A Foray into DM-ing

Back in October I started playing Pathfinder again, taking part in a campaign called The Thin Man run by my friend Seb (of Miniature Strategy fame). It was sent on a fantasy version of Earth (Alterra) with a firm rooting in the 'real world' in terms of timelines, global events and geography. The campaign went swimmingly - featuring heroic battles, great sacrifices and a lot of childish giggling.

With that story now wound up, it raised the question of what we were going to play next. I'd been wanting to DM a full campaign for quite some time but never quite settled on a story that I felt able to tell nor had the experience to improvise. Apart from a handful of one shots a decade ago I'd always been a player, not a storyteller. No doubt many of my friends were already sick of me saying that I would run something 'soon' though.

I started to think over all the settings and stories that I'd like to have seen expanded and one jumped out at me - Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl. I busily set to work converting the setting back into something compatible with Pathfinder.

A map of the Zone

Human Sphere - a new Infinity Wiki.

I've been a little quiet on my blog of late and that's because all my free time over the last few weeks has been sucked up by an exciting, new project.

I'd like to present to you the Human-Sphere.com Wiki.

Human-Sphere aims to create a full catalogue of all the miniatures produced by Corvus Belli for Infinity, including those that are limited edition, unreleased or just long out of production. Each page brings together a lot of information that was otherwise very distributed, including:

• Fluff text
• A full listing of miniatures for each troop.
• Faction and unit logos
• Concept art

In addition I've also tried to document other accessories that might be of interest, such as books, dice, ITS packs and patches. Collectively this weighs in at over 400 individual pages and 1,800 images so I'm sure there will be at least something of interest for all players.

Let's just say I've been busy...

Using Nimbus Grenades

Nimbus Grenades.

What they do is fairly straight forward. They create an area which has the properties of both a Low Visibility Zone(or Poor Visibility Zone for Nimbus Plus ammunition) and of a Saturation Zone. This results in a penalty to hit (-3 or -6 respectively) as well as reducing the Burst of all attacks into, out of and through the Zone by 1 to a minimum of 1.

The visibility/Burst penalties cannot be bypassed by Multispectral Visors, apply to both player equally and persist until the end of that player turn.

These esoteric pieces of equipment are scattered about a variety of troops but hardly see any use at all in my experience. In fact neither myself nor my regular group have ever used them or heard of them being used in a meaningful way.

Clearly they must have an intended role though, otherwise they wouldn't be in the game right? So I got to thinking in more detail about when I might make use of these strange explosives.

Infinity Tactics - Presence

Today I'd like to talk to you about Presence.

No, this isn't some new-fangled special rule, but rather a concept. It's something that I've heard talked about a number of times using different ways to refer to it, but it was always a slightly nebulous thing and poorly defined. So let me try and pin down what I mean by it.

Here are some definitions of presence (thanks Google) to get us going:

• "The state or fact of existing, occurring, or being present in a place or thing." 
• "A group of people, especially soldiers or police, stationed in a particular place." 
• "The impressive manner or appearance of a person." 

So a group of solider stationed in a particular place in an impressive manner, which sounds close to what I'm getting at. These soldiers aren't cowering around in total cover; instead they are actively making their existence felt. In Infinity we can take Presence (with a big P) to mean:

The influence of an army on the battlefield and the pressure it places on opposing forces.

Now, what can we do to get more Presence and why would we want to?

Operation Cowboy Part 3

My current project has been converting the USAriadna motorbike troops into proper cavalry units and I'm pleased to say that I'm now finished!

It's been a bit of a slog getting here, but I'm really happy with the end result. My thanks go out once again to Philip Hynes for the sculpting, Hysterical Games for the casting and everyone else who gave me the courage to think that this wasn't a completely stupid idea!

Below are WIP as well as finished pics of all the models, as well as a little bonus surprise at the end.

Operation Cowboy Part 2

My horses have been sculpted and their being cast up as we speak so I'll hopefully have them in my grubby mitts within a couple of weeks!

Needless to say I'm pretty damned excited about them, so to tide me over whilst I wait for them to arrive I asked the sculptor to send me some more pics!

Operation Cowboy

I find the motorbikes in USAriadna deeply disappointing. Not physically, but conceptually so.

They might be great miniatures and the bikes definitely fit the anime asthetic but they just don't gel with the riders for me. When I think American wilderness and frontier towns I don't think of bikers, I think of cowboys. Do cowboys ride bikes? Not a chance. Bikes run of petrol (or gas, in USAriadna), can't easily traverse difficult terrain and can break down. What you want is a horse.

I man come on, just look at the concept art. Sure, fluff-wise the Ariadnans probably wouldn't initially have had horses, but I'll be damned if that will stop me. Plus given all the other 'American' tropes they've tried to fit into I can bet they'd have imported some as soon as they had a chance!

Wide brimmed hat, poncho, holstered pistol. Check, check and check.