Heroquest: The Lair of the Orc Warlord and Prince Magnus' Gold

 

Back on the Quest with the further adventures of the Fellowship of Destiny!  You may recall that the fellowship did not have an auspicious start!  Their Barbarian Nonak was killed by Varag during the Trial!  However, Mentor was able to locate a replacement in Neo-wulf.  With the Fellowship reforged, the Fellowship was entreated by Prince Magnus to rescue his advisor Sir Ragnar.  Ragnar had been kidnapped by the foul Orc warlord Ulag.  Led by Allathusa of the Green, and joined by Hamilcar Margos, Aerlin and Neo-wulf the adventurers managed to free Sir Ragnar and battle their way through the horde of greenskins to safety.  The Fellowhip was handsomely rewarded for their efforts.  

The Fellowship of Destiny! I decided to go with the Classics 

 After freeing Sir Ragnar, the Fellowship had enough gold to update their equipment.  Hamilcar and Allathusa picked up some helmets to help protect themselves from harm.  Aerlin had a fine staff crafted for him, giving him enough reach to support his fellows with more than just magic! Thus equipped, they received word from Mentor.  A new challenge awaited them.  Price Magnus had deemed the kidnapping of Sir Ragnar a great offense.  He offered a reward for Ulag's head!  Using Loretome, Mentor was able to divine the location of the warlord's stronghold.  Thus armed, the Fellowship of Destiny made haste to smite Ulag and recover the reward.  

The Lair of the Orc Warlord

Our heroes descended into the Orc Warlord's stronghold.  They set-up a kill zone at the first door, and were aghast to find it heavily guarded by Goblin sentries.  Despite the tactical advantage the goblins were able to apply serious damage to Neowulf and Hamilcar with some lucky hits as they stormed into the fortified room.  1 room down and the Fellowship was all ready in rough shape!  

Before the Fellowship even made it to the first hallway, Hamilcar and Neo-wulf were down to half wounds.  Despite the injuries, the party split up with Neo-wulf and  Aerlin going one way, while Hamilcar and Allathusa went the other.  The Elf advised against such a strategy, but Neo-wulf wrecklessly pushed forward, heedless of the Elf's words.    

Aerlin used his magic to heal just as Neo-wulf was jumped by an Abomination in a weapon's room!  That was close!  However, the pair did find a trusty wooden staff there.  It was not as nice as the one Aerlin had commissioned, so Neo-wulf kept it incase it was needed.    

Meanwhile Hamilcar and Allathusa battled their way through a few Orc guards.  Again, the Orcs were able to leave Hamilcar heavily wounded, and Allthusa and Aerlin were out of spells to help!  Allathusa's helmet had paid off, as she blocked multiple crude orc sword blows with her head!  However, the battle had taken a long time, and Neo-wulf and Aerlin were able to return to help, their scouting leading to a dead end. 

Despite his injuries, Hamilcar barreled ahead and slew goblin warriors guarding a cupboard.  There he found a health potion and eagerly gulped it down.  His wounds slowly closed and the severe bleeding stopped as the magic coursed through his veins and knitted damaged tissue back together.  That was just what Hamilcar needed to keep going!  

As the leader,  Allathusa took the lead.  Her efforts led the Fellowship right into a room full of danger.  Orcs and Abominations filled the room.  

Hamilcar, reinvigorated; leapt into danger and attacked.  However, it was all the others could do to keep Zargon's forces from overwhelming them.  Aerlin's Ball of Fire hit the Abomination but the magical flames seemed to have no effect on the beast.  However, Allathusa's Tempest spell held him up long enough for Neo-wulf to arrive and help out.  It was a tough fight, but the Fellowship pulled through.  

However, what they found in the next room was even worse!  There, they found Ulag in counsel with a vile Dread Warrior in ancient and corrupted armor, a foul stench emanating from his bloated form.  Hamilcar was enraged by the foul beast and attacked, while Neo-wulf tried to thin Ulag's goblin guards.  Allathusa took on Ulag in a duel, but her skills with a sword were sorely tested by the Orc Warlord.  

Things were looking perilous for Allathusa, and she used her magic to escape; only to fall into a pit trap protecting a treasure chest in the other room.  Apparently, Ulag had yet to be paid by the Dread forces of Zargon as the chest was empty!  

Neo-wulf mopped up the Goblin guards and roared a challenge to Ulag!  The Orc Warlord could not turn down such a fierce opponent and squared up.  The Dwarf and Dread Warrior's duel was also an epic battle, with both exchanging punishing hits.  However, the Dread Warrior seemed to shake-off the hits with ease!  He even managed to tank one of Aerlin's spells!    

Finally, Neo-wulf managed to off-balance his foe.  As Ulag over-corrected the barbarian spun is sword in a wide arc and lopped his head from his body.  Aerlin blessed Hamilcar with Courage and the Dwarf managed to dodge beneath the Dread Warriors' blow and strike him a fierce blow beneath the arm of his armor.  Aided by Aerlin's magic, the blow was fatal!  

