Year in Review: Three Threads for 2023

    One theme that remained constant in 2023 was work on my post-apocalyptic terrain

Three main projects dominated my painting and terrain building for this past year, 2023. One thread remained constant, though at times it faded almost completely into the background. The other two surged for awhile into the spotlight, in essence battling for my attention. The one that remained constant was my post-apocalyptic campaign. The other two that saw periods of intense focus were Ancient/DarkAge/Medieval Saga and Science-Fiction gaming.

Post-apocalyptic

The constant thread was my post-apocalyptic campaign. I entered the year with nearly all of my survivor gangs painted up, adding only one to the ranks in 2023. This occurred only as it became obvious that I might need to play occasionally to balance out the numbers in games. So, I reached into my Battle Valor Games purchases and created one more gang -- the Green Dragons. They first hit the table in February. They were an Asian-American gang, and saw action in the second scenario we played in the campaign, "I Smell a Rat." 

    

    I made some modifications to Monster Fight Club's chain fences (like the thin strand of barbed wire)

Most of my efforts on this project were in terrain building. From barbed wire compounds to burnt-out vehicles, I cranked out the tabletop scenery. Those were probably my two favorite additions to the scenery. The barbed wire compound was a store-bought purchase from Monster Fight Club scenery, using two of their "Chain Link Fences" boxes. Of course, being me, I couldn't just use them straight out of the box. I modified them fairly heavily and these are one of the best additions to my terrain collection this year, in my opinion. We have used it in two scenarios so far, "Searching an Abandoned Army Base" and the most recently, "Where the Dark Things Gather."

    I was really pleased with these die cast vehicles that had been set aflame turned out

I was also very happy with my addition of damaged and burnt out vehicles for the desolate urban areas in my post-apocalyptic world. I had done some research on how to get the effect of a burnt out vehicle and was shocked that the consensus was to actually set on fire die cast models. First, I used pliers and wire cutters to remove the wheels and much or all of the plastic. Then, on a warm April evening, I swabbed them down with rubbing alcohol and lit them on fire. Thankfully, no neighbors were outside to see what the amateur pyromaniac was doing. I was fairly happy with how they turned out. The ash-like char seemed to never be sealed in by numerous clear coats, though. So, I still have to handle them carefully. I would end up doing two more batches of damaged/burnt vehicles, but who knows? Maybe one day I'll make some more!

    My favorite Jarls Workshop building was the six-story corner ruin (with some of my own bits added)

I also constructed a number of new buildings for the an urban, post-apocalyptic battlefield. My favorites were the ones I bought from Jarls Workshop (Rusty Parker) at the previous year's Advance the Colors 2022. They turned out great, and I would end up buying more from him in October at the 2023 convention. My favorite was the six-story corner remnant that I jazzed up with wooden beams and bricks. I bought more of these this year, but have yet to assemble them and get them ready for the tabletop. They will probably be the first terrain that I create in 2024, though! Rusty's 3-D printed buildings paint up very quickly and I highly recommend them. 

    We got in four games over the course of 2023 of my post-apocalytpic campaign

Finally, we got in four post-apocalyptic games over the course of the year. That was way under what I was hoping, but it did remain constant throughout the year. I am happy with how the Wiley Games Core Rules are working out for these skirmishes. Each player selects four characters for that scenario from the 7-8 that I had created for their survivor gang. Sometimes, characters who are wounded have to miss the following scenario or die of their wounds (only one character so far...sigh, mine!). The players have gotten the hang of using Renown Points to purchase new Traits and upgrade their force. I am having fun with running the scenarios, and will probably step back from playing in them with the Green Dragons unless we have a very small turnout. Look for more games in the coming months -- especially during January and February when our usual Sunday evening host will be out of town.

Science-Fiction Gaming

As the year closes, Sci-Fi gaming is the one I am focused on, now. It was also how I began 2023. I'd picked up Space Station Zero from Snarling Badger Studios, intrigued by the possibility of co-op skirmish as crews explore a derelict space station on the edge of the galaxy. I went all in for a few months, creating a playing surface of metallic looking tiles. I also made various bits of Sci-Fi scatter terrain that would work great for either the interior of a space station or on a planet's surface. Some were store-bought from Mantic Games, Acheson Creations, while still others were scratch-built from wooden pieces at craft stores. Jazzed up with metallic paints and various metal scatter consoles from RRB Minis & More, they set the stage for a new period of gaming in a new year.

