IHMN: Society of Thule vs. The Mole Men!

My friend Dave and I had a game of In Her Majesty's Name tonight, pitting the Society of Thule (Dave) against the Mole Men (me).

We played the Bad Jack scenario, where there is a bloodthirsty mutant in the centre of the table, and both forces set out to kill it. The rules for Bad Jack (who came to be known as Swampy Jack for reasons that will be clear when you see the miniature) were sparse, to say the least, so we made up some very basic movement and decision-making rules for him as we played. 

The Mole-Man sniper watches over the bridge where Swampy Jack came from as his comrades advance.

On the other side of the bridge, the Prussians had only just deployed when Swampy Jack came slurping out of his hole and attacked one of the Jaegers! What manner of horror lies obscured by the tree?! Only a better photographer would have been able to find out!

One of the Mole-Man riflemen peers out of the window and down the alley to the corpse of the Jaeger who had been hiding behind the wall. But wait... why is the body moving??

A zombie appears and shambles forward, trying to save Dr. Kobalt from the menacing Mole-Man!

Meanwhile, on the other side of the field, two Mole-Men gang up on a lone Jaeger and hack him to death with their axes. But that's not the last we'll hear from this particular Prussian!

Just when things are looking grim for poor, asthmatic Dr. Kobalt, one of the dead Jaegers rises and shambles to his aid! 

Swampy Jack abandons the body of the Jaeger he had been fighting, killed by some Mole-Man Marksmanship, and slithers back under the bridge to fight the Auto-Shotgunner. The Kapitan stands by, trying to decide if he should get in there or just let them sort it out amongst themselves.

Krieg lies dead as the auto-shotgunner gets ready to open up a lead hose on another zombie!

Dr. Kobalt's escape plan goes horribly awry when he is caught and murdered by a Mole-Man. The Mole-Man's position doesn't look much better, though, as he is caught in turn by a zombie and Swampy Jack! Below, the leaders square off in single combat as a crazed Mole-Man pyromaniac tries to burn one of the zombies with his molotov cocktail! (It was a no-avail cocktail, though, as he missed with both of the bottles he carried)

Final dispositions before everybody decided to stop this crazy war and just be friends instead. 

In Her Majesty's Name: Society of Thule

I finished my Society of Thule guys. I liked painting them quite a lot, though I wasn't too excited about doing green uniforms. The figures are cool, especially the zombies, who really look like they are shambling around spastically.

I learned two things after taking these photos: one, I need to go easier on the clear varnish, because it really goobed up some of the eyes... the bodyguard guy in blue especially. They will have to be repainted. Two, I need to clean the sensor on my camera, because the amount of defocused dust and crud I had to paint out was ridiculous.

In Her Majesty's Name: Mole Men

I decided to put together a Mole Men list so I could use my Quar in IHMN. I want to use my Partisans, because I think they are such cool minis. There are only 8 of them, so I made them pretty tough.

I also invented an "automatic shotgun" weapon for my shotgunner.

In Her Majesty's Name: Scotland Yard Company

It has been a long time since I had anything worth posting. I finally got motivated to work on some minis again when my copy of In Her Majesty's Name, plus three teams: The Society of Thule (Prussian occultists), Lord Curr's Company (British adventurers) and the Scotland Yard Company (Scotland Yard and associates). I had a hard time deciding who to paint first, but the Scotland Yarders came out on top, so here they are:

Scotland Yard constables.

Scotland Yard constables.

Scotland Yard Special Branch.

Scotland Yard Special Branch.

The Consulting Detective and the Good Doctor.

The Consulting Detective and the Good Doctor.

The Sergeant and Chief Inspector.

The Sergeant and Chief Inspector.

The whole gang.

The whole gang.

The miniatures have lots of character and they were a lot of fun to paint. I feel like I'm still getting better at pinstripes and tartans.