The forces of Zargon had been bested once more.  The bruised and battered Fellowship managed to reach the surface once more, and collect the reward from Mentor on their return.  Ulag's head was all the proof Mentor needed to convince Prince Magnus that the deed was done. 

Post- Battle

Wow!  Zargon's forces were rolling really well this game.  I was taking triple hits from Orcs pretty regularly.  The Elf's helmet paid off in spades, and the Dwarf's extra armor was enough to keep him alive.  To make it worse, the forces of Zargon did pretty good rolling black shields as well, so the battles were hard fought.  I think the Fellowship took something like 20+ wounds in this dungeon.  Everyone made it back in one piece, but only by the skin of their teeth! 

With our gold, I was looking to see if we could get a few Potions before going to the next Quest.  However, I am only finding a Potion of Speed available, as well as armor and weapons.  I think other Quest packs expand the offering, but I am going to keep it to the core rules for now and not offering any others yet.             

Prince Magnus' Gold      

Having proven themselves useful to Prince Magnus, the royal lord has reached out to Mentor to help him with another problem.  Royal gold was stolen by a group of marauding orcs and their Dread Warrior master, Gulthor.  Mentor has offered the services of the Fellowship of Destiny to help retrieve it.  With a reward being offered, the Fellowship strap on their arms once more and make their way to the bandits hide-out.  Before heading out, Hamilcar picked up a shield to boost his Defense to 4.  

The Fellowship entered the catacombs with care, and were confronted by Orc and Goblin sentries.  One tied them up in a long hallway, and Allathusa used her magic to get past him, while Hamilcar shrugged off the Orcs attacks.  However, the dwarf could not finish the enemy.  

After finally besting the Orc savage in the hallway, the Fellowship continued their search.  The long hallways and spread out lay-out of the bandits stronghold was stringing the Fellowship out.  They were becoming separated, as the labyrinth was probably designed to do.  As Aerlin the Wizard searched a room for treasure he was ambushed by an Abomination!  Thankfully he was able to fend off the creature long enough for Neo-wulf and Hamilcar to finish it off.  However, the Wizard did not escape unscathed.  

From there, traps took a toll on our intrepid Fellowship.  Neo-wulf and Hamilcar both fell victim to Pit traps, learning the hard way.  Neo-wulf also fell victim to a trap while searching for treasure alone.  The monsters had failed to hurt them too much, but the traps were hurting.  As they explored another long hallway, Hamilcar took the lead and put his learnings to use.  He detected and disarmed a trap.    

From there, Neo-wulf flew into a rage at the dishonor of all the traps and went storming far ahead of his companions, who failed to catch-up.  He burst through a door to face several Orcs.  He tore into them, and by the time the rest of the Fellowship caught up, the Orcs were in disarray.  A final shot from Aerlin through the doorway with his staff finished the last of them.  Neo-wulf failed to learn his lesson and stormed off again with Aerlin barely keeping pace.  Allathusa and Hamilcar were trailing far behind! 

Neo-wulf sighted an orc guard and cut it down in moments.  He then impetuously stormed into the center room with a roar of defiance!  There, he found Prince Magnus' gold, as well as the vile Dread Warrior and his gang!  The bandits grabbed their weapons, and attacked  but not before Neo-wulf and Aerlin stormed the room and killed a Goblin guard.  

They were quickly surrounded!  An Orc warrior guarded the door as his friends attacked the impetuous invaders, Neo-wulf and Aerlin.  Aerlin found himself faced with the Dread Warrior, Galthor.  He smashed the poor wizard with his shield.  However, the Wizard kept his wits around himself enough to heal Neo-wulf.      

Hamilcar fought valiantly at the doorway, trying to break through the Orc defender.  However, the Orc held long enough to keep reinforcements from arriving.  Allathusa managed to cast sleep on one of the attackers through the doorway, relieving some of the pressure.  Seeing Gulthor bear down on him again. Aerlin used Pass Through Rock to escape the Dread Warrior and the room of death.  

Neo-wulf hacked down more of the gang in his battle rage, but was taking damage at an alarming rate.  Hamilcar defeated the Orc at the door, and he and Allathusa rushed in to aid their companion.  A Rock Skin spell helped keep Neo-wulf going, but the Abomination and Gulthor were slowly tearing him apart.  

Finally, Hamilcar was able to get the drop on Gulthor and sink his short sword into a soft spot in the Dread Warrior's armor.  The Dwarf claimed a second Dread Warrior kill!  Neo-wulf and Allathusa managed to clean-up the rest of the bandits after that.  

From there, the heroes managed to lug the treasure chests to the stairs and escape.  There Sir Ragnar's men meet the heroes, and gathered the gold to take to Prince Magnus. They compensated the Fellowship with their reward as promised.   

Post-Battle

This was a close run thing.  Neo-wulf had been reduced to 1 Body after healing once. Hamilcar to 2 Body after being healed once,  Allathusa also down to 2, and Aerlin was also down to 1.  The Pass Through Rock spell had kept him alive!  Thankfully, I had enough spells at the end to keep me going.  