    Our one and only game of Space Station Zero (so far, to be fair) using my game mat tiles & terrain

Except it never really went very far. Jenny and I played one scenario of Space Station Zero. We had fun, but after playing, I felt that its scope and scale wouldn't fit in as well for our Sunday evening gaming sessions. Even switching from co-op to competitive play mode in the rules, I felt that we'd struggle with so many players to have a game session for what was originally designed as a solo miniatures gaming adventure. Jenny and I swore we'd play the next scenario some winter evening when we had nothing else to do, but never got around to it. I'd painted my crew -- Dave and the rest from the spaceship Jupiter in 2001: A Space Odyssey -- but it looked like the Jupiter was grounded back here on Earth.

    JS Wargamer Printing 'Machine Wars - Exterminators' very cool 3D printed Terminators

In August, Sci-Fi gaming showed another flicker of life. Keith ran a Star Wars scenario using Wiley Games Galactic Heroes rules. He had a lot of the Wizards of the Coast pre-painted Star Wars figures. I was intrigued. We knew the rules. Both Keith and Mike S had tons of figs, but school had just started up again and I was hitting my busy point in the year. Sci-Fi gaming seemed to be an empty void once again until just last month. I decided to paint up one of my purchases from CincyCon 2023, JS Wargamer Printing's 3-D printed Terminators. This, and the purchase of rules books from the "Rampant" series at Advance the Colors 2023, convinced me to give Xenos Rampant a try.

    I was really pleased at how these various robots and droids came out with their metallic paints

This is a bigger size game than either Space Station Zero or Galactic Heroes. Each player will likely control 4-6 squads of figures, making it just a bit under Saga sized force, in my planned scale. Since then, I have been busy cranking out sets of Sci-Fi miniatures. After the Terminators (for a Machines force, of course), came a couple batches of droids or robots. I continued on with some 3-D printed space marines bought from Wiley Games. I called them the Bronze Legion, and bought and painted up a second squad's worth of the figures. And, for those who follow my blog regularly, you know that has continued apace with some Blue-skinned aliens and a squad of Star Wars B1 Battle Droids.

Aliens from the Strargrave Mercenaries box and actually painted to match one of my survivor gangs.

I'm anticipating my first game of Xenos Rampant in January. If not, at least by February. It's kind of cool that I started and began 2023 with Sci-Fi. I'm a big fan of the various Star Wars streaming series, so it is almost unusual that it hadn't found its way to the tabletop for me.

    It seems I never choose a simple army to paint, and that was definitely the case for 2023's Thracians!

 

Saga Ancients/Dark Ages/Medieval Skirmish

The third thread of my year of gaming was playing Saga, the skirmish miniatures game from Studio Tomahawk. In fact, it took over the majority of my painting and gaming from about late summer through Advance the Colors 2023. Two main reasons for this was that I had undertaken painting a new army, the Thracians. Also, I was painting up prizes and prepping for my two tournaments I was going to run at ATC 2023. I had queried local and regional Saga groups and they gave a thumbs up to adding a Friday Age of Ancients tournament to my 3rd annual Saturday Age of Melee one. Ancients includes the six armies each from Age of Hannibal and Age of Alexander. 

    At least the Thracians had only one unit of mounted -- unlike an entire army with the Mongols!

In fact, the Thracians I was painting up were from the Alexander book, and had caught my eye for their interesting "Loot" mechanic. They were also an army almost no one was talking about, and I enjoy painting the fringe armies. Greeks and Macedonians were sure to be popular choices from that book, but I wanted to do something a bit different. Naturally, if they're an army that I am picking they MUST have complex patterns or something to make them a challenge to paint, right? Of course! Greek pottery gives us a wealth of primary source material on the geometric (and assumed) colorful cloaks that the Thracian warriors wore. I borrowed my friend Mike's Osprey book on the army and sketched out about a dozen simplified versions of the patterns to use on my own miniature Thracians. With 28mm minis, we want to give the effect of something -- not necessarily a 1:1 recreation of it. Too much often ends up being, not surprisingly, too much.

