Thursday 20 September 2018

LATE POST

Well it's been a while, but at last here's a LONG overdue post on the blog!
Family commitments, work, a leaky gutter on the front of the house and mechanical problems with the van have left me with virtually no hobby time to speak of, but thankfully there's still been a trickle of post-worthy progress and finding myself with the opportunity, I'm making the effort - just to restore my mojo.
I'm not going to do anything daft like saying "Things should start returning to normal" (whatever 'normal' is), because the last time a did that, they didn't!!!

Anyhow, I've hardly lifted a paintbrush over the last month, but was determined to keep things at least ticking over, doing a little bit whenever I got the chance - usually while having a Java Lava before setting off somewhere else in the van.
The result of this plan are presented here.....
The drummers are "Musicians" for my Test Of Honour warbands. I decided to mount the pair with the portable drum together on a base, and will treat them as a single mini in the game. Conversely, I trimmed down the large base provided with the Dixon's mini and mounted the drummer on his own base - the drum can now double as a terrain piece.
A "Bannerman" and another Sergeant for the Takeda round off my total, but there's a Mura clan standard bearer still on the bench as 'work in progress'.

Something I would definitely have mentioned earlier was the Warlord Games "£1.00 sprue sale", where I splashed out and ordered a couple of Modern Military and a Female Survivors sprues for the All Things Zombie campaign (Mentioning ATZ, the sharp eyed among you will have noticed that my "Currently Reading" info box displays the latest version of my favourite zombie game, and I have been giving it a thorough read since its release - expect a review / game report soon.), and a Terminator endo sprue for Bladerunner droids, plus Terminator Resistance fighters - also destined for Bladerunner (and any other Sci-Fi games).
Not only is the number of mini's for a fiver great bang-for-the-bucks, but I received another 10% Off all in store purchases voucher....... all I need now is the time to pay them a visit!

I also picked up issue one of the Games Workshop part work whilst on my travels - three pots of paint and a brush for £1.99 is not the sort of price associated with GW, so how could I resist?
 The Space Mu-Reens have gone in the bits box for now, but let me know if you happen to need them to finish off a squad or something.

Now, after the painting and collecting, we move on to the interesting part of this post - gaming.
Being away from home and not being able to play was getting me down, and bless her, my wife noticed. Both of us are big fans of The Walking Dead tv series, and she'd been playing a new game on her mobile phone........
I'm far from keen on this kind of game, but she convinced me that "owt was better than nowt", so I downloaded it and started playing.
DON'T WORRY - THIS IS NOT A POST ABOUT A MOBILE GAME APP !
It's OK as a "gaming fix", but here's the revelation..... for the first time (apart from some 'social' D&D sessions with friends) - we were gaming together and not only that, it opened up the opportunity for me to talk her into actually trying a game of ATZ !!

So, it is with great pleasure that I present a brief AAR introducing Jackie.

Jackie and Cory were out on a foraging run in the downtown area of Lubbock - it's normally quiet around here, but the "Differently Dead" seem a lot more active today!
Even though they've gone in quietly, there's a whole bunch of zeds closing in from all sides. Jackie has ditched the original plan of checking out the diner across the road and decided they should duck into the general store on the corner.
The first PEF has emerged onto the street, but the school bus blocks the line of site
The pair enter the store and thankfully find it clear of zombies, they also see it's already been picked over - but whoever was here previously had left behind a loaded rifle!
Gratuitous overview of the zombies closing in on the store and all three PEF's on the move.
While Jackie started searching for anything else useful, Cory barricaded the front door by pushing shelving and shop furniture up against it...... and here, dear reader, I became engrossed in running the game and its narrative for SWMBO and made a complete hash of what few photo's I did remember to take!

Somehow, while barricading the door, Cory sprained his ankle very badly (Random Event after rolling "doubles" for initiative),
his cry of pain and stream of foul language distracted Jackie, who was sure she'd just spotted someone else out on the street over by the diner entrance (one of the PEF's moving into cover).
The walking cadavers were gathering outside the front of the store, and looking at the state of Cory's ankle, it was no time to risk checking upstairs.
The pair made their way over to the side door and checked for an escape route - a pair of zombies were shuffling along the alley but the crash of broken glass as the store front window gave way under the weight of the swarming undead spurred them on! A blast from Jackie's shotgun took down one of the zeds and cleared a path to safety.

