In The Grim Darkness Of The Past There Is Only Lead: A Warhammer 40,000 Battle Report

Today I give you a battle report, but with a difference.  I met up with Paul at the weekend - a gentleman who I met through The Oldhammer Community on Facebook.  We've met once before and chatted a few times online but today we were getting together for our first game against each other.

Now, unlike some people in these circles I still play the newer versions of the game: much as, unlike some of the people who read the RPG Grognard blogs, I play some fairly modern and non-Gygaxian RPGs as well.  but I do have an interest in older versions of games I like, as previously mentioned. With Games Workshop games in particualr it's the background of the older product that appeals to me - I'm more interest in the late eighties/early nineties world than the more modern interpretation of it.  I still consult the older books for painting ideas, background inspiration and general enjoyment even if I tend to use the newer manuals to actually play games.

My WFB 1st/2nd/3rd/4th and 40K 1st/2nd books sit alongside their more recent brethren.

However, Paul gave me the chance to do more than just be inspired.  Glad to have met a fellow Oldhammer type person in Glasgow, he invited me to his pad to play a game of the very first edition of Warhammer 40,000 - with it's superfluous subtitle Rogue Trader.  He's a little older than me so played as a youth but by the time I got into Warhammer proper it was moving into 2nd Edition and so I've never had the pleasure.  I've had a copy of the core rulebook for the first edition for over a decade - it's one of the first things I ever bought on eBay - but it had never seen use as a wargaming rulebook.

.... and now, in my best Clarkson voice: Until now!

Painting And Modelling Progress - Hobgoblins & Knight Titan

My painting and modelling tools all piled up on the shelf

RPGs have predominated recently but this started as a wargaming blog and I've finally got some wargaming updates to share with you.  Today it's an update on what's happening on my assembly line, while next post I should have a couple of battle reports to share with you.  Inevitably there will be an Age of Sigmar update too, since the new Warhammer Fantasy rules are a bit of a Bloodthirster in the room.

Painting wise, the last project you saw me work on was the Hobgoblins.  Remember when I only had ten?  Now I have more.

Communism & Computers - Playing Night Witches & Save Game

For though he was master of the game, was not quite sure what to do next.  But he would think of something.

 Our block of playing Traveller at our Thursday night roleplaying sessions has come to an end.  The group had slightly mixed feelings about it, some of which I've discussed before - I think it's a game we might play again but only with some changes to the premise and rules to keep things moving - the trading rules in particular seemed to work poorly for us with Sister Superior finding the whole sub-system a boring and long-winded affair, and no-one disagreed with her all that much.

Rather than leap straight into our next campaign block we took two weeks off for one-offs. We usually take longer but since Traveller lasted longer than expected I didn't want to dawdle.  Still, I got the chance to run two games I've never ran before - both using systems that are popular on the interwebs.  Will they turn out to be all that, or will my group not be as wowed by the RPG.Net Darlings?

Round Perdition's Flame - My First Games Of Star Trek Attack Wing

Explosions in the Mutara Nebula

I've written a couple of times before about the Star Trek RPG I occasionally run.  This is a very Next Gen style affair, all about the soul and diplomacy and resolving problems peacefully.  We only do violent starship-style exchanges for end of season affairs - much like the Next Gen TV show did, in fact.

Despite that, sometimes I have an itch for spaceship combat that I like to scratch.  One of the first wargames I played when I got back into the hobby as an adult was the Babylon 5 starship combat game, and last year I got the Star Fleet version of those rules.  (I've still to give them a try - I must get someone onboard to try them out sometimes soon)

Aaron introduced this to me a decade ago, when my Warhammer urge was lying fallow.

However, another Star Trek game is the focus of today's post.  A game I've walked past on Static's shelves for ages but never tried.  A game whose figures I've seen and glanced at as RPG props but always passed up. A game part of a family of several other popular games but of which I have no experience of.

I speak of Star Trek: Attack Wing.