    One of my three victories with the Picts at CincyCon 2023 - this one against a Norman foe

As December comes to its end, I am not strictly done with the Thracians. I have about one batch of javelin-armed warriors to paint up. I also have yet to do the custom fatigue markers I will create for this army. I borrowed some spare heads from friends who have plastic kits (where they provide options for players to use). I will mount these heads on the markers because the Thracians were known as a head-hunting tribe. Luckily, I already had suitable markers created for the loot tokens from a past gaming project.

View of the action at ATC 2023 weekend, which saw more than 30 participants from near & far

Our monthly Saga Sundays at the Guardtower East continued, but attendance seemed to die down a bit, this year. We were down from 12-16 attendees to the 6-10 range, most months. Unfortunately, the trips to Beavercreek and the Dragons Guildhall also decreased, on my part. I probably made it only about 4-5 times this year instead of being a regular. Honestly, the reason for this was likely the increase in the number of tournaments we had in the area. The year started off with a Saga tournament run in Ft. Wayne, IN, in February. The tournies continued in March with Cincycon 2023 -- where my Picts were victorious overall. I did not make it to Adrian John's next tournament at DayCon, but did actually participate in a small one at Historicon in July. In September, I also drove north to Port Clinton, OH, for Rusty and Jim's Hold the Line convention. That was followed by the success at Advance the Colors, with 14 players in my Ancients Saga tournament and 24 on Saturday. So, lots of tournaments probably meant fewer people at our monthly game days, I imagine.

    One of the six warlord stands I painted up and gave away as Saga prizes in 2023

One thing that my friend Mike has cautioned about is getting to the "burn out" stage with these rules, like we eventually did with DBA (De Bellis Antiquitatis). This is my fifth year of playing Saga. We played DBA for a couple decades, so it is nowhere near the same longevity. However, I do see a similar vibe with a tournament at every convention beginning to happen with me and Saga. I have also noticed my enthusiasm for hosting new episodes of my Saga Ohio Podcast waned over the course of the year, too. Mostly, this is because school is always so busy -- "180 days of triage", I call the school year. Possible burn out IS something to keep an eye out for when scheduling my gaming and painting, though.

Obviously, this isn't every bit of gaming that I did in 2023. It is a good sampling to reflect upon, though, and I hope readers enjoyed it. As we head towards 2024, my production seems to be picking up speed. What will 2024 bring? Hopefully, more faithful readers of my Lead Legionaries blog like yourselves! Happy New Year!! 😃

Some Cool-looking Robots and Droids for Sci-Fi Games

Selection of Droids & Robots from three different manufacturers recently finished up for Sci-Fi games

These have been sitting on my desk base-coated for several months, now -- perhaps longer! I began working on them when I was painting droids or robots for enemies in Space Station Zero. With my interest beginning to tail off and my painting schedule for last year's Saga tournaments picking up, they simply sat their dormant and patiently waiting for their turn. Now, that I have a renewed interest in Sci-Fi miniatures with my purchase of Osprey Games' Xenos Rampant (which I picked up from Shieldwall Gaming Club). I based them all on circular bases and pulled them into the painting queue.

    The three miniatures assembled - called Vatacina Sentinels and Purifiers on the Aberrant webpage

The three on the left in the metallic green, red, and blue are from Aberreant Games for their Rezolution Science Fiction Miniatures Combat Game. I don't know a lot about the rules, other than the website says they represent a dystopian 2175 A.D. future. I picked the miniatures up from Bryan Borgman at his flea market at the Origins Game Day this past January. Look at the website for Aberrant, I got an amazing deal. I swear he was selling these packs for $1 each. On their website now, they list for nearly $20 per figure! That said, I ended up failing miserably at putting them together and handed them off to my friend Keith. He's more adept at super glue, model cement, and other types of bonding agents. He did a fine job on putting them together, and I had to admit they looked a lot cooler than they had unassembled in the packed! I wish I had bought more, now...!

