It's not you, it's me.

Oh... Hi there, blog. It's been a long time hasn't it? Yeah, I know it's been a rough blogging year all around. No, it's not that I haven't been doing anything..

I've been steadily working on my Heavy Gear army. It's slow going to be sure, but I'm making progress. Five Gears, a tank, and some infantry painted and done with more on the way. I've also been assembling some Skaven slaves that will eventually form the core of my Warhammer army. Then there's also the two Dystopian Wars fleets (Antactican & Prussian) that are assembled and primed but just need to feel the caress of my paintbrush. That's all been within the last several weeks.

I've also been gaming way more than I have in years past. Dave and I have established a regular game night. Though the night itself varies, we've been gaming almost every week now. We've played Heavy Gear: Blitz and Dystopian Wars, along with a bunch of board games like Stronghold, Summoner Wars, Quarriors, and Rune Wars.

Then there's the video games. While my Xbox has been falling out of favor as my desire to play Halo Reach has faded, I have been playing quite a bit more on my PC. Since most of the MMO's out there have been going free-to-play, I've created characters on Dungeons & Dragons Online, DC Universe Online, Warhammer Online, and Champions Online. These have been nice for when I just feel like running around another world for a while, but they don't hold my attention for very long. Recently, I also purchased the Blood Bowl: Legendary Edition from Steam. This game is fantastic and I've really been enjoying every game I've played. Even the ones I've lost.
 Now, however, I have found a game that is likely to pull me in to the exclusion of all else, much like City of Heroes did years ago. You may have heard of it.. Star Wars: The Old Republic. Yes, I have joined the ranks of lightsaber-wielding maniacs running around the worlds of the Star Wars galaxy. More on that in a later post... probably.

So anyway, the irony of why I haven't been posting is that, while I have been gaming and doing hobby things, I've been feeling less interested in writing about them. It's not that I don't want to write, more like I don't want to take the time. But, I have missed you, my little blog. I've always wanted to fill you with more interesting content and I've had my successes and failures with that. I think this coming year will be the defining moment for you. If I can't bother to fill you with more than one post a month in 2012, maybe it's time to call it quits.

Don't fret though, we still have one more year. I want to get to a few more conventions this year and continue with the gaming I've been doing. I'll be trying to balance leveling my SW:TOR characters while I still continue to work on my miniatures. And yes, of course, there's Gen Con.

I will have plenty to post about, lets just see if I can find that urge to write..

Until next time,
Jack

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So what's been going on?

It's time to get this blog up and rolling again! So, to that end, here's what have I been up to since getting home from Gen Con.

For the most part, it's all been Heavy Gear: Blitz. Dave and I have been slowly working our way through a HG:B game. We've been taking our time, learning the rules over several weeks of game nights. The funny part is that we both love to talk. We can literally spend two hours talking before we even start going on the game! It's okay though, since we still have a good time. I keep telling myself, however, that I should turn on my microphone and make an awesome gaming/general geekery podcast out of our pre-game ramblings.

Game start (photo credit Dave P.)

Despite the chit-chat, we both feel like we're starting to get a good feel for Heavy Gear and are starting to see the deeper tactics that are there and how different units fulfill different roles. There's a lot of depth in here and a lot of stuff your forces can do. I'm really enjoying it and it's been getting me to paint up my Gears in-between game nights.

From meh..

As usual, I was not very happy with the first paint scheme that I came up with (Shut up, Dan!). It had potential, but it was just too blah and even the red that was supposed to make them stand out just didn't make up for the very boring grey.

So, one quick color change and an expansion of my alternating pattern later and... voila!

..to much better!

I'm very happy with this new blue/tan scheme. They look great on the table and, for once, are relatively fast for me to paint. Relative meaning that I can get a mini done in a couple of nights instead of a couple of weeks.

Dave's been painting too and his big, resin hovertank is looking fantastic. I forgot to take a picture of it last time, but I will try to remember to get one next time as well as some more battle pictures. Our goal is, for once, to both have a fully painted army for a game that we play.

