I didn't expect the best game supplement for my "new" gaming year to be produced by.... Wendy's
Yes, Wendy's.
The fast-food chain has released a 97-page pdf, Feast of Legends: Rise from the Deep Freeze. It's a set of rules eerily similar to a popular game, an amusing setting, and an actual adventure!
Very akin to the Gentleman class the Old Spice released awhile back but far more expanded, Feast of Legends is certainly a parody, but a very playable one. My problem is, who wouldn't want to play an Order of the Baconator?
They didn't even slouch on the maps for Nuggeton....
This will get a play through on a non-campaign night for my Monday crew.
Cape Fear Games in Willmington, North Carolina has been awarded the consignment rights to what is considered one of the world's largest gaming collections.
According to a news story in the Port City Daily, a former Stanford researcher and Microsoft engineer passed away, leaving a jaw-dropping collection that was recently transported cross country in a tractor-trailer.
(Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Perhaps the pictures don't do it justice, but it's a massive but unimpressive collection. I've seen better copies oft the games listed (and heavens forbid, at more reasonable prices at an HMGS flea market. I'd love for some testimonials on how this guy was an awesome gamer, but at first glance, he's a game, model hoarder on a Microsoft Vice-President's salary. There's probably a few gems in 3,000 square feet of gaming,
At least this article buys me a little more time with my wife to straighten up the basement of all my minis.
Check out the rolling estate collection offerings at Cape Fear Games
This year, the core set will now be $120, twenty bucks higher than previous. Not a horrible first time increase on the main set since the Bones I Kickstarter launched more than seven years ago.
The original core set at launch 1 of 3
The original core set at launch 2 of 3
The original core set at launch 3 of 3
As always, I jumped on the $1 level for future a la carte spending. Already got one item on my list.
Past $240,000 I'm just going to write up new posts for the additions and stretch goals.
In the early days of becoming a Stout Gnome at the HMGS conventions, I became friends with Friend of the Blog (and Award-Winning GM), Mike Lung. While my convention availability was a mixture of work and financial, Mike's cancellations and short visits were always governed by his kid's travel sports schedule. I did not mock him, I did not really try to empathize, because I did not fully understand the Geas put on parents by their children, but now, now I'm at the early stages of that.
This new 2019-2020 gaming "season" is the first with me as Vice-President of the Mountaintop Youth Basketball League. On top of that, I'm coaching Millie's team, watching Maja's, and to complicate matters more, I was convinced to allow them to play in an AAU developmental league this Fall that overlaps MYBL for three weeks.
And then there's three hours of dance. I've got to fit a few hour-long sessions for the painting table, and a little "Dad Time."
With my 2018-2019 gaming season in the books, what does 2019-2020 hold in store for me?
Let's Keep it Simple, Stupid!
More Family Time: It happened in waves, but we did get some quality gaming in the Casa Del Viscount this year. Next year should be more gaming in general, with more consistency. Better put, off with the devices, pick up all the dices.
Okay, maybe not perfectly constructed, but I get it.
Complete the Saga: I had launched the Lost Dispatchesa year ago, and had expected this cycle of Actual Plays to end before the Summer. Except I've thoroughly enjoyed bringing distant memories back to life. Episode #48 ends the original campaign of my high school crew, but I am well past that, tying Elsderth Millbottom, ne Sir Elsderth Greyhawk into my further undocumented campaigns. There's enough material there to run well into May, and once that's done, there's always the Adventures in Gulluvia. It is technically in Georic, hence why it's listed with the other campaigns on the front page of my blog. And if I can get that finished? Well, there are ten episodes of the The Burning Trogs Redux waiting for a write-up (sans Elsderth). The Tuesday RPG Actual Play isn't going away any time soon.
Role-Playing:
The Online 5e Game: Jeff (or an elaborate Uzbek bot) has returned from his exile. Unsure how often the D&D 5e game will pick up again, but my other options are always available to fill the void, with or without Jeff .
Adventures in Gulluvia (BECMI D&D) was presented as a way to run some of the Red Box adventures again, but they've persisted long enough to almost get halfway through the storyline.
Curse of Nevoz - Canadian Call of Cthulhu in the 90's has never been this weird, and I have four or five sessions outlined.
The other direction is to restart some Face-to-Face games on Sundays. It's been five-plus years since I wound down my Call of Cthulhu campaign by starting up Masks of Nyarlathotep. Two options: Restart the CoC campaign in full, or assemble the Secrets of Saltmarsh. Hmmm.... perhaps Secrets might be a good online replacement, if things go south for Jeff AND he wants to stay in a player capacity.
Star Wars d6 - There's a new hope for a resurrection/reunion for a game I didn't get to play in during the 90's (and lamented about it during #RPGaDay back in August). The group was fabulous but slow as molasses twenty years ago, so this nothing's written in stone yet, but a chance to join this merry group of misfits... as a character I played in one of the GM's con games, has me excited.