Love the look of these -- kind of like a cross between Star Wars droids and Starship Trooper arachnids

The miniatures resemble a cool-looking cross between the Starship Troopers arachnids and Star Wars battle droids. I painted them a base white way back when I started getting them ready. Recently, when I began working on them again, I changed my mind. I based those that were unbased on round magnetic bases and spray-painted them Krylon black instead. Following that up with my usual 50/50 acrylic black paint and water, I waited from to dry, then painted the entire surface with a dark metallic color. I then gave them a very dark black wash to see if I wanted to keep them a dark metallic. I decided instead that they would look better in brighter metallics. I chose my three current favorite metallics, a red, green, and blue. I left some portions the dark metallic and others I did in an accent color. I picked out various other details, such as tubing and silver blades. All in all, I was ecstatic about how they looked. Once again, at a buck apiece, I wish I'd bought more!

    Tracked robots (or droids) from Wiley Games, Reverisco, and Aberrant Games

The next batch is from three different sources. The futuristic artillery piece is from Reviresco Miniatures, the large, tracked robot is from Wiley Games, and the tiny droids are also from Aberrant's Rezolution line. The Wiley Games bot is called B3EAST and is a resin figure for only $5. He needs to be glued together, but that seemed to be fairly easy to accomplish. I decided to try some white metallic paint with red accents for this one to give it a more retro look than the crab-like Vatacinas. It took a couple coats, but it finally covered my original all dark metallic paint, and I like the way it turned out. The Wiley Games minis are very affordable, and I recommend them to anyone who wants to pick up some interesting or odd figures.

    The Droid/Robot artillery pounds away at their human enemies from the cover of a ruined building

The Reverisco Robot Power Gun was rather more interesting to put together. No matter which way I placed the pieces, I had some left over. Maybe it was meant that way to give you some variety? Reverisco is very old school metal minis. They tend to be on the clunky side and not as cleanly sculpted as more modern day miniatures. However, once painted up, it definitely looks cool and will be a good addition to a Sci-Fi force. Xenos Rising has support artillery as a troop type, so this will be perfect. RRB Minis & More has other Reviresco Sci-Fi gun types, so check out their site and pick up some! I just did a search on their site for "Reviresco" to see what they had.

    Another look at the whole batch of cool-looking robots and droids, ready for the tabletop!

 The tiny droids were in one of the packs I picked up from Bryan at his flea market table. I like the way they look and -- shocker -- wish I had picked up some more! All in all, I'm very happy with how this batch of mechanoids turned out. I look forward to using them in games of Xenos Rampant, and who knows? Maybe I'll start playing Space Station Zero again and they'll show up as the enemy in there...

Flying Drones for Space Station Zero (& more terrain)

    Unmanned aerial drones fly over my newest terrain piece for Space Station Zero

One of the dangers that crews can possibly run into when exploring Space Station Zero are flying drones. With my dearth of Science-Fiction terrain and figures, I had nothing I could reasonably use as them. So, when I was at Shore Wars 2022 this past December, I was very interested to see RRB Minis & More's booth at the show. They carry an extensive line of 25mm Sci-Fi figures, vehicles, and accessories. Maybe I'd be able to find something there?

    Closeups of the red and blue color schemes I painted on the Stormbirds from RRB Minis & More

Naturally, I did find something that would be perfect with a little modification. From the McEwan Miniatures Classics line that RRB carries, I picked out the Stormbird flying vehicle. Leaving off the crewman and a couple other pieces, I thought it would make a suitable unmanned drone to guard the corridors of the space station. Because I wanted the figures to fit on some magnetic flight stands I'd bought long ago from Litko, I had to glue a washer on the underside of the drone. I also epoxied in the gatling/minigun, and that was it for construction. I can certainly deal with a minimum of fiddly-ness!

Drones endlessly patrolling corridors for intruding crews (I really like the dark red metallic color!)