Next time I'll give a quick rundown of the colors I'm using for my Gears.

Until then,
-Jack

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The clouds of Gen Con

I had a rather funny olfactory experience at this year's Gen Con. This led to a tweet, which in turn has led to this blog post. I present to you..

The clouds of Gen Con! In descending order of offensiveness.

7. The overdone perfume (or cologne) cloud.

This one took me by complete surprise! Passing through the dealer hall, I walked through someone's excessive perfume trail. Now, under normal circumstances, I find this particular habit disgusting. A person is not supposed to put so much on that they can smell it themselves. However, given all of the smells to be taken in at Gen Con, I found it to be quite refreshing!

6. The smoke machine cloud.

You're not going to run into the smoke machine cloud just anywhere. More than likely, you'll be in the middle of a True Dungeon run, the Gen Con dance, or perhaps a special event put on by one of the bigger companies. It's not particularly annoying or nasty, but smoke machines do tend to leave a bad taste in my mouth.

5. The cigarette smoke cloud.

You might think this particular cloud would rate more highly on the offensiveness chart. However, since smoking is prohibited except for outside, it's easily avoidable. A lot of smokers still tend to congregate on the steps on the north side of the convention center leading out to Maryland St. But, with all of the 'hamster tubes' leading off everywhere, you barely have to set foot on the street if you don't want to. I just made the mistake of crossing over to the Marriott at street level at one point. *cough*

4. The excessive application of onions cloud.

Ah, onions. Natures tasty stink bomb. This one can be avoidable, as long as you stay away from the concession stands in the main dealer hall. I did see enough people heading away with piles of chopped onions on a bun that I actually wondered whether they had a new menu item or if there was, in fact, a hot dog under there. Yuck! It can also lead to #3...

3. The belch cloud.

Yeah, gross! Thankfully, most people are polite enough not to just exhale their chili dog & root beer combo in your face. That doesn't mean that it won't happen though. Gen Con was more packed this year than ever and more than once I heard the rolling gargle of a burp blasted right near by me. I usually have enough wits about me to quickly shut down any inhaling until I've passed the immediate area. At least you can hear most burps and take evasive action. But, then there's..

2. The fart cloud.

Okay, I know we're all human and we all have gasses to let go of, but, be humane people! I ran into it almost as often as the dreaded #1 smell this year. At least try to make it to a more isolated corner of the hall before letting rip. Think of the children! Their little heads are usually right at ass level. Isn't it bad enough that a gas mask is nearly required life support to enter any of the bathrooms on the show floor? It also doesn't help that in the roar of the dealer hall, all but the most intense flatulence will be rendered silent. But, at least a fart dissipates relatively fast. Unlike..

1. The body odor (or B.O.) cloud.

The most dreaded smell ever. Rancid, unshowered, non-deoderant using, STINK. Your only hope is to walk away fast. This stuff clings to the person carrying it and it's constantly replenished over time. It is perhaps the most vile and disgusting smell, if only because it can be helped. There is no excuse for it. There is no "oops" when it comes to B.O. unlike an accidental belch or fart.

How can a person's sense of smell be so deadened that they noxiously poison everyone within 10 feet of themselves, but are blissfully unaware of their own stank? Or is it that they just don't care? No type of gaming is immune, either. You're just as likely to be asphyxiated by someone perusing the newest miniature release as you are by someone carrying their entire Dungeons & Dragons collection around.

I know people love to game. Sometimes to the exclusion of all else, including hygene. But, assuming you're not a computer or console gamer, you generally need someone else in the same room to play with. How is it then that these people actually get to partake in this hobby of ours? I can deal with a little bit of sweatiness, but if someone dared to enter my house with the level of funk that I encounter at Gen Con, they would be permanently banned until they shaped up their act.

Seriously. Don't be this person. Ever.

I hope you've enjoyed this list of the many odors of Gen Con.
May we never smell them again! (not likely!)

