Let's Rock

A punny title for a post all about rocks, or more specifically, rocks usable for wargames. Now that I am heavily involved in Strontium Dog and my Wild West and Weird West projects I knew I needed more pieces of rock scenery to use in my games and in this post I want to show you my current collection.

First up are these three rock towers produced by Warlord Games as part of their terrain items, where they are called Hoodoo Rocky Terrain. Hoodoos are tall skinny spires of rock that protrude from the bottom of arid basins and "broken" lands. Hoodoos are most commonly found in the High Plateaus region of the Colorado Plateau and in the Badlands regions of the Northern Great Plains. While hoodoos are scattered throughout these areas, nowhere in the world are they as abundant as in the northern section of Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah.

These three towers come in a boxed set and are fully painted. You can buy them in black or brown colours. I opted for the brown coloured set. I'm not sure what they're made of - it feels like some sort of hardened polystyrene. They are very light. Sadly, when I checked the Warlord Games webstore, they were currently out of stock. No price was given for them but I do remember they were very cheap. I bought mine over a year ago. You may remember I used them for the first time in my introductory Strontium Dog batrep, not too long ago.

Moving on, we come to some of the best rocky terrain pieces on the market and they are made by my good friend Dave at Wargames Terrain Workshop. First up is the impressive piece - a Large Natural Arch as it is described on Dave's webstore. This is a huge and chunky piece of resin. It comes in two parts. The thin "leg" at the left is a separate piece. I drilled and pinned it before using epoxy resin to glue it in place. I hid the join with Milliput and added lots of Milliput to the inner surface of the leg, which was flat, in order to give it a more natural look.

I'm using my 28mm scale figure of Vampifan in all of these photos to give you a true sense of scale of the rock pieces. According to the WTW webstore, this piece measures 240mm long by 55mm wide by 140mm tall. Incredibly, for such a huge chunk of resin, it only costs £10 unpainted or £18 if you want Dave to paint it for you. I bought all of my WTW rock pieces unpainted. My painting recipe was to prime them in matt black, then cover them in Foundry Rawhide Shade 11A. I gave them a wash of Citadel Agrax Earthshade. Finally, I dry-brushed them in Foundry Rawhide Shade 11A, then Foundry Rawhide 11B and last of all, Foundry Arctic Grey Shade 33A. I used an old half-inch paintbrush for all of the painting, which was ideal for covering such a large area quickly.

Moving on, is the WTW Natural Arch/Bridge. The piece in the centre of these two photos above and below was supposed to sit atop the two outer pieces to form an arch or a bridge. I decided to keep the pieces separate to give me more smaller pieces. Besides which, I already had two arches and I didn't want a third one. In addition, I glued the top of the pillar from below to the long flat part to give it more height and to offer more protection for those hiding behind it. Also, note that the bottom part of both these pieces were flat. If I'd used them as intended, I'd have wanted to make them look more natural by filling out their bases with Milliput.

I'm very pleased at leaving them as separate items as they give me more bang for my buck. This three piece set costs just £8 unpainted or £14.40 if you want it painted.

Here we have three smaller rock pieces that I bought from the WTW webstore. At the far left is a small rock pillar. This was supposed to have the small rock slab that I glued on top of the bridge above sitting on top of it. Instead, I kept it separate and I rounded off the top of the pillar with a small amount of Milliput. This little piece costs £3 unpainted or £5.40 painted.
Next in line is the Rock Formation - Natural Archway. This piece has been made as intended. Because the base of the crosspiece on top of the two pillars was smooth and flat, I added Milliput to it and gave it a more textured and natural look. It was glued in place with epoxy resin.

The final piece of Dave's rock terrain that I bought is the Small Escarpment, a sloped slab of rock that measures 110mm long by 55mm wide by 50mm high. There's not much more to say about it other than it costs £4 unpainted or £7.20 painted. I have to say that I am mightily impressed with these pieces. They are superbly sculpted, looking very natural, and are great value for money. They are definitely some of Dave's best work.

Finally, because I'm devoting this post to rocky terrain pieces, I thought I'd end with something I sculpted myself many years ago. I made this skull rock piece to go with my Dark Elf army for Warhammer as part of the kingdom of Naggaroth, also known as the Land of Chill. It did appear in a few battles I played as unpassable terrain. I built it around a circular plastic pill/tablet box and covered it in Pronto Das modelling clay, which I sculpted into the shape you see here.

