The Mike Lung Gallery #24: The Adventures of Stan and Sally

I daresay, it's been months since I've had a Mike Lung update!  Mike's trying to balance crazy life and numerous projects, although his latest needed to be reposted immediately.

The latest fascination is with Two Hour Wargames'  All Things Zombie - Final Fade Out.  The figures are not metal or even Bones plastic, but they do the job admirably.

The Adventures of Stan and Sally

Stan and Sally on the morning of their big adventure

Stan and Sally get out of their broken down car.  Why are those people acting so strangely?

There's a lot of them.  Something is really wrong with them!

Watch out Sally!  Don't let it bite you!

I can't believe you just killed him!  There are so many more.  Run!

Maybe we'll be safe in that store.

They are following us!  Quick grab those tools as weapons!

Help me Stan!... There are too many... No! No! Noooo!  Ahhhh!!

Aahh!  Let me out of here!  Mmrhh! Chomp! Rip! Slurp!

Mmrrhh!

(Review) Canis Mysterium

After much delay, I finally got a copy of Canis Mysterium (Chaosium 23124).  Unlike other books that have been out longer, I was excited to get this as it's (a) a stand alone CoC supplement and (b) is only $10.95.  I wasn't expecting a large tome for that price, and I wasn't disappointed.

Plot:  It's 1930 and a team of researchers and students (Psychology) from Miskatonic are called to the town of Coldwater Falls to investigate a man who acts like a dog, a particularly violent one if the evidence proves correct.

Any CoC player of any experience is anticipating the big bad hiding around Coldwater Falls (hint: it's NOT a werewolf) and the cover of the scenario helps seal it.   Outside a few possible deviations, your assumption holds true.

While I understand the plot device to drop this into the 1930s, this scenario feels in a better like a scenario for beginning players/investigators and that sort of avoids large swaths of Chaosium's product line without some possibly significant revisions.  With that said, the 32 page scenario could greatly benefit from the removal of the ghastly artwork and the inclusion of six pregenerated investigators.  If a keeper were to run this, the precluded notion that everyone is part of the Miskatonic U's Department of Biology to achieve the ultimate motivations should demand such an inclusion.

Despite my excitement for a relatively inexpensive, stand-alone published scenario, there are better and longer scenarios offered for free on the Chaosium and yog-sothoth.com websites.  It's with much sadness, that I must rate this book just one gnome out of five.

There are so many better books and scenarios that deal with the big baddie that I can't justify this purchase other than a test run of the special ordering from my new FLGS.

In fairness, I may come to run this if I stumble upon a group of new people interested in learning RPGs and interested in mysteries.  It's not The Haunting, but I could justify building all those pre-gens. 

Miniaturizing Legends of Oz and Oz: The Great and Powerful

I can't imagine it's almost been two years since I started my research on miniatures for The Wizard of Oz.  Little has been done on the purchasing front, save the fact that I finally put my choice of figures for the Winkies on my Want List.

To help celebrate my daughter Maja's fifth birthday, we all went out to see Legends of Oz: Dorothy Returns.  The movie is stuck in the middle somewhere between a horrible direct-to-DVD one and a Disney mega-picture.  Despite a huge cast of well-known actors doing the voices, the animation varies wildly, the plot is too cheesy even for a kid's movie, and it severely deviates from the source material of Dorothy of Oz, the kids loved it.  I, however, have learned to hate any and all Martin Short performances after The Three Amigos.  You can read an Oz-o-philes review of it here.

We also got Maja a copy of Oz: The Great and Powerful.  Definitely PG-material, but the girls enjoyed a few shocks and screams, and no one woke up with nightmares.

Now that we're back on track with a property that could dim the shining status of Frozen in my household, the question then turns to, "How can we game with this in miniatures?"

Let's start with Legends of Oz, where I'll try to combine the book with the movie.  I ask you to reference the first link in the post to reference characters in the original movie and either or both of the newer movies.

Candy County -  While Marshall Mallow is a character made up for the movie, I like the concept, and it can easily be replicated using Eureka's Toy Town figures, perhaps using from green stuff to sculpt a squarer face.

Stolen from One More Gaming Project

The chocolate soldiers are perhaps the easiest to represent on mass.  The appear to be a bit smaller than Dorothy, so it's safe to buy a bag of 15mm Napoleonics, paint them up in milk chocolate brown with some highlights and shading, and BOOM instant army.

Dainty China Country - There appears to be two troop types in Dainty China Country:  Those defending the walls have a medieval feel to them, while the ones in the final battle look Napoleonic.  Due their short stature, I would go with 10mm figures for effect, although I can easily see 6mm.  Lots of pastels are in their color palette and I definitely recommend a super-shiny sealer for the porcelain effect.  If one can find 10mm civilians, you can use them for citizens/traveling companions.

Jester: Good God, with the dozens of manufacturers making thousands of medieval or fantasy figures, you would think there would be an honest to God normal jester that isn't a bloated lout or finishing his apprenticeship in necromancy.  Need some help here, people!

Mice Queen:  While there is a princess mousling coming out with the next batch of Bones, her subjects/bodyguards fit the Mice Warrior line from Eureka.

Wiser:  I'm going to slightly cheat here, like I have with previous characters.  Giant (read: FAT) owls are more common in children's toys than miniatures.  If you want an adventurous owl with some heft, I might recommended one of the more humanoid owlbear figures from Reaper:

Oz: The Great and Powerful

Oz Troops  In Great and Powerful, the Winkies are noted as being the guards to Oz AND the land-based shock troops to the wicked wicked witch. They also aren't green-skinned (yet?) and dressed like Vlad the Impalers shock troops.  For this I may need the help from the internet in love with Napoleonics.  I can't figure out what nationality to use for the troops.  Greatcoats are also usually worn, plus big feathers or furry hats. 

