Time Travelers and More

Bow ties are cool

Highlander Studios has some new heroes ready for Rebel Minis. Some familiar time travelers and zombie hunters soon to be available for 15mm games.

Recon in Force: More Mecha

Last month massive machineries of war were spotted on the horizon (Advancing Mecha Sighted!).The emphasis on Armor Grid's excellent models was for quick starting, print-n-play action. This follow up features a small selection from the vast world of 15mm Mecha and terrain, plus a Kickstarter you should really look into if you're a Mech aficionado.
First up is Rebel Minis, the 15mm masters. They have a vast array of units, designs for several different armies (including alien bugs, Mr. Rico) and box set deals for Two Hour Wargames 5150 Star Army series.
Next we have Khurasan Miniatures. They are vast, they contain multitudes. Plenty of armor, hardsuits and infantry. Plus Gigeresque and Lovecraftian horrors to haunt your armies nightmares!
Meanwhile on Kickstarter the Salamander Mech  is fully funded with a half month still to go. This very large Mech would even be suitable for 28mm gaming IMHO

Six Golden Geek Nominations for Fate Core

Winter Knight FATE Dice (Photo credit: Eoghann Irving)

The 2013 Golden Geek Award nominees have been announced, and six of them are for Evil Hat's Fate Core and Fate Core supplements. I've wanted to write about Fate for a while now and this seems like a propitious time.
Fate is a highly flexible story-driven system descended from the venerable FUDGE system. With roughly an hour of discussion around a table with your friends you can adapt any of your favorite role-playing settings, books, movies or good old wild imaginings and start playing. Evil Hat also publishes Fate Accelerated Edition (FAE), a trimmed-down version excellent for introducing folks to Fate and RPGs in general. I used Fate Accelerated for a pick-up game of wild pulp space action at my FLGS.
You'll need 2 to 4 friends, pencil and paper, four Fate dice (recommended but regular d6s will do) and some beads or tokens or such to use as Fate points. Gamemasters tempt the players into risky actions and players propose wild plot twists by exchanging Fate points.
There are a wide variety of game settings already available for Fate and more are on the way. Evil Hat has published the Fate System Toolkit to help you fine-tune your game and two volumes of ready to run Worlds for your friends to adventure in.
Fate: Core System and Fate Accelerated are both available as physical books and pdf versions are available as pay-what-you-want items from DriveThru RPGs.

Related articles

• Fate Accelerated Edition (FAE): First Impressions
• Epic Norse fantasy for Fate Core: Iron Edda on Kickstarter
• Fast Pulpy Action In Fate Accelerated

Dream a Little Dream

Here's a little taste of the days when airships were all the rage from Max Raabe and the Palast Orchestra:



Sadly I have only recently been introduced to Max Raabe and his vintage cabaret sound. His sound is very much the Roaring '20s but his playlist extends all the way through the Naughty '90s to ... whatever this mess we're in now is. Look him up and give him a listen.

Masters of the Skies

"Airships must be powerful masters of the skies as the ultimate symbols of freedom and defiance, roaming the clouds without hindrance and restraint".
-- Nick Ottens

view from French dirigible (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Nick Ottens has posted a splendid article at The Gatehouse on the ups-and-downs (Haw Haw) of airships in wartime. The main vulnerability was the flammable hydrogen gas used for lift. Also, the effectiveness of airships as bombers was hindered by altitude, wind and cloud cover. All problems easily solvable in a world of Science gone Mad!
Firstly the development of non-flammable lifting gas or alternate means of neutral buoyancy. Cavorite comes to mind. With a strong enough lifting force armor becomes possible. Clockwork ailerons could make bombs into self-correcting air torpedoes while dastardly spies guide the attack with wireless telegraphy.

Related articles

• The Heyday of Rigid Airships
• A new age of airships
• Steampunk Hands Around The World - Join in!
• Mad scientists, airships and class: the politics of Steampunk by Rjurik Davidson
• The Rise Of The Blimp

Advancing Mecha Sighted!