The base, made of very thick card, was covered in small stones taken from my back garden. Sand and gravel were glued to the base to fill in the gaps. The sides of the pillar upon which the skull rested were covered in sand. The whole piece was primed in matt black then dry-brushed with successively lighter shades of grey. I'm really proud of this piece and I'm sure it'll get used again in the future, although not in Warhammer, which I doubt I shall ever play again.

Strontium Dog Scenario 01 - Introduction part 1

I've been promising you a Strontium Dog batrep for a while now and here it is. Because this is my first such batrep it is going to be very rules heavy as I explain everything that is going on. Future batreps will be much shorter and less wordy. Strontium Dog mainly uses special designed six-sided combat dice with Hit symbols (explosions) on three faces, Armour symbols (shields) on two faces and a Special symbol (2000AD logo) on one side. Occasionally, normal d6s are used. Models have six statistics - Move (the distance they can move in inches with one action), Shoot (the number of dice they roll when using a ranged weapon), Fight (the number of dice they roll when in close combat), Evade (the number of dice they roll to dodge an incoming attack), Resist (the number of dice they roll to stop or reduce the damage of an attack) and Cool (which determines how many actions the model can take in a turn or how well the model can avoid getting hit, injured, pinned or stunned). At times a model will have to take a stat test (for example an Evade test to dodge an attack) and if so the player rolls one dice per point of that stat the model has at the time. Unless otherwise stated, a stat test needs a Special result to succeed, in other words, at least one roll that shows the 2000AD logo.
Models can take two actions per turn, either two single actions or one double action. Single actions are Move, Snap Shot, Throw, Fight or Shake It Off. Double actions are Aimed Fire, Sprint, Charge, Jump/Climb, Set Overwatch or Hunker Down.
THE SET UP
The set up sequence has ten parts and I'll go through each one in turn.

1. Choose Leaders
I chose Johnny Alpha to lead Team Alpha who'd use the red tokens against Stix Brother #1 to lead the Stix Brothers and they'd use the black tokens. Leaders have to have a Cool stat of 4 or better. Johnny is Cool 5 and Stix is Cool 4.
2. Draw Armoury Cards
Each side draws six Armoury cards at random and may keep three of them. Johnny has a special skill called Well Equipped, which allows him to retain one extra card. The four cards that Johnny kept were Electronux, Medipack, No.3 Cartridge and No.4 Cartridge. The three cards that Stix #1 kept were Beam Polariser, Frag Bomb and Gas Bomb.
3. Determine Protagonists
To determine which side is the protagonist for the coming side both leaders roll 1d6 and the highest wins. The loser becomes the defender. Ties are re-rolled. I rolled 5 for Johnny and 2 for Stix, so Team Alpha would be the protagonists.
4. Generate Job
To determine what the protagonist wanted to achieve I rolled 1d6 twice on the Job Table on p.80 and got Gunfight followed by Takedown. Both sides would have 100,000 creds Collateral to spend if they wanted. No special rules applied. The game would end when 50% (or more) of a sides named models were down. All models taken down would be worth their bounty value to the other side.
5. Recruit Band
I decided to go with the recommended rule of having both sides with a limit of 50 Notoriety. Johnny has a Notoriety of 22. He chose Wulf Sternhammer with a Notoriety of 15 and Durham Red with a Notoriety of 13, bringing him up to 50 exactly. Stix Brother #1 has a Notoriety of 10, so he simply chose four more Stix Brothers to bring his total up to 50.
6. Roll For Encounter
Once the players know what job is being undertaken, it is time to work out how the two sides meet. The defender rolls 1d6 on the Encounter Table on p.81 and cross references it with the protagonist's job to determine the encounter. For the most part, the encounter defines how the models are placed on the table at the start of the game, but also details what extra resources that might be at hand, and particular tricks or strategies one side or the other can employ to gain the upper hand. The encounter I rolled for was Face Off - exchanging threats and insults, the two bands closed on each other determined to be the only ones to walk away.

Starting with their leaders, the two sides took turns deploying a model at least 9" away from the centre line running from the short side of the board to the other short side. The defender went first. The board I played on measured 36" by 24", which is smaller than the recommended 36" by 36" but it didn't make any difference to the outcome. Besides which, 3 feet square is just a recommendation and isn't mandatory. The terrain on the board consists of four of my Battle Systems Shanty Town buildings, one and a half Shanty Town gaming mats, three rock towers that I purchased from Warlord Games but I forget who actually produced them. The cacti, small lake and wrecked car are all from Wargames Terrain Workshop. The centre of the car denotes the centre of the gaming board.