The monsters were not getting triple hits like last time, and I was rolling pretty well for defense the first half of the game.  The second half..... not so well.  The traps really took a toll on my team.  It seemed like the order of operations kept having me fall into traps as I was moving into new areas, beyond where I had all ready searched for traps.  I am still getting the hang of how to make sure traps do not whittle my Fellowship down early. 

The quest has a cool, carrying mechanic; but by the time it comes into play; it is mostly useless.  It just makes it take longer for pointless rolling to escape the dungeon and it takes twice as long now.  However, if we took the chests and scattered them around the dungeon, this could have made things more exciting as there would still be foes to face off against.  

When all was said and done, I did manage to walk out of the dungeon with a Potion of Strength and a reserve Healing potion for Allathusa.  We also had enough gold to buy some more defensive equipment for Neo-wulf and Allathusa going forward.  

Until next time as the Fellowship of Destiny continues their quest.       

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Battle of Kadesh Participation Game from the True Crit Gaming Guild

 

Greetings all, 

If you are in the Northwest Wyoming area on April 5th, I would love to see you at Gestalt Studios in Powell, Wyoming around 1pm.  I will be hosting a participation wargame about the Battle of Kadesh using the In Strife and Conflict rules.  This is an event open to the public and I hope to have folks get hands-on with wargaming.  No experience necessary and I will provide everything you need to join in. 

Of course, I will be on hand to talk about wargame design, host the game, sign books, and have a great time!  First come, first serve.  

I hope to see you there! 

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On The Painting Desk: Anglo-Saxons are Back on the Menu!

 

Last year, I picked up an Anglo-saxon army from Victrix using a combination of Late Anglo-saxon, Early Anglo-saxon, and Dark Age Archers ranges.  I started by painting up the Anglo-saxon shield wall infantry.  I left off the process here: 

 I still had to do the finishing touches on these troops.  They needed a good basing and their shields done up.  One thing about shields, is it is almost like painting up another miniature!  So much of the attention will be taken up by the shields!  

Therefore, I decided to start off phase II by doing the bases!  This is a simple coat of Territorial Beige of cheap big, box acrylics.  Then, when the paint is still wet, I sprinkle in some lichen for some ground cover.  Nothing fancy and all easily sourced at your local Big Box retailer.  With bases these little plastic dudes look like this.  

That led me to the shields.  The bloody shields.  I paint all my shields on the sprue to start with.  I find them much easier to manipulate this way.  I undercoated them with a cheap acrylic white.  Then, I start by batch painting them with some sort of wooden color like Fur Brown, Bestial Brown, Oaken wood, Desert Yellow, and Skeleton Bone.  This gives them their wooden base and frames.  From there, I give them an initial coat of white, green, blue or red.  This often takes two coats for good coverage.  Then, I paint their metal boss a metallic color.

Now comes the hard part.  Vikings shields, and Anglo-Saxon shields, tend to have quartered or other similar designs.  Those are not easy to free hand, but I am going to give it a shot.  I have done it before, and I will do it again.  Here is a quick tutorial on how to do basic Dark Age shield designs.  

First, you paint 4 to 8 lines on the face of the shield in the alternate color.  It reminds me of slicing a pie or pizza.  Yum.  Shields from the period tended to be whole colors, halved, quartered, and in eighths.  

Second, you fill in the tops and bottoms of the wedges in alternating pieces of the pie.  This informs which wedges you are going to fill in. 

Lastly, you just put paint in the wedge where it belongs.  Ta-da!  Now it is time to go eat some pie!  Only 39 more to go! 

Once you have painted all the designs, the bosses are done, and the frames are all blocked you take the final and most important step.  You slather in a Strong Tone wash to help cover up all your sins and lack of coverage!

Finally, you remove them from the sprue and attach them to the models.  Fun fact about Viking and round shields from this period is that they were carried in one-hand and had no supporting straps.  That means they were not worn on the forearm like the Kite shield.  They were held out in front in a single fist along the center axis of the shield.  They were also rather light weight and mostly protection against missile weapons unless they were overlapped for extra strength.  This allowed for a variety of tactics for individual shield usage but also shields overlapped with others reinforced and strengthen each shield for a shield wall, while keep each individual shield light and easy to carry.  They were also often slung on the back when two hands needed to be free.  

The Fyrd all ready to fight! 

 

The Earl Eirkir and his noble Thegns

On the models you can see how the shields were held-out in the fist, as opposed to strapped on the arm.  If you try the arm mounting, no one would have their shield in the proper position for fighting!  

That finishes up the shield wall infantry for my Anglo-saxon force.  40 guys batch painted.  The shields are almost like painting another half dude!  The Fyrd were all from Victrix's Early Saxon box, while the Thegns were from the late Anglo-Saxon kit.  I figured the bosses would have the best, most modern gear while the Fyrd maybe not so much. 

This army still needs 20 skirmishers and 30 archers before I call it done.  This will give me more than enough units to mix and match a bit to take on Erik Greybeard and his Viking raiders or King Errc and his Dark Age Irish using Fury of the Northman.  

Here is the infantry out on the table, formed up for battle.  

   Until next time! 

