalker
Children of Bodom - Angels Don’t Kill
Coroner - Skeleton on your Shoulder
Cradle of Filth - Her Ghost in the Fog
Crimson Glory - Queen of the Masquerade
Dark Fortress - Insomnia
Dark Tranquility - Cathode Ray Sunshine
Deathstars - Blitzkrieg
Def Leppard - Rock of Ages
Dethklok - Mermaider
Diamond Head - Am I Evil?
Dimmu Borgir - Progenies of the Great Apocalypse
Dokken - Mr. Scary
Dragonforce - Through the Fire and Flames
Emperor - Thus Spake The Nightspirit
Enslaved - Frost
Enslaved - Loke
Firehouse - Overnight Sensation
Girlschool - Bomber
Iced Earth - When the Night Falls
Iced Earth - Pure Evil
In Flames - Goliaths Disarm Their Davids
Judas Priest - Battle Hymn
Judas Priest - The Hellion/Electric Eye
Judas Priest - Leather Rebel
Judas Priest - One Shot At Glory
Judas Priest - Painkiller
Kabbage Boy - Girlfriend
KMFDM - Free Your Hate
KMFDM - Rip The System
King Diamond - Cremation
King Diamond - Welcome Home
Kiss - God of Thunder
Lita Ford - Betrayal
Marilyn Manson - Beautiful People
Manowar - Die For Metal
Manowar - The Dawn Of Battle
Mastodon - Crack the Skye
Mastodon - Oblivion Instrumental
Megadeth - High Speed Dirt
Megadeth - Tornado of Souls
Metal Church - Metal Church
Michael Schenker Group - Assault Attack
Ministry - Stigmata
Ministry - Thieves
Mirrorthrone - So Frail
Motley Crue - Dr. Feelgood
Motley Crue - Kickstart My Heart
Motley Crue - Live Wire
Motorhead - Back at the Funny Farm
Motorhead - In the Black
Motorhead - Marching Off to War
Motorhead - We Are the Road Crew
Nitro - Machine Gun Eddie
Omen - The Axeman
Ostrogoth - Queen of Desire
Overkill - World of Hurt
Ozzy Osbourne - Believer
Ozzy Osbourne - Mr. Crowley
Ozzy Osbourne - Diary of a Madman
Prong - Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck
Quiet Riot - The Wild and the Young
Racer X - Technical Difficulties
Racer X - Y.R.O.
Ratt - Lay It Down
Riot - Road Racin
Riot - Narita
Riot - Swords and Tequila
Rob Zombie - Superbeast
Rotting Christ - Ad Notics
Running Wild - Riding the Storm
Sanctuary - Battle Angels
Savatage - Hall of the Mountain King
Saxon - Wheels of Steel
Scorpions - Blackout
Scorpions - Holiday
Skeletonwitch - Soul Thrashing Black Sorcery
Skid Row - Youth Gone Wild
Slayer - Metal Storm/Face The Slayer
Slough Feg - Warriors Dawn
Static-X - Love Dump
Tenacious D - Master Exploder
Tenacious D - The Metal
Testament - For The Glory Of
Testament - More Than Meets The Eye
Tvangeste - Birth of the Hero
UFO - Rock Bottom
Whitesnake - Still of the Night
Wrath of Killenstein - Ignisis Dance

Adios, TSoaLR Muchachos

Well, after a whopping 667 page run, and six years later, Turn Signals on a Land Raider finally came to a Reaver Titan crushing end. Turn Signals followed Kren and Frep, crew members on board a Space Marine Land Raider in the Emperor's Pointy Sticks chapter. Hilarity ensues. Their misadventures came on a regular basis and covered all the great inside jokes that only tabletop gamers would get. Pulling off consistent 40k humor is no easy task, but they certainly did that very thing. A long time Tau player, I always liked it when they showed up, and the exploits of the Space Marine Scouts were my absolute favorite. They'll be missed, but according to the creator, they did about as much as they could've done. The archives will be up for a while, so if you haven't checked them out, do yourself a favor and do so!

