The OT Plays with Little Men

I had the day off today, so Katie and I dove in since the rulebook was surprisingly well done and intuitive for an FFG game.

game 1 took 2 hours to complete as we referred back to the rules occasionally. Invader player won (same as Keeper in MoM or Overlord in Descent). We times our game turns as one would in space hulk. 1 minute for the marine player, 2 minutes for the keeper since he has a lot of stuff to deal with.

Game 2 took an hour and a half to play. Marine player won.

Game 3 was deathmatch style and the rules were included in the expansion. 1 hour play. Very similar to Frag but quite a bit better IMO. We’ll try capture the flag next.

The rules are much easier to grasp than descent. Katie doesnt enjoy the theme as much as descent, but she likes the game itself much better. I happen to agree. Too bad this bitch went out of print. Hopefully ffg will make this game again with a different theme as it is a shame it is no longer in production. I guess FFG no longer have the license from ID software.

She likes it a lot more than space hulk since there is more variety in weapons and such. Still just as tactical but scratches the dungeon crawl itch she enjoys.

I am sick to death of the recent trend in co-op games that have hit boardgaming by storm. Even the new gears of war game is going to be co-op. We need more games with a human adversarial interface instead of bullshit programming of the cards AI.

I’ve played the hell out of DUST tactics and it is a great board game. But unfortunately a board game is all it is. They’ve been jerking us around forever by promising us our table top rules and yet…

I’m with Hellfury on this one, but I will say the minis are fantastic. Pre-primered is a great blend of the AT-43 pre-painted style (which forced assholes like me to repaint them) and the normal mini style (where you have to wait to assemble/paint to play). The sad fact though is that the game doesn’t need the miniatures! The number of men in the unit is simply a wound/shot count for the unit itself and makes it unwieldy to move said counter around the board. Most of us assumed they did this because they were going to transition to a table top ruleset, but that faith has since left me and others as well.

I still think they can save it but honestly the best thing they could do would be to just re-use the AT-43 mechanic and roll it into this world.

I’m finishing up a test model for my Napoleonic Austrian infantry, and starting my French Line infantry test models. They’re all 18mm AB Figures. The long-term plan is to do an Austrian Avant Garde Division and a French infantry division based on units at the battle of Alpern-Essling in 1809. The ruleset I’m going to start out with is Lasalle (it looks pretty cool).

I’ve basically picked out which regiments my battalions are going to be based on. Planning on having three(ish) battalions of Austrian infantry from 3. “Erzherzog Karl” infantry regiment, and French battalions from the 3rd and 57th Ligne regiments, and the 10th Légère regiment.

Plus Grenzers, Jägers, Uhlans, and Hussars for the Austrians, and Hussars and Chevaulegers for the French. And some artillery for both.

Reality started to set in as I was finishing the Austrian test mini. This is going to take a long time.

I haven’t played [Mantic/Kings of War], but the rules remind me strongly of Black Powder, which I quite enjoy, but BP is designed towards playing a fun game in a reasonable amount of time with fuckin’ enormous numbers of miniatures on the tabletop.

As for the miniatures, the plastic undead and the orcs are good. The dwarfs/evil dwarfs are a bit uninspired. The elven infantry have their own, very non-GW vibe, and seem to inspire love or hate.