Here are Durham Red, Johnny Alpha and Wulf Sternhammer lined up next to one of the three rock towers.

The Stix Brothers lined up in the main street of the settlement. I identified them as Stix Brothers #1, #2, #3, #4 and #5 from left to right. Neither side gained any extra Collateral for this encounter and no special rules applied. However, each side got a Chicanery tactic to play immediately after deployment and I'll go through them below. For Team Alpha it was Sneak and for the Stix Brothers it was Expecting Trouble.

7. Draw Chicanery Cards
Players are each dealt three Chicanery cards. These cards can be used as explained in their individual rules, or cards may be expended at other times for certain bonuses. The cards drawn for Team Alpha were Raargh!, Red Sneak Attack and Wrong-Footed. The cards drawn for the Stix Brothers were Adrenaline Surge, Firing Line and Stone Cold. The photo above shows part of the area of my dining room table in front of my gaming board. From left to right are my A4 note book (I took 8 pages of notes for this batrep!), the stat cards for Team Alpha, their 4 Armoury cards and their 3 Chicanery cards

Here's the other side of my dining room table. In the top left is a box containing all the black and red tokens needed for the game. In front of that is my personalised Vampifan Nerd Herd dice bag, a gift from Andy of Da Gobbo's Grotto fame (thanks, Andy!). It'll be used for placing the Action chips in so that I can draw them out without knowing which one I'll be drawing. Next in line is my extendable tape measure; every gamer should have one. The tokens numbered 1 to 5 are there to show which Stix Brother has activated in the turn. To the right of them is the Stix Brother stat card (only one because they're all identical). Below it are their 3 Armoury cards and 3 Chicanery cards and finally, at the far right is the rulebook.
8. Spend Collateral
Now that the players know about the coming fight, they may then spend Collateral to hire more models, giving them additional gear and other expenditures as described in the Collateral rules on p.79. and also in the relevant parts of the encounter description. The defending player spends any Collateral first, it being assumed that the protagonist will have done some basic scouting on the enemy before launching an attack. I wanted to keep things simple so neither side spent any Collateral.
9. Deploy Models
Scenery and models are placed on the tabletop as described in the encounter description. 

Before the game could start properly, both sides had a Chicanery tactic to play. For Team Alpha that was Sneak, which allowed them to move up to three models 1d6" closer, rolling for each model separately. Durham moved off to her right 4"; whilst Johnny moved forward and to his left 5", closely followed by Wulf who moved 4". Those were three good rolls.

The Chicanery tactic for the Stix Brothers was Expecting Trouble, which allowed them to activate one model for free, who could take two single actions or one double action before any Action chips were drawn. Stix Brother #3 moved his full 5" forward for his first single action.

Then he fired a Snap Shot at long range with his Custom Hand Blaster at Durham Red. She was 14" away from him and in the open. Long range for Hand Blasters is between 8" and 16" in this game. No modifiers applied to his Shoot stat of 3 so he rolled 3 combat dice looking for Hits. He scored 1 Hit. Durham got the chance to dodge it by rolling 3 combat dice for her Evade stat of 3, looking for any Special results. She succeeded with 1 Special result and negated the attack.

In addition, she had the option of moving 3" in any direction and could change her facing. She moved to cover beside the rock tower. Durham has the Gunfighter skill, which allows her to get a return Snap Shot off at the attacker providing that she not be Pinned (either already or by the incoming attack), have the attacker in her Front Fire arc and have a ranged weapon which can be used for a Snap Shot. She met all three criteria so she Snap Fired back with her twin Custom Hand Blasters. She gained a +1 bonus to her Shoot stat of 3 because she was firing two pistols at once.