I primed the figures white, and then applied metallic craft paints to them. My favorite color scheme turned out to be the dark red metallic. I had recently purchased that bottle of paint, along with the dark blue, which I used for another pair. The green and white colors I already had, and had painted earlier droids, robots, or terrain with those colors. After the base coat was painted, I decided to get fancy and add in stripes. I am not really happy with how they came out. My hands apparently aren't steady enough to paint an even width line that is good and straight anymore! I did a dark metallic gray wider stripe with a slightly narrower stripe of either silver or gold. I then decided to paint the two nacelles that project forward on the model in the accent metallic, too. For the white metallic ones, I used the dark red and a lighter blue as my accent colors.

    Four more aerial drones that will be a menace to any exploring crew in the derelict space station

The mini gun was painted with a range of steel metallic colors. The breech and housing ring were done in Ral Partha steel, while the gun barrels themselves were painted pewter. I highlighted the barrels with an aluminum color that I don't like using often. It is a weird, almost enamel consistency and is really hard to remove from my brushes. Finally, I did a dark black wash over the mini gun. I decided not to do the usual black wash over the entire drone surface, rationalizing that if they are in good enough working order to be still flying, the machines would probably be kept fairly clean. 

    Luckily, I had some unused flight stands from Litko and some rare earth magnets to attach them

In the photos, the drones are flying above my latest piece of 6"x4" terrain for Space Station Zero. As with earlier ones, it is a combination of store-bought pieces (Mantic Games) and scratch-built items. I painted it in the same colors and style as the previous ones. The only difference was I decided to do the floor slightly different. I wasn't happy with how dark the metallic floors were looking in previous pieces, so I lightened the floor up with a watered down pewter. I added in full strength, dark black wash to represent oil leaks or other equipment seepage.

First Game of Space Station Zero!

 

    The Discovery crew explore the vast interior of the derelict Space Station Zero

After all the hours of painting terrain, creating boards, and corridor walls, we finally got our first mission of Space Station Zero in on Saturday evening. Jenny and I were trying a two-player, cooperative game. I was bringing the Discovery crew from 2001: A Space Odyssey, and she was bringing Ripley and the Marines from Aliens. Humans stick together when lost in time and space, especially when marooned on a hulking, derelict space station!

    My newly-constructed terrain, walls, and boards made for a nice looking table, I thought!

Both of us had chosen four-man crews (not counting the commanders - Dr. David Bowman and the redoubtable Commander Ripley), so we had relatively elite troops. We were playing the Docking Bay scenario, which all explorers of Space Station Zero begin with. We rolled up Ancient Sentries and Poison Gas as our dangers. We also rolled for how much terrain to place on the 22"x30" board, and used every one of my completed large pieces, but only a few of the small ones. My scratch-built Droids and some 3-D printed Bots assumed the role of the dozen derelict, barely-functioning Ancient Sentries.

    The two crews deploy, with the Discovery crew moving up on the left and Ripley's marines the right

We weren't 100% sure how to do the sequence of a multi-player, cooperative game. We decided that since my Discovery crew was deployed to take on one group of six sentries and Ripley's marines were set up against the other six, we'd treat it like four separate forces. I would go first. When I lost the initiative, the sentries lined up against me would go. Then, Jenny's marines would go, and when she failed the initiative, the sentries lined up against her would take their actions. I'm not sure if we did it correctly, but it seemed to work okay. It would certainly keep us from arguing which figures we would activate amongst our crew if we had to share a player activation phase!

    Whirring and clanking through the poison mists were the robot denizens of the Docking Bay

Dr. Frank Poole, my soldier, activated first. He ran to the corner of a piece of machinery and opened fire on one of the sentries. Talk about good omens! I rolled a critical success on my first die roll in Space Station Zero. Poole's sidearm shattered the sentry into several pieces and it fell to the metallic floor with a loud clatter. We then said, "Oops - we forgot to roll for the poison gas!" Poole rolled his Life saves, looking for at least 3 successes (even numbers) out of the six dice rolled). Not so good! Poole took one damage. I also failed to roll high enough to activate my next guy, so the initiative passed to the sentries. Two of the sentries whirred and clanked forward before they failed, and passed the initiative to Jenny. 