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RPG Review: Pendragon 6th Edition - Chaosium

 

I think there is something wrong with me.  I love RPGs with social systems that reduce player agency and boxes players into certain values, almost like you are part of a civilization that has certain mores, customs, and ways things are supposed to be done.  Games like Legend of the Five Ring with its very rigid social system appeal to me.  Therefore, it is only natural that I would be drawn to this.  

Pendragon is about semi-mythical, romanticized Knights of the Arthurian tradition.  Like Samurai, Arthurian Knights had a code of servitude they were supposed to live by.  They had a social role in society of warriors and protectors.  They serve a lord and in exchange are taken care of by their lord.  The lord provides food, shelter, housing, and equipment in exchange for service and acts of bravery and violence.  Knights must follow their lord, and interestingly, protecting the weak is at best secondary and is often not even part of their job.  

If you have read a lot of Arthurian folklore and legend you know that knights are big personalities full of foibles and swings of passion.  They are not like Samurai in that regard, who are supposed to be supremely stoic.  Knights are figures of romantic (in the literary sense) character and that brings bouts of moodiness, melancholy, and madness.  Knights were full of feelings about their duty, chivalry, and courtly romance that they expressed in the literature.   

Before we get too far, know that this is a hefty tome!  It is a nice, full-color hardback with 251 pages of details.  There are a few ribbon book marks built into the spine.  I think those will be necessary to keep track of key parts of the book.  It is clear that the author Greg Stafford knows a thing or two about Arthurian lore, both literary and historical. They are clear that this is not a book about the actual time period of the Dark Ages, but how the Arthurian Legends that have been passed down to us in literature.  

So, let's take up our lance, sit astride our chargers, and prepare to go on a quest into these rules......

 Things I Liked

There is a lengthy discussion at the beginning about what a knight is, and what a knight isn't in terms of Pendragon.  It has some detailed discussion about female knights, and cites some literary and historical examples.  It also discusses why you may come across knights doing bad things or things they should not be doing.  This is followed by an idea of the themes of the game, and how it should be played.  This is necessary to help ground the GM and players into the game system and what it is trying to simulate.  This is not the world of Dungeons and Dragons, not even close. 

I think my favorite part of this game is the Opposed Traits system.  There are a list of "Knightly Traits" that are opposed to each other.  These Traits are split so they add up to 20.  For example, your two traits are 13 Merciful/Cruel 7.  The GM will call on you to take dice tests to determine how your Knight will respond to various situations, so they might call on you to make a Merciful check to spare a fellow knight in battle.  You roll a d20 and try to get below the dice check required, if passed you get to act Mercifully, if failed you make a dice test on the Opposed Trait to see if you act the opposite.  In this case a Cruel 7.  If you roll under 7 you act Cruelly towards the fallen knight.  If you roll above, you can dictate your action.  Therefore, you can give your Knight preferences for how they will act, but in the heat of the moment they may act in a way outside of their normal character.  This can lead to great melodrama and tragedy, actually codifies knightly conduct in the rules, and fits in nicely with the Arthurian theme.  However, some players may not like this as it removes some "player agency" from the game.  

An extra wrinkle to the Traits system, is that Knights often have certain "Passions" that they can call out to temporarily boost a Trait.  These Passions help further differentiate Knights from each other, and they fall into various categories based on the nature of the Passion.  Things like Homage to their Lord, Love of Family, Passion for their gods, and Hate for a Foe fall into these categories but diversify the longer you play.  Failure on Passion related checks can lead to bouts of madness and melancholy.    

One key component of Pendragon is that everyone dies!  However, there are detailed rules for playing not just a Character, but a family line of Knights.  Therefore, if your first character falls, but has an heir you can continue the adventure with their off-spring or close relative taking up the mantle.  There are rules for passing on Glory, Passions, and other details down the family line.  This type of play is encouraged, and finding a spouse and having heirs is a key part of the game play IF you want to follow the full Arthurian myth cycle from the very beginning to the end, as it covers 150 years or so of time!    

 

Things I Did Not Like

The dice mechanic for resolving basic tests and opposed tests is somewhat convoluted and non-intuitive to me.  For starters, it is a d20 system but it is a roll under system.  Never a fan of roll under, but I understand why here.  Crit failure is a 20.  Crit success is if you roll the exact number of your stat.  In addition, if it is an opposed roll you will need to roll lower than your stat, but above your opponent.  The good thing is that this can lead to a variety of success states, but ultimately is not intuitive to recall at all!  This is before we get into Passions and other variables that can be applied to rolls. This leads to some convoluted sets of modifiers that I think I will need a cheat sheet to keep track of what does what, what is a success, partial, failure, etc. for a while when playing this game. 

Combat uses the basic system mentioned above with skill checks.  The hardest part if cross-referencing the Crit Success, Success, Failure, Fumble chart.  There is also distances and weapon damage, knockdowns, etc.  A QRS will be needed until you get the hang of it.  It is also important to note that combat can be rather brutal with people dropping weapons, weapons breaking, and getting knockdown a lot.  Plus, a Knight can't take that many hits without being knocked out.  To make it worse, healing can take a long, long time in this game because there is no magical shortcuts.  Healing is done on a weekly basis.  Therefore, fighting is common but can get deadly relatively quickly.  Thankfully, most Knights are more valuable alive as ransom to their fellow knights or are fighting to the first blood.  