Looking for Hits on the 4 combat dice she rolled, incredibly she managed to score 4 Hits. This equalled the Stix Brother's Cool stat, so he was automatically Pinned. He attempted to dodge the attack but only having an Evade stat of 1, he failed to get a Special result on the combat die. Next, Durham rolled 4 combat dice for the Power of her pistols to see how much damage she could do. Once again looking for Hits, she scored 3 of them. Stix Brother #3 had the chance to reduce their effectiveness by rolling combat dice equal to his Resist stat of 4. He gained  a +1 bonus, taking it up to 5 because Durham fired two pistols at once - a case of quantity over quality. Looking for Armour results he only scored 1, so Durham's damage score of 3 was reduced to 2. A result of 2 on the Injury Chart meant that he was seriously injured and he took two Injury markers. For the rest of the game, all of his stats would by reduced by one per Injury marker he sustained. Note that Injury markers can be removed by a Medipack or by taking the Hunker Down double action.
10. Start Playing
Count up the number of Action chips for each side and place them in a bag. The game turn starts by drawing Action chips, one at a time, from a bag. When a player gains an Action chip, they choose a model to activate and take actions with it, either two single actions or one double action. A player can select any one of their models on the table top who hasn't activated yet to use their Action chip. Leave their Action chip beside the model (I placed them on their character cards for Team Alpha or by the five numbered tokens for the Stix Brothers) after it has completed its actions to show it has activated this turn and can't activate again. When a Star chip is drawn (Star chips are used by models with a Cool stat of 4+, which was everyone in this scenario) there is a chance that it isn't left on the table top afterwards and instead gets returned to the bag. This leaves the model free to act again later in the turn and means that a Star chip is in the bag ready to come out again later in the turn. Star chips are good!
Once the chosen model has completed its activation from a Star chip, take a Cool test for the model by rolling one combat dice for each point of Cool the model has currently. If any of the dice roll a Special result, the Star chip is returned to the bag and the model may activate again later in the turn with another Action chip (an ordinary one or a Star chip). Theoretically a model could keep being activated indefinitely but even models with Cool 5 will eventually fail. Note that Star chips do not have to be used on models with a Cool of 4 or greater when they are drawn. This represents the leadership and confidence (or fear) by having a hardened bounty hunter or outlaw on the model's team. Clearly the chance of a model with a lower Cool passing the test to return the Star chip to the bag is lower, but it can happen.
Failing the Cool test to return a Star chip to the bag comes at a price, however. Not only is the Star chip left in place to indicate that the model cannot activate again this turn, but it also gains a Pinned marker to indicate its overextended and somewhat precarious status. When a model with a Pinned marker activates, roll a number of combat dice equal to the model's Cool stat to remove the Pinned marker. Any Special results rolled removes the Pinned marker with no further effect and is classed as a free action. If the roll is unsuccessful, the activating model must use a single Shake It Off action to remove the marker before doing anything else.
I placed three red Star chips for Team Alpha and five black Star chips for the Stix Brothers into my Nerd Herd bag. Turn 1 could now begin.

The game only lasted one turn but seeing as it was such a long turn I'll cover it in its entirety in my next post in a few days time. Don't miss it!

Six Gun Sound Scenario 01 - Gunfight at Stillwater

Finally I present my first ever Wild West batrep. This has been a long time in the coming but is something I have been dying to do ever since I started blogging. It has taken me a long time to build up my collection of Wild West buildings, figures and scenery in 28-32mm scale. Now my collection is of such a size that this batrep is possible. I am using the Six Gun Sound: Blaze of Glory rulebook with a few changes and additions from the upgraded, simpler and faster to play sequel. I much prefer the original version because it is so much more detailed.

This is my town set up, primarily using buildings from 4Ground. Now I know they are expensive, but to me the price is worth it because they are incredibly detailed and best of all, they come pre-painted. This is a huge time saver, however, I do paint the edges to blend in with the appropriate colour and to hide the dark wood. This is a tip I learnt from making my card buildings - always paint your edges.

The town of Stillwater, New Mexico is close to the border with Mexico. It has a main street running from south at the bottom of this photo to north at the top. A side street runs east and west.
As I said, most of my buildings are from 4Ground, but the one exception is the sheriff's office and jail, which I purchased from TT Combat. It came unpainted. Painting it wasn't too hard but it was time consuming. It did help me in that I used coloured card on the interior walls and I stuck black, fine-grade sandpaper on the roof.

This view of the crossroads shows from left to right at the top of the photo, a two-storey building under construction, the undertakers and across the street, the hardware store. A chuck wagon stands outside the store. This was a plastic construction kit in 1/48th scale that I bought many years ago. I don't know which company made it, but I do recall it was a Japanese company. Sadly, it did not come with horses.

At the western side of the main street is the only two-storey house in the town, with its family of four standing outside. Next to it is the land office and at the corner of the crossroads is Miss Kitty's Hotel, run by Kitty Trent. The name hotel is a bit misleading as the establishment is actually a brothel.

