Starforged: First Session

Hello humans!

And today it looks like it's more RPG stuff.  While I couldn't get into Ironsworn, for some reason Starforged was easier for me and I was able to get started and play through to the end without a problem.  Well, almost without a problem.  For some reason it took me months to come back to this and roll the dice two more times.

Anyway, here's what happened...

Space Station Zero: Vorann (The Pod)

 Hello, humans!

Continuing from the previous post, Vorann's crew faces a new Challenge in "The Pod".

As they arrive in a new section of Space Station Zero filled with loose, sci-fi junk, a pod opens up and ejects some kind of device displaying a digital count-down.

Oh no!  I guess we'd better get over there and disarm what is obviously a virus bomb!  Good thing there don't seem to be any other threats in here. [wink]

Space Station Zero: Vorann (Docking Bay Access Port)

Hello, humans!

Snarling Badger Studios came out with a new solo, sci-fi minis skirmish game and it had a great cover so I went ahead and picked it up.

The idea is pretty cool, and it has a sort of "rogue-like" quality that might work well for a video game, but seems to be ruffling some feathers as a minis game.  Maybe it's just expectations?  We'll see.

Regardless, I decided to give it a try.

Squad Hammer: Mech vs. Mech!

 

Hello, Humans!

It's still NovHammer, so here's more NWG stuff.

Today I'm trying out some clever (but still in development) rules for stompy giant robot combat using Squad Hammer Core.  I didn't write this one.  I'm just testing out some test rules that I have access to.

Time to get excited!

Ion Hammer!

 

Hello, humans!

It's November now, which means it's time for Nordic Weasel Games' "NovHammer" event.  What does that entail?  Playing Squad Hammer and it's variants!  That's it!  Pretty easy, right?

To start it off, my first go at it is some good old Squad Hammer Core with my Ion Age minis.  The scenario I've envisioned is several Prydian units trying to defend a war-torn area of a city from Khanate (mostly Malig) forces.

Chrome Hammer: Ascension - Campaign Turns 2 & 3 (Rescue & Astral Pain)

 

Hoi, Humans (and Meta-Humans)!

Last mission was successful, but Sarge (the Ork Shadow) was captured by the Corporation!  Technically, Sarge can sit in limbo until I get around to trying to set up a rescue, but I'm impatient and want my cool Ork back, so despite not getting paid, I'm setting out to rescue our captured Crew member!

There's also a follow up Astral Pain mission.  We'll see how Shuffle does on his own.

So let's get to it!

Chrome Hammer: Ascension - Campaign Turn 1 (Wetwork)

Hoi, Humans (and Meta-Humans)!

It's time to start a Chrome Hammer: Ascension campaign!

I've been building this thing and testing it and laying it out, but I haven't had a chance to approach it like a player, starting from scratch.  Well, no more waiting!  It's time to eat my own (soy-)dog-food.

I've already got the table set up, so let's go!

Five Parsecs: Bug Hunt

 

Hello humans!

An entity on the NWG Discord offered to host a cooperative Five Parsecs: Bug Hunt campaign, and I thought it would be a good way to force myself to actually play a game.  So far, it's working!

Lock and load, Marines!  It's time for a Bug Hunt!

Five Parsecs from Home 3E!

Hol-lee crap!  Five Parsecs from Home got the nod from Modiphius and has come out with a shiny new third edition!  So obviously I had to give it a go.  Maybe this will even be a running thing.

I made a new crew, all Human except for the lone Engineer alien.  The had a pretty good start, too.  Most of my guys had a Reaction score of 2 or 3, which is nice for a starting crew.  The team consisted of Verdun the Captain, Bloo, Flavio, Spiegel, Riek, and the alien Döbler.

Verdun has a sweet Glare Sword and a Hand Laser.  Bloo has a devastating Shatter Axe.

Our ship, the "Profit Margin" is cobbled together out of salvage, but still put us in debt of 25 credits.

Time for adventure!

Remember Tomorrow: Welcome to Somewhere

Hello, humans!  In an effort to entertain myself, I  thought I'd try soloing Gregor Hutton's "Remember Tomorrow: Near Future Role-Playing".  This is one of those where it's GM-less and the story and characters are shared between the players.  Is that better for a solo game or worse?  Who knows?

