Saturday 15 March 2014

Mighty Monsters and Irregular Wars. What jolly good fun!

Well I wasn't quite sure what to expect when I bought Mighty Monsters and Samurai Robots Battle Royale from Ganesha Games (I got them together in a US$14 pdf bundle). Last night I had my first couple of games and you know what? I have two regrets. 


The first is that I didn't invest in the hard copy books - because lets admit it, a book is always nicer than pages you printed at home. The second, is that I waited this long to play the games. They were, genuinely, a real laugh. The lads I played with and against were top quality chaps anyway, but the rules really bring the giant stomping monsters and mechs to life and make destruction and havoc a real blast (mind the pun)! It's the sort of destructive fun that my generation haven't had since the 1986 arcade game Rampage.


In both games I took the much shot at Mantis, my chitinous kaiju based on a giant praying mantis. In the first game Mantis was in a one-on-one duel with IRN Mech. While Mantis is very powerful in combat, it is very slow, while IRN Mech is a bit of a multi-tasker. 


I have to say that the mech had me in trouble almost from the start and at one point had me pinned in front of a large rock. He kept using a concussive blast which made me hit off the rock and collapse. I'd spend my turn standing up, then he'd knock me down again. This went on for several turns until a well aimed blast from the mech's twin-linked cannons took the poor insectoid out of the game.

Our second game saw IRN Mech supported by an ISIS Response Force and Mantis joined by Dagon, the fishy kaiju. This game was a bit more evenly matched but the mech still came out as pretty much the last man standing. He certainly earned 'man of the match'.


However, by far the most enjoyable critter on the table was Dagon who squished and squashed his way around buildings repeatedly spitting acid on the ISIS artillery piece until it blew up. Meanwhile, poor old Mantis was shot at some more and ended up being KO'd when a building fell on top of it...


Towards the close of the battle Dagon was surrouunded by the ISIS infantry platoon but managed to create a poisonous cloud which successfully took out 80% of the enemy.


Nevertheless, by this stage the little fish-dude was badly wounded and as he skulked off to hide and regenerate a little, IRN Mech managed to leap over the intervening buildings and flatten Dagon with a body slam. Meddlesome humans and their tech, 2: Kaiju, 0.

We chased those games down with some more playtesting of Irregular Wars: Conflict at the World's End (2nd ed) which also went very well with no new issues raised and a rare victory for me (Dutch) against some pesky Caribbean Indians.

In this first shot you can see the Cimaroons (escaped slaves) sniping - badly - at the duch from the woods. Dutch deployment was superb but the pre-game disease and mishaps round saw them very ill and dispersed all over the place.

However, as the progressed the Indians stretched their line too much and several units who fell out side of their lord's command radius fled the table altogether. A judicious use of my single troop of rijters (mounted pistoleers) saw the cracks emerge in the Indian ranks and the successive turns of Dutch artillery and shot pounding the Indian cacique (chieftain) saw his men flee the table.

A very VERY satisfactory evening and a big thanks to those who kept me entertained! 

Wednesday 12 March 2014

More Mighty Monsters

I am finally gearing up to have my first few games of Mighty Monsters and its sister game, Samurai Robots Battle Royale, this week. I have previously posted a couple of models for these games, IRN Mech and Mantis, but I have rebased them, so I thought I would repost them now, together with their com-padres, an ISIS Response Force and Dagan. 

As readers of this blog will know, I am a bit fond of my historical wargames and only branch into fantasy gaming these days via Song of Blades and Heroes (of which I am a card-carrying fanboy). For me, MM and SRBR - from the Ganesha Games family - will mark my first foray into sci-fi gaming for almost 20 years. I did have a Warhammer 40K army back in the days of 3rd edition but I lost the love for that sort of game a long time ago. 

Even though I gave up on sci-fi games, I've always enjoyed Star Wars (at least the good ones) and Pacific Rim, in my opinion, rocked. It was the latter movie which compelled me to give these games a shot. Rather than fielding a warband or faction like in SBH, SAM and SSD, players field one of more kaiju-style monsters or mechs - where different limbs are activated separately, or perhaps a raft of military units. Here are my four 300 point forces that I am starting out with.


MANTIS
chitinous kaiju 300 points
Head
Q:3
C:3
40 points
Special rules: Armour, Light (15); Fangs (10)
Body
Q:4
C:3
40 points
Special rules: Armour, Light (15); Body Blades (35)
Arms
Q:2
C:4
85 points
Special rules: Armour, Light (10); Grappler (15)
Legs
Q:3
C:3
50 points
Special rules: Armour, Light (10)
Generic Special Rules
Slow (-25)
Battle Honours
victories
Losses
untested
0
0
Total:
0
0
Mantis is a 28mm dreadball player from Mantic. He/she(?) is a great wee figure that I was given by a fellow gamer and formed my first steps into MM.


