Tuesday, September 30, 2014

The chances of anything coming from Mars...




While not exactly being a million to one, did seem increasingly remote as it has been almost a year since I joined this Kickstarter (entirely the fault of Michael Awdry, I should say),  This may seem like a curious project for me but I spent the first twenty years of my life pretty much only reading and watching science fiction and so, actually, it is merely a return to my cultural roots.  Anyway, a nice big box turned up yesterday with more alien goodies to come.  It does add another 40 figures to the pile, however!  More on the Martians when I have time to look at them properly, as I am fighting off another potential South American trip in as little as three weeks time, if I can't get out of it.




I really am trying not to get any more figures at the moment but I am very tempted by these new North Star 1672 civilians.  Utterly gorgeous!  Thoughts of pirates and Donnybrook spring to mind.




Last week I had two games at Eric the Shed's in a game-packed evening that saw us start with another Very British Civil War game.  I won't say much about it as it was a play test for a game that Eric is running in the near future.  It was a very balanced scenario as it literally went down to the last dice roll (my side lost - ending a run of victories in the shed).  This was primarily because I didn't spot a unit of the enemy lurking in the latest addition to his town: a garage.  They promptly erupted from inside and destroyed a whole unit of mine in one go.  Added to that my armoured car broke down on it's first move.  Given all that, it is amazing that I kept going as long as I did!


It's a jungle out there


We had time for another game and such is the capaciousness of the shed, that Eric had already set up a jungle which must have had aquarium owners in Chessington blubbing into their fish tanks as they wondered where on earth all the plastic plants to add interest to their piscine environments had gone.  This was a game based around the film Predator and had just five figures involved. 


It's quiet!  Too quiet!


Two of us had two humans each and one of us was the predator who had the advantage of hidden movement.  These were Eric's own rules and worked brilliantly as a game which generated real tension in a struggle that was, again, resolved on the last throw of the dice.  As we moved up the jungle board different landscape and hazards where revealed on the grid-based board.  This would also work for things like dinosaur hunting.


Ola - a good frock (I'm sure she is)


Looking forward I don't see much painting getting done for a while as I have been asked to co-author a book for the World Bank which is going to take much of my time.   There are also, potentially, two trips to South America in the next two months too.  We have also seen the return of Strictly Come Dancing which puts paid to Saturday and Sunday nights as we watch Aliona Vilani, Ola Jordan, Iveta Lukosiuta and Kristina Rihanoff undulate around the dance floor.  Ola's frock this week was an engineering marvel!  We also like Pixie Lott who we (literally) ran into once at The May Fair Hotel a couple of years ago. She had splendidly toned legs then so what a couple of months of dance training does to them will be well worth following.

9 comments:

  1. Those NS figs have a ton of character. I'd give in to temptation.

    Is that Diana Rigg in your "currently watching"?


    FMB

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    1. No, it's Swedish actress Anne Bie Warburg who very rarely kept her clothes on in her films!

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  2. Also love the 1672s! That's a period I'd love to have a crack at; I really enjoyed the Quicksilver books.

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    1. I've actually bought quite a few of the figures but admit to having no idea about the time period or uniforms!

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  3. Never mind all the ladies, can you tempt me with any pictures of your Victrix Republican Romans? I am "hovering" on the cusp of getting/not-getting these

    I seem to be drifting from my strict 15mm Ancients rule into "Oh what the hell" 28mm plastics are brilliant

    ;)

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  4. Another interesting read and an fascinating choice in foreign language films!

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  5. Good to see you getting in some gaming again and on very nice looking set ups indeed... distracted by undulating ladies on the dancefloor? Surely not!? ;-)

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