Miniatures:
At first glance, I honestly have nothing planned, but then my brain sparks and it trickles in.
The Legions of Steel Playtest should take up a bit of my time (and it's pretty easy.. only 25 years since I heavily invested time in LOS).
Cold Wars 2020 is a heavy Wargaming in Education convention for HMGS, so I'm pondering reviewing and presenting my Battle of Yellowstone interactive game.
The Pulp Game doesn't thrill the family like it used to, but I'm interested in finishing Season 3 and even working towards one final push for Season 4.
One word: Mouslings. Whether I'm using Pulp Alley or Savage Showdown (Savage for the spells), I've got too many cool scenarios not to run.
Conventions:
HMGS cons and Mepacon day trips. Mepacons keep getting the way of "family life" so I might stop running games anyway. Luckily someone else is running My Little Pony: Tails of Equestria now.
Painting: Yes, Please!
Keep it Simple, Keep it Going. Dungeon Decor, Mushrooms, and perhaps, the entire family can paint up Space Marines and IG. Kickstarters:
The year starts off with a taunting bang, especially as today we discover the fate of my wife's position at work. Golden Goblin Press, Pulp Figures, AND Bones 5 all concluding in this first month? Shoot me, please. And eventually this LOS playtesting is leading to a new Kickstarter as well...
The Viscount's Birthday Gala: But one of the Kickstarters that I've already paid for the Steve Jackson Games' Pocket Box Games of the 80's with a heavy dose of Car Wars. I'm thinking a Car Wars weekend sometime in April might be doable, culminating in food truck battle royal I pondered after my 40th birthday bash. I wonder what the weekend rate a hotel conference room is?
Gnome Wars:
The inspiration for the blog title. The Legion of Nauvoo might be my German "Flying Monkeys" for this upcoming decade. If anything, Maja enjoys painting them, so she can get something accomplished.
Hey true believers! Ever since high school, I've tracked my gaming like the federal fiscal calendar, so it makes sense to have September 30th cover my Year in Review. The Blog
Ten years blogging as of this month. Almost 3,000 posts and we'll be hitting a half-million views (some actually legit!) sometime in 2020. It's been a fun hobby documenting my other hobbies.
I'll usually take any traffic I can get, but the New Post-Apoc Minis from Brigade post and the one regarding Jim Stanton for HMGS Board of Directors seemed to pique the interest of certain Italian and Ukrainian bots, respectively. After suffering from outrageous production from posts regarding Wardlings and a Shadowrun Kickstarter last year, I felt it was appropriate to delete those posts.
Removing all the posts with alleged bot-hits, 2019 looks similar to 2018. No Easter game this year removed wargames from the top "8." And it pays to work off a popular free Call of Cthulhu scenario and another based off a Reddit chain to my "Curse of Nevoz" Canadian College Cthulhu campaign.
The demise of Google+ was quite noticeable to my overall and individual post views. It seems more than coincidental that after April, the average pageviews for the first week of a new posts seems to have dropped in half compared to the last few years. Again, it could have all been bot-inflated numbers exploiting Google+, but it makes one wonder.
Best Laid Plans that Didn't Pan Out: Everything - The girl's basketball horizons expanded from the local community league (which I'm now vice-president of) to five different leagues and an equal number of camps. Outside of a badly injured wrist at an AAU tournament at the Jersey Shore, it's been a positive and fun experience, but it has significantly hampered any sort of family gaming projects. Tack on my second promotion at work in the last two years and normal lunch hour chillaxin' on the blogs has disappeared. Let's not even mention the pool we got installed. First world gamer problems indeed.
The Purge 2019 - A mini-book purge cleared up the shelves. Nothing that I was even close to playing.
Kids Painting - See basketball comments above, although they have managed to use my paints for some arts and crafts projects.
My Painting - I touched up a bunch of figures... and then... nothing. Working on the RPG actual plays has turned by workbench time into office time in front of the computer. The basement flooding didn't help either.
Reverisco - I was able to make a few interesting purchases this year. One was finally placing an order with tin-soldier.com (Reverisco). The sets are quite affordable, except that the scale of the figures wanders between 20mm and 28mm. That's a huge disparity. Highlights of 2019:
The New Neighbors and the Return of Swahili!: We loved our old neighbors, we were sad when they were forced to move for work, and we had the slightest of trepidation with the new family and their younger kids. Except James, the father, plays Magic, is interested in podcasts and D&D, and family in general likes to play games. Probably didn't get as much out of it as I could this Summer, but I broke out my Magic cards against an adult, and dusted off my old copy of Swahili. Even with basketball season coming along, I foresee some winter days playing games with all ages between the houses.
When we do get the chance to chill out together our families keep things low-key
Battle in a Box, Prematurely: The Harford Area Weekly Kriegspielers (HAWKs) have a host of cool ideas, one of which was Battle in a Box. The idea of setting up a game that could be easily packed up and transported, and making a contest out of it was simply brilliant. I just couldn't get mine to run following the contest rules at Fall-In! Still, six players and a chance to play more Second Samoan Civil War was a hoot!