The book is very comprehensive and has a great table of contents and a list of key tables.  I really liked the Key Tables contents page.  However, the book does place rules in some strange places and there is a mix of flavor text and rules in some parts.  I think this will make it challenging at times to play.  

The Core Rulebook references a lot of other rulebooks and they are not covered in this book.  I was a bit surprised by this, as I expected to get the rules for the game.  Apparently, this is more of the Player's Handbook, with different books for Gamemasters, Estates, and other details.  Supplements are fine for a game, but I feel the naming of this book is a bit misleading.  I would therefore not call this a complete game because a lot of key ideas are touched on, but not covered.  SAD!  

There was no introduction scenario to help GMs and Players get introduced into the setting and the game.  That disappointed me. I am left not exactly sure how to introduce my players into this world or how to even get a grasp on creating adventures for this game.  Double SAD! I guess for that I need to get the Starter Set too? 

Meh and Other Uncertainties

All players start as Squires.  In order to become full-fledged Knights there are a few mechanical things they need to do.  This includes hitting certain thresholds of Skills and Glory mechanically.  There are also some other Role-Play aspects such as age, having a Lord, etc.  Therefore, this game starts with young adult characters and follows their careers as they age, grow old, die, and then carries over to their heirs!  Each adventure is one year in the longer campaign, and the end of each session has a "Winter" phase where characters update for the next year.  This includes aging, skill development, etc.  It reminds me of an "End Phase" in wargaming.  Keeping track of the year, and how it corresponds to the Arthurian timeline is relatively important in this game.  

The game uses Glory as the main metric for determining success, well; there are a lot of ways to measure success.  You can level up certain traits to become various types of Knights like Chivalric, Religious, etc.  You can level up and down your Honor rankings.  There are a lot, but the main mechanic is Glory.  As you complete adventures and tasks you earn Glory.  It is also something you use to measure against other Knights you encounter as well.   

This game has dedicated rules for solo play.  I think this system really works well with that format.  I have to admit, the big appeal to me of RPG is the social group aspect.  Take that away and I might as well play something else.  However, the way this game is structured made me question my own thoughts on solo-play.  It is more about "discovering what happens".  However, it speaks to the somewhat abstracted nature of the game compared to some other RPGs out there.   

There are three chapters dedicated to arms, armor, and horses (?).  Horses are actually a pretty big deal in this game and not the disposable things you see in most Fantasy games.  I think one of my favorite tables is the Horse Personality table, as players as expected to role-play their mounts as well!  The game has several pages dedicated to creating Heraldry for your Player-Knight.  Of course, it is just a short primer on a topic that whole books have been written on.  However, even this small sliver is very interesting.   

Final Thoughts

This is a relatively crunchy game that leans more towards Simulation than it does Narrative.  However, the simulation is focused on a fictional world of the Mythical King Arthur cycle.  Therefore, it is not for the feint of heart.  I really enjoyed how the game "codified" and "systematized" the conduct of Knights and this is one of the few games I have seen that have managed to codify such a behavior based system into rules.  

In some ways, this is a bit of a throwback design to things that were popular in the 80s.  RPG Design has moved a lot in that time.  There are some things that are very detailed and focused on, but other very important aspects are just handwaved.  In addition, a lot of outcomes rely solely on dice rolls.  

That said, like Legend of the 5 Rings; this is not an RPG for the newbie role-player.  This requires a couple things to work.  You have to be willing to engage with it for what it is.  This is not a rules-lite Narrative heavy game.  This is a crunchy outcome generator for Arthurian legends.  If you come to this game with the wrong thought process, it will be very disappointing.  Come at it in the proper context and interest in Arthurian Legend and you will have an amazing time.       

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On The Painting Desk: Anglo-Saxon Shieldwall for Fury of the Northman

 

The first big painting project of 2025.  I am working on an Anglo-Saxon army for Fury of the Northman.  I picked up the miniatures for it in 2024 but did not get the time to work on it back then.  However, it is winter time and there is no better time to paint a big project than now.  I am using a combination of Victrix kits, the Late Anglo-Saxons, the Early Anglo-Saxons, and the Dark Age Archers kit for this army.  The army will look like this: 

• 1 Unit of Shieldwall Nobles as Thegns from the Late Anglo-Saxon kits
• 3 Units of Shieldwall Militia as Fyrd from the Early Anglo-Saxon kits
• 2 Units of skirmishers/irregulars from a mix of Early and Late Anglo-Saxon kits
• 3 Units of Archers from the Dark Age Archer kits

That is enough for an army plus some swappable extras to play against my Dark Age Irish and my Viking force.  That will allow a pretty decent campaign mix.  Still thinking about a Muslim army for this period too. 

