Monday, March 18, 2024

(Kickstarter) Firefight at the Research Station by Things from the Basement

 Things from the Basement has launched their most recent laser-cut MDF sci-fi buildings: Firefight at the Research Station

Things from the Basement has teamed up with Trench Coat Minis to cross-promote the new buildings, as well as Trench Coat's Trilaterum minis rules and figures.

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Let's Talk About Henning

So, fun fact: My sister and her Canadian husband got married a little over 11 years ago in a civil service up in Boston, but their post-ceremony celebration that evening also had George Takei (oh my...) at the same bar.  

That summer, they had a get-together up in Boston with all the family and friends from far and wide.  The last activity we did the Sunday before we returned home was a visit 311 Broadway in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  Why, you might ask?

I get the distinction of having my most famous relative headlining a Supreme Court case, Jacobson vs Massachusetts, a case where the Justices ruled compulsory vaccinations were constitutional because "the police power of the state may be allowed to constrain individual liberties through reasonable regulations when required to protect public safety."

So just to clear the air, Henning Jacobson, was not some wild anti-vaxxer by today's standards, or even the early 20th Century.  After two horrible experiences with the antiquated 19th century vaccinations in routine circumstances that left family members dead or maimed in both Sweden and the United States, and decided to hold his ground when Cambridge instituted compulsory vaccination 1902 during an outbreak in the community.  His case through the judicial process was paid for by prominent anti-vaxxers for the day.  

In hindsight, the new manufacturing process and administration of the vaccine at the turn of the century had been completely changed, with miniscule reactions compared to the prior methods, but to quote George W. Bush, "Fool me twice, won't be fooled again."  I'll also note that no family member who has taken the modern versions of the vaccine has come down with any reactions in the last 120+ years.  (I'm almost disappointed that smallpox was removed from the in processing inoculations for US Military between 1983 and 2002, so I didn't get it when I was in the military.  I'll gladly take it today, if needed, though I might pass if it still involved a live virus.)   Very similar to the last few years of COVID, a mixture of traumatic anecdotal experience (there weren't sufficient medical records to justify an exception, even if one would be accepted.) 

One of the other points of consideration I'd hope he did consider was his profession and its impact to the public.  As a pastor of a Swedish Lutheran church with a sizable congregation, I see a matter of personal and public safety to consider, although I add that there was nary a mention from the pulpit that researchers could find, and only a scant few amongst all ethnicities in the city objected.  

So why do I rant on about my Great-Great-Grandfather Henning, smallpox, and the like?  Because the congregation he presided over, the church he helped build was at 311 Broadway in Cambrige.  

When we visited, the church, now Faith Lutheran, as a grand old church with massive beams and fabulous woodworking built by Swedish immigrants.  Like most mainline Protestants churches, it's original congregation fled the city and a much smaller and diverse group took up their mantle.  

I've got to admit that when I introduced myself I still got a bit of the rock-star treatment.    I even got to meet an elderly woman who was actually baptized by him before he retired... and somehow had his old church desk in her house!  However with small little ones and a 5+ hour drive home, I couldn't take full advantage of the hospitality, just a chance to take some pictures, see some artifacts with ancestral ties and meet some very nice people. 

I had not found an opportunity to revisit the church in the following years, and as of Easter 2023, that opportunity was now impossible.  

Sometime after the Easter services last week, a fire started in the church.  All those magnificent beams?  All that fantastic woodwork covered in thick layers of varnish and lacquer?  Now it was all fuel for a fearsome multiple-alarm blaze.  

The congregation has been worshipping at different sites, thanks to the grace and generosity of other denominations in Cambridge.  

Recently, the current Pastor posted a video on Youtube, stating that the church was going to need to be torn down in the future, and reaching out for ideas as to uses for the property in the future.  It's not going to be as grand, but here's hoping they rebuild into something that has multiple uses in serving God in the community.  

