Another solo wargame battle report today, and this time I'm going into the darkest reaches of space in search of a "spiritual follow up" for A Call to Arms that we played to high heaven and back with the Far Side a decade ago.

The rules used are something Andy found on the internet, a free 2 pageside system called War Fleets (edition 2.2).

I went for equal forces, in that the Federation intercepts a massive vessel from Space Battleship Yamato (some old model kit I build years ago, without some fins etc that where sourced back then into terrain), and I try and build the vessels to represent "what they could do".

Both Federation vessels are destroyer class at 60 points each, and equipped with three components each.  Obviously, that means a Warp Drive and Torpedoes for each, but the Vesper class gets Shields compared to Armored Plating for the NX class.  The admiral is on the Vesper class.


For the Yamato universe vessel, whom I dubbed Murusame for no reason except it sounds cool, the Battleship of 120 points was selected.  For it's six components I went for Cannon, Giga Cannon, Rail Cannon, Barracks, Reinforced Ram and finally a Tsunami Gun.


That megaweapon will fire on a predetermined point in the game, aka either on turn 4 (I plan to play 4 turns for this try-out), OR the moment the vessel goes down to it's final 2 hit points (aka last component, which will be this weapon obviously).

 I needed to think out a sort of 'AI' for the Murusame, and it will behave according to this simple flow chart:
1. Target the closest vessel to it
2. If both are equal, target the most heavily damaged.
3. If that is also equal, target the NX class

This has all to do with the morale rules so I can try those out if needed.  Should the admiral fall, you autobreak, but otherwise if you go to 50 or below, you take morale tests to see if you stay in the game.   This would allow the Vesper class a chance to remain in battle should the NX be swiftly dispatched off.

Note: I did forget the changing "goes first" rules in the rulesets during this test, as while the Federation got the first turn, the Murusame would have been going first in turns 2 to 4.  However, this would have resulted in a single extra Giga Cannon shot, and at best an extra damage (and knocking out the NX class one component) would have been done then.

The Battle



The fleets deployed each near an asteroid field, the Federation putting the NX a bit closer then the Vesper class.

Turn 1

The NX class moves forward but misses with it's torpedoes, as does the Vesper class.  Murusame moves down the centre, guns blazing, and both it's Cannon (ACC bonus of 4 goes a long way) and Railgun strike home on the NX, knocking 2 points of the Armour Plating.




Turn 2

While the NX engages, the Vesper class tries to flank the Murusame with the help of it's Warp Drive for an additional 9" of movement.  However, Federation fire remains ineffective, either missing the target or failing to damage the big battleship.
Murusame retaliates by closing the gap to the NX further and knocking out it's complete Armour Plating.



Turn 3

As the NX passes by the Murusame, it's torpedoes strike home doing a point of damage to the Barracks, before warping out of range of it's Giga Cannon.  The Vesper tries to move to take cover of the asteroids, but fails again to hit home, as Murusame pivots and damages the NX's torpedo module.


Turn 4

The NX class strikes true again, taking down the Barracks component of the battleship, before trying to hide behind the asteroid field but not making it.  The Vesper class moves in to shield her but once again misses.  Not a single shot of the vessel had stricken home, and now she faced the charged Tsunami Gun.  Locking on to the Vesper now, the Murusame blazes with all it's in range weapons, knocking out the Shield Rig and damaging the Torpedoes on the Vesper class.  Though with the 1 point of damage rule, one can perhaps better fire the Tsunami Gun every other turn against destroyer class vessels...



And so the battle reached it's time limit, and the Federation had to return to their Starbase blood nosed, and having to report they couldn`t stop the big, strange vessel they encountered in the sector...


The Conclusion

I must say I`m still in doubt on these rules.  Granted, I played below the 300pts size and build vessels 'in character' but this means it was hard to damage the opponent on 4 turns.  Though should I played one turn more, I think the Federation would crumble.
Hitting seems to be the hardest, so weapons with an ACC bonus are the way to go.  On a full game, taking fighters and destroyers with only Cannon modules and nothing else give me the feel that this is "the way to go" to do serious damage,  but that seems a pity for all the other characterful components in the rules, though I will probably revisit the rules in the future with 300pts and smaller vessels to check this out, though I will still build them in flavor of whatever models I`ll be using then.  Depends what I print up mostly I guess.
But for a "meta universe crossover" style game, I think it might be a tat to simple to play, it's great as the (intended) Beer & Pretzels game, but to use it for, let's say, the space component of a space / land campaign, I fear that one rulesgamer might dislodge the balance so hard the game breaks.

It wasn`t bad in the end, but I guess it's fine for just what it is supposed to be: a quick game to play on an evening for sheer laughs.

With spaceship games back on the table, due to "Project Far Side", it is also necessary to get some terrain for tables which are in general one big black square.

And what better place to start then with some asteroids

I considered a couple of possibilites for this: 2D templates, foam blocks on stems (like in the old days), printed blocks on stems... in the end I found perhaps the good comprimise on Thingiverse: plastic asteroids on small hexes.


That way, they asteroids are far more stable and less prone to knocking over (and steam breakage as a result), while the 3D aspect just makes it all look that little bit better.

For starting out as such, I printed 15 of them, while planning at least as many again to be able to put down an whole belt if wanted for gaming.  The paintjob was pretty straightforward, yet efficient: a Burnt Omber basecoat drybrushed with a warm grey.


And so the first batch of "space terrain" has been completed for the games, starting soonish with a solo-effort.

Hello all to another week of hauls and trades for my collection.

And once again, it has been a calm but decent week of gathering and foraging.

