Berserkon

Last weekend I went the inaugural Berserkon Event in Duluth MN. I will say, I went expecting ePic Fail. I had not been impressed with the coordinators communications with the teeming masses, and I was disappointed in a failure to respond to my efforts to make a contact between them and my historical miniatures wargame friends.  But, I was happily disappointed.

This is not to say I don't have complaints, but I did manage to keep myself entertained, primarily with boardgames, and one off indie RPGs.  I will cover that after I gripe. Not a full on rant. I did much of that prior to the event.

I think this event benefited greatly from too much space. Coordination of events seemed poor, but the huge swaths of terra made it possible to easily set up a pick up game for anyone interested. Several events I heard about on Sunday didn't seem to go off.
The price is not competitive with other, larger, Cons. Not a problem for locals, as we save fuel and hotels. But outsiders are paying a premium, and more than they would pay to go somewhere local. 

A three day holiday weekend and you don't take advantage of the third day. Ok, it is Memorial Day, and some might see that as Crass. So pick a different three day weekend if that is your concern. Friday afternoon was a wasteland. I considered creating an twitter account just because I was bored..

Next the miniatures world is larger than GW. LakeSWATT did a nice job with their miniatures event, by all accounts. But, I certainly didn't want to play a tourney when there should be a host of opportunities to play new things. I do appreciate the painting class they put on.. it gave me an opportunity to try blending.. by the schmeer method, as I call it. I don't have patience for the layered method. I ramble..

Things I did do.. and enjoyed..

Artimes Starship Simulator.  This was a hoot,  and it was busy most of the con. For 40 bucks in software, (hardware is another factor, nothing unusual, and your crew can probably provide much of their own..) you can command a starship. Or serve as communications on your friends. Or whatever. That is the price for a crews worth of installations. If you get a chance, try this out.

Power Grid was a pretty decent game, complex enough to be a challenge, simple enough to be approachable.  I would recommend it.

Watched a bit of Standard Action  I had seen the first two seasons on the web, and watched some on a poor screen with lousy sound quality in an nearly empty "theater space" at the Con while I ate and checked facebook. And I crushed a bit on Edda who was there with some other guy from the show.. my inner fan boy found an outlet, for a few minutes, then I drove him back into his Ikea storage cube..

Played a bit of Bare Bones RPG.. late on Fri. The game has a simple, OSR feel to it, with a few add on bobs to push the RPG aspects. The primary mechanic for that is the traits you self assign - one good, one bad, one more for humans (I was human). They added a fate point like mechanic for working them in and playing them up. I took Blind as my bad trait. I was an archer/priest.. I took snap shoots at sounds as a good trait. And Zealot to the phrase my religious texts "Make the whole world blind, that they may see..".  I think I spooked the other players when I threatened the local eldars with hot pokers to purify their souls, but in the end, everyone actually thought it might be a good Idea..


Saturday began with Last Night on Earth.. which was an ok game. I have trouble with a mechanic that lets Zombies act intelligently and gives them options. Might improve the game play, but it breaks my suspension of disbelief.

Painting class was next.. I chose an Eldar from the box, in part because I don't own any, and in part because I wanted something I could approach in a completely different way than the IG I am used to.

     add pic here..

Then I talked a couple guys from the cities into a game of Flash point..  which went ok. I promised I would return after a scheduled game of

Werewolf. I had heard of this and played a game online. Pretty much strictly a social game, trying to suss out which players are werewolves eating everyone else and betting a villagers life that you have pegged it correctly.. Eaten once, Hung Once, Nailed the werewolf once.  An ok record. Werewolves are tricky..

Returned as promised, and played Conquest of the Fallen lands, which was a quick and tricky little game. I was led to believe it was out of print, but that appears to be an error. 