I decided to get started on the Shieldwall infantry first.  That is the heart of most armies in the Viking Age isn't it?  Well...... no..... but it is for this one!  I have been spoiled by all those Heroquest models because I forgot what a pain it is to actually assemble your models!  That really slowed me down.  However, I soon had the 40 shieldwall models all assembled and put on washers.  Then, before painting I of course gave them an undercoat of Grey Seer.  

Before I got started, I decided I was NOT going to be using Speedpaints on these guys.  All of my other Historical models I use the base coat and a wash method.  So these fit in, I decided I wanted to do the same with this army.  Therefore, after spray undercoating it was time to start batch painting.  

Here is a quick look at my batch painting technique.  I have obviously batch painted a few armies in my time, so I think I have a decent technique down for it.  First thing I do, is paint all of their flesh and all of their shoes/boots.  I typically use three different colors for their footwear.  

From there, I start painting from the lowest layer up.  Typically, that is the pants!  I decide on the various colors of pants I want, then I start to break them up into smaller groups, so that each unit will only have one or two guys with the same color pants.  

I then, do the same thing with the next layer.  In this case, it was going to be the leggings.  I typically use the same colors I just make sure a guy with that color pants doesn't get the same color leggings.  I then make one last mix up for their tunics.  I tend to do the same thing but with fewer colors and larger batches for all the colors as I move up the model, so belts, hafts, armor/helms, etc.  You may have also noticed that I keep all the shields off, I paint those on the sprue separately and add them just before basing.  

Of course, I got a bit impatient and spent some time away from the Fyrd, and focused on the Thegns and got them done the fastest of all the Shieldwall infantry..... woops......

All that chainmail was just begging for me to finish it off.  Afterall, they look so... unfinished... in all that gun metal and polished silver.  I couldn't let that stand!  I finished the base colors with a nice coat of Strong Tone wash. The guy in the purple cloak is supposed to be my Earl.  I like to give my officers purple..... it is a hang-over from my ancients painting.  Any excuse to use purple am I right!  Like the Fyrd, I will be painting the shields and adding them last.  

With a small hit of Dopamine to help me get to the end, I went back to working on batch painting the Fyrd with my tried and true method.  I mean, it is only 30 of them right!  The biggest "batch" to batch painting with these guys will be their tunics.  I mean, these look super comfy and I am hoping one day they come back in style!  It is basically a really long and flowing shirt belted around the hips?  I would wear that.  

Look, it's the Power Rangers: Dark Ages!  Go, go Power Rangers!  Here the Fyrd are about half finished.  From here, it is about painting up the belts, pouches and gear that they are all wearing.  This is mostly Skeleton Bone, Dessert Yellow, Leather Brown, and Fur Brown.  Again, each model typically uses two different gear colors to mix it up.  Since I use those colors on their tunics (or are they tabards?) you have to make sure you don't make the belt and gear the same color as the clothing.  Easy to do when batch painting.  

It is always amazing to me how "finished" a model becomes when you paint their weapons.  I could have a full unit painted, but not their weapons and it would look like I still had a ton left to do!  Since they are spears, I mixed it up with different colors on the hafts using the same colors as their belts.  Then, I painted up all the metal, including helmets, buckles, spear points with a variety of Plate Mail, Gun Metal, Bronze, and a few Metallic Speedpaints for variety.  Once again, hair color was one of my favorite parts using a some yellow, and orange, but mostly ash grey, dark stone, fur brown, and monster brown.  The base colors were all in place! 

The last step to finishing the basics on these guys was a nice Strong Tone wash using my Armypainter washes.  The Strong Tone is black based and it works well with Chain Mail and armored minis.  These guys are not wearing chain, but I used it on the Nobles.  I felt like if I switched to a Light or Soft Tone they would not blend in as well.  Those tones are sepia based.  So, with some trepidation I hit them with the Strong Tone......

Oh yeah, that darkened them up.  However the blend in pretty good with the leader squad.  The only left to do is to base them and get their shields painted.  Man, I hate painting shields, but especially Dark Age shields.  You can see how it went last time with my Vikings, but you will have to see how these turn out.  

Painting these 40 guys to this level took me about 4 days of work, spread over a couple weeks of time, a few colors here and there.  I rarely get to just sit down and paint for 3 days straight!  Most of my painting projects I pack up in between sessions, but these guys just sat on the desk and waited pateintly.  I do not think I would enjoy just sitting down and painting all day!  I tend to do a color or two, get up, do something else for a bit, and then come back to it.  

Next up, I will go over the shields and start in on the Skirmishers and Archers.  Probably another batch of 30-50 guys.  Until next time! 

Bonus Content! 

I managed to go down and play some of the new edition of Kill Team with the True Crit Gaming Guild.  I took the Hand of the Archon out to play since it had an actual Kill Team box and I hoped the rules were still current.  No idea still, but my opponent was nice enough to let me use what I had.  

I honestly only picked up on a few differences compared to the last edition.  Of course, the missions changed, some of the keyword rules changes a bit, assets changed, and the way Conceal/Engage worked changed a bit.  They also ditched the stupid shapes instead of numbers thing.  However, it seemed to play pretty much the same after that.  However, it is also possible that I never knew the old rules well enough to notice the differences!  

