Epic Wargame Campaigns: Free yourself to play unsafe

Wargame Campaigns provide a framework for linked games on the tabletop and a fruitful opportunity to inject narrative elements into the story of the conflict you are exploring. Take a leaf from the roleplayers' skillset and play unsafe and unscripted for a more exciting experience for all involved.

 

My D&D Origin Story

My other passion, beyond wargaming, is roleplaying games. In particular, I have been a D&D player for over 40 years and from the very earliest days I have painted miniatures to accompany my games. If it were not for D&D I probably would never have become a wargamer. So do you have a similar backstory, or was your entry to historical wargaming more 'traditional'?

Roleplaying into Wargaming

Could roleplaying games be an underappreciated route into wargaming for young gamers? Games such as D&D are where I cut my teeth on cooperative gaming, painting, worldbuilding and design. I went on to play bigger and bigger games until the inevitable happened and I turned to Wargaming.

The Golden Age of Geekdom

Today's video is inspired by a blog post I wrote twelve years ago. It was itself inspired by an earlier article I read in a gaming magazine which asked when was the Golden Age of gaming and if it is different for everyone. I have had several Golden Ages across several genres of geekdom, and I argue, I'm living in one right now.

Creating Narrative in Wargames

My gaming origins - back in the mists of time - are as a roleplayer in my early teens. Over the years I played a lot of RPG's, wrote dozens of stories to play and even indulged in a little bit of worldbuilding. I mostly wargame now but that doesn't mean I can't bring some of those storytelling skills to the wargames table. This week The Quarantined Wargamer discusses how to create a narrative on the wargames table and why this can enhance the wargaming experience.

As usual, I'd love to hear your views and experiences so please share them either in the comments below or on my YouTube Channel. Next week I'm going to develop this theme and look at player handouts before and during a game. Until then, stay safe and keep rolling high! 

Return to Ravenloft

Social distancing has meant gamers of all stripes have had to resort to the internet to keep in touch and play games. I've played a couple of wargames games now with the Rejects using Zoom but my hobby activities have extended far beyond just wargaming. For the first time in a very long time, I'm roleplaying again. And not content with one game I'm taking part in two separate campaigns with two groups! 

Last year my eldest daughter (the original Padawan) and her Partner invited my youngest daughter and me to play the Stranger Things themed D&D game. Perry had bought the special edition box set and over the course of three sessions, we played a very enjoyable mini-campaign. I loved it, I hadn't played D&D in years and it was good to get behind a character sheet again. The Young Padawan also really enjoyed it so Perry suggested we get together regularly for a 5th Edition D&D game in the Ravenloft campaign setting. We started using Discord to run the game but quickly switched to Roll20 and this has worked really well. 

Meanwhile, my old school chum, Andrew suggested running a short game with our original D&D group, using Discord as our means of communicating and rolling dice. We are playing the Red Box D&D rules from the 1980's... in fact, I'm using the same books I used for our first ever game over 35 years ago!

Probably the main reason our roleplaying group disbanded was the difficulty in getting everyone together on a regular basis. Our jobs were pulling us all in different directions (literally into different parts of the UK and beyond) and work and family commitments made game nights problematic at best, particularly when you are playing a campaign that needs a certain level of commitment by all the players. The advent of internet tools like Discord and Roll20 has suddenly made some of the problems of geography less of a problem, although work commitments still play havoc with scheduling. I for one hope we can make a go of this new socially distanced campaign because it has been great to see and chat with the guys again after our prolonged break. 

Back to wargaming, the Rejects have played a couple of Zoom enabled games recently and both I and Ray are working on some more so despite restrictions on gatherings still being in place, we have managed to see and chat with each other, and play games, almost as much as we did before. Its a Brave New World...and I think it's going to be around for a while. 