When we returned home from our trip, I wrote a social media post mentioning how awesome it was that something my ancestor helped build and nurture might be something strong enough for one of my kids' grandkids could see one day.   Nothing lasts forever, and for most things, much shorter than they deserve. 

Friday, March 15, 2024

Preorders Now Open For Arena of Blood by Wiley Games

Wiley Games has just opened up pre-orders for their latest game, Arena of Blood.


Contrary to my initial thoughts, Arena of Blood is not part of the Fistful of Lead product line.  Rather it's a new game, albeit with some familiarity.

In Arena of Blood, you are the proud owner of a gladiator school, with a stable of gladiators, all with different fighting techniques and abilities. Careful use of your fighters is crucial. Each gladiator has strengths and weaknesses.

Pit your gladiators against your rivals in the Arena of Blood! Matches are quick. Play a whole tournament in an evening!  

If this doesn't scream Thursday night convention fare, to compliment the Friday night Gnome Joust and Saturday night Gnome Game, I don't know what does.  Better yet, this sounds like perfect Sunday morning fare.  

Thursday, March 14, 2024

The Mike Lung Gallery #88 - The Adventures of Bernard and Cindy Part One

We continue to post some old All Things Zombie (ATZ) scenarios friend of the blog and Award-Winning GM Mike Lung played almost a decade ago... with LEGOs.  There's rumors that he was bitten by a LEGO zombie and started up the games again...

The Adventures of Bernard and Cindy

Bernard and his kid sister Cindy were alone in the woods.  Something terrible had happened back at their camp. When they returned from a hike.  The camp site was covered in blood and gore, and their parents were gone.  Screams of terror could be heard from nearby campers and dark shapes shambled in the woods.  Realizing their camper wasn’t safe, Bernard grabbed his father’s pistol and Cindy picked up her baseball bat before dashing into the woods to find safety and help. 


After a long terrifying day in the woods, Sally complained that she was too hungry and tired to go further.  Just then they stumbled into a clearing and saw a parked utility truck with its flashers on.  Nearby was another camper.  “Sally, maybe there is someone here who can help us!”   But then they saw the bodies strewn about the grounds.  A distant moan and then another alerted them to the danger.


More moans erupted behind them.  They were surrounded!




They had no choice but to fight.  Shaking with fear, Bernard raised his father’s gun.  “Blam! Blam!,” he shot the ghoul that had once been Ollie. It fell to the ground but was still moving. 

“Blam!” Not taking any chance, Bernard fired another round into its head.

Desperately, they raced to the utility truck and searched it for something that could help.  Stan picked up a hatched to help defend himself.

“Bernard!  We need to get out of here!”  Sally screamed interrupting Bernards search as more zombies approached.

They retreated to the edge of the woods where Bernard took careful aim at the oncoming horde.  “Blam! Blam!”  Two zombies dropped.


End of Part I


Wednesday, March 13, 2024

New Finds at the Dollar Store

It's been awhile since I drop by one of my many local Dollar Tree. I avoided the temptation of mass-produced Easter candy, but did find some awesome finds in the adjacent 

I did find two new houses for the gnome village, that I hadn't seen on the shelves.  The purple one is from the Garden Fairy Spring Mushroom house line, the white and blue from the Garden Fairy Spring Flower house line.  I am starting to get picky with these ones ,because a number of them have doors that are simply too small, even for the mouslings I play with.  

The find I'm really excited about are the Easter erasers of rabbits.  Eight sturdy rubber rabbits for $1.25?   I picked up 24 rabbits without blinking.  They're definitely making an appearance for the Easter game this year.  The only drawback I'm seeing is that they're erasers, and pretty effective ones.  They are picking up marks already, so I'll experiment with sealant once I figure out how to mount them.  

Tuesday, March 12, 2024

(Gamma World) This is Not a Test #23 - Manchi

Our heroes, the De Facto Explorers, have returned home to Riverbend

=================

Sneaky Pete: A mutated weasel scout.  Pete's telepathy and night vision take a backseat when he whips out his electrical powers.  Recovering from his injuries from the Glow near Ulmin.