Sat eve got to be late for me. Went to dinner with friends, then went home and cobbled together a kit for demo-ing Song of blades and Heroes. I had been considering doing this, or perhaps Hordes of the Things. I decided I didn't feel comfortable with HOTT rules, which are simple and written for an English professor.  I had loaned my SOBH to a friend, and when I tried to retrieve it, he couldn't find it, so I had tabled the idea. But I knew Sunday had little of interest going. (I think Pandemic was Sunday.. ) So, I dug in my Geek Pile and found another copy, and spent the night pulling figures, and terrain, and printing up Warband rosters, and reprinting them with built in QRFs.  And finally went to sleep around 4 AM, which meant I was late arriving in the AM to Con, which meant I couldn't demo anything before (ah .. that's when that was.. ) Pandemic, so I spent the AM re reading the SOBH rules, which was probably a good thing..

Then Pandemic.. game is good, I had played it before. It is high on my list of cooperatives.. but it is a short list.. so.. not much to say.. Play if you can.. We lost in the end.. with only one disease left to cure..

 And a local chap ran a FATE rpg game he is kickstarting called Time Heroes, a serialized and somewhat silly saturday morning cartoon themed game. This episode was called Rise of the Plushies, and involved trying to stop a time displaced H.P. Lovecraft from melding thousands of animate Cthulhu Plush Toys into a full size Eldar God with cybernetics. I am not sure where the Cyber came into that. But since it did, and since I was a Cyberprincess ala Inspector Gadget.. I eventually got a chance to hack directly into his firm ware. I don't think it was I that ultimately took him down, but, I did insert a bit of viral code called "stop hitting yourself...". I think he would have eventually beaten himself up..


Finally,  I set up my game table and started playing SOBH solo. . The ref from the Barebones game wandered over, and I talked him into taking control of a Warband. I was using my Fractal Cave terrain and Mage Knight figs and the Techno Dwarves were trying to rid the caves of Orcs (me)..

The terrain is my "Fractal Caves" concept.. It was not finished, and looks way too green. I started building it for a battle in the Womb Of Hrihayel, from my Tekumel campaign. I have since toned down the green, and it blends better with the cave formations you see above. They are cast from Hirst Arts molds. I purchased them cast from... hmm. I don't recall, but a licensed seller.*

The demo was successful, though I messed up a few rules and completely forgot to utilize my hero special rules (which grant some auto activation successes), and the Orcs lost, their shaman scampering off into the caves..

So I start breaking it down, as the place is really getting thin. And then I was approached by another gentleman from the twin cities region. We both admitted to being a bit brain dead, but we decided to try another game. He took the Orcs, I took the Dwarves, we cut the Orc Shaman, and several Dwarf warriors to balance, so as to avoid the complications of magic casting. And played a quick game.. It was pretty well balanced, for a bit, but the Orc Poison did it's work and eventually the upended the mounted Dwarf leader, and broke the morale of the few remaining Dwarves..

So two games of SOBH.. And I have a nearly grab and go demo kit assembled.

* I do have a small and growing collection of Hirst Arts Molds. Probably should start using them..

Older projects

I have been on a bit of a terrain kick of late. Lots of things half started. It would be a lie to say lots of things half finished. Tekumel is kinda in Idle. We have played, a bit, but I haven't blogged on it.. which I will remedy. Working on the History of the Three States of the Triangle, but I keep being distracted. Both real life, and terrain. Haven't had much chance to play anything of late.  House projects, and local politics are competing for my attention. Tekumel has been too strenuous, intellectually, I think I need a minis fight..

Towards that end I have been buying or trying to build terrain.  First I bought a Hirst Arts project someone else created, off TMP. Space ship interiors, kinda for Space Hulk type scenarios. They were assembled and rough painted. Figured I could put them on table as is. Didn't figure on shipping damage. Pics

very disheartening. Kinda my fault. I asked him to ship them cheapest means possible. And, I didn't note that the description said plaster, not hydrocal. Some of the damage has been repaired. A lot of tiny pieces missing. Currently Boxed.


