The picture shows only a small part of the entire setup - it wraps around in the distance on both sides. My wargamer's brain went in over drive with the possibilities of gaming on it :)
Monday, 25 September 2006
Now that's a wargame terrain!
This Sunday, we took the kids to the Efteling. The visit itself was very nice but off topic for this blog, except that in one building we only ended up in because we were looking for a toilet, they had a giant diorama of a big mountain valley with trains, cars, boats, and what not - the ultimate wargames terrain:
The picture shows only a small part of the entire setup - it wraps around in the distance on both sides. My wargamer's brain went in over drive with the possibilities of gaming on it :)
The picture shows only a small part of the entire setup - it wraps around in the distance on both sides. My wargamer's brain went in over drive with the possibilities of gaming on it :)
Thursday, 14 September 2006
Full Thrust
For our monthly "Schild & Vriend Revival Game Series", we had a very nice Full Thrust game this week, at Frank's completely new wargaming facilities. We used to play FT quite a lot over the years, and it was nice to play a system again after so many years. It still felt very familiar.
Now, some people say FT does not have a lot of tactical depth. I do agree in some sense, since once you have mastered the movement rules, it all comes down to selecting what weapon type to fire first. However, when space is littered with planets and asteroids, things become interesting.
The first scenario we tried was a classic Space Academy asteroid belt run: steer your ship as fast as possible around the table without crashing into any big space object. Phil won this Space Race without too much trouble and was promoted to Space Cadet of the Year.
Now that everyone had the movement rules mastered, it was time for a more interesting scenario. Frank, Koen and Phil had a cruiser each, and their mission was to intercept an enemy fleet of 4 ships (Bart and Eddy), before these were able to check a suspicious radar blip on their screens. The tactical plan of Frank, Koen and phil worked brilliantly: send a cruiser on each flank, turn around the asteroid belt, and end up smack in the aft-arc of the main ship of the enemy. This all worked very well, so well even that Eddy's two ships were just obliterated in the process. Not to worry, Bart gave one of his commands to Eddy, so the game could continue.
With all ships converging on the same location, and the big one effectively standing still, the game to a small shootout. Eddy lost another ship, and after some shooting, the last big ship of the BartEddy alliance exploded in space.
So, the overall effect was that Frank, Koen and Phil had won the game (although we admit we had some lucky dice rolls on crucial shots), and that the intruders lost 4 ships, 3 of which that were under Eddy's control. After the court-martial it was decided he had to spend at least 5 years frozen in the Jive Cubes on Sigma Alpha X . Bart was sentenced to one week of forced labour in the Cobalt Mines on Pegasus III. Frank, Koen and Phil all won a free cruise to the Pleasure Palace of the Batuvian Demon Whores on Andromeda IV.
So far the Full Thrust game! On to the next dice-rolling fest!
_Update_: (robartes) [Some pictures](http://www.flickr.com/photos/robartes/sets/72157594284291860/) of this game are now up on Flickr.
Now, some people say FT does not have a lot of tactical depth. I do agree in some sense, since once you have mastered the movement rules, it all comes down to selecting what weapon type to fire first. However, when space is littered with planets and asteroids, things become interesting.
The first scenario we tried was a classic Space Academy asteroid belt run: steer your ship as fast as possible around the table without crashing into any big space object. Phil won this Space Race without too much trouble and was promoted to Space Cadet of the Year.
Now that everyone had the movement rules mastered, it was time for a more interesting scenario. Frank, Koen and Phil had a cruiser each, and their mission was to intercept an enemy fleet of 4 ships (Bart and Eddy), before these were able to check a suspicious radar blip on their screens. The tactical plan of Frank, Koen and phil worked brilliantly: send a cruiser on each flank, turn around the asteroid belt, and end up smack in the aft-arc of the main ship of the enemy. This all worked very well, so well even that Eddy's two ships were just obliterated in the process. Not to worry, Bart gave one of his commands to Eddy, so the game could continue.
With all ships converging on the same location, and the big one effectively standing still, the game to a small shootout. Eddy lost another ship, and after some shooting, the last big ship of the BartEddy alliance exploded in space.
So, the overall effect was that Frank, Koen and Phil had won the game (although we admit we had some lucky dice rolls on crucial shots), and that the intruders lost 4 ships, 3 of which that were under Eddy's control. After the court-martial it was decided he had to spend at least 5 years frozen in the Jive Cubes on Sigma Alpha X . Bart was sentenced to one week of forced labour in the Cobalt Mines on Pegasus III. Frank, Koen and Phil all won a free cruise to the Pleasure Palace of the Batuvian Demon Whores on Andromeda IV.