At the other side of the crossroads is Rogan's Bar, run by the strong-willed and tough miss Cathie Rogan. The upper floor is a bunkhouse for travellers looking for a cheap place to stay overnight. Next to the bar is a single-storey building under construction. The town is expanding northwards.

Here is a view up the side street. The two buildings at the bottom of the picture are single-storey houses for some of the town's residents. Some residents live and sleep in their own establishments.

In the north-east corner of the town is a small lake, from which the town got its name of Stillwater. This wonderful terrain piece came from Wargames Terrain Workshop, and its owner, Dave Stone, kindly painted it for me. I did ask him to and I was thrilled with the result. Dave added a rattlesnake to it, which is such a cool touch! It is only just visible at the top of the lake and directly below the topmost cactus. Note that my glasses are visible to the left of the house. I never noticed that they were there until after I'd posted this picture. Silly me!

The outdoor toilets are card models. The smaller one to the left was produced by World Works Games as part of their TLX Deadfall range. The larger one behind the sheriff's office was produced by Stoelzel's Structures as part of their Fatal Frontier set. I built two of each for my town.

And so we come to the scenario itself. I played a simple Gunfight encounter (p.35 of Blaze of Glory) and this was GF-2 where one side is outnumbered by the other. Obviously the encounter took place in town. The two female bandidas are after the four man outlaw gang after they shot and killed a good friend of theirs.

In this encounter the characters face off at the shortest effective range of all the characters involved. That was 8" for two of the outlaws. Although technically this is outlaws verses outlaws I called it outlaws verses bandidas, because the two females are Mexican outlaws known as bandidas. Note that males are known as bandidos.

The two females are from left to right Sara Sandoval and Maria Alvarez and both are Rep:5 Gunman Bandida Stars. Yes, I know this goes against the rules that a gang can only have one Star leader but I'm using a house rule that allows me two Stars as leaders. Sara has the Attributes Marksman, Lucky and Knife Fighter and she is armed with two Colt .45 Pistols and four Throwing Knives. Maria has the Attributes  Marksman, Lucky and Resilient and is armed with two Colt .45 Pistols. These figures are from my Shadows of Brimstone collection. Maria is appropriately enough, a Mexican Bandida and Sara is actually a Bounty Hunter figure.

The four outlaws whom Maria and Sara are after are a mixed bunch. From left to right are Benito Zedilla, a Rep:4 Gunman Bandido Grunt, Andrew Calder, a Rep:4 Gunman Bounty Hunter Grunt, Thomas McKay, a Rep:4 Gunman Gunslinger Star and leader of this gang, and "Wild Willy" Wilkes, a Rep:4 Cowboy Mountain Man Grunt. Zedilla is armed with a 12 Gauge Scattergun and has the Attributes Marksman and Dumbass. Calder is armed with two Colt .45 Pistols and has the Attributes Marksman and Initiative. McKay is armed with a Colt .45 Pistol and a .44 Derringer Pistol and has the Attributes Marksman, Nerves of Steel and Tough. Wilkes is armed with a Springfield .58 Rifle and a Bowie Knife and has the Attributes Brawler and Marksman. All four figures were produced by EM4 Miniatures.

Before the combat begins both sides must roll 2d6 verses their Sand scores for the Flinch test. Stars can choose their results, so Maria, Sara and McKay automatically passed 2d6 and could draw as normal. Zedilla and Calder also passed 2d6 but Wilkes only passed 1d6 and Flinched, giving him a -1d6 penalty on the Draw table.
Next, everyone rolled a number of d6 equal to their Rep for the Draw and applied appropriate modifiers. All Gunmen (that's everyone except Wilkes) got a +1d6 bonus and counted passes on 1 to 4 instead of 1 to 3 (this rule appears in the new version of Six Gun Sound and I liked it so much that I used it. Cowboys pass on rolls of 1 to 3 and Townsfolk on rolls of 1 to 2.). Zedilla suffered a -1d6 penalty for drawing a weapon that wasn't a pistol, derringer, knife or tomahawk. The same rule applied to Wilkes who decided to use his Rifle instead of his Knife. Finally, Wilkes suffered another -1d6 penalty for Flinching. Wilkes would only count passes on a 1 to 3 because he was a Cowboy, not a Gunman. So the results were as follows from highest to lowest -
Maria rolled 6d6 and passed 5.
Sara rolled 6d6 and passed 4.
Calder rolled rolled 5d6 and passed 3.
McKay rolled 5d6 and passed 2.
Wilkes rolled 2d6, and passed 2.
Zedilla rolled 3d6 and passed 1.