I'll start of with this Veers minifigure.  I`m not a SW builder at all, but this one is for something special at Comic Con Brussels next month, so I went to Brick Link and grabbed the figure.

Facebook has been a good provider this week, as I managed to obtain a nice set of polybags from one source, and a Legolas figure from another.  And a third thingie I picked up on the social media channel is a small space set of the K9 robot dog.  I`ll build that one for a picture report (expected publication somewhere second half of 2018) and toss it in my trade box afterwards.



During a clearance at the local supermarket, I picked up "some" polybags of Nexo Knights, good to take along to an event sometime.

Ow, and as a final haul, I picked up the recent Blocks magazine issue ;-)



Now, as this closes off on Friday's, a lot of exclusives that arrived saturday aren`t in this overview yet, but expect next week to be a humongous episode!

With the holiday festivities dwindling down, it's time to get back to the order of the day.

And that means we're beginning the third calendar year of this longest running regular feature on this little corner of the internet.  Once again, I`ll hope to show you a year long the coolest 10 builds I found on the internet on a weekly basis.

Starting this episode, we have a large Classic Space based starbase.  Complete with all manners of different spaceships, the designs are on par with current day techniques and builds, while retaining the classic colourscheme.








Next, we have the Joker standing above the chemical vats at ACE Chemicals.  This build makes great use of smoke and lighting effects to give it an eerie look.

I always loved MASK as a toy when I was a kid, and this rendition of the good guys headquarters, Boulder Hill, is excellently executed.

Hailing from the Andromeda's Gates online game at Eurobricks, comes this sinister looking Chrome Driller mining machine.

An archeological digsite is next on the list, including a small caravan for the researchers to rest and relax.

This is a fantastic rendition of Lu Tze, the monk from the Discworld series by the late Terry Pratchet.

One of the movie successes of last year was the sequel to Nemo's adventure, Finding Dory.

After a week of big dining, a simple hot dog might be a welcome variation of the menu.  I really like the use of banana's to represent the mustard on this build.

Next we have a good looking microscale landscape build, with Karnavian Falls.  The inverted round bricks and stems for trees give it a distinct look.

A fantastical detailed and sleek lined build of the classic Gundam mobile suit, the RX78-2, really looks intimidating.

And there we have it, the start for another 50+ weeks of inspirational builds found on the internet.  As the past two years, this will be posted on mondays as much as possible (so with vacations or so, it might differ a little now and then).

Until next time, and keep on building in 2017!

Today we revisit the era of the second iteration of Blacktron, where the all black spacemen turned into a white black uniform instead.

And I actually liked those uniforms more when I was a kid.

This set, that came in a small box, counted 17 pieces and a minifigure.  So in 1991 it was a box, now it would be a polybag.

The minifigure comes equipped with a special backpack / jetpack.

The basis of the vehicle are a black 2x4 plate and a black slope, around which the little car is build.

As balloon tyres are added to the vehicle, we add a heap of trans-green detailing and a control plate to the slope to set the vehicle out.


Unfortunatly, that is also all there is to the build, so here it stands completed:

A real simple little car, it does have it`s benefits with the trans parts and the excellent minifigure in my opinion.

While it won`t be remembered as one of sci-fi's great, the only series of recent years I saw for that title was Teh expanse, this is a good show.

I kind of compared it to the british classic Blake 7 last year, and this year, well, it only becomes more so actually.

Plot

We left of last season with the crew of the Raza being captured by Six, who was before the mind wipe a Galactic Authority officer.  In jail, they quickly try to escape, and do so in the end thanks to Six again, even though without Corso.  He has been executed by the man he wanted to copy and find...

The crew does get some new additions though, but one of them is quickly revealed as being an undercover agent.  It turns out the chip Five stole before boarding the Raza, is the plan for a Blink drive engine, allowing immediate transport anywhere.  Including the obligatory alternate dimension jump of course...
When some of the crew recover their memories but have to redelete them, Four saves and fixes them, and rises to the throne of Zairon as it is rightfully his, but in the final episode, he tries a desperate plot to save his nation, even if this costs his former crewmates their lives...

Opinion

Like I started with, this won`t be remembered as one of the great works of science-fiction, but the fact it really takes inspiration from all over the place makes it a good show to watch and enjoy.  We got some Star Trek influences as the android becomes more aware and human thanks to an illegal emotion ship.  There is the omnious Blake 7 influence with a band of rogues trying to do good and at the same time preserve themselves, and the changing cast.  And of course we go alternate dimension travelling like any sci-fi series seems to do.
I think the cast additions where decent replacements, and the fact some of the characters develop really well as we learn their true pasts, but the season also has some weak episodes in between them.  Boone is turning out to be like the best develloped character, especially his "blast from the past" feature episode.

Only pity is we know they survive the cliffhanger, as the series is already renewed for a third season coming to us in 2017 :-)

Rating: 6 / 10

Okay, so this is perhaps the prime example of how a rebooted series can be better then the original, even with the (gorgeous) female Starbuck...

And I just wanted to have a Battlestar in my Lego collection, which is something they don`t produce at all.

I think it all started with an old HispaBrick (the great free download Lego fan magazine), issue 14 I think, where a plethora of Battlestars past the gallery.  I went to look for instructions to build one myself, when someone send me an LDD file with the plans to do so.  Some modifications where done in the about 3000 piece old beast, and then the stacking of plate upon wedge upon plate could begin.




A build done over three days during the heatwave that struck Belgium later, the Galactica was ready to stand on my shelf, all nearly 5 kilo`s of it.