In a slight departure from Steam-powered amusements, Two Hour Wargames' 5150 Battalion Commander is now on sale. Command a Sci-Fi armor battalion in planetary conquest. Battalion Commander is the latest entry in Two Hour Wargames Science Fiction universe, a stand-alone game that builds on and complements the other titles in the series.
To quickly get right into massive mecha battles, you can use Armor Grid's extensive collection of print-and-play 15mm miniatures. Infantry, mechs, vehicles and aircraft in multiple color schemes are all there for you to command. Build an army as large as your printer can handle.
Armor Grid's own game, Mech Attack, is a best seller on Wargame Vault. Due to various circumstances I lean towards games with a solo option, like the 5150 series.

• 5150 Battalion Commander AAR

Becalmed in the Aetheric Doldrums

Another slow year. Some progress has been made with my Steampunk history, a suitable setting for Role-Playing, War Gaming and other entertainments. Among this year's acquisitions are three of Osprey's Wargaming series:

• In Her Majesty's Name: Steampunk Skirmish Wargaming Rules (Osprey Wargames)
• Ronin - Skirmish Wargames in the Age of the Samurai (Osprey Wargames)
• Of Gods and Mortals - Mythological Wargame Rules (Osprey Wargames)

Each of these games is a small-scale skirmish game for 2 or more players.
The next game in the series, A Fistful of Kung Fu, is coming this February to a theater (FLGS) near you!

39th Annual Origins Awards

The Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts and Design has announced the 2013 Origins Awards Nominees. These awards are presented to companies for outstanding games in the industry. 

A sample of the nominees:

• Margaret Weis Productions - Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Basic Games
• Green Ronin - Mutants & Masterminds: Threat Report
• Posthuman Studios - Rimward: The Outer System
• GMT - Andean Abyss
• Catalyst Game Labs - Battletech: Weapons Free
• Paizo Publishing, LLC - Death’s Heretic

The full list of categories and nominees is posted at GAMA.org.
Many of the nominees' games are available on sale at DriveThruRPG.com.

Gaming in the Aether

An itemized list of role-playing and table top skirmish games with Steampunk and Victorian Science Fiction themes. Vote up your favorites. Don't see your favorite game? Add it!

Steampunk Games

View more lists from Andrew Tuttle

Mecha Mayhem

MFZ - Merc Frame "Tóraí" (Photo credit: neoaez76)

Following a successful Kickstarter, +Joshua A.C. Newman is publishing Mobile Frame Zero: Rapid Attack. MF0 is a tabletop miniatures wargame based on mecha anime. The game is set on a future Earth and Earth's interstellar colonies, MF0: Rapid Attack supplies a detailed history. The game mechanic is dice based, each mecha has a number of systems which grant the player a number of 6-sided, and possibly 8-sided, dice to roll. The attackers dice are matched against the target to determine the results.
The best part: the mecha and terrain are made out of LEGO.
This means fully "destructable" mechs and terrain. Enjoy!

• Mobile Frame Zero Flickr Group

Related articles

• Mobile Frame Zero - Game One

Dreams of Steam

+Dreaming in Gears by +Alex Hakobian  is a role-playing game of Steampunk fantasy. It is set in an alternate time where the discovery of a new and rare mineral in 1859 lead to a world of Steampunk "super-science" in 1888. There are no "Classes" in DIG, character creation is based on distributing points for Primary Stats and selecting Skills. The game mechanics are dice based, d10 and percentile.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
-- Arthur C. Clarke

The Science of DIG is sufficiently advanced. By mechanically and mentally influencing the rare mineral mentioned above a character can produce wondrous, fantastic effects. Effects range from forms of telepathy to various attacks and defenses.

Losing Steam...

A fairly disappointing 2012, only a measly 8 posts and none of 'em AARs. Well, I've mentioned this problem before, Just more of the same really. Let's see if I can't do better in 2013. There is "In Her Majesty's Name" from Osprey to look forward to, but it looks like they've pushed the release date up to May.