Shooting was carried out from highest result to lowest with ties being resolved simultaneously. When a character fires, it targets an opponent. That opponent must return fire. Each character must be targetted once before another character can be targetted twice. Maria went first and using her Marksman Attribute which allowed her to roll twice on the Ranged Combat table, counting the best result, but only for single shots. She fired once at Calder rolling a 5 and a 2. The 5 gave her a score of 10 because you add the dice roll to the character's Rep score. A 10 counted as a hit. Rolling on the Shooting Damage table, she rolled a 9, which was a hit in the gut. If hit by a Pistol, Carbine, Scattergun at 3", Shotgun at 6", Rifle, Buffalo Gun or Tomahawk the character was Out Of Fight, otherwise, the character rolled on the I'm Hit table. So Calder measured his length on the ground and took no further part in the fight.

Next up Sara fired once at McKay and like Maria, she used her Marksman Attribute. She rolled a 6 and a 3. The 6 gave her a score of 11 - a hit and she got to choose the result on the Shooting Damage table for rolling so high. She chose result 5 - hit in the head and Obviously Dead. With McKay being a Star I rolled for his Star Power Advantage to reduce the damage he'd taken. He rolled 4d6 for his Rep score and needed results of 1 to 3. Unfortunately for him I rolled high with rolls of 6, 6, 5 and 4 - all misses and the two 6s reduced his Star Power Rep to 2. I could have used his Cheating Death Advantage, which would have allowed him to be removed from the table to a place of safety, but that would have reduced his Rep by one level to Rep:3. I decided not to bother because for narrative purposes it made sense that he got killed.

Next to fire was Wilkes. He fired his Rifle, which could only target one character per turn. He shot at Sara and using his Marksman Attribute rolled a 3 and a 3, giving him scores of 7 and 7 - both a miss.
Zedilla fired his Scattergun at Maria and it could hit three targets but Zedilla concentrated all three shots on Maria. He rolled 5,4 and 1, giving him results of 9, 8 and 5. The 9 was a hit, the 8 misses because it was the second or higher target, and the 5 was an obvious miss. When firing a Scattergun you roll twice on the Shooting Damage table and count both results. He rolled a 4 and a 7 on the Shooting Damage table scoring a hit in the leg and a hit in the gun arm (if this had been at range 3" or less, Maria would have been Out Of Fight but the range was 8") and forcing Maria to roll twice on the I'm Hit table to see what the extent of her injuries are. She rolled 2d6 verses her Toughness of 5 and passed 2d6 twice, scoring a just a scratch result. She remained standing but must take the Being Shot At test.
At this point with everyone still standing and having fired, Reaction Tests had to be taken. I used the Reaction Test tables from the second edition rules. Stars can choose their result so Maria and Sara therefore chose to pass 2d6 verses their Rep and could Return Fire. Zedilla and Wilkes had to roll for Being Shot At and Man Down. They only rolled once but applied the worst result of the two tables. They both passed 2d6 giving them a Return Fire result on the Being Shot At table and a Carry On result on the Man Down table. Therefore they took the Carry On result, which allowed them to act as normal. And yes, this would allow them to Return Fire if they wanted to and more importantly, if they were able to, because Maria and Sara were about to Return Fire.

Maria shot first and once again used her Marksman Attribute to fire once at Zedilla. I should point out that Marksman is a Class Ability that all Gunmen characters receive. She rolled a 5 and a 2, giving her scores of 10 and 7. Obviously, she took the 10, which was a hit. Rolling on the Shooting Damage table she scored a 9. Zedilla was hit in the gut and was Out Of Fight.

Next it was Sara's turn to shoot. She used her Marksman Attribute to fire once at Wilkes with her Colt .45 Pistol. She rolled a 6 and a 1, giving her scores of 11 and 6. The 11 was an excellent result as it allowed her to choose the result on the Damage table without having to roll for it. She chose result 12 - hit in the chest and Obviously Dead.