Perseid Meteor Shower Tonight

Skygazers are preparing for another dazzling sky show, as the annual Perseid meteor shower reaches its peak. No special equipment is required to watch the shower, which occurs when Earth passes through a stream of dusty debris from the comet Swift-Tuttle. Astronomers are advised to lie on a blanket or a reclining chair to get the best view.

As the cometary "grit" from Swift-Tuttle strikes our atmosphere, it burns up, often creating streaks of light across the sky. The meteors appear to come from a point called a "radiant" in the constellation of Perseus - hence the name Perseid.

The late evening on 12 August through to the early hours of the 13 August is the best time to see the shower. The best time to watch is before dawn on Wednesday.

Astronomers say up to 100 meteors per hour are expected to streak across the sky during the shower's peak. But this year, light from the last quarter Moon will interfere significantly with the view. Astronomers say binoculars might help with viewing the spectacle, but will also restrict the view to a small part of the sky. The Perseids can appear in any part of the sky, but their tails all point back to the radiant in the constellation Perseus.

Flames of War: North Africa 1942

My posts get queued up for a while, so I'm hoping by the time this one pops up, Brian will have already posted his own battle report with the most important thing of all...details. I confess, I'm not the biggest WWII gamer, although it's huge right now in the gaming world, but I'm just foggy on all the details, theaters, campaigns, dates, etc.

I'll do my best from recollection. Mind you, every time I show up for a game, I'm also having to learn the rules on the fly as well as take in all the details of the scenario. We're in the North African desert in 1942, and the forces arrayed for the battle were the British versus the Germans. I believe the scenario was a canned one from the book called [edit: Breakthrough]. The table was split in four quarters, with British troops defending the dentral town and objectives in the southeast quarter. The German forces started the game in the Northwest quarter. Both sides would be able to bring on reinforcements throughout the game.

Whenever I'm able, and want to get in on a great historical game with convention level terrain and fully painted forces, Brian and the three-letter name group of guys are the way to go (Tom, Bob, and Ken). WWII makes the most appearances, but ancients aren't uncommon either. If there's a post here with 'historical' in the tags, chances are I was playing with these guys. So we'll let Brian write it all up and I'll just give y'all some eye candy.


The British Big Guns


Lorries hauling more guns


My tank squad!


The German forces


British tanks score first blood


Revenge! I slag three of Andy's British tanks in one turn


British infantry digs in and a smoking Panzer is sign of things to come...


The skies were thick with the smoke of charred, armored husks


German infantry assault a British tank, schnell, schnell!


Usually I'm a visitor at someons else's house when it comes to historicals, but this time I hosted the game at my house. Mind you, everyone had to bring everything (terrain, armies, etc.) but I did contribute some homemade, colon-cleansing salsa! I loved the game, I always do, and dang it if I couldn't see myself getting into to it, but that's the last thing I need; more minis to paint. Fortunately, these guys are all loaded to the freakin' gunnels with beautifully painted armies, vastly huge armies. Only if I wanted to be an absolute glutton for punishment would I ever need to plop down for some WWII minis.

The Boys of Delta Squad

"Listen up you apes! We got FNG's inbound and new weapons!"

My last post of equipping 3:16 troopers was a while back, and consisted mostly of the NPC's of Poseidon company in my little vision of the wide 3:16 'verse. Having a couple of live-fire missions under our belt now, here's the PC's of the campaign.

I'm still tweaking it as we go along, and visually, the troopers have been toned down just a tad. I wanted individuality for the players, but still look the part of a military unit. I've been using a lot of Alpha Team and Agents bodies, which have been great, but as I add more Space Police sets to the collection, they're gonna be the new standard.

These newer bodies are just too good; militant gray, printed backs and legs, obvious carapace armor all over...they look great. Another direction I wanted to go in was while at the same time unifying the look, I wanted players to feel they could personalize as much as possible for individuality. The first time around I used Insectoid helmets / shoulders, but (as in the rulebook) they obscured all the features that make a player human.