Dragonmeet 2019

The wind was biting cold on Saturday, despite the sunshine, but it didn't stop us from having a great day out at Dragonmeet. This show used to be a regular part of my gaming calendar and then for a few years it just wasn't. No particular reason but I missed several years (and a change of venue) and it was only last year that I attended the show again. My eldest daughter and her friends were going, they had a spare ticket so I tagged along like the crotchety grandpa of the group...and I had a great time. So this year I had the show pencilled in on my calendar well ahead of time and I convinced the young padawan to join me. We met up with my eldest daughter and partner for what is best described at the premier roleplaying and board game convention in London.

The show is hosted by the Novotel complex in Hammersmith and is spread across several floors with a separate and very busy trade hall. Side rooms host day-long gaming sessions although you need to be fast to get booked in for a game. Hard-core gamers can play a range of participation games right up to midnight, but I was going mainly to look at the new releases and to do a bit of retail therapy in the trade hall.

The Trader Hall

I bought some of these resin figures last year.

The Padawan

A blurry picture of Ian Livingstone signing books. 

Another shot of the trader hall. 

Me and Dredd

There were plenty of participation games taking place. 

Dice... a gamer can never have too many!

The Bring and Buy was packed early on but quietened down as the day went along. Some really old stuff on sale here but often quite expensive. 

More boardgames being demo'd in one of the other halls.

Painting displays were also taking place. 

This is obviously a tabletop board and role-playing conventions, so may have limited interest to wargamers. Personally, having started with RPG's in my youth, I like to think I straddle both sides of the hobby. I was there mainly looking for miniatures and I came home with some very nice figures from a range of retailers. I also couldn't resist buying more dice...and a dice bag and a dice tray. My wife also bought me some Frostgrave figures (or so she found out after I got home) so not a total bust from a wargaming perspective. 

Dragonmeet 2018

Way back in the mists of time (while still a callow youth) I started my gaming life as a player of Roleplaying Games. A small group of school friends and I got together and started playing the classic RPG, Dungeons and Dragons. The same group kept going for many years playing several versions of DandD and exploring a wide range of other games including my first venture into wargaming with Warhammer Fantasy Battles. We would regularly attend a small Tabletop Gaming convention called Dragonmeet but as the years passed, the group dispersed and my interests moved firmly from RPG's to Wargaming, I stopped going to the show. 

Its been a fair few years since I last went to Dragonmeet and in the intervening years it has continued to grow and prosper becoming the largest event of its kind in the UK. The show is a broad church with a wide range of demo and participation board and role play games; a bring and buy stall; a Magic card game tournament; guest panels; and traders selling games, dice, models and everything in between. In recent years my eldest daughter and her friends have started playing DandD and regularly attend Dragonmeet. Up till now I hadn't wanted to cramp their style by tagging along (I'm a bonafide old fart after all) but this year they offered a spare ticket to me and I couldn't ignore the invitation and the chance to revisit a fond corner of my gaming heritage.

The bring and buy stall. Plenty of bargains for those lucky enough to find what they are looking for.

Perry and Sarah... 2nd generation gamers.

There were lots of Demo games taking place, many featuring newly released games and kickstarters.

Shadow Warriors with their WW I aerial warfare game. 

Dice...lots and lots of dice.

Sarah and her friends buying gaming mats

More demo games... Is it me or are these getting more complicated over time? Seriously, you need an overdraft and a forklift to buy these games.

Ian Livingston signing copies of his Fighting Fantasy books. 

Meeting  John Kovalic; cartoonist, games designer and jolly nice chap.

What a great day! The show has certainly changed since my last visit, but for the better. More traders, more space for participation games and a wider selection of seminars. I was even able to pick up some miniatures that may make it into the Painting Challenge. 

40 Years of Adventure

My job has been exceptionally busy over the last few weeks and as a result I have had very little opportunity to write anything for the Blog or paint anything for the Analogue Challenge. I'm still very busy but I am slowly getting to grips with my suddenly increased workload and hopefully things will return to some sort of equilibrium over the next couple of weeks. I'm hoping to have a new entry for the Challenge by the end of the week (I've already submitted my Casualty bonus entry) and I am trying to catch up on the huge back load of Blog Posts that I haven't had a chance to read. I'll get there eventually, but it may take a couple of weeks! 