Here's Bruce Campbell to help you out with your thinking caps.

The Wizard: Finding a pure sideshow charlatan/barker is proving harder than I thought.  Not that the Wizard should be in combat (and his other form is a bit unwieldy for a gaming table), but with a little modeling this Deadlands Huckster might fit the bill:

Stolen from Bandit86

Quadlings/Tinkers:  Outside of trickery and collateral damage, the Quadlings couldn't call shotgun for a car seat, much less harm anyone else.  A mixture of Medieval, Renaissance, and even up through western townsfolk to randomly flee across the table should do.

Flying Monkeys:  There looks to be three different types of flying monkeys in Oz, the witch's monkeys from the Wizard of Oz, the far-more violent flying baboons of the wicked witch in this movie, plus the smaller, friendlier version like Finley.  I can't find any flying baboons or bellhop monkeys, so I recommend using either Eureka and Alien Dungeons versions. 

Evanora:  I'm going to be lazy here.  Any Reaper female wizard with an amulet will fill her role as King's Advisor, pre-Wizard.  I found a dozen different hag figures for post-hag Evanora.

The Black Man

It was great weekend for the family.  Of course Mothers Day went off without a hitch and the kids managed to get a tan over the first decent weekend of the year.   Couple of things:

The guys over at Emerald Vale pulled through and I snagged a my copy of Canis Mysterious without a hitch.  Still, trying to figure out the format of the review, it's a peculiar little product.  They also got some Ticket to Ride in, so Fathers Day might be easier for my wife. 

Took Maja and Millie to see Legends of Oz.  Between that movie and Oz : Great and Powerful playing in the house last night, I'll also have a some updates to another post I made long ago.  Maybe I'll even tackle a popular children's movie, or perhaps I should just it go...

Over this past week, I've overheard a few odd conversations with the girls.  Instead of their normal "Let's pretend," with princesses, ponies, and babies, they kept talking about "The Black Man" in hushed tones.  Since we live in a rather pale community, yet I don't remember my wife or I discussing anyone with that phrase, I was confused.  Further talks with girls netted a little more disturbing info:  The Black Man lives in a secret room under their bedroom and some nights they go there after everyone falls asleep.

Between the facts that we personally know every male figure they deal with (yes, yes I know the stats, I'm still confident of my statement) and their stories are filled with gleeful giggles, I've come to these two conclusions.

1. They've learned about telling scary "campfire" stories from some of the older kids at daycare, and this is their imaginative, giggling attempt to scare themselves.

2.  They've made contact with Nyarlathotep.  Guess I should stop reading Masks at bedtime.

At least it wasn't Y'golonac.

Eastern Ukraine is Mine!

With all the talk recently of Pro-Russian Separatists, some of you who don't mind gaming active conflicts may want to play some Eastern Ukraine urban scenarios. Thanks to  Stan Johansen Miniatures new Insurgents in Western Dress, you have more figures to choose from.

Sure, they're missing ski masks and such, but they look appropriate for taking on Ukrainian Security forces, or dashing across the streets a Sarajevo.   $15 for 5 figures.

ALLIANCE Aloud: Game Trade Magazine News!

Outside of one of the bloggers I follow returning from a cruise of the Western Mediterranean, and another with pictures from a giant Seven Year's War game, the blogs have fallen silent as of recently.  It can be anticipated I had a (as the kids say) OMG/WTF/BBQ!!!!! moment when this popped up on my feed.

ALLIANCE Aloud: Game Trade Magazine News!: Dear GTM Retailers / Readers, We here at Game Trade Magazine ( GTM ) have some exciting news to share with you! We’ve decided to spru...

Here, they're simply going to glossy paper for the interior.  As often as I've seen Game Trades pile up in the corner of the gaming section, or collect dust, as the store staff only cares about product lines A, B, and C.  Going glossy is probably on the bottom of most store owner's list to improvements on the order book.

Back in my day (selling comics, pogs and Magic cards up hill both ways in the snow) we were happy to get a description of a product in the monthly solicitations.  Heck, sometimes I swear the sheets were mimeographed from sheet typed up on an actual typewriter... and this was the 90's!

Alliance raised the bar with Game Trade, giving stores a vehicle to solicit pre-orders from the their customers, thus resulting in better sales, better inventory control, and better budgeting.  Here in Pennsylvania, I don't believe I've ever seen a store take advantage for this technique, simply because they're exhausted/bewildered from Diamond/Previews arrangement it's modeled after, and Previews generates more business for them. 

(Kickstarter) 28mm Modular Gladiator Arena & Accessories

As I was cleaning up my desk at work yesterday, I found a copy of the Old Glory catalog and started going through it.   Sorry, no earth-shattering revelations to be made, except some may notice the Voynuk Infantry added to my Want List.  I'm no where near starting my Wizard of Oz project, but it doesn't mean I can't watch the movies with my kids while painting some Winkies.

Again, no great surprises perusing the book:  I might want to look into accumulating Spanish-American and Boxer Rebellion figs, maybe a few WWI vehicles, and perhaps seeing how cost-effective it would be to convert my Battle of Yellowstone from gnomes to normal figures.  Who wouldn't want to paint 20+ buffalo in 25mm?

Then I hit the Gladiator section in the back and my scheming was awoken from its long slumber.  Gladiator games are quick, easy, and with the right environment, fun for the whole family.  I still have a pile of figures hiding in a box somewhere.  It's a long-range goal of mine to get this set up.

Then this shows up this morning. 

I'm a huge fan of this, even though the 10-piece set, with shipping from England is going to run almost $180.  With the modular sections and the different pdf playmats they're offering, I can imagine a nice campaign (league?) wandering around the arenas of the Roman World.  Tempting, but I've got much bigger fish to fry right now at home.