In the city of Somewhere, things are all cyberpunky, with corporations and gangs and cybernetic implants and humanoid robots and such.  This game tells the story of some characters trying to get what they want, but to do that, they'll need to be ready, willing, and able when the opportunity comes along.

Chrome Hammer: Ascension Beta (Severance Package)

 

Star Breach

Hello, humans!

I was itching for a game to play, something new to ease my fidgety ennui, so I thought I'd finally try Star Breach, by Elijah M. Kelogg!  (I'm assuming the "M" stands for "Multigrain".)

This is an attractive book with glossy pages and nice illustrations and photos of minis.  It's something I could probably convince a friend to play if I had friends.  I mean, friends nearby that I could hang out with.

Anyway, here's what I did.

Gaea Prime: First Defense or "X-COM Please Don't Sue"

 

Let's face it, whenever I see a new sci-fi skirmish game, it seems like the first thing anybody asks is "Can it do X-COM?"  If for some reason you're not familiar with X-COM, it was an old computer game of tactical skirmish combat that explored fending off alien infantry, raiding their crashed ships, and researching the remains to reverse-engineer all of their cool tech to use against them.  Great game.

Gaea Prime: First Defense is basically that: GP's first encounter with alien slavers raiding the Earth for resources, and the adventures of GP's armed forces as they kill the aliens and loot their bodies for research fodder.

Here's how my first game went...

Weasel-Hammer: White Scars vs. Orks!

 Hello, Humans!

This September is Weasel-Hammer month!  What does that mean?  It's a loosey-goosey campaign set in a lost corner of the Warhammer 40k universe, but mostly played with Nordic Weasel Games games.

In the fractious and war-torn Mustelida sector, some kind of Warp disturbance has cut off that region of space from outside communication and travel while dark forces begin pouring in.  Whatever Imperial elements that happen to be trapped there are the only hope for Humanity!

"In the grim derpness of the far future, there is only w... weasel!"

Laserburn: Nostalgia Kills

 Sometimes you can't truly appreciate what you have, or what you've lost, without going back and (re)discovering it for yourself.

Laserburn is one of those things that bears experiencing. It's a sci-fi game from 1980, which if you're reading this in 2020, was about 100 years ago.  This was apparently before the time of common word processors, or technical writers or editing I guess.  Clearly this was type-written and then copied to make books.  But who am I to talk?  I was alive in 1980.  How many beloved games did I write? :)

I actually didn't get into minis games until much later, so I don't have any nostalgia for the game, but I'm also kind of a gaming hipster, so I at least had to try it.  Here we go.

Chrome•Hammer: //Virus Upload

This weekend I had a chance to playtest some cyberpunk minis beta rules.  Welcome to:

In the first mission, FOZ Pictures Corporation fought Meyerdyne Corporation over a resource extraction site.  Despite Meyerdyne's ED-2099 droid turning more than once on its own units, the pharmaceutical corporation came out on top, dropping FOZ's stock.

Renegade Scout - Crash Landing

Great Mountain Mercs vs. Stinging Willow Precursors

The Department - Sixth Mission

Mission Six: Murder Sweep!

Hey! Didn't you already do one of these?

Well, yes, but that's part of the game. There are only six different missions, plus the unique "boss" missions, so there's going to be some back-tracking in an effort to earn the required evidence. Actually, I would have rather have had a go at the Nightclub or Bust the Lab missions, but I don't currently have a 25+ cm nightclub interior, or 6(!) such interiors to represent the floors of an abandoned building. It's something to work towards, though. :)

For now, we get Murder Sweep again.

Hardwired: Cyberpunk Mayhem!

It seems like skirmishy solo games are all the rage lately, and that works for me, since I don't have a lot of victims friends to try new 15mm games on.  I also, for some reason, like the cyberpunk genre for these sorts of things (witness the terrain).

So, eventually I picked up Hardwired, with the hope that it would be a cool solo cyberpunk game experience.  (Unfortunately, the awesome cover didn't actually come as part of the PDF.  I am sad.) 

Anyway, here's how it turned out:

Blood in Space(...ace...ace..ace...)!

Blood.
In.
SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaace!

So, @Dutch_Law implied that I should try out Blood In Space.  I already owned it, but hadn't played it yet (after all, I have plenty of games to play already).  Blood In Space is a solo or cooperative game of sci-fi shoot-em-up.  It comes with a few pregenerated characters, but you can make your own.  It also has a campaign system of interlocking scenarios, which is nice for a solo game.