Sonny Helianthus: a sentient sunflower artifact examiner with Restorationist ties. 

Slitheran Wurmtail (aka Squiggles): a mutated earthworm scout, in impromptu power armor, looking for trouble, and finding it often.

Lathar Bracken: A pure-strain human from River Bend.  He's got the muscle, the face, and a mount for most encounters.  Lathar's trusty beast of burden, No Name, travels wherever he does.  Looking for trouble in all the right places.  Recent jousting champion of Fair-Town and has been awarded... a peacock.

Ramsay Kallax:  Mutated Ram from the far-off KIA Academy with a predilection for ancient treasures... and the occasional head-butt. 

================

It had only been a few days, and nothing had befallen them during their trip to Fair-Town, but to the De Facto Explorers, Riverbend was a sight for sore eyes.

Sneaky Pete returned to his riverside burrow for a long nap.  

Ramsay found a stall in the stable to stretch out and rest.  

Lathar returned to the home of Mrs Bracken, his mother, for pancakes and mothering.

"My big boy won an award!"

Squiggles searched for a safe location.  His rendezous with Ubenda in Fair-Town had proven productive.  He was with children and looking for place to let them hatch.  Farmer Yulius' farm was as good a place as any, and by the latrine was as safe a place for self-reliant offspring that he could think of.  

Sonny was on the far side of the farm, pulling in his flimsy books from the bug-mart into his shed next to a garden.  He doffed his frockcoat and planted in the garden with a mid-80's issue of Boy's Life.  

The next day, Squiggles woke up and emerged from his shed to a trees filled with blackbirds. Most were crows, and most of their attention was in the area of the privy.  The worm dashed over, howling like a banshee, firing flintlocks into the trees to scatter the birds. 

"Not my babies!!!!"

The birds flews off.  Except for a few cursory scratches in the ground, the unhatched eggs were still buried deep enough to avoid unwonted chaos.

Back in town, Lathar's mom just made pancakes for the two of them.  While he tried to go into more detail about the joust, his mother was more worried about the future.

"With your father not here, I need grandbabies. I'm going to get palpitations before that, I fear."

Lathar gave his mom a peck on the cheek, and ran off towards Pete's followed by Sonny and Squiggles.  The pair heard the gunshots and upon their arrival, Squiggles was pacing the yard.  

"If you see any birds, get rid of them, please..."

"Okay... Is there a reason the birds are even more your mortal enemy than any other day."

"Of course!  My babies!!!"

"Waitwhat... Congratulations!"

"Yeah, proud Dad... or Mom..."

Sonny was not in his shed.  So they headed into town.

Earlier in the morning, Sonny had dragged his red wagon of books and traveled to Ascension Hall. 

The acolyte who opened the door looked puzzled, "What is that?"

Sonny depanned his response, "Chauncey, this... is knowledge..."

Chauncey led Sonny to Justinian's office, "Once he comes back from breakfast, he wants to talk to you."

Sonny waited for a bit for a Justinian to return, an armload of bread for his acolytes. 

"Where were you guys," Justinian asked with a mouthful of bread.

"Fair-Town."

"Oh"

"Is there a problem?"

"No, Fair-Town is a fine place, just not where we normally look for knowledge."

"That's where I got the wagon full of knowledge that's sitting in the foyer."

"The one that could be pulled by a tiny horse?"

"Indeed, a lot of survival knowledge.  Kind of martial knowledge we try to avoid, but its quite interesting."

"There so flimsy"

"I got them for a fair price."

"Sounds good, you guys aren't soldiers, you can do what you like, but something came up."

Justinian continued, "Have you guys seen the falling stars the last couple of nights."

"No...."

"I happened upon a visitor yesterday morning, the Hisser of Huush from across the river.   There's more than that one enclave of them across the river near the ruins of Level A and beyond.  The last few nights , one of their larger villages was getting hit with multiples objects from the heavens.   Not major damage to any buildings, but the objects have struck a number of Hissers, killed a few as well.   It's a phenomena that's not happening in any other village, and with clean water and a formerly safe location, that wary about running away.  They begged for help. They're willing to pay for help, this village of Notex, well above Level A, but on the opposite side of the river."