This was a classic battle of dwarves vs. elves, as my friend took the new League of Votann Scavengers for their list.  I couldn't tell you too much about them, except they seemed to be a close ranged team.  They had shotguns and a lot of pistols and CC dudes.  I had them pretty well shot up, and managed to out flank them.  We scored points by being in the enemy control zones and deployment zones.  They had some resourceful tricks, but ultimately the Dark Eldar were nastier this time.  

I saw the Hivestorm box at the store, but ultimately I doubt I will pick it up unless I come into some sort of windfall.  I really do not need two new Kill Teams when I all ready have more than I will probably use!  Plus, I am not sure the rules changes are enough where I feel like I need the update to the newest edition in order to keep engaging with it on a casual level.  

Until next time!  

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Battle Report: Heroquest- The Trial and The Rescue of Sir Ragnar

It is time to embark on a great quest, a quest for Heroes!  A Heroquest!  

I packed up my Core Set of Heroquest and took it to my families' for the Holidays.  However, it never got put on the table.  We were too busy and never got to play it.  It happens.  However, when I got home I figured it was about time for the game to hit the table.  I had downloaded the App, and decided to give it a whirl solo.  I think you lose a lot when you do it solo, as some of the "RPG-Lite" gets left behind.  However, I tried to inject a bit of it into my gameplay where I could.  

My Heroes!  

Speaking of that, I decided to use the Original Heroes for my warband.  I could have added the Druid but I chose not to.  Maybe next playthrough?  They call themselves The Fellowship of Destiny.    

They are ostensibly led by Allathura of the Green.  An Elf from the ancient kingdoms, her people have stood against evil countless times before.  Now, her people have sent her to defend the realms of the freefolk once more.  

From the ancient Dwarf halls comes Hamilcar Margos.  A fierce warrior and renowned tinkerer.  The cousin of the son-in-law of the Thane, he has been tasked with upholding the honor of his people.  His task is to cut down his foes and make sure that foul machines and traps do not harm his fellows.  

The wizard Aerlin of the Moonlight is said to possess a natural talent for elemental magic that could one day rival Mentor himself.  However, Aerlin is patient, and cautious in his ways.  Mentor has the utmost faith in the lad when it comes to defending the realm from magical threats and Dread magic.  

Lastly, the Fellowship is joined by No-nak from the North.  His people owe fealty to the King, and have defended the Northern Approaches for decades.  He is strong of back and swole of arm.  No-nak often solves his problems with violence!  

Together, Mentor has dubbed them the Fellowship of Destiny.  After years of training, Mentor has one final task for his students.  They must hunt down the foul Gargoyle Varag in Fellmarg's Tomb.  

The Trial

The first quest is a bit notorious for being difficult because it uses ALL the monsters and the heroes only have their starting gear.  It is so notorious, that Avalon Hill/Hasbro released a new beginning quest.  However, the App just starts with The Trial, so I did too!  In my review, I also talked a bit about using some House Rules for movement, but I just decided to play it straight.  

Right away, in the first room Allathura ran into a wandering monster!  It leapt from the shadows and attacked!  However, after an initial surprise she was quickly able to dispatch the foul minion of Varag! 

 

The App is kind of fun, because it keeps the surprise of what is behind various doors or pathways a surprise as you explore.  The enemies are not that smart though, and it is easy to trap them behind a doorway, or in a corner.  However, they do like to hit and run, so that is something you need to think about.  Plus, with starting equipment you do not have any diagonal attacks, and that can be tough as monsters will block doorways too.  It was a bit of a learning experience on the best ways to approach doors and exploring.  

Despite the lack of traps or secret doors in the first dungeon, I liked to keep Hamilcar in the lead.  He is resilient enough to handle most things, and then No-nak could maneuver tactically to deal with it.  I made the right choices and found Fellmarg's tomb pretty quickly.  However, the Mummies protecting the tomb and Fellmarg's undead spirit really were a tough nut for me to crack.  A powerful fire ball from Aerlin was needed to finish the job.  Afterwards, I needed to boost up Hamilcar and No-Nak with magic from the others.  

Thankfully, we found a Potion of Defense.  We opened a door and ran into an Abomination.  This thing was a tough nut to crack as well.  Hamilcar and No-Nak had it boxed in, but were failing to put it down.  Thankfully, No-nak had Rock Skin and the Potion of Defense so managed to avoid further serious injury despite the prolonged combat.

 Allathusa of the Green led the way to the center room.  There, the Fellowship of Destiny discovered Varag!  However, he was not alone!  A powerful Dread Warrior was in counsel with him!  Allathusa quickly hit the armored monster with a Sleep spell and then she and Hamilcar closed in.  No-nak took out one of Varag's orc Henchman, but only after a devastating flurry of attacks injured him.  

Varag sensed weakness and pressed in on No-nak.  Allathura and Hamilcar looked on in horror as the Gargoyle tore into No-nak with fury.  A fatal bite to the jugular from the Gargoyle finished off the barbarian hero.  HIs body fell, his sword slipping from his hand.  