So far the Full Thrust game! On to the next dice-rolling fest!
_Update_: (robartes) [Some pictures](http://www.flickr.com/photos/robartes/sets/72157594284291860/) of this game are now up on Flickr.
BattleLore
I've been a big fan of the Battlecry gaming engine ever since it was published. Likewise, I also like Memoir44 and C&C Ancients, exactly because they use the same engine. This gaming systems were developed by Richard Borg, and they have drawn quite some attention over the years.
Even my own Te Wapen fantasy rules are based on the ideas found in these games.
I was therefore pleasantly surprised that Days of Wonder will publish a fantasy version, called Battlelore. More info on:
http://blog.battlelore.com/en/
http://www.battleloremaster.com/
Even my own Te Wapen fantasy rules are based on the ideas found in these games.
I was therefore pleasantly surprised that Days of Wonder will publish a fantasy version, called Battlelore. More info on:
http://blog.battlelore.com/en/
http://www.battleloremaster.com/
Sunday, 10 September 2006
We've moved
Right, nirya.be is now live (at least the HTTP part of it) at Dreamhost. It will take a while for DNS changes to propagate, so this post has been put up at both old and new versions. Comments have been disabled while DNS has not fully propagated, BTW.
This should take a few days maximum. You can check for yourself by doing a nslookup for www.nirya.be, which should return 208.97.191.54 (the shiny new host), not 193.109.185.2 (the old host).
This should take a few days maximum. You can check for yourself by doing a nslookup for www.nirya.be, which should return 208.97.191.54 (the shiny new host), not 193.109.185.2 (the old host).
Thursday, 7 September 2006
Right, this might hurt a bit
After many years of good service from [Dommel](http://www.dommel.be), I have decided to move nirya.be to a different hosting provider because Dommel no longer has, by any stretch of imagination, a good price/quality ratio (good quality, but too expensive for what you get).
As of now, nirya.be is in the process of moving to [Dreamhost](http://www.dreamhost.com), which might or might not result in lots of funny effects on this site, including but not limited to intermittent or continuous unavailability of the site, all of the posts and comments of this blog disappearing and other various funky shenanigans. You have been warned.
As of now, nirya.be is in the process of moving to [Dreamhost](http://www.dreamhost.com), which might or might not result in lots of funny effects on this site, including but not limited to intermittent or continuous unavailability of the site, all of the posts and comments of this blog disappearing and other various funky shenanigans. You have been warned.
Tuesday, 5 September 2006
Crusade 2006
Saturday, September 2, Bart, Alan and myself attended Crusade in Leopoldsburg. As the Schild en Vriend demo team, we ran a fairly simple game: WW1 dogfights, based on the Wings of War rules, and hexified (see also a previous game report on this blog on this topic).
The game proved to be succesful. We managed to run a few scenarios, and even had some bystanders join in. This game was supposed to be a dry-run for the Crisis game, and I think the test proved to be ok.
As for the convention itself, there were the usual suspects: all the various Belgian/Dutch gaming clubs, and some shops, selling a limited selection of their goods (at very high prices, sadly enough ...). Nevertheless, being the obsessive/compulsive buyer I am, I bought a few things: 2 boardgames, some Pirates boosters, and a figure in the B&B.
The demo games were of a good level. Best game was probably the 80 years war battle by De Alde Garde. There were the usual GW games, but also Flames of War by Murphy's Heroes, and some alternative fantasy game (Confrontation a.o.).
All in all, a nice and small convention, ideal to catch up with people, but not the major shopping fest that Crisis is.
The game proved to be succesful. We managed to run a few scenarios, and even had some bystanders join in. This game was supposed to be a dry-run for the Crisis game, and I think the test proved to be ok.
As for the convention itself, there were the usual suspects: all the various Belgian/Dutch gaming clubs, and some shops, selling a limited selection of their goods (at very high prices, sadly enough ...). Nevertheless, being the obsessive/compulsive buyer I am, I bought a few things: 2 boardgames, some Pirates boosters, and a figure in the B&B.
The demo games were of a good level. Best game was probably the 80 years war battle by De Alde Garde. There were the usual GW games, but also Flames of War by Murphy's Heroes, and some alternative fantasy game (Confrontation a.o.).
All in all, a nice and small convention, ideal to catch up with people, but not the major shopping fest that Crisis is.
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