The figures had fairly prominent mould lines, so they required quite a bit of filing before they were ready for the paint. After filing and gluing on the (very fragile) power cables for English All-Electric Truncheons, I epoxied them to washers and then evened the bases out with plaster. I think the cobbles might have looked better if I had carved the grout lines into the bases, but a) the pewter bases of the figures come right up to the top level of the bases, so I would have had to cut lines into the metal as well as plaster, and b) I already spent a lot of time on the bases as they are, and I would rather be painting figures than bases. I think they look all right as they are, and it's definitely possible I could have made them look a lot worse if I tried to carve out the bases.

One thing I did on these guys that I don't normally do is paint eyes and pupils. I think painting the eyes on miniatures looks goofy 99% of the time, but these turned out okay. I think eyes on miniatures look better the smaller they are, and I went back and overpainted the upper and lower lids with my flesh base colour so the eyes are narrow slits rather than big saucer googly-eyes.

Next up: The Society of Thule.

Coming soon-ish: A Force On Force campaign

I spoke to a few people at Trumpeter Salute about starting a Force On Force campaign. I'm going to have to miss the May game night, but I would still like to start it up in June. I'll post more details later, but here's the basic idea:

- The campaign will centre around a (fictional) platoon of Canadian soldiers fighting the Taliban in Kandahar, Afghanistan, around 2006-7. We'll be using the Force On Force campaign rules.

- We'll be tracking the progress of the 'characters', not the players. So anyone can drop in for a game, or miss a game, or even switch sides from game to game if they like, without interrupting the continuity of the storyline.

- For the first little while, the games will be small. We may even be able to get in several games per session, depending how things work out. Later, the battles could get larger with more support options (like when I get my LAVs!!).

- I'll post AARs here, on my photo log, and on Facebook, in case people who aren't playing in the campaign are still interested in watching the progress (and/or decline) of the soldiers and the insurgency.

A few photos from Trumpeter Salute

Here are a few photos from my "Busy Day In Kandahar" game from Trumpeter Salute. Unfortunately the battery on my phone died before I could get any photos of the second game, "Bomber In The Bazaar."

Busy Day In Kandahar was notable mainly because it's the first time in any of my Force On Force games where the Coalition forces were able to eke out a win! We didn't play through the full 8 turns, but by the time we finished almost every Taliban fighter on the board was dead or had fled. Canadian fire was very effective, having wiped out both Taliban MG teams and one of their sniper teams in the first turn.

Another major factor in the game was Fog Of War cards, causing mayhem for both sides all over the board. I really like the cards. They add a lot of the unpredictable and random elements you read about, but which are hard to replicate in a game. Radio problems, IED and old Soviet mine strikes, interference from higher command, low ammo, random mobs of civilians, and all sorts of other events had a big influence on the game.

Canadian section commander and medic position themselves to watch over both the rescue of the wounded soldier and the EOD team.

The EOD team, supported by a 2 Section fire team, wait for the area around the IED to be secured before getting down to business.

A Tier-one Taliban team arrives near the IED.

1 Section, having pulled the wounded soldier into the cover of a nearby building, lay down fire in three different directions at the Taliban. The small building in the upper left was the scene of several bloody assaults, after a Canadian fire team was captured by Taliban and subsequently rescued by their comrades.

Canadian sniper and GPMG teams, with help from an infantry section, watch over the HLZ.

Also, Magnum.

UPDATE: Courtesy of fellow Trumpeter Tony, here are some photos from the Bomber In The Bazaar game:

Force On Force Pre-Convention Playtest

I had some friends over for a game of Force On Force last weekend, ostensibly to play test one of the scenarios I have planned for Trumpeter Salute, but mostly to give myself a refresher on the rules before hosting two public games. We played Bomber In The Bazaar, from the Operation Enduring Freedom source book, somewhat modified to make it a bit more winnable for the Coalition forces. As it turns out, the game was still really hard on the Coalition - I'll have to adjust it a bit more to make it fair for the tournament.

Here are a few random photos from the game.

Civilians mill about in the Bazaar.

Just another quiet market day...

The view from NE.

A Canadian fireteam and their Human Terrain Team enter the bazaar to disperse the crowds.

A group of Taliban get ready to cause mayhem in the market.

Despite having seen his compatriots mown down by a Canadian fireteam, the lone survivor of a Taliban cell remains defiant! (from behind a compound wall)