"So we're doing diplomatic work?"

"If it's no you, who?  I'm not sending Chauncey up there."

Sonny left Ascension Hall and hunted down the other Explorers to fill them in on the mission.

After hunting down the boys, then finding Ramsey, the group went about resupplying and finding the members of the White Hand that could help.

All three healers were actually in town, tripling the amount of smoke and incense inside their shack.

Seraphina, the plant expert, did not use her normal "bag of tricks" on Sonny.  Rather she used a series of sucralose wraps with something called chakras to get the sunflower as close to tip-top shape as possible.

The young male healer, was very confused by Lathar's injuries.  Lather was very patient, "I'll self-administer the electricity damage around my bum."  

"Thank you for that, it's my medical opinion, that the scarring damage around your bum will not completely heal."

"BUH-CAW!!!"

"What the hell was that?"

"That's just Chambray, my peacock."

Squiggles was leaning up against the wall, opposite a make-shift privacy screen, "You named the peacock, Chambray?  What the hell?"

With that, Lathar grabbed some bird feed from the dry goods store, and the crew returned to Lathar's mom's place for lunch and some experiments between Lathar and Sonny improving black powder weapons.

The Explorers stayed one more night in town before investigating the Hisser issue.  After an early evening, everyone returned to their homes to be ready to depart around dawn.

Lathar wasn't as inebriated as before, but he was ready for his mother's tirade.

"Mother, look at everything I've gained, and yet you complain about grandkids. "

"BUH-CAW!!!"

 Look at Chambray, look at No Name, these are my companions and friends...." *THUD*

Lathar lifted his head from the floor, "And I have met some other Pure Strain humans, a leader of her own people.  And next time, when I go to Fair-Town, I will actually talk to her."  *DOUBLE THUD*

Squiggles found himself being chased by a large, black bird.  He was running through the woods, but stumbled.  The bird jumped upon his exposed chest and started pecking at him.  

Squiggles woke up from his nightmare to a dozen inch-long versions of him, trying to wake him up. 

"Father, Father, Help, Quick"

He emerged from his shed to find his eggs had hatched.... and the black birds had returned.


Dozens of little white worms with arms and legs were running to and fro, the blackbirds trying to feast upon as many as their could be.   

Using his flintlocks, he killed two birds and scared off a number of others, before running around like a madman to shoo the rest and secure the surviving three dozens offspring.  

"Papa, Mama... save us."

The ones that had awoken Squiggles called to him, 

"Father, can we stay inside your building."

"My shed is your shed.  And I will protect you.  Call me.... Manchi"

Squiggles secured his spawn in his shed, overturning some of the soil to give them easier access.  With that he heard the eldest, "Inexplicable" soothe his siblings, showing great resourceful a two hour-old worm.

"We'll be alright in the shed.  The big bird will not get us, and we'll definitely be safe from the little ones.  They only do the big bird's bidding.  He like their Bird God."  

With that, Squiggles shut the door, latched it, and walked to his friends preparing for their mission.

GM Notes:  All my knowledge for Squiggles and his offspring were based off of Welsh Ministry of Natural Resources.  As Lathar pondered the sheer army that Squiggles had created, worries of recreating the Clone Wars storyline were announced.  

Next: #24 - Podogs Down by the River


Monday, March 11, 2024

(Kickstarter) 28mm Space Dwarves by Warblade Miniatures

Why do all the cool Space Dwarf Kickstarters come from the UK?

Warblade Miniatures has launch a campaign for their 28mm Space Dwarves, as well as add-ons for their sci-fi Scavengers, Cultists, and "Wolf Pelts" .

What makes this set of 10 figures more fun than others?  

Two Words:  Jump Packs!   Self-tossing dwarves!