And so the Gunfight at Stillwater came to a bloody end with the four outlaws lying dead and dying in the dirt. Maria and Sara had avenged their friend and they left town for further adventures. Neither increased in Reputation.
Conclusion
I played this game on a 4' by 3' table and I didn't think the buildings I had would fill the table. Individually they don't have big footprints but when put together, I was surprised at how much space they took up. I may have to get a 6' by 4' battle mat for future games as there are still a lot more buildings I want to buy, some of which have much bigger footprints, such as the 4Ground livery stable and corral or the 4Ground bank or the 4Ground Sassy Gal saloon. Playing this certainly gave me food for thought. I also want more scatter terrain, fences and saddled horses with and without riders.
As for the rules, I'm fortunate in being very familiar with the Two Hour Games rule systems. However, Six Gun Sound: Blaze of Glory is different to many other THW games in that it is incredibly detailed. For example, it has rules for hitting various body parts on humans and horses and more detailed rules for cover, horses and wagons. I love this extra level of detail and so I'm a huge fan of this game.
To be honest the game went pretty much the way I thought it would. Maria and Sara had the advantage of higher Reps but the outlaws had the advantage of numbers. Unfortunately for them, they didn't make it count. When Calder and McKay went down, Zedilla and Wilkes could have turned the tide but Wilkes missed and although Zedilla scored a hit on Maria, she shrugged it off. Bad news for them!
I know that this batrep was very rules heavy and that was deliberate. After all, this was my first Six Gun Sound batrep, and I'm sure most of you are unfamiliar with the rules. I would hope that future batreps would be more narrative driven with fewer references to the rules. Now that I have played my first Wild West batrep, you can expect a lot more.

Now then, in my last post I asked you to name the film in which Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz played Sara Sandoval and Maria Alvarez respectively? The answer is Bandidas, a 2006 French/Mexican/American comedy/action Western film directed by Norwegian directors Joachim Ronning and Espen Sandberg and produced and written by Luc Besson. It tells the tale of two very different women in late 19th century Mexico who become a bank robbing duo in an effort to combat a ruthless enforcer terrorising their town. It is very much a popcorn movie, not to be taken seriously but it is a lot of fun and Salma and Penelope are so lovable and so beautiful you can't help but like them. Here's some photos of them.

Sara Sandoval and Maria Alvarez played by Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz.

Maria teaches Sara how to shoot. She is not so good with a pistol but an expert at knife throwing.

Maria the feisty, poor peasant girl with her twin Colt .45 revolvers.

Sara, pampered daughter of a rich landowner, takes aim with her Colt.45 revolver.

A scene near the end of the film taken after a running battle on a train.

Maria and Sara looking so cute and adorable. Who couldn't fall in love with them?

MC1 Assorted Judges 01

It has been a while since I posted anything for the Judge Dredd Miniatures Game but that does not mean I have forgotten about it. A new batrep will be coming soon as I continue my campaign. I'm looking forward to using my new Battle Systems Sci-fi Terrain sets to recreate parts of Mega City One. In addition, I have been collecting some new figures for the game and painting more of my current collection of figures. In this post I want to showcase an assortment of MC1 Judges that I have acquired this past year. What they all have in common is that they are limited edition figures and I feel very lucky to own them all.

At the far left is Judge Harry Heston, an ape Judge who was part of an experiment wherein the Justice Department was looking for more diversity with its Street Judges. The project was short-lived and never really took off. Heston is an intelligent gorilla who only appeared very briefly in the comic series. The figure is a very limited edition casting sculpted by Dave Stone of Wargames Terrain Workshop. Dave very kindly gifted me this figure. The figure came with a choice of two right hands - one holding a Lawgiver Mk.2 Pistol, and the other a long Day-stick. I opted for the Lawgiver because he can do more damage with that than a Day-stick. I have to say, this is one of Dave's finest sculpts.
Next in line is Judge Dredd 04 by Wargames Foundry. Yes, this is the fourth version of Dredd that they made, and whilst not the best, he's not the worst either. Just before Foundry ceased production of their entire range of 2000AD figures they added a couple of new figures to the range. This version of Dredd was one of them and a rather spiffy Don Uggie Apelino was the other. I bought them both a couple of days before their sale ended, thus giving me their complete range of 2000AD figures. I will be using this figure as a generic Street Judge in my JDMG campaign. Note that he is armed with the Mk.1 Lawgiver Pistol. He is a good sculpt but his shoulder pads are far too big! Compare them to the next two figures who are more accurately portrayed.