Until later,
-Jack

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Gen Con 2011 Picture Dump

I took quite a few pictures at Gen Con this year. Some I tweeted right away. Some have already ended up in this blog. But, I still have more to show off. So without further ado..

Game Tables:

A nice little adobe wild west town.

The FFG Dust Warfare demo table.

I thought this was a Malifaux table, but I see D10s scattered about. Hmm...

Battletech board #1

Battletech board #2

An awesome looking dungeon layout. I wish I would have asked what they are playing.

A mech game with cool buildings and what I believe are hover trains.

Settles of Catan for people who REALLY love Settlers of Catan.

Cool stuff at booths:

 New Dystopian Wars releases at The War Store's booth

Heavy Gear: Blitz stuff at Dream Pod 9.

Some HUGE new Dust models at FFG's booth.

 

 

Also at Fantasy Flight Games...

 

The upcoming Runewars expansion..

..some new Tannhauser units..

..a new game called Rex and the remake of Wiz War..

The ships for Rex.

The wizards for Wiz War.

 Some Super Dungeon Explore..

And some Relic Knights..

 And finally I leave you with my surprise of Gen Con. Quarriors! from WizKids.

Think Thunderstone but with dice.

Until next time.
-Jack

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Gen Con 2011 - Relic Knights Demo

Stopped by the Cool Mini or Not booth and gave the Relic Knights games a try. This is the game to go along with the very anime styled miniatures from Soda Pop Miniatures. The style may not be everyone's cup of tea, but I really like the look and this is definitely on the comedy/action side of anime (i.e. large breasted, scantily clad women, chibi familiars (think pokemon), mecha, crazy-looking demons & monsters, etc. I think they're awesome! Okay, so how's the game you ask? Honestly, I was quite impressed. Think Warmachine & Pokemon combined. It's a skirmish level game. You have a hand of cards, each with up to two colored symbols on them. These are your power cards. On the back of your unit cards are your attacks and abilities, each with corresponding colors. You spend the cards in your hand to use those abilities. Plus, when you do attack, you gain extra cards from what stat your attack is based on so you're not just stuck with what you have in your hand. The same goes for defense. Many abilities allow you to enhance the attack or defense by using yet more power cards. So it's like Warmachine, but instead of using focus, you're using the different color power cards like Pokemon.

Here are some of the painted figures they have in the display case. Each one comes with it's unit card and the color of the card tells what faction it's part of.

Sorry it's a bit blurry.

I also took a video of the demo. It's my second (and last) video demo from this year's con. Much like the Dark Age one, I filmed this one vertically, (D'oh!) but at least I did not turn the camera this time.

Chris from Soda Pop Miniatures was nice enough to let me film this demo. Although I felt really embarrassed at the beginning when I can't remember the name "Soda Pop Miniatures". It was because we were at the Cool Mini or Not booth and that's all I could think of.

It's not nearly as long as the Dark Age video, so this one has only two parts.

Note: The booth was very loud & busy when we were doing this and the Phone wasn't picking up Chris as well as I would have liked so you may have to turn up the volume a bit.

Enjoy!

Part 1-


Part 2-


That's it for the videos from Gen Con this year. I hope to do more next year (widescreen of course).

Until later,
-Jack

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Dark Age Apocalypse demo at Gen Con 2011

So that Dark Age demo I spoke of before? Here it is.
In three parts, no less!

Please click the button in the bottom right of the videos to watch them full-screen.

A quick note:

Yes, I filmed this the wrong way. I just don't do stuff like this often enough and I totally forgot that my iPhone needs to be held sideways. I also forgot that the camera does not change the perspective of the video if you turn it. Because of this, there's a few minutes in the first video where the shot goes sideways as I try to get the table in the shot. I apologize and I thankfully realized this a few minutes in and it disappears around minute 6 or 7.

Enjoy!

Part 1-


Part 2-


Part 3-


And there you have it. I hope you enjoyed it despite the shoddy camerawork :) Look for another video demo very soon!