I've devised "types" of MandelBrite armor depending on the extremes of the environment. Most of the time the players will be in light (Type I) armor, allowing them to have personal affects, such as cowboy hats, hair pieces, and the like. Type II armor might call for the beefier shoulder armor, but still no bubble helmet needed (maybe gas masks), and of course Type III armor will be for poisonous environs or EVA activity.


Lieutenant Satan

The 'LT' gained a rank after his actions on Klimt. The unbridled freedom he has found in the Expeditionary Forces will carry him far. His weapon of choice is the sidearm, which he continues to upgrade for maximum carnage.


Trooper Out

Out communicates subvocally over the squad's comm system, his voicebox being ritually removed before he left Terra. Once a member of a monastic temple of assassins, Out now plies his deadly trade in the Expeditionary Forces. Preferring to engage his targets up close, his weapon of choice is the combat shotgun.


Trooper Buzz

This big Russian has seen action dirtside on both Klimt and Matisse. Good humored and dependable, Buzz is the type of trooper the Expeditionary Forces are built on. He has great affinity for his trusty M41a pulse rifle, and is never seen without it.


Trooper Jericho

Not interested in promotion, or even having synthskin to cover his cybernetic enhancements, Jericho is an enthusiastic, somewhat reckless force of nature on the battlefield. Equipped with the devastating heavy MG, he is always found where the fight is thickest.


Trooper Sockeye

Many a trooper has been saved at the last minute by a long distance sniper shot from Sockeye's energy rifle. Sockeye is often used in forward roles by his platoon, operating alone scouting enemy positions and engaging them as necessary.


Corporal Duke

Duke is a Delta Squad veteran, and has efficiently been the squad's corporal for some time. His E-Cannon has been modified beyond regulation specs and his kill counter totals post-missions have been some of the highest seen during this campaign.


The A.S.S. (adaptable statistics servo-droid)

I was toying around with the idea of having a robot for the squad to lug around, I still don't know. It sounds like the players are leaning towards a higher-tech campaign, so a walking 'bot may not be necessary. It would've provided field data, communications, and the like (and probably get blown up, eaten, crushed, and destroyed every mission).

G.I. Joe, Oh no...

Snake Eyes!

Take a good look of the above pic. Got it? Good, now I just saved you ten bucks, go buy a cool miniature instead and paint it, it'd be an infinitely better use of your time. Heck, taking a hammer and deliberately smashing your hand with it, over and over, for two hours is actually a better use of your time than going to see this movie.

I'm thirty five years old. This means that when Snake Eyes, Scarlett, Rock 'n Roll, and the MOBAT tank came out in 1982, I was at the magical age of eight. This age is particularly magical because an eight year old boy, kitted out with tanks, laser cannons, jet packs, and the coolest action figures ever to come out, can sit in the backyard for hours imagining all kinds of missions and battles. Around high school, most kids lose the urge to play with toys, others don't. For me, getting my driver's license at sixteen just meant I could now drive myself to the toy store to browse the racks for what? GI Joe figures. So for a solid eight years, conservatively probably more, I was an active GI Joe "fan", collecting as many of the toys I could get my hands on, watching the cartoon, and collecting (memorizing) the comic book.

It's important to note that I realize that big screen translations can't mimic whatever original form we all know and love. Take the X-Men movies for example. The first two were nigh-amazing, even though they had to really mix things up to make a cohesive story on screen. They did, however, keep the soul of the X-Men alive. Same thing with the Hulk movies, Hellboy, Batman, and countless others. Some movies like 300 and Watchmen stick even closer to the source material which is an impressive feat in and of itself. I knew all of this going in and wasn't expecting them to adhere to strict GI Joe dogma.

I'm not going to pick it apart, frankly, it'd be too easy. From the tiniest, minute contradictions that only a 'true fan' (ie, someone as a kid in the 80's playign in the backyard) could pick up on (which isn't fair to do with any movie anyway) to the largest, overarching basic movie 101 concepts that shock me to have escaped such a large budget, big screen debut, this movie had it all.

