Star Wars Risk (really)

Last fall, I bought a copy of the 2015 game Star Wars Risk entirely because it had a tonne of tiny space ships. I was just going to cage them for painting and toss the game but I read the rules first and it is actually pretty decent (and good for a Risk variant) so I added a few more minis and have been running a few games.

The game board is shaped like Darth Vader's tie-fighter silhouette, has three play spaces (left, right and centre), and lets you fight out the Battle Endor. Action is card driven, which lends a bit of interest and fog of war. Basically, the Space Vietcong have to destroy the Death Star before the Space Americans/Nazis wipe out the Rebel fleet.

The central area sees fighters contest for control of space around the fully operational Death Star while they wait for the ground forces to fight it out and lower the shields (I added minis for the larger ships and the DS). This shot is at the end of a game where the forces are pretty severely depleted and the Empire has managed to wipe out the Rebel fleet before the Death Star was destroyed. In each of the five games I've played, the game came down to the wire so it is well balanced and I don't see any killer strategies you could employ..

The ground game (above) sees the Rebel commandos move closer to the shield generators, slowed but not stopped by the Empire. The game comes with cardboard counters but I had some 15mm troops that I painted and added for colour. The tension here is how many cards does the Empire waste to slow the Rebels? Once the shields are down, the Death Star is very vulnerable.

On the other side of the board is a throne-room duel between Luke, Vader and the Emperor. Again, cardboard counters were replaced with some extra 25mm WEG metals from the 1980s. This duel is very much a sideshow and is less integrated into game play than the shield generator track. It has some nice colour (do you redeem Vader or just kill him--depends on your cards and your planning).

Overall, for a game that is designed for 10-year-olds (and requires no reading to play), it was a hoot. You can easily learn the game and play twice in an hour if you are an experienced gamer. I wouldn't want to play this very often but, as something to have around to haul out and play with non-gamers who like Star Wars, this was way better than expected.

Forest terrain for smaller scales

Most of my gaming is on hexes these days and I needed some indicators for forested areas that were suitable for 3mm to 15mm figures. I looked at some commercial options but didn't want to pay the high price so I decided to just make some using stuff I mostly had laying around.

I cut some floor tiles into hexagons and then bisected them. I wanted a mixed of conifers and deciduous. The conifers are made from wavy pipe cleaners (in eye-searing Christmas green) that I glued to the base.

I then spray primed it black and hit it with some matt sage green. This dulled the pipe cleaners (mostly!) and matched the base to the rest of my terrain.

I then filled in the spaces with train foliage.

The result, seen from above and three feet away, looks fine and is hazy enough it can work in multiple scales. I didn't want to haul out a hex mat so I just pulled a single hex to photo-illustrate the finished effect. The hex can be fully filled with trees.

If there are units, they mostly fit with half of the hex open. A green felt hex laid underneath would allow removal of all the trees but still have the space marked as forest. So now I'm off to look through the bins for some dark green felt.

I have a small number of hex bases left that I didn't turn into forest. I'l; have to have a look through the rule book to see if there are other kinds of terrain I need to model.

The Battle of Hoth

For my birthday, my wife got me the new Battle of Hoth game. This is basically a reskin of Memoir 44 and comes with miniatures.

The bulk of the miniatures are Imperial Snowtroopers, which I promptly painted up.

The snow troopers are okay figures. This was a quick prime, detail and wash. I see the bases may need some more work.

The best part about them is that they more or less match the 25mm West End Games figures I have from the 1980s. The WEG figure is slightly beefier and is on a washer but otherwise, these are a good match. It is wild how long it has taken for a Star Wars game token to match the old WEG figures!

There are also some probe droids that match the WEG ones pretty closely.

There are also a bunch of Rebel Hoth Troopers.

These are pretty nice figures that paint up well.

The rest of the minis have variable scales. The snow speeders are maybe 5-6mm sized.

The AT-ATs are very small (2mm?), the turrets are more like 10mm, and I've no sense of the ion cannon or the shield generators.

Once put on the game board, the effect is awesome and I cannot wait to play a game as well as the two campaigns the box comes with.

Star Wars Risk fighters part 1

In the autumn, I bought a Star Wars themed game of Risk because it looked to contain a bunch of fighters as game tokens. I figured the game would suck (it is Risk, after all) but the tokens would be worthwhile.

To my surprise, the game (which focuses on the Battle of Endor) actually looks good, using cards to drive action on three separate tracks (shield generator, space battle, and throne-room duel). I'm keen to play but first I need to paint the figures!