Until later,
-Jack

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Gen Con 2011 - Day 3 & 4 recap

Saturday was pretty mellow for me in the morning. I did have another FFG game of Civilization to play at 9am, but I decided to skip out on it. I was tired and, while I was playing Runewars the day before, I had overheard one of the FFG guys commenting that none of the Civ games so far had finished within the 4 hour time slot. I did not really want to get bogged down into a game that we wouldn't finish in time.

So I spent most of the morning in the dealer hall, which is not a bad place to be at any time.. well, maybe not for your wallet.

I happened by the Dark Age booth and was offered a demo while I was ogling their miniatures. Dark Age is a post-apocalyptic 32mm skirmish game set in a sci-fi universe and based on the artwork of Brom. Humanity settles on an inhospitable planet to harness it's resources but when the corporations suddenly pull up and leave, the rest of the population is abandoned with no incoming ships to provide food or goods. Survivors scramble to rebuild as best they can in the anarchy over the next few centuries.
It was a great demo (look for another post very soon about that) and since they were running a good deal (Buy the 2 books and get $20 off up to 2 starter sets) I bought in. I went with the Forsaken, the 'somewhat' more civilized humans, and the Dragyri, the honor-driven alien race that's indigenous to the planet. They are really cool miniatures and I can't wait to get started on them.

Saturday's loot pile.

After that I bought a couple of things at the Dream Pod 9 booth for Heavy Gear: Blitz. Although, I really wish I would've waited until Sunday when they were taking 20% off of everything. D'oh! Ah well, live & learn for next year. I also ran back by the vendor who had the markdown 40K stuff and found one more box of Dark Eldar.

In the afternoon, I had a game of Malifaux to get to. This was meant to be a set of demo games called 'speed dating' to give you an idea of how the different factions play. Since I already have my faction and my crew picked out I just asked if one of the guys would walk me through a few turns to cement the concepts of the game in my head. I have read the rulebook, but I figure out how the game plays much better by actually doing it. Things really clicked after a couple of activations and I feel ready to play. Now I just need to find someone else around here to play with.

Don't lose your paper clips!

Later that night was my new experience for this Gen Con. I finally submitted to my curiosity and played in a True Dungeon event. I had been wanting to try it for years now and since I had heard nothing but good about it, I had to give it a go. As I walked in and sat at the table, however, I was still a little leery. Was this going to be lame? As a 'noob' was I going to not have a clue what was going on? Was my group all going to be all ultra-geeks who have done this since year one?

My worries were put aside when I sat down and started chatting with the other players in my group. A couple others were 1st timers, which was refreshing, but even those who had gone before were very helpful. I was asked if I would play the Druid, as no one had taken it yet, and I didn't mind one bit. I've always liked the class anyway. We traded around the collectable tokens that depict what weapons, armor, equipment, & magic items you have, with several being outright given to me to full out my Druid's combat abilities.

Finally it was time to go and we went in to face the Sea Lich. I'm not going to go through and explain every last detail of the experience. I wouldn't want to run anything for anyone thinking about doing True Dungeon in the future. Yes, they will be new dungeons, but some of the riddles and concepts might be similar. I will leave you with a few tid-bits, however..

I rocked as a spell caster! Magic users have to memorize shapes when you train (right before start the dungeon) to make their magic checks. Druids had to memorize the shapes of real-world leaves. Two years of biology came in very handy! Also don't forget your class abilities! The druid's ability to  speak with animals can not be overlooked.

I was not so good at the puzzles. They vary in difficulty. Some require you to think a bit outside of the box, but don't look so far as to miss the obvious answer, and beware of red herrings. For example, One puzzle gave us the letters to spell out the answer, but, because there were multiples of each letter, we missed the obvious conclusion.

They're like poker chips, but for geeks.

I can see why there is such a market for the item tokens. Some magic items, in particular, are very powerful when used in the right circumstances. My Wand of Tentacles, which I didn't think too much of it until I was using it on the end monster, made sure she never laid a claw on us. Powerful indeed!
Obviously, we were victorious!