There's a couple of pieces of eye candy they tried to throw in there 'for the fans' I suppose, but it felt too little, too late; for instance, Breaker chewing bubble gum, Heavy Duty actually saying "Yo Joe", Scarlett riding a motorcycle, and the Baroness being, well, mega-hot. Yes, they even threw in the 'knowing is half the battle' line as well.

The story made zero sense and paced as if written by someone with the worst ADHD case imaginable hopped up on twelve cups of coffee with near-diabetic coma causing levels of sugar in their bloodstream. You start the movie out with basic troops armed with standard M4's and Humvees, and end it with a technology level more advanced than the highest tech in any sci-fi genre. Literally, what they sported in GI Joe put the tech in Star Wars to shame. If the grunts of Starship Troopers had access to this equipment, their war against the Arachnids would've been over in about five minutes. There weren't any rules set to the genre, no parameters, no natural ceilings in the movie to reel all this tech back with. Once they started with an idea, it just snowballed and snowballed until it was mind-numbingly out of control.

The actor who played Duke does deserve special mention. Either the actor didn't want to be on set, or the direction was that the character Duke just shouldn't care about anything and be bored in every scene. Bottom line, he singlehandedly made a bad movie even worse. Oh, and adding the token minority character for comedic relief? Insulting.

I guess that's how I can sum up the whole movie, it was beyond bad, it was insulting. Did I expect a masterpiece? No. I expected a fun romp down memory lane, with lots of cool cameos and neat explosions. I didn't even get that. I had a free movie pass leftover from my birthday, but since 'Joe was a new release I had to "upgrade" my free ticket for an extra buck fifty. Yes, I consider the dollar fifty I paid entirely too much.

The Adventuring Party

You know me, if it can feasibly be done in Lego, I'm going to do it. So our 4e campaign is underway, and around these parts, Lego figs have pretty much always been the standard in representing the party. It's just plain fun, and no matter what kind of character you have on paper, you'll be able to find parts to make it for the tabletop.

Part of this goes way back too, it would seem that whenever someone actually painted up a metal (or plastic) fig to represent their character for a game, the game would invariably tank soon afterwards. Lego figs are a great way around this little curse.


Grimlock, Half-Orc Warden

Grimlock took on a new guise, eschewing his old class for a new one. All I had to do, fig-wise was ditch the second weapon and add a shield. I would like to put a beard on him too, but all of the official beards are crazy and long, so I'll have to pick up a Brickforge one at some point. While I'm at it, I'll get him some proper pauldrons to boot.


Freya, Half-Orc Druid

There's something that's grabbed me about Half-Orcs in the new edition I can't quite put my finger on. The idea of the noble savage is pretty cool and I like the close links to nature. Freya, as the name suggests, is a female, so we'll see what transpires between the two. Since this Druid will be my secondary character, they'll never actually be "on screen" at the same time. I need to think about getting a better quarterstaff for her too.


Hawk, Human Monk

Monks are always fun to do in Lego because they require very little in way of accoutrements. Ray's Hawk here is pretty much just an Annakin head and body with a hair swap and the addition of the Indiana Jones satchel, no weapons though.


Helkonde, Human Cleric

After our last game something kept bugging me about Andy's cleric character on the table. Just the fig mind you, not anything else, so I gave him an overhaul. I ditched the purple shield and cape for a more intense red, and I went with a red helmet too. His mace got a slight update, and I kept the head but switched out the torso for one that had red trim in but still had obvious chainmail in there. Now he really looks the part, ready to bash some skulls in the name of his god! Hopefully his secondary character will be as fun to make.


Elric, Genasi Swordmage and Theidifoe, Dragonborn Fighter

In an unprecedented move, our other party member, Chri3, made his own Lego characters. I wish I had pics of them because they both look cool. The Swordmage uses a Voldemort head with a gray cloak / hood and the Dragonborn uses Killer Croc from Batman as the base. Next time I'll grab some pics to replace the above placeholders.


From the cutting room floor...

You may remember my camera operator from my cell phone video. As I was geeking away, a grown man taking photos of little Lego men, I noticed something creeping into the frame from off camera...someone was trying to get in on the photo shoot on the sly! So here we have little six year old fingers and her 'character' getting in on the act.