There are three types of rebel ships (B, Y and X wings) that are molded in hard plastic. A bit of spray prime, some detailing, and a wash and voila, a pretty decent fleet. These are pretty small (like 3-4mm scale) but perfect for all sorts of gaming. If I was going to use them for different rules, I would probably base the X-wings.

I still have a bunch of Tie fighters to paint (they are primed but are fiddly as they have no bases to hold onto) and I'd also like to replace a few of the paper tokens with proper models.

Last of the 3mm

This week, I finished the last of my 3mm Rommel painting. The biggest lot was 20 German infantry bases of two different types (samples below).

I'm sorry the pictures are poor--they are just too tiny for my camera even with a tripod and zoom.

Rommel also requires each side to have a supply base. I used some spare models and some sculpty to try and fabricate a representation of a pair of depots.

These look better in person than they do no camera. Can you see the guy mooning the camera?

Up next: Probably some 25mm Star Trek again. Then some 28mm sci-fi.

3mm German vehicles

I finished the German 3mm vehicles I bought this week. For each base shown, there are four more not shown! Apologies for the pictures--it is hard to get a decent shot this small.

First up are some mobile infantry (half tracks and trucks) as well as some artillery.

Then some tank destroyers/assault guns.

And finally some Panzer 2s, 3s and 4s.

Up next: German infantry.

3mm British infantry and terrain

I finished some more 3mm figures for Rommel this week. These are very tiny; the bases are standard FoW 40x30mm bases. 

The British infantry come with strips of standing and strips of prone infantry. I left the strips (I did not want to be fiddling with individual 3mm figures) but separated them into advancing and defending groups. I added some extra cannon to the defenders. There are about 12 bases of each type.

I needed some bridges so got eight in five types. Not sure why they are showing as pink?

Rommel also requires entrenchment markers. I bought the simplest berms I could find.

Up next: German vehicles in 3mm.

Terrain refreshening

Basing 3mm troops is taking more time than painting the (drying time mostly), so I have also been refreshing some of my terrain.

 I have a bunch of old 4" GeoHex hills that I use on a playing mat that I textured a long time ago (12 years? maybe 15?). They are on the left above. I have been repainting them to match the mat and the troop bases (right). There is a slight colour shift in this image so the new paint looks a bit dustier than it is in person.

Since I'm using the same paint colours, the match to the bases is almost perfect. There are a couple of dozen hills to do so I am slowly chipping away at them.

I'm also pretty happy with the match to the playing mat. This should make the hills blend in a bit better than the old ones did.

Up next: British 3mm infantry blocks plus some terrain. Then maybe some German vehicles.

3mm terrain and tanks

I managed a bit of painting among short vacation trips this week. I needed some objective markers so I thought these oases might be fun to try. These are 3mm palm trees and painted up well (after some farting about getting them glued down).

While they are listed as 3mm trees, they are really a bit more like 6mm items. For example, each trunk is thicker than the diameter of a Honey turret. Workable and all, though.

I also finished off the British vehicles I purchased. There are five bases of each type below, including Stuarts, Morris trucks, and universal carriers and A-13s, Grants, and Sherman IIs.

I also did some bases of 25 pounders. I've zoomed in to try and show off the crews (look for the helmets).

 Up next: Some 25mm star Trek and maybe then some 3mm British infantry.

3mm WW2

A few weeks back, Bruce very kindly donated some surplus 2mm terrain. I was very much taken with Rommel when we played it back in the autumn so I ordered some 3mm WW2 tanks.

Apologies for the picture quality--it is hard to snap a shot of tanks these small. The bases are 40x30mm FoW size.

I spent a fair bit of time fiddling about with different basing techniques. These look much better in person than they do in these pictures (e.g., way less green).

A search of pictures on the web suggested some useful techniques: mono-colour tanks with a wash to bring up detail and contrasting bases to let the tanks pop a bit. Bruce helpfully suggested wall filler as a basing compound which allowed me to put some texture on the bases.

I then ended up in a cycle of painting, drybrushing, and washing. I was trying to use pre-made colours (so I could replicate look later) but also match my existing Hotz mat (cause I'm not buying another mat!) and to be vague enough that the units could do Italy, France 1940 and the desert.

The picture below is probably the most colour-true picture and achieved the arid-olive look I was going for. The finished units will have a paper unit tag (for basic info plus hits) taped to the bottom. It has been too hot to sit in front of the computer to figure these out.

Up next: I have a ton of other units underway, including individually posed strips of foot pounders! I also have a few terrain pieces (couple of oases, some bridges, some trenches). But likely a job lot of sci-fi and pulp next.