Overall, I had a great time and I plan on doing it again next year. Probably only once per con though as $38 per run is not cheap. My only gripe is that it felt like it was a bit short, but when you get out, the allotted time has passed so it's more that you wish it would go on for longer instead of it being rushed.

So that was my Saturday at Gen Con.

Dark Age junkie!

There's not too much to say about Sunday. It was mostly just packing up and then taking one last run through the dealer hall. Having been totally suckered into Dark Age, I bought several more packs to beef out the two factions that I picked in the deal. Beyond that, I didn't see too many outrageous deals on anything I really wanted (except the aforementioned Heavy Gear deal) and I really didn't have too much money left to spend. I did buy a few things for the kids and then we were on our way home.

In conclusion, this year was a blast. I had a lot of fun and I ran into several old & new friends while I was there. I'm grateful that it's over, but I still can't wait for next year.

There's still more Gen Con posts coming though! Demos, pictures, & final thoughts, so stay tuned!

Until later,
-Jack

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Gen Con 2011 - Day 2 recap

Friday.

This one is going to be a quick post because I was doing a lot of my own personal shopping in the morning and then had a long game in the afternoon, but I'll quickly cover what I did do.

I did find a couple of awesome deals at two different booths. At the first one (I apologize that I can't remember the name) I found a bunch of brand new Warhammer & Warhammer 40K stuff that was already priced at 10% off with a further 25% taken off of that. A pretty nice score since the best you will find online is 20% off these days. I picked up a couple boxes of Skaven Clanrats and then got started on a Dark Eldar army for 40K with 2 boxes of Scourges, a Raider, and a Razorwing. I wish they had more!

The next big hit was at The War Store again. I'm so glad I stopped by there! They had their Uncharted Seas stuff marked down to 70% off!! Now, they aren't dumping the line, but if you follow Spartan Games you already know that almost the entire line is getting re-sculpted digitally. Emphasis on the word 'almost'. Apparently, The War Store was not aware the the Ralgard faction was already digitally sculpted and therefore will not be getting the same treatment. So I picked up a current fleet plus a few more ships for 70% off. Score!

The lesson learned is: if you look hard enough, there's some great deals to be had here. Keep your eyes open and your wits about you as you traverse the chaos of the dealer hall.

Bad map layout but fun anyway.

The rest of the day was taken up by gaming. Played a fantastic game of Runewars by FFG. Didn't win, but had a good time anyway. Then later, after dinner, I played a game of Quarriors with Dan & Buff. Quarriors is a fast and fun dice-building (think deck-building but with dice) game. I really enjoyed it and I'm seriously thinking of picking it up as I think I can get Dave to play this one. Dave always liked the Dragon Dice game from TSR years ago. No pictures sadly since our lighting was terrible, but I'll try to get some later.

So, again I leave you with my purchases from today..

40K, Fantasy, Uncharted Seas, AE-WWII, & T-shirts!

P.S. The internet here in the hotel is HORRIBLY slow. Because of this, I'm only posting the pics that are immediately relevant to what I'm writing about. I will have some after-con postings where I will dump the rest of my pictures.

Back to the dealer hall!!

Until later,
-Jack

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Gen Con 2011 - Day 1 recap

Thursday. Opening day. It was a great day!

Started out early this morning as I had some ninja shopping to do for a couple of my twitter buds over in the UK. However, despite prior knowledge of the changes, I did not take into account the fact that the dealer floor is laid out completely different this year. In previous years, the little booths might change a bit, but the big boys like Fantasy Flight & Privateer Press were relativtely in the same spot. Not so this year. The dealer hall is much larger and therefore required a new layout. I chose the wrong door unfortunately and ended up in a 45 minute line at Privateer Press because of it. But, I did manage to score the minis I had promised to get.

Then I worked my way back to The War Store's booth because I knew they had some Dystopian wars stuff I really wanted. Picked up two of the new Magenta Class French battleships, as well as both the naval and land battle groups for the new Antacrticans plus their carrier. I'm really excited about them and can't wait to get started cleaning them up when I get back home.