As ever, ATZ:FFO took the game in a completely unexpected direction with the number of zombies generated, and I was worried that my Better Arf wouldn't get as much enjoyment as I'd hoped from such a restricted encounter ("First Impressions" and all that) - however, to my amazement and delight, she loved it !

Many thanks to regular visitors to the blog for your patience, and a big "Hiya" to newcomers Mike and Jonathan. Fingers crossed it won't be another month before the next post!

16 comments:

  1. Great to have you back blogging, mate. I've missed your posts this past month. When you said you and your wife love "The Walking Dead" TV series I was half expecting you to say you're playing Mantic Games' TWD skirmish game.
    I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on ATZ:Evolution. I haven't bought it because I'm not happy with THW's decision to simplify the rules. I like the more complex rules of ATZ:FFO, which ticked so many boxes for me.

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    1. Many thanks Bryan, it's good to be back - and I have SO much catching up to do on everyone's blogs.....
      Having talked her into trying a tabletop zombie game, I was tempted to use TWD, but went with ATZ because I'm more familiar with the rules and hoped I could make the game flow better - I was keen on making a good first impression :-)

      I'm looking forward to discussing ATZ-Evo, there are definitely some "Marmite" changes to some of the mechanics!!

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  2. Hi Greg, I'm glad to see you back, I was getting a bit worried about you. Well if I'm honest, not really about you but about one of my favourite blogs, the place I enjoy reading about Zombies and Zombie games. ;) :)
    So you might have a new gaming partner, that does sound like a win for the home team, well done.
    Hope things settle down for you in the near future.
    Take Care

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    1. Cheers John, yep, back up and not so much "running" yet, but moving in the right direction.
      Picking up from where I left off seems the best option - folks have been so prolific that it'd take me ages to catch up on their blog posts!

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  3. Terrific to have you back posting, and I was especially interested to see you’ve picked up “Warhammer Conquest” to give it a try. As one would expect from “Games Workshop” I thought the quality was excellent, and great vfm as you say. It’s also great to hear others within your household taking an interest in your well-loved Zed World too :-)

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    1. Thanks Simon - I've even picked up the second issue this weekend, so who knows where this is leading?!

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  4. Welcome back Greg :) like you I also took advantage of Warlords sale even got the same females Plus some of the Z ones who will all go into storage for now.

    I hope this post is a sign of things getting back to normal for you mate :)

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    1. Many thanks Frank, the 'sprue sale' was great but I missed out when they added some of the additional sculpts to the offer. By the time I spotted 'em they'd gone!
      Ho hum, glass half full etc :-)

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  5. Good to hear your okay, and managing on through as best you can.
    Must be great to have your good lady interested as will give you someone to game with.
    Great looking Samurai and fun AAR

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    1. Thanks Dave, we're in the middle of a busy weekend's gigging as I type, but "just" having work as a distraction is bliss!
      Having SWMBO showing an active interest in gaming certainly makes for 'interesting times' :-)

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  6. Loads of wins here today mate! Yeah let us know how Evo changes the ATZ rules. I’m really happy with FFO so will be reluctant to change for the sake of change

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    1. Cheers Andy :-)
      Having started with FFO, I feel very much in the same position as a lot of the guys who started with the earlier editions of the rules - I think it won't be a case of "changing" but "adopting" ;-)

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  7. Welcome back Greg! Believe me, I completely understand not having any hobby time and it was fantastic that your wife noticed and helped to get some dice rolling, that's a keeper there mate :)

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    1. Thanks Ivor - never underestimate the female species though.... it's our wedding anniversary on Tuesday, could there POSSIBLY be an ulterior motive to her recent actions?????? :-)

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  8. Glad to see you're still active, even if a bit restricted in posting opportunites.
    Always good to read a zed encounter, but as for even more rules changes/simplifications from THW, this will be the third (possibly fourth or fifth) incarnation and can't see me buying yet another re-write.

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    1. Many thanks Joe, and with a bit of luck, things 'should' start to improve from this point.
      I completely understand (and share) your thoughts on yet another edition of ANY set of rules, and mercifully we're not part of any "competitive" gaming circles, so they're entirely optional :-)

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