A good omen! First shot - two 12's on 12-sided dice meant a critical success (double damage)

Ever the lead-from-the-front type, Commander Ripley darted out front and blasted away at the only sentry she could see. Her rolls were not nearly as good (or my saves for them were better -- sorry!) and she put only one damage on it. Her soldier, Corporal Lucius then pulled out his bayonet and chivalrously sprinted just beyond Ripley, so any sentries would have to go through him. As more sentries appeared around the corner, one of the marines was heard to mutter, "We're in some pretty $hi% now, man!" When my turn came up again, the Discovery crew continued to move forward. Dr. Victor Kaminsky moved a full move towards the machinery vent that was spewing poison gas, making sure to stay behind Poole, though. I continued to activate one and fail, so the initiative passed back to the sentries, again. The remaining three sentries arrayed against my crew moved up two moves.

    Two of the Ancient Sentries close in on Dr. Frank Poole - the Discovery crew's 'point man'

Jenny's medic, after taking a shot at one of the sentries, moved up close to Lucius to heal him next turn, as the soldier had taken two damage from breathing in the caustic gas. Her remaining crew move to the right towards the ruptured pipeline that was spewing gas nearest to the marines' side of the board. After the rest of the sentries moved forward, it was back to my turn. Dr. David Bowman moved forward and blasted away at another of the automatons, shattering it, too. Two of the sentries were down on our first turn of shooting! I was doing well, so far, on this "roll 12-sided dice and hope for even numbers" system...ha, ha! Dr. Charles Hunter, my medical doctor, followed up to get in position to heal up anyone who rolled badly against the poison gas. 

    The Discovery crew's shooting was on target! We took out three of the sentries on our first turn!

Turn two arrived, and Dr. Poole aimed at one of the sentries closing in on him and blasted it into a pile of mechanical junk. Behind him, the Chief Engineer, Dr. Jack Kimball, raised his side army and sighted at what looked to him the most vital bits of the machinery. His assessment proved correct, and a fourth sentry fell to the floor in a shower of broken and damaged machinery. My "M.O." in miniatures games is usually my poor dice rolling. However, Space Station Zero seemed to be proving the opposite (so far!). Four shots and four kills! The remaining two sentries moved up doggedly forward towards Poole, but had yet to engage him with their jagged mechanical arms.

    The ancient sentries close in on Commander Ripley's marines, too, our companions in exploration

Meanwhile, that was not the case with the marines. The closest sentry whirred towards the gallant Cpl. Lucius, who defeated the sentry in close combat, ripping off sections of the machine with his titanium bayonet. Ripley called out encouragement, then fired at the next sentry in line, putting some holes in it, but failing to stop it. The medic had a hard time patching up Lucius while the soldier was engaging the sentries, healing only one of the damage he'd suffered. With our elite crewmen rolling six dice and needing three successes, we were doing relatively well. I did flub one roll rather badly, but used my Time Masters "edge" to re-roll for a better result. Apparently, a passing through the Monolith and warping space and time to arrive at Space Station Zero, had enabled Dr. Bowman with some unique and useful abilities!

    The Discovery crew hangs back as Dr. Poole advances to make sure the sentries are truly destroyed

Meanwhile, Dr. Kaminsky darted to the machine spewing toxic gas, and began shutting off the valves. Poole rushed over to help and finished the job, closing off the leak. The Discovery crew was doing rather well on its first mission aboard the mysterious station. The marines were doing fairly well, too, although Cpl. Lucius had taken wounds from another sentry that tore rents in his spacesuit. The medic tried again to heal him, but failed on all his rolls. Dr. Bowman noticed that, though, and used his Monolith-given power to move the medic back in time to try again. This time, he was able to heal Lucius some.

    The sentries move through the poison gas preparing to engage the intruding crew of marines

At the start of turn three, the Discovery crew opened up on the remaining two sentries and took them out. Dr. Bowman then sprinted towards the furthest piece of machinery spewing gas, followed by Dr. Kimball and Dr. Hunter. The marines shut off the valves closest to them, as well. They were downing sentry after sentry until only one remained. Ripley placed her pistol next to what she determined to be its head and pulled the trigger. The robot fell to the ground in a mechanical heap. A shout of "All clear!" from the far end of the docking bay marked the success of Bowman and Kimball in shutting off the third valve. 