Per the rules, when a hero falls with a fellow hero in the room the equipment goes to the other heroes.  However, I was unsure if that meant that Hamilcar could use the Barbarians broadsword or not.  I decided that he could not use it. 

A summoned Genie from Aerlin dealt a vital blow to Varag, but the beast yet lived.  Enraged by the death of his comrade, Hamilcar threw himself at the Gargoyle with a rage.  His short sword stabbing and probing into the cracks of the beast.  Varag bellowed a last time before cracking and crumbling into pieces.

With that, Allathura led Hamilcar and Aerlin back to the surface and safety.  There Mentor listened to the tale of the death of No-nak and shook his head with grief.  Perhaps he had been too hasty in sending the Fellowship of Destiny into Fellmarg's Tomb.  Thankfully, there was another warrior Mentor knew he could call on to help the Fellowship.       

Since I had heard how difficult this dungeon could be, I did not open every door, or try to find every treasure chest.  After getting jumped by wandering monsters twice in a row, I became a bit more careful about how I searched for treasure too.  Therefore, I don't think I found everything or recovered all the loot that I could have.  After killing Varag, I pretty much just hoofed it out.  Hamilcar was low on health, as was Allathura.  The Fellowship did not have enough left in the tank to keep exploring.  

The Rescue of Sir Ragnar? 

After the disappointing results of the Trial, Mentor searched the land and found another who could replace No-nak.  In the North Tribes, he discovered another champion, Neowulf..... just Neowulf.  He was a man of action, and skilled with a blade.  Mentor gifted him No-nak's Broadsword so he could carry on the fallen champions legacy.  

After several weeks of training with Allathura, Hamilcar, and Aerlin a messenger came to Mentor.  Sir Ragnar, an old friend of Mentor's and an advisor to Prince Magnus; had been kidnapped by an Ork warlord; Ulag.  There was a reward for finding and freeing Sir Ragmar.  Mentor's magic led him to the man's where-abouts, and the Fellowship of Destiny was ready to descend into the dungeons to free Sir. Ragnar and claim the reward! 

Soon after entering Ulag's prison, the Fellowship was confronted by Goblin sentries.  Aerlin was caught out in the open by a pair, and used Move Through Rock to escape back to the safety of his sword wielding friends.  

I made the right choices in which way to go, and soon found myself looking through a secret door that was guarded by an Abomination!  It struck hard and fast, causing some serious damage and refusing to be killed.  However, it didn't have much room to maneuver and eventually the Fellowship's numbers proved decisive.  

Oh boy!  Our first secret door!  I kept Hamilcar looking for Traps pretty regularly, and Allathursa found the secret door.  I also had better luck with Treasure this round, finding a few coins and gems here and there.  It did not take us long to find Sir Ragnar.  

What I did not expect was that to trigger every Orc and Gobbo in the place to come running for us!  The Fellowship quickly set-up a defensive perimeter at a doorway.  It was sort of like the battle of Balin's Tomb as Goblins and Orcs pressed forward only to be cut down by the Fellowship waiting on the other side.  The Rock Skin spell paid off again, making Beowulf tough to injure in the initial waves of attackers.  Neowulf tended to soak the attack, while Allathura dealt the killing blow.  A few times Aerlin had to step in and clear out an Ork or two with a spell.  

I think this encountered showed some of the limitations of the Apps AI.  The greenskins pretty much just kept trying to walk into my meatgrinder.  Then, they got ground up!  I think if I was playing Zargon, I would have made a checker board up the double wide hallway, where I could maybe let my numbers play to an advantage.  I mean, the Fellowship had to get Sir Ragnar up those stairs!  If you let them get closer to the center room, you can also attack from both sides.  

Anyway, I mistimed the end a bit.  I let Sir Ragnar get off the board before I opened a chest or two.  Hopefully not getting some of the loot on this board won't be too much of a hinderance.  The reward from Prince Magnus will help my guys become a bit more survivable or murderous next adventure!  

Despite the meatgrinder at the end, this adventure was not as dangerous or deadly.  Neowulf needed a healing spell, but he was also taking the brunt of the attack waves.  I still had one in reserve, even though a lot of my Fellowship was down 2 to 3 Body points from starting.  

Sir Ragnar embraced his old friend Mentor when the Fellowship led him back into the world of the light.  Mentor escorted him back to Prince Magnus' court, and returned with the reward for the Fellowship.  

Final Thoughts

Well, it was great fun getting the game I have painstakingly been painting out on the table.  That is always good for the motivation.  The App has some pluses and minus' to using for solo-play.  The exploration is maintained, it is easy to track, and it automates enemy attacks.  However, the AI component is not amazing.  However, I will give it credit that the enemies do use hit-and-run attacks and are not afraid to maneuver, I just don't think its post deployment moves are always great and it can be baited. 

We will have to see how my own Solo-campaign progresses.  I don't think this will stop me from trying to find a few folks to play a campaign with.  You just lose some of the charm of a game like this via solo-play.  Half the fun is how the players react, what they say, their attempts at role-play, and listening to them strategize how to open a door.  

Until next time! 

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Blood and Spectacles Patreon! 

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