Stopped by the CoolMiniOrNot booth and played a demo of Relic Knights (watch for another post for that one) and looked at the impressive figures from the upcoming Super Dungeon Explore game.

That's a lot of minis!

Of course I had to run by Fantasy Flight Games to check out the new X-Wing miniature combat game. It looks very cool, and appears to pull some inspiration from their successful Wings of War game. The minis are pretty impressive for the scale (I'd say about 1/250th). As quality goes, using a scale of 0-10, with 0 being WotC's crappy warped plastic prepaints, and 10 being the 1/144 scale models from F-Toys that I have, I'd give these about an 8. Still, FFG clearly wants my money on this one and I will be hard-pressed to resist.

Oooooh..shiny!

Spent most of the rest of the afternoon finishing up the dealer room and then went to play a very fun game of Descent. This was an official Fantasy Flight run event, so no repeat of last year's weirdness thankfully, but the custom-made scenario kicked our collective Hero butts. The Overlord took the day pretty easily, but it was fun regardless.

Death comes in red plastic these days. 

Lastly, I met back up with Dan, and our other friends Craig, & Buff (short for buffalo) to play Fortune & Glory from Flying Frog Productions. Again, as with their other games, this one's a winner. A very Indiana Jonesish pulp adventure sort of game. Even though I was incredibly tired, I still liked the concept and I'd be interested in giving it a try when I'm fully conscious.

I'll leave you with a picture of my purchases today. More coming tomorrow. Stay tuned for more Gen Con info!

Dystopian Wars & Dice.

Until then,
-Jack

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Gen Con 2011 - Prologue

It's here! It's finally here! It's Gen Con time!

That's right, the gamer equivalent of the Super Bowl has descended on Indianapolis once again, and once again my plan is to tweet and blog from the con. So here we go...

There's really not too much to talk about on the night before gaming-wise except for the swag bag. Which, I'm happy to say, is halfway decent in comparison to other years.

Swagtastic?

While I'm certainly going to miss the Miniature Market coupon this year (unless they are handing them out at the booth), but I have to say that it's pretty impressive.
The first thing that sticks out is the full software for the Rift PC MMO game. Not too shabby, I'd say. Not sure if it comes with any free game time or not, but I will still probably give it a try.
You also get a 30 card deck of Magic cards of a random color. Mine was blue and Dan got red. We've already played a couple of games with them and they aren't bad decks for 30 cards.
There's also one of these in there...

 The matching weapons in this set are the Katana, Bo Staff, Nunchucks, or Sai.

For those of you who don't know what this is, it is a loot token from True Dungeon. That's the popular live action dungeon run that goes on every year here. I hear nothing but good things about it (other than last year's runs were too hard) and I'm seriously considering doing a run this year myself since there's still tickets available for may slots. A bit expensive at $38 a go, but everything I read and hear points to the fact that's totally worth it. If I do try it out I will let you know. I'm more apt to now that I already have some armor, however light, to head in with.

Most of the rest of the swag bag is the various coupons and advertisements that always fill out the bag. Some of them, however, are pretty good. Several are for free things at different booths! Honestly, this is the way to go for vendors wishing to draw people to them. Sure, opening your bag to see a cool freebie or two is awesome, but it doesn't really draw you to a company's booth. Giving you a coupon for a freebie when you visit their booth, however, is a much better return on their investment since you might stay for a demo or buy into their line. I know there are a bunch of stops I'm already planning on making tomorrow for said items including free miniatures, free t-shirts, free cards, free True Dungeon tokens and more.

My only other thoughts about the con so far is that this one already feels like another record year for attendance. I mean it's only Wednesday, but all afternoon the Will Call line was full. And I mean FULL! It stretched for several hundred people every time we walked past it and only seemed to grow in length as the day went on. All I could think to myself was that I was glad that I chose the FedEx option and had my badge shipped.

As I close down for the night, I will leave you with this picture I took at sunset.. Good night from Gen Con!

Sundown in the blue monster of the JW Marriott

Until tomorrow,
-Jack

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