Austringer 1 and 2

Hired by the Guild for their affinity with their bird of prey, they strike from afar without regard for line of sight or cover. If stuck in melee the bird can get its master out of trouble quickly.

 There are two versions of Austringers. This one is #1.

This one is #2. I have fought against them but not with them. I can say they are a real pain for models that use terrain to their advantage but they fall apart if you can get to them quick and cut them down in melee.

 Primed black.

 P3 Greycoat Grey, drybrushed P3 Ironhull Grey then P3 Bootstrap Leather including the birds.

  Drybrush P3 Rucksack Tan on the parts painted brown, P3 Thamar Black (gloves) and a 50% P3 Rucksack Tan and P3 Cygnar Yellow mix on the birds. Then P3 Khardic Flesh and drybrush P3 Midlund Flesh.

  Drybrush P3 Coal Black on the gloves, drybrush P3 Bastion Grey on the gloves and GW Runelord Brass on the buckles and such.

 P3 Khardic Red Base on the scarf and bird eye, P3 Skorne Red drybrushed on the scarf, drybrush Cryx Bane Highlight on the gloves and P3 Cygnar Yellow on the bird beak and drybrushed on the wings.

 Then it was a wash of GW Gryphon Sepia on the bird and GW Devlan Mud on the austringer.

The base was done in GW gravel and GW grass with the same desert grass used from IMEX Southwestern Alamo Accessories as Perdita's Gang that I did last year. The base edge was painted with GW Mecrite Red.

Spartan Games Linking and Splitting Fire

When to link or split fire for a squadron is one of the most important decisions in any Spartan Game product. In this post I'll talk about each one.

Here we have a squadron of four Prussian frigates who want to target one Britannia Cruiser. For the example's sake we are at range band one (zero to eight inches away).

  At this range band each frigate gets six dice each.

The cruiser's Damage Resistance (DR) is four and Critical Rating (CR) is six.

If each frigate rolled the average on six dice, on average there would be one of each number rolled.

This would generate an average of four hits for each frigate on the cruiser. 

This means that the cruiser would take a minimum of four hull damage (one for each of the four hits equaling or exceeding its DR). This would destroy the cruiser (as it only has four hull points or HP).

If two of the frigates combined fire, the first one would get the full six dice and the other frigate would add half (rounded down) for a total of nine dice.

This would, on average, provide five to seven hits. This would do either a HP of damage or a critical. With four frigates doing this (linked twice) it would score two HP to two critical. As you can see, this is not as dependable on average compared to each frigate firing on its own. It may even provide less damage on a cruiser than if each one fired individually. This is because a critical hit, one that equals or exceeds the CR rating of a ship, will on average score two hull hits.

 Now have all four combine fire. The first one gets six dice and the other add three each for a total of fifteen dice!

That would score seven to thirteen hits. Definitely a critical on the cruiser and maybe two. Why two? Because thirteen is more than double the critical rating (CR) of the cruiser. If it was eighteen then it would be three critical. Devastating but again it would be taking a chance. Why? Because on average it would score only one critical and on average criticals score two HP. The cruiser would still be alive and returning fire.

Against a battleship, all of the frigates linking fire would be the best choice to make a dent in it because you need the fifteen dice.

To do well at Spartan Games products, think of the averages and maximize your HP damage to take out models completely.

RANGE BAND TWO

For the same four frigates firing at a cruiser at range band two, each frigate would get three dice. This will provide less of a chance to destroy the cruiser as the damage would be one to two hits. Not enough to dent its DR of four.

With linking fire, the first ship uses their full three dice and each ship adds half (rounded down). This adds up to six dice for all frigates. This will be four hits on average and cause a HP of damage. As you can see, take the average number of hits to calculate whether to link or for the ships to go on their own.

 

THREE CRUISERS

If you have three cruisers at range band one to shoot at, do you link or go separatly? The answer is both. You link fire with two of the frigates against each cruiser. This gives you nine dice to roll against each cruiser. On average you will do five to six points of damage scoring a hit or a critical.

Say you have a Britannia Cruiser against four frigates at range band one. You only have two turrets. What do you do?