The Judge with the Scattergun was produced by Warlord Games, available only if you bought the JDMG rulebook and Blood on the Streets supplement together. Also in this deal was a limited edition female ganger. When this offer was made I already had both books, so I figured I'd never get either figure. But, fortunately for me, the two figures came up for sale on eBay and I successfully bid for them. I can't tell you how delighted I was to scoop them. It is nice to have a Street Judge armed with something different to a Lawgiver Pistol, although he still has his Lawgiver in his boot holster.
Last in line is another rare figure. This one was produced by Mantic Games as a Kickstarter exclusive referee for their Dreadball game. Once again, I acquired mine from eBay but this time with the "Buy Now" option. He only cost me £3.50, which was an absolute bargain. Because he is so small and slim I have converted him into a Rookie Judge. He is, in fact, my only Rookie Judge. You can identify a Rookie Judge by his chest badge, which is cut in half down the middle. Oddly enough, in JDMG, the stats for a Cadet Judge and a Rookie Judge are identical. Whilst Warlord Games did produce figures for Cadet Judges they ignored Rookie Judges. I simply took a craft knife to the chest badge of this figure and cut it in half to convert the figure into a proper Rookie Judge.
All in all, these are great additions to my growing force of Mega City One Judges.

Contemporary Witches 01

As a complete change of pace I thought I'd show you three contemporary witches, two of which were recent purchases and one, which I've had for quite  awhile now. They are all made by different companies to varying standards.

First up is my favourite figure out of this trio - the limited edition version of Jill Lucas by Silver Fox Productions for the RAFM Miniatures range of USX Modern Day Heroes. Jill is available in two versions - normal and limited edition. The limited edition versions differs from the normal version in that it comes with the spell effect rising from the pages of her spell book. Only 300 of these figures have been produced and mine is number 117. They all come with a small certificate. Jill is obviously a Goth Girl. The sculpting of her is just exquisite. I love her coffin shaped backpack and her red plastic horned tiara. The spell effect of the ghostly skeletal head is such a cool touch. Limited edition Jill Lucas is RAF09001 priced at $10.95. If you want the normal version, she is RAF02838 priced at $5.95.
In the centre is Witch Hazel, sculpted by Kevin White as part of the Hasslefree Miniatures range of Modern Day Adventurers. She is obviously based on the character of Willow Rosenberg from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV series, specifically series 6, when Willow turned bad and almost destroyed the world. I'm using her as an evil Goth Girl rather than bad Willow, and keeping the name Witch Hazel. I should mention that Buffy the Vampire Slayer and its spin-off series, Angel, still remain two of my all-time favourite TV series and I would love for someone to do a full range of figures from both series. Witch Hazel has cast a levitate spell on herself. Once again, the sculpting of her is sublime. She is listed as HFA041 Witch Hazel on the Hasslefree webstore and she costs £4.00.

Third in line is Anastasia Tenebris, sculpted by Dave Stone of Wargames Terrain Workshop. She is actually described as a female necromancer but that just makes her an evil witch in my book. I must admit to having mixed feelings about this figure. On the plus side, I like the concept of her raising the dead so spectacularly. What is cool is that her base, with the two rising skeletons has been cast in transparent green resin. Most of this has been obscured by my painting but the ghostly flame effects do show some of the green resin beneath my dry-brushing. The necromancer is a separate casting and could, if you wanted, be glued to a different base. She'd fit well on any 25mm diameter base. What lets this figure down is the sculpting of the necromancer. Compared to the other two on display here, she looks rather crude. Now don't get me wrong, Dave is a very talented sculptor. His scenery pieces and monsters are just superb. However, when it comes to sculpting humans, he still has a long way to go to match the work done by the likes of Kevin White and B. Van Schaik, who sculpted Jill Lucas. The female necromancer is not named, so I gave her the name of Anastasia Tenebris. She does not appear in the WTW webstore's online sales section, but you can see her in the News and New Releases section as part of the September 2017 new stuff. I'm sure if you sent Dave an e-mail he'd be able to give you a quote for her price. I can't remember what I paid for mine.
I bought the figure of Jill very recently, and Anastasia a couple of months ago. Witch Hazel was bought a few years ago as soon as she was released. I could have called this post, The Good, The Bad And The Ugly, but decided not to. I do like all three of these figures but I haven't decided how to use them yet. My thoughts at the moment are to wait for the release of N.O.W. by EN Publishing to use them in that contemporary setting RPG. Oddly enough, Anastasia is the one who has the most gaming potential. She is such a generic sculpt that she would fit in well in almost any genre from fantasy to sci-fi. I am pondering about whether to make her an ally of Malexica in my JDMG campaign. Does Malexica need an ally? We'll see. And no, I haven't forgotten about that campaign. A new batrep will be coming soon.