Frank Chadwick's Space:1889: Mars Needs Legos!

Frank Chadwick's Space:1889: Mars Needs Legos!
Fantastic confluence of Victorian Science Fiction and LEGOs!

Bugs Mr. Rico, Two and a Half Dozen of 'em

Got my Bugs from Defiance today, so glad to see them! Somewhat more in depth report to follow.

The Hits Just Keep Coming...

Another interesting announcement from Osprey. (Previous interesting announcement here.) They're gearing up "Osprey Adventures" for March, 2013. Along with classic Myths and Legends there will be Urban Myths and Legends in the style of Zombies: A Hunter's Guide , beginning with The Nazi Occult by Ken Hite. I've been a fan of Ken Hite, Master of Secret History, or Secret Master of History, fnord, since Suppressed Transmission (Steve Jackson Games) and I'm always glad to see his eldritch brand of lunacy in print. Can't wait for The Nazi Occult? More Ken Hite madness here.

Ooooh! Shiny!

For months now I've been caught up in the cycle of needing to get just one more model to make my collection perfect. "I need this for my game!" "I need that for my game!" Doing so much to create the perfect game that I never play the game.

I bet there's a term for that.

Among the must-have items that I got to make the game perfect:

• Squirmydad's Steam Ram. A steam tank with nice customizing options.
• Steam Rocket Troopers from Dragnoz' Gods of Steam. The Rocket Troopers pdf uses layers for extra customizing and the Storm Troopers have been updated to use layers as well. So many choices!
• Cowboys and Indians from Arion Games. I observed the Queen's Diamond Jubilee by buying Cowboys and Indians. Go figure.
• WorldWorks' Deadman's Canyon. Wild west mesas.

Spotted in the Wild

Very nice looking beastie from Troll Forged, 10cm tall! No word on price or release date. Should look very impressive on the battlefield.

Interesting Offering from Osprey

Osprey Wargames presents In Her Majesty’s Name: Steampunk Skirmish Wargaming Rules. Looking forward to seeing how the rules deal with the wild steam-powered technology that forms the backbone of Steampunk. Not planning on holding my breath, the book's not due until March 2013.

Osprey's offering is certainly welcome however there is no shortage of Steampunk/VSF rule sets:

• The popular and revered G.A.S.L.I.G.H.T. rules support a wide range of adventures from Victorian Weird Science to Rayguns and Rocketships pulp.
• Adamant Entertainment offers both The Imperial Age series (d20 based) for Victorian Adventure and MARS (d20, Savage Worlds) for Barsoomian amusements.
• Speaking of interplanetary colonialism, the venerable Space:1889 covers Ether-space from Mecury to Mars and all points between.
• Blacksburg Tactical Research Center brings us Verne for their EABA system. Verne is well-grounded in both the fiction and the fact of the Victorian Era. As a bonus they provide a free character generator.
• From Cubicle 7 comes Victoriana and Abney Park's Airship Pirates. Victoriana blends classic RPG magic and fantasy with Victorian Romanticism while Abney Park's Airship Pirates looks to a dystopian Neo-Victorian future based on the band's music.

Check out the blog links to see what games people like. As for myself, I use a mash-up of Two Hour Wargames rules including Colonial Adventures and Larger Than Life. I've even thrown in All Things Zombie on occasion.

Thrilling Adventure in the Weird Wild West!

The Dramatis Personæ and scenery for a new adventure are almost assembled.

A group of Shock Troopers seemed to be startled by some wild cactus.

Or is it the fact that Violet Glory and a Pinkerton agent are lurking nearby that makes them so jumpy?

What nefarious scheme  requires this steam powered contrivance?

Will our heroes save the day?

Find out in our next thrilling installment!

World War II Units

Reinforcements arriving from Victory Force:

New Special: Choose 4 WWII Packs for $35 | Victory Force Blog Site

Looks like a good time for me to get some Weird World War gaming in.