I would split fire with one turret and use the other to fire on one ship. Reason being that a frigate's DR is three and CR is five. A critical automatically destroys a small ship. You would be scoring two to three hits on average with the split fire (you divide the dice you have, any way you want as long as the total does not exceed the weapon total) and seven hits with the full turret. This would score a hull damage on two ships with a critical destruction of a third. This would cripple the frigate squadron and force the opponent to retreat to the back of the playing field to keep thier fog of war STAR card for that squadron. Again you have to know your target number of hits and compute the average number of hits for each option.

I hope this article helped.

Spartan Games - Wing Marking

The way the number of planes you have in a wing are marked in Spartan Games products are different for Firestorm Armada and Dystopian Wars.

In Firestorm Armada, wings can be Fighters, Interceptors, Assault Shuttles or Bombers. The wings are indicated with a chit or handmade plane (they have no resin markers yet so i'm using a Dystopian Wars Prussian one) plus a die to represent how many planes are in the wing.

In Dystopian Wars, wings can be Fighters, Scout, Dive Bombers, or Strike bombers. They are represented by a resin marker for each plane squad (of three) in the wing.

The advantage of the Firestorm Armada method is saving space. The advantage of the Dystopian Wars method is at a glance you see how many wings you have and you have to think about how to have them attack a target.

Regardless, for Firestorm Armada I will use my Dystopian Wars Wing markers.

X-Wing Miniatures Game First Look

I tried out the new (as of 2012) X-Wing miniatures game from Fantasy Flight. For those who have played the old Wings of War WWI aerial combat game (which I own and was published by Fantasy Flight) and the sequel of it by Ares you will find the movement system similar.

The gameplay takes several steps beyond in elegant complexity by having different pilots able to pilot the same miniature for more points. Ships are also upgradable in many categories like skill, torpedoes, and droids depending on the ship chosen. Each class of ship also has special actions they can do to give them an edge although difficult red colored maneuvers prevent the ship from taking an action and earns them a stress token. This token can be removed by performing an easier green maneuver. For example the above Tie Advanced performing a "corrigan" (move forward four and reverse direction) cannot do an action and earns a stress token but next turn can perform a green action and is back in the fight again. Al these rules are easy to learn and use in the game.

The miniatures are fantastic looking right out of the box. Several people on the interwebs have made their own paint schemes to great effect. The game is played on a three foot by three foot surface and although it seems small has plenty of room. The mat pictured above was procured by my friend from Gale Force Nine.

It has been recommended to me that a great starting spot for getting into the game is two starters and a booster each of the X-wing and Tie Fighter (for bonus pilots). That will enable you to play multiple 50 point games before getting more ships. They have booster packs for many ships in the Star Wars universe.

Will I get this game? Not now but once I sell my Wings of War to make room I will. Which is a big regret as I love WWI aerial combat but none of my friends wanted to play it after I purchased it and with this game they definitely won't. There is also a Star Trek: Attack Wing miniatures game from Heroclix coming out soon that uses the same movement system as X-Wing (under license). That may be something to pick up to have some variety in my gaming groups.

Spartan Games Exploding Dice Tracking Method

Exploding dice in Spartan Games systems is a core function of the combat rules. The concept of exploding dice might be a strange one for those who are not used to it. A good way of keeping track of the dice that explode was taught to me during Gottacon when playing Firestorm Armada.

 

For regular weapons a four or five counts as one hit and a six counts as two hits. For an example of the exploding dice technique I have the above Brittania cruiser firing on a Prussian cruiser for the Dystopian Wars miniature game. It is firing broadsides torpedoes at range band two (eight to sixteen inches). The cruiser rolled six dice at this range band and on average one will come up a six. Because a six counts as the exploding die it counts as two hits and another die is rolled. Another die is rolled and the gunners are accurate today as this die came up with another six. On the second extra die a four is rolled. If another six was rolled yet another two hits would have been scored and yet another die is rolled. This is how a small frigate can take out a battleship, although the odds would be against it.

Spending the time counting would make seven hits, four for two sixes and three for the other three hits.