    Dr. Bowman and Frank Poole step over the lifeless hulks of the ancient sentries as all six are downed

With that, our first mission came to an end. The only damage the Discovery crew took was from poison gas failures. The marines were similar, except Cpl. Lucius came dangerously low in life. We collected our experience and then rolled to see our next mission, the Medical Bay. Hopefully, we'll be able to game that out next weekend. How did we like it? I felt the mission was fairly easy, but my rolls were way above average, I feel. I also think the early missions are meant to be easier. Plus, with both of us choosing the elite crew of four, our stats were high enough that we were never in much danger from the poison gas or sentries. I'm looking forward to the next game, even though I realize it will likely be more difficult. Stay tuned!

    One after another, the sentries advance through the marines' gunfire...still coming!

    Unlike with the Discovery crew, the sentries make it into contact with the marines, drawing blood

    Dr. Kaminsky and Dr. Poole team up to shut off the flow of poison gas at one of the leaks

    Hoping the marine take care of the second leak, Bowman, Kimball & Hunter sprint for the third

    Ripley places her pistol against the sentries 'head,' and pulls the trigger: "Game over!"

More Terrain for Space Station Zero

    The interior of Space Station Zero with my combination of scratch-built and purchased components

I have been working steadily on my terrain for Space Station Zero. This post shows another of the larger, 6"x4" pieces, as well as five of the smaller, roughly 2"x2" pieces. Both are a mix of store-bought components and scratch-built portions using pieces bought from the local craft store. After this batch, I have one more larger piece that is about halfway complete. Perhaps one more evening's worth of work is all that is needed on it and I should be done with terrain that I have to complete.

    Two smaller terrain pieces, mostly from the Star Wars Legion line of plastic terrain

I was at another of our local game stores, Dragons Lair Comics and Games (in the Polaris area), when I saw the Star Wars Legion "Priority Supplies" box on their shelf. The box contains four moisture evaporators, five supply crates, and three communications stations that were perfect for random terrain to affix to a base. I tossed in a wooden barrel from the craft store on one of the bases to fill up the area on the base. Just like pretty much all the other terrain that I have painted up for this project, I began with a black spray prime and 50/50 acrylic black paint and water base coat. Next came an overall covering of Metallic Battleship Gray. I applied Metallic Pewter highlights for the evaporators and communication stations. I also applied a coppery gold as highlights in various panels The crates were given various other metallic colors. Finally, a black wash was applied overall. The communication stations received a pastel colored panel with bright yellow, red, or green "buttons" or lighted switches.

    Some items from the local craft store with a panel from RRB Minis & More made for more terrain

The Priority Supplies box gave me four bases worth of Sci-Fi terrain. For the fifth base, I used a wooden spool from the craft store, with a round disc atop it. I added three computer panels which I had purchased from RRB Miniatures at Shore Wars last month. I had to take a large craft knife and shave off part of the panels so they would look like they belonged on the rounded surface of the wooden spool. I prepared the piece the same way I had the others. I decided that the cylindrical portion should be a metallic green. I would say of all the craft metallic colors I've been using, I like how the green looks the best. It is more subtle than the blue and red (looks pink) shades. I gave the panel the same combination of Metallic Gray and Gold accents like the other pieces. I figured if the pieces looked like they belonged together, thematically, that would help the overall appearance of the spaceship.

    Another larger piece of Sci-Fi terrain, most of which comes from a Mantic Games terrain box

The larger piece is mostly from the Mantic Games "Industrial Accessories" box I mentioned in previous posts. It contains a big diameter section of piping coming out of and going back into the floor. It also contains one of the large pieces of machinery that the plastic terrain box. You can see in the photo some scratch-built pieces to fill out the area, too. The upright piece is a collection of wooden pieces from the craft store with various MDF gears that I had also picked up at the same spot. Around them are conical beads topped with a large sequin. Since this is an alien space station, I feel it is within keeping with the them to have unexplained terminals and other bits on the pieces.