I.R.N. MECH
Independent Reconnaissance Neutraliser Mech 295 points
Head
Q:3
C:3
40 points
Special rules:
Body
Q:3
C:3
50 points
Special rules: Concussive Blast C5S (25)
Arms
Q:3
C:3
50 points
Special rules: Blade (15); Shooter C4M Twin Linked Cannon (45)
Legs
Q:3
C:3
50 points
Special rules: Leap (20)
Generic Special Rules

Battle Honours
victories
Losses
untested
0
0
Total:
0
0
IRN Mech is another 28mm dreadball player from Mantic. I actually bought this one and was rather shocked by the price for a plastic figure. That said, I do like the pose. The twin linked cannons are copper pipes added to the left arm.


I.S.I.S. RESPONSE FORCE
Imperial Special Incident Service 300 points
I.S.I.S. Platoon (x5)
Q:3
C:1
22 points
Special rules: Puny; Shooter C2S; Short Move
I.S.I.S Goliath IV Mobile Artillery
Turret (head)
Q:3
C:2
30 points
Special rules: Armoured: Light (15); Shooter C5L (65)
Hull (body)
Q:4
C:4
55 points
Special rules: Armoured: Light (15)
Tracks (legs)
Q:4
C:2
35 points
Special rules: Slow (-25)
Battle Honours
victories
Losses
untested
0
0
Total:
0
0
These bold heroes of 'The Empire' are 6mm special forces from DarkRealm miniatures. These are great wee figures; I'm running the tank/artillery as a mech with infantry support. Due to the scale of 6mm figures with the 28mm mech and monsters, I have buffed their fire power a little compared to the rosters in the rule books.


DAGON
amphibious kaiju 300 points
Head
Q:3
C:3
40 points
Special rules: Fangs (10), Spits Acid – Shooter: C6M (50)
Body
Q:3
C:3
50 points
Special rules: Poisonous Cloud (30)
Arms
Q:4
C:2
25 points
Special rules:
Legs
Q:3
C:2
40 points
Special rules: Short Move – Land (-10)
Generic Special Rules
Amphibious (5), Free Disengage (15), Regeneration (45)
Battle Honours
victories
Losses
untested
0
0
Total:
0
0
And this wee dude is perhaps my favourite model of the group. He is a 28mm piranha-boy from Four A miniatures. I have to say that I can't recommend this company enough. They have great little models and a good price and the service was stellar. I'm really happy with them and wish I had a good and immediate reason to buy from them again...

Sunday 9 March 2014

A fine afternoon's gaming.

I enjoyed another fine afternoon of wargaming today with a game of 6mm Hail Caesar chased down by a great playtest of the 2nd edition of Irregular Wars: Conflict at the World's End.

In the first game I took an overwhelmingly superior Seleukid army (superior in both numbers and, for the most part, quality) against some Hellenistic Spartans. The Spartans were tasked with defending a fordable river while my boys were required to force a crossing.


We were playing on a very narrow front so my numbers were somewhat obsolete. In the shot above you can see Conor's Spartans moving up to defend the river. 

He made a bit of a gaff by sending his lighter thureophoroi to take control of the hill and left some of his heavy ex-helot and Periokoi pike units to hold the wood on his right.


I pushed a light division of infantry towards the  wood and some light cavalry towards  my extreme right, to head around the hill.


Sending my light infantry across the river to secure a beachhead in the woods, and my light cavalry across the river on the far right, I hit the thureophoroi with my trio of scythed chariot goodness. Their pointy wrath was enough to weaken the Spartan's mercenaries before I sent my heavy cavalry across the extinguish their pitiful existence.


With the Spartan left wing completely destroyed the Seleukid cavalry surged down on the Spartan centre. In a desperate and misguided dash, the Spartan centre tried to take the offensive and plunged into the river - going into open order to try to get across.



As the light infantry held on doggedly in the woods, the open order Spartan phalangites in the river proved to be easy pickings for the Seleukid heavy horse and the battle was more or less over. The river could have proved a real obstacle to my lads, but in the end it caused the destruction of the Spartan centre. 

The second game, playtesting Irregular Wars (2nd ed.) saw Conor take the Colonial Spanish against my Miskito Indians. As Conor hadn't played the game before, I was at a distinct advantage and I suspect that my narrow victory might have been much narrower had he been more familiar with the rules.


Without giving too much away - hence the sneaky shot through the palm grove - the new phase sequence  of shot, 'action' and melee certainly streamlined the game. The revised version of the core mechanics are working well and shooting now has the potential to be much nastier and the lord has more decision to make regarding his own role during the action phase. Companies outside of the lord's command radius are still troublesome but much less likely to go running off like bad 90s computer game AI. 

My thank's to Conor and his gracious acceptance of a double defeat.