You could also make a pile of the dice that count as hits, by adding a die to it for every six. Now compare the two above pictures and tell me which one makes it faster to count the hits. The second method saves time and means more time gaming. Try it out.

Spartan Games - Range Scale and Firing Arcs

Range scales in all games are a funny thing. Some allow you to premeasure and some don't. In all of  Spartan Games products you can premeasure. Use it often and wisely.

In the above photo, this is just at the limit of range band one or eight inches. Quite close. This is measured from the firing ship to the nearest point of the target. This is even if it is its beam...

...or stern or bow is closest.

If you are firing a CC then it is determined from that side. That means fixed channels, especially front and aft and less so from the side as above, are very limited. In the case above, the Britannia cruiser has fixed channel torpedoes and would miss the Prussian cruiser. If it had a broadside firing arc, it would be able to target the Prussian.

This is at the limit of range band two. For most forces in Spartan Games family this is the optimum range, which is between eight and sixteen inches. From my experience in the Navy, more weapon systems can be brought to bear on an enemy at the halfway point between the average maximum and minimum range of all weapon systems and Spartan Games has chosen this range to be it. It also encourages models to move closer to one another but not too close.

Range band three limit at twenty-four inches. Medium and larger capitol ships can still cause major damage at this range. My advice would be to either hope for a lucky hit on same size ships as the firing ship, link fire to target one size class larger than the firing ships or eliminate smaller size ships before they all get too close.

From the view of the ship its quite a ways away.

The furthest is range band four, twenty-four to thirty-two inches away. Generally only large and above class ships can do any noteworthy damage at this range and only against small size ships, unless you feel lucky.

Dystopian Wars - Prussian Empire

In the Spartan Games miniature game Dystopian Wars, the Prussian Empire has grown from a terrible defeat at the hands of the Kingdom of Britannia to again being the military, scientific and economic juggernaut it is today. Now with Tesla technology it has begun to expand its empire.

I bought the starter on sale and it is a perfect enemy for the Britannia starter I bought. It comes with one battleship, three cruisers, nine frigates, two bombers and ten wings. More products for the Prussians are available from Spartan Games web store here, hopefully your local store or web suppliers.

The paint scheme was primed krylon black. The wood was painted with P3 Bootstrap Leather and drybrushed P3 Rucksack Leather. The hull was painted with two parts P3 Cold Steel with one part P3 Frostbite. I really like the unexpected WW2 German paint color it turned out to be. Then it was GW Brazen Brass, P3 Cold Steel, P3 Cygnar Base Blue and Cygnar Blue Highlight for the windows, GW Dwarf Bronze highlight on the brass parts, P3 Trollblood highlight on the edges, P3 Solid Gold as light brass highlighting and the Iron Cross and Prussian flag on the battleship was done with P3 Morrow White, P3 Thamar Black and P3 Skorne Red.

I forgot to mention that all turrets on mid to large ships for all factions are removable.

That's so the Battleship can exchange turrets for various Telsa and advanced weapons/generators including shield generators.

The starter also comes with templates and counters for keeping track of damage.

Reaper Bones Kickstarter has arrived!

Well, it finally arrived. My Reaper Miniatures Kickstarter Vampire package of bones! I commented on this here and since then the factory in China was busy making the miniatures from the molds. Because of this Kickstarter the company is starting their own manufacturing in Texas.

It came with a flyer and paint guide for base, highlight and shade colors.

 The box was very full.

Six large bags in all and some smaller ones. Recyclable plastic too...a nice bonus. Over 240 miniatures, as I picked up the Cthulhu Mythos pack and the Forces of Nature pack.

 I also picked up the travel case. Not that I need another one with the GW and other ones but having one exclusively for RPG miniatures is great.

The foam is a good size and the case can be locked too, a nice feature.

 There was little flashing and the detail was good. It is amazing the lightness of the polymer. My only hesitation is the bendiness of the figures. The paint may peel or chip. Time will tell.

 Take a gander at a few I broke free of their plastic prisons.

Overall this kickstarter was a great experience. Now to start painting them!