The Lost Dispatches That Will Not Die: When I started my Lost Dispatches of Feraso, I simply wanted a vehicle to document all the adventures I ran in high school in the very early 90's. Within the first ten posts it evolved into something else. I've been able to not only cobble together the adventures into a logical order, but expound upon those areas. I must admit that I'm re-writing some campaign history as I go.
The Kid's Painting:
Maja enjoyed painting at Jim Stanton's classes at Hobby U
Maja's work on the left.
My Own Painting:
A pittance, really. Touching up the Samoans, a Middle-Eastern building I've yet to use, and a random hill giant. This is why Reaper Bones V goes live tomorrow and I probably will pick up $40-50 worth of a la carte items.
Games: 5e D&D - Our DM Jeff ran into some personal problems and was forced to bail. I love GMing, but being a player was pretty liberating and relaxing. Just a week ago, Jeff made a triumphant (albiet three week) return, and I greatly appreciated Falgor the Mighty and Uthar literally wrestling cats. Okay, they were Tabaxi, same difference.
Adventures in Gulluvia: Once Lost Dispatches is finally finished (March 2020?), I already have 17 episodes of Adventures in Gulluvia in the can. BECMI D&D with a decent body count and better role-playing with 3d6 stats in order than most special systems I've seen.
Curse of Nevoz: Running a 90's Call of Cthulhu game set in Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada was not on the top of any list, but it seems to be successful.
Risus: If all else fails, another Fleetwood Mac cover band can be used with Risus.
Pulp: Our Savage Showdown game is slowly evolving into Pulp Alley and the kids might like it that way.
2019 Gaming with the Gnomies Awards! Best Kickstarter: Life of the Party - Quick, easy, exactly what I wanted. Bag of Bags gets 2nd place.
Worst Kickstarter: Flying Circus - Estimated delivery: August 2018. I think I have a copy of the pdf (my reward level), but I don't know if it's the final word, and I really don't care at this point. Best Game: Whiskey Tango Rattlesnake - a two player, one Keeper game of CoC using the character rules from Electric Hoe-Down of the Atomic Reptile Bikini Women in 3-D!!! Was the most enjoyable game I've had in a long time. I laughed.... a LOT. Best RPG Purchase: 5e Ghosts of Saltmarsh still hate the hardcover campaigns, but it's a well put-together project. Best Minis: Space Marines/IG - If something is going to jump-start the family painting, dirt cheap Imperial Guard and Space Marines might be it, even if I'm not a Games Workshop fan.
Best "Other" Purchase: Bloody White Baron by James Palmer. Enough of a reality-check for the true brutality of the Back of Beyond, but I'm also intrigued.
In this day and age, pursuit of anything military is ofttimes considered the mark of a bloodthirsty Attila. Quite the contrary, the imagination, creativity and dedication required to play at wargames is the mark of an intelligent, reasoning human being. For those of us sharing this interest, the intellectual involvement, couple with the brilliant pageantry of the miniatures, creates an inviting diversion from the pace of everyday life. We enjoy the opportunity to match wits with our friends in gamemanship, to exercise our artistic urges tin the collecting, organizing, and painting of our miniature armies and to demonstrate our creativity in designing and constructing realistic terrain and buildings. Indeed, a hobby requiring more from the participant would be hard to find!
In kind, however, it would be likewise difficult to determine an activity offering a greater return in camaraderie or pride of craftsmanship. Here is not a static thin, but a viable interest with no limitations. Whether you can field five hundred or five thousand makes little difference in the pure fun of the thing. Some of us are content to uniform our men in a basic coat sufficient of identification while other must make sure each button is correct. Whatever our persuasion, we welcome you. We've had a great deal of fun with these rules as well as having the satisfaction of knowing we are acting in a reasonably historic manner. Ray has worked hard to assure accuracy in the playing manifestation.
So to you, my fellow wargamers, I say -- please give our rules a try. To all others, I assure you that we're quite harmless. To paraphrase our founding father, H.G. Wells, we must indicate that you have but to play briefly at little wars to quickly recognize what a tragedy and a pointless waste real war can be, and how inadequate man is to its many demands. But in miniature, it loses its sanguinary aspect and becomes a game -- somewhat controllable and most exciting.
All kinds of people play at wargames -- from schoolboys to university presidents, tradesmen, merchants, doctors, lawyers. The motivation is the same, the pleasure none the less... providing an easy bridge between individuals, a stimulating activity that generates interest as it develops.
Give our game a go! Here's hoping that you have as much fun with it as we've had!
The fast-food chain has released a 97-page pdf, Feast of Legends: Rise from the Deep Freeze. It's a set of rules eerily similar to a popular game, an amusing setting, and an actual adventure!
