The last of the Imperials....for now!

 Hello again,

I have spent the last week assembling and painting up the last couple units for my Imperial forces in Star Wars Legion.

I was able to finally pick up two boxes of Shoretroopers after they had been unavailable due to stocking issues at Fantasy Flight for months. Here are a couple pictures:

Click on after the break for pictures of the other unit and how they faired in their first battle last Friday!

SAGA Milites Christi v Scots, and bonus video of Vikings, Scots, Welsh, Danes and Castle Ravenloft!

 Celtic defeat Motherwell 3-0 in the Scottish Premier League, "WAAAAAAAAAAGH"

We've been playing some SAGA lately, Tyler has his Danes on the go, Christian does Vikings, Andrew has Anglo-Danes, Tris has Welsh, Moser has Mongols, and Scott and Matty have the Milites Christi and Crusaders.   Loving the game so far, its quick to pickup but has lots of granularity from the battle board options.   Here is a game Scott and I had, and at the bottom, Bonus video of last week's game plus some Ravenloft.  Enjoy!

Blonde adventeress, both sides had to capture and bring off their board edge at M speed (sorry Cavalry!) The Milites maybe thought she had information on the Dead Sea Scrolls? while the scots were after her for probably more base reasons!

The SAGA begins....

Last weekend I attended Cold Wars down in Pennsylvania along with Matt Varnish and PhantomRescue. We played different games, shopped for deals and had a good time nerding out with all things table top for 3 days. I decided to take the plunge and picked up SAGA - a historical table top skirmish wargame set in Europe's Viking Age (i.e. 793 AD to 1066 AD). 

Why? Many reasons it would turn out. But initially it was the figures I saw for sale by Footsore Miniatures ( https://footsoreminiatures.com/ ). I met the sculptor (Bill Thornhill) and we got to chatting. Some of his handy work:

Pardon my French: Napoleonics battle, Black Powder, 500 points Peninsular

Hey gang.   Scott and I did our first game of 2017:  Napoleonics, using Black Powder Rule set, 'Granja Abundancia' from the Albion Triumphant Peninsular War supplement, essentially, a take and hold field objectives. First time we have everything painted, 500pts a side, on a nice 12 foot by 8 foot table.  Below is the picture dump, the actual battle report is in the linked video:

  Enjoy!

Another Gaming Year Winding Down

It's been a busy 2016, with the release of a few new games such as Team Yankee, the re-vamp of Warmachine and a shift to plastic miniatures by Battlefront for Flames of War. It signifies it's a great time to be a nerd and enjoy all things dice related moving into a new year.

Make sure you have enough money and time going into 2017! You're going to need plenty of both to get your armies to where you will be comfortable getting them onto a table.

Let's Get a Move On Yeh!

Having a slight connection to the UK, it was easy for me to get into a few new games over the fall. Both Saga and Team Yankee offer a little bit of everything that brings me into all things Queen and Country! Saga stuff is one the way, just need to choose a faction. The British Army on the other hand, is here an assembled! Can't wait to take on the Communists!

Tuesday Night at The Box

Another Tuesday night and another night of some Warmachine games for the journeyman league that Tristan is running for the next few weeks. It's a nice break from getting ready for the Flames of War Nationals that are happening here in Ottawa in a few weeks time. A few weeks.....just enough time for painting touch-ups and maybe a few more test games. I know I have some German artillery to paint and also put together a few other things for my list.

War of The Machines!

Warmachine is sweeping through the Dice Devils crew like wild fire! Most of us are either buying a complete Battlebox army, or using existing models that we have. Warmachine is essentially a skirmish based miniatures game that is both easy to learn and fun to play. Adding in the fact that the games do not take a long time to complete, you can play multiple games in an evening. We've also found several new places to buy and play this game with new players getting into it!

Charlie Don't Surf!!

Charlie might not surf, but there are some of us who do!! Summer is in full swing and there has been a lull in the battle. Us here at DiceDevils continue to try and get as much independent and relevant content for all things gaming.  I'm here to update you on the current situation of the Dice Devils. Topics will include games of course, who's playing what. I'll also be taking you through the future and what is coming up in the short term as far as events and such!

PAK 40 Build and Paint (Part 1)

Sometimes you have some free time to help others out! Since I have been very busy building and painting some of the things in my pile of unpainted minis, I had a chance to build and paint a PAK 40 platoon. They don't belong to me, but I had a lot of fun doing my own a few years back and sometimes it's tough for others to find the time to get their own stuff done. No big deal, take on the challenge for turning out some models for a friend.

Hobby Saturday and Football!!

HELPING YOU STAY ON TARGET FOR 2016!!

Easy enough to watch football on a Saturday morning, we're talking soccer here folks. NFL wasn't on until the afternoon! A perfect backdrop to getting some models and some pre-painting prep done. So after a Newcastle victory, we moved on to watching NFL and finishing up some stuff we've just started working on for this year. With more than my fair share of unopened boxes and new games, it's going to be fun getting this stuff done and on the table.

More Stuff To Do & Getting It Done!

Like any hobby, finding the time to build and paint is sometimes the lease favorite of playing miniature games. On one hand, it's pretty satisfying to get a whole army done. On the other hand, it takes a lot of TIME to get a whole army done. Let's look at ways to avoid the burn out of trying to do much, too fast. Hope you find some of these tips useful for your long list!

Getting The Most Out Of (New) Sci-Fi Gaming

With the flick of a switch, a turn of the page or a roll of the dice. Sci-Fi gaming presents itself a way to get into something far different than the regular gaming experience. Video games, board games and table top miniature wargaming offer that escape to another world and a different genre of fun.