A couple years back I bought a pile of Hirst Arts Water Cavern Castings, with the intent of making a Cave setup.. This should have been during the Cavern portion of my Tekumel campaign, but, I don't find any posts on it.. which surprises me. At any rate, I have returned a bit to that project. I already have a pile of painted stalagmites and limestone formations. Working on a system for building a cavern. Originally I was just planning on duplicating the Hirst Arts Set, but feel it looks more like a dungeon than a cave. Good for certain types of games, but not really for a tactical fight, and not flexible enough. So, this is what I am thinking at the moment..  pics

cut some pieces out of foam core

build em up as limestone flows

use them to highlight the rock formations. They will need some texturing, and paint to match. Hope I can figure out how I painted these castings..


Building terrain will serve several purposes, I think. There is a bit of a zen quality to the task, so it might relieve some anxiety, It will hopefully consume some of the clutter I have accumulated over the past few years.. most of which I acquired thinking I would use it somehow in terrain of as troops. And it might generate a place for me to field some figures, any figures. A water cavern is generic enought to allow me to stage a battle among pirates, ImperFNORDial Troops, or Sarkus Minions. Or a host of other figures. I also have been cutting bases for all the foliage I have collected. But none of this is getting the campaign arc up to date..

Left to their own devices

This weeks game was truncated by a beguiling siren who talked us into taking a break to play Dominion*.. (I think). So only a bit happened after some initial book keeping.

The High Priestess Mis took her Tirrikámu, her Rényu, her protégé, and halve the temple guards, plus some slaves and a palanquin she picked up on site, and headed off to Butrús for recovery. She left our hero and the remaining Temple Guards to recover the Chnéhl. They had been seeding the area with drops of perfume to keep the beasts local, and they hired some local artisans to build some bamboo cages. Fortunately, they tested the cages with a couple of strong guards, and found them wanting. But Mis sent down two animal handlers from Butrús temple (figure that this would be a common enough skill in the temple of Hriháyal considering the necessities of certain rituals..) and they brought some appropriate cages. I figure one knows Zoic Domination at U4. A Specialist in the Priesthood.

On the first attempt they baited the cages with Hmélu. Hmm. Can't find that word with proper accenting to add to my Tekumel Dictionary at the moment..** At any rate, the Chnéhl didn't take the bait. The second attempt they hid the cages inside tents, and placed a slave, dolloped up in a bit of Mis' Personal perfume. This brought the Chnéhl to the edge of the camp, but they didn't make entrance. They did appear to make an attempt to outflank the guard on duty, however.

This is when our distraction arrived. It is also when I realized one of the reasons that running a solo player is so tough. He has no one to bounce ideas off but NPC's. That leaves the ref having to balance between giving too little and too much guidance over and over. And it certainly gives me problems with presenting just plumb bad ideas, which players manage to create organically. I may need to have Geo bring that Mythic Game next time, if I don't find any more players with free time.. who'ld have thought that would be so difficult.

On the Dominion front, I handily won the first game, and was robbed of victory in the second, just barely falling 4th out of four. It is a pleasant little game, which changes up the rules every game via a mechanic of using different sets of cards. Mildly Crack like, in that they will keep putting out new decks, it does not suffer the insanity of the Collectible Card game market. You buy a box, it has several “decks” which can be mixed an matched with to play games and additional boxes do the same. They are all free standing games, but the decks can be interchanged. Since the cards establish a lot of the rules details, each game is a bit unique, and replayability is high. Still, I doubt I will buy it.

Speaking of spending money, I picked up some GFNORDW bits and some figs via Ebay, at reasonable prices. Some are even painted, and will fall right in line for some Sárku temple guards. Others perhaps Hnálla, or Thúmis. I also bought some pre cast hirst arts bits that I hope to make into a modular cave set. All further purchases are on hiatus, because I ran my checking account pretty thin when I paid for some work on my Truck.

There will be no game tomorrow, as I will be at work..

* yes, dominion
** found it..