    The other two small pieces created from the Star Wars Legion Priority Supplice pack

I really like how the terrain is coming out, though I may rethink my bases. I applied Metallic Gray to them and pretty much left it at that. In the pictures at least, they look a little dark next to my texture paper space station floor. After playing a game and seeing how it looks, I may go back and use a lighter color that matches the silvery color for the floors I created. We'll see.

    My most recent batch of Space Station Zero terrain on my gaming boards

What's next? Like I said, one more piece of large terrain needs to be finished. And also coming soon should be a game report! Woo-hoo!! My girlfriend Jenny and I may play our first cooperative game of Space Station Zero as early as this evening...!

Space Station Zero - Creating a Framework of Corridor Walls

    My newly-created foamboard walls for games of Space Station Zero

As you may remember from my previous posts, a new project for me is trying out Space Station Zero from Snarling Badger Studios. We'd enjoyed their Reign in Hell rules, so I picked them up from Wargame Vault (nice deal on print and PDF). Reading the rules, I was intrigued, so began building terrain to create my own dilapidated space station somewhere lost in the depths of space. An earlier post showed you the six 10"x11" battle boards I created to piece together for the 30"x22" board.

    Another look at the walls, with images that I had downloaded off the internet glued onto their sides

The more I began to think about it, though, I felt I would need walls to give the real look of a space station. I looked around for something commercially available, but didn't find anything in a reasonable price range. So, like with my boards, I figured that I could create my own. Wandering the aisles of the craft stores is usually where I get my inspiration. I came upon a black, foamboard trifold that I have often seen my students use for project displays. That made me think, "Hmmm..." The trifold would already have the fold in it for each of the 90 degree angles needed. That would work! 

    As you can see, I used about a quarter of the trifold, foamboard display

I stuck a tape measure next to some miniatures and chose to do my walls 4" tall. Since the playing area is 30"x22", I figured four corner sections placed together would work. One arm could be 15" for the long side and the other arm extending out from the corner could be 11" for the shorter side. Placing them all together in a rectangle would create the 30"x22" frame. It was an easy matter to cut the foamboard with a sharp X-acto knife. 

    An exploded view of the four sections, each with a long 15" and short 11" arm

Now, I could have left them like that, but felt that gluing on images of space station corridors could really make the walls pop. I went online and Googled various images of space station corridors, downloading a number of images. I resized these in Photoshop to 4" tall. I then duplicated the image and flipped it vertically so that it could wrap around the top edge of the foamboard and extend down to the bottom, enclosing the foamcore in an upside down "U-shape." I took these images to the local office supply store and printed them out on their color laser printer.

    I used doors/portals glued to cardstock to clamp the four sections together with magnets & steel bases

 The trick was accurately pasting them onto the foamboard. I used Gorilla Glue spray adhesive, spraying both the back of the image and the foamboard. This kept the foamboard from warping, like it may have if I slathered the whole thing in white glue. I was fairly happy with how this process (which took several hours) went. I did screw up, though. One of the four pieces had its image glued on upside down. Much to my surprise, it did matter for everything to line up and have the "raw" foamboard edge facing down onto the tabletop. 

    Bonus pic of a recently-painted Dr. Zaius from Planet of the Apes investigating Space Station Zero

While trying to get to sleep the night before, I thought about how to clamp the four sections together so that it didn't get knocked over during play. I hit upon the idea of using the image of a door or portal glued on a piece of cardstock and placed over where each section joined the neighboring one (at the center of each long and short side). But how to clamp them? I decided to glue steel bases near the bottom corners of each side of the cardstock door. I placed magnets on the steel bases, peeled off their backing, and then pressed the door into position. Squeezing the door attached the adhesive backing to the wall section in the exact correct position. I was delighted to see the doors peel off and reattach easily with the steel and magnet connection. Success! I love it when a concept like this actually works out...ha, ha!

So, here are some pictures of my space station walls with the boards in between. I was very happy with how these all turned out. I think the walls make it look much better than simply using the boards would have looked.