"French Suffer Humiliating Defeat" in a Black Powder game..

"Almost accurate of this battle.  Not enough French casualties though.."

Well, here we are again, Scott's basement, the waning days of 2015, and we have a nice game of Napoleonics using the Black Powder rules.   Mark and Scott will be using the British, whilst I use the French in a meeting engagement to control a farmhouse during the Peninsular Wars.   Our lists are from the Albion Triumphant supplement for Black Powder, and we are using a 8 foot by 6 foot table

Using Alternate Brigade deployment, the French are at Left, British at Right.

As usual, massive dump (pictures that is) and video follows after the break

Team Yankee: 1 vs 1, 68 pts then 2 vs 2, 170 pts.

Not a European-Theatre M557.... but would make a kickass objective!

Howdy everyone, now that the Team Yankee books and the box sets are out, Kevin aka Glitch and I decided to head to the FLGS across the border to Quebec and play some kickoff Team Yankee.   Store owner Seb and Robert were already underway.  Robert built and spray-painted 22 T-72's in 2 days!

Robert's T-72 platoon

M557 "Queen Mary" Command objective, from the Bannon's boys boxset.

 Cdn and British soldiers dubbed the M557 "The Queen Mary" as in the cruise ship.. as it was the only vehicle that had enough room to stand up in.  Some other Brit command one is dubbed "The Gin Palace" after the HMS Agincourt, again, had a gigantic ballroom on board for the officers mess.   <end Cliff Clavin voice>

Seb had some Cobras out as well.

Robert's flock of Hind-D's.   Couldnt hit those M1s with ATGMs at all!

Enough of that other table's pictures, lets get to our game.   Kevin was running 2 platoons of 2 M1s, with two command M1s, a Mech Platoon, a VADS section, an ITV section, and 2 Cobras for 68 points.  I ran 9 T-72s, 2 Shilkas, and a minimum Motor Rifle Coy, in 4 BTR-80s which were subbing as BMP-1s.   Pics below:

Napoleonics: British vs Natives South Africa 1819

Here we go again, another game using the Black Powder ruleset to play Napoleonics.. this time with a Colonial flavour:  British vs the restless natives in South Africa in 1819.   The british must prevent the Natives from reaching the town and putting it to the torch.

I have a video bat rep at the end, but took a tonne of pics also, enjoy!   

38th Foot march out of Grahamstown to meet the natives on the field of battle..

I had an inept C/O whilst one brigade commander was 'great' and the other also inept and non aggressive.   I reckon the two were related and got their commissions just to get them out of the family business.   I had a unit of Brit line infantry, Brit Dragoons and British rifles (in the forward outpost) and 1 cannon.  Mark had 5 warbands of natives, some with shields, some with spears, some with decent leadership and the 'bloodthirsty' rule..

Team Yankee Test Game

Deleted 'Red Dawn' scene...

Despite us not having the Team Yankee book yet, as it is November 27th, Keven (Desert Rat) and I decided to try it out with what we know.   The Breakthrough Assault guys have tonnes of army cards up, plus I took a few screengrabs of the demo book at the LW FoW tourney a few weeks ago.    So Kevin is running Proxy USA and I will rock the Reds (a few proxies as well)   I took video as well, but here are the pics and the video is at the end.   It was great fun though we for sure botched a few rules!!

100pts a side.  I have 18 tanks and Motor Rifles, he has 10 M1s plus support.  The Sturmovik is an A10.

Kings of War: Napoleonic French Fusiliers Tabletop Ready

I quickly painted a regiment  for Kings of War.. I am using Kingdom of Man list so these are Arquebusiers.  They are just Perry Miniatures plastic French Line Infantry.   I will ink and detail them later, but I have only a few weeks to get colour on models before the first tournament of Kings of War.. early October!

Command models and casualty figure.. the casualty has been inked and detailed, the regular guys just basecoated.   "Good from Far, but Far from Good" :)

Another shot of the backpacks, where 90% of the detail is.... Next up Cannons.  Then I have to figure out a QUICK way to paint 25 horses ....

Vive La France! (Kings of War army.. French Napoleonics...)

Yes, so the lads locally have been getting into Kings of War.. and while I was going to paint up my dwarves, (on the civic holiday I started) I had to stop.  Why?  This would be the 3rd dwarf army I would paint.  My first was converted 40k Dwarves, aka Squats.. and the second was my Chaos Dwarves, again converted.   Just couldn't do it!!  So I gave away the models to my buddy Matt, and Rob has the other half.   Therefore I am left with nothing that is not historical.. so ofc why not do Napoleonics?  Haha.  I ordered Perry Miniatures plastics from Sentry Box in Calgary, in order to not get hosed in the atrocious Cdn Dollar right now on UK or US orders, and got my metals from the Warstore.  Both orders came in within hours of each other, and here is what I got:

I've G'ot Tha Beast In M'y Sights

The fact I have an entire new army to paint for a game I never expected to play or really have any interest in, comes as a surprise to myself. In starting to figure out how to even paint my new Dwarves is a little outside of my 'element'.

So, in looking for ideas and suggestions, it looks as though I'll be using the color scheme of one of my favorite Hearthstone cards.
Hearthstone is an online card game that is easy and fun to play, created by Blizzard Entertainment. They're responsible for Warcraft, Starcraft and of course World of Warcraft.

I plan on using blue for the trim around the armor of my Dwarf army. It's outside the norm and will look great once they are all on the table together.