D&D Red Box - My Introduction to Adventure

One event that almost passed me by unnoticed was the 40th anniversary of the Dungeons and Dragons roleplaying game. My own involvement with this game started over 30 years ago when I was about 12 or 13. I was first introduced to D&D through a friend - after a very brief apprenticeship in fantasy gaming through the Fighting Fantasy solo gaming books by Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone. It was a short step from these adventure books to proper roleplaying when I and some of my friends bought the now famous Frank Mentzer 'Red Box' rulebooks. We played the sample scenario given in the Dungeon Masters booklet and I still vividly remember my first combat victory against a Carrion Crawler. My character was a stereotypical Barbarian hero called Vulcan the Slayer (facepalm!) and that first game was a simple monster bashing adventure, but I loved it, and I was instantly hooked for life.

This was also the time when I painted my first model - a Knight in black armour with gold edging - using the only paints I had available at the time, some Humbrol enamels. It was an awful paint job but at the time I was very proud of it. I was one of only a handful of player's to use a fully painted miniature in those early games and although the techniques and materials I use have changed a lot since then, I still hold true to the principle that I never game with naked metal! Unfortunately that first mini was lost a long time ago and its only now I look back and wished I had realised that this was a special possession marking the start of a lifelong hobby. I can't remember where I even bought the model, but back then there seemed to be plenty of small independent games shops to choose from. 

A picture of me before I became 'BigLee' circa 1985
(clearly 'Selfies' are not a new phenomenon!)

Our small group consisted mostly of friends from school and although the composition of the group changed a bit over the years the core members continued to play together for nearly three decades more. In the early years we would meet for games at least once a week and we even ran a charity game in school with some of the teachers joining in! When University or jobs beckoned we played less often but for many years we still managed bi-weekly games and it was D&D that kept us in touch with each other more than anything else.

Most of the group have run games over the years and I have twice adopted the role of Dungeon Master for short campaigns. This picture shows me preparing for a game sometime around 1985. We were still using the red box 'basic' rules at the time but we had also bought the Blue 'Expert' box and the Black 'Master' boxes as they became available. I would happily spend hours planning out huge underground complexes, stocking them with all manner of monsters, traps and treasures.

Most of the time we would create our own 'dungeons' but we would also reach for inspiration in the pages of Dragon magazine and even the earlier editions of White Dwarf. One such dungeon complex I developed was based on an article in WD43 called The Hive of the Hrrr'l which featured creatures called the Flymen. I expanded the original maps into a huge complex of rooms and chambers which kept us busy for many many weeks. In later years, using the 3rd edition rules I designed an entire world setting called The Isles of Ethos and my players fought their way through two long story arcs before we moved on to the 4th Edition rules.

Nearly all the members of my first D&D group are
pictured here. 

D&D and painting inevitably and rapidly led to our involvement in other games and our first flirtation with wargaming in the form of Warhammer Fantasy Battle, WH40k, and Epic 40k. This of course was in the days when my friends and I still had disposable incomes (student loans mostly!) and before careers and families nibbled away at our spare time. For a long time we wargames and roleplayed simultaneously depending on who could attend a game and where we were playing. If we had space to lay out a wargame on a floor we would play WFB and if we didn't we could happily pick up where we left off in our D&D campaigns. 


Over the years many of my early gaming buddies have moved on and moved away and as far as I know I'm the only one still playing with toy soldiers on a regular basis. But although we are not gaming on a regular basis most of us still keep in touch - through the wonders of social media - and we still occasionally gather for an impromptu board game or one off RPG game. I credit the strength and endurance of our friendships entirely down to the hours we spent 'adventuring' together as young adults. Yes we were socially awkward geeks but through the enduring power of collaborative roleplaying games like D&D we became slightly less socially awkward adults... and I wouldn't trade a minute of it for anything else. 

Limping along together

A handful of The Delver's will be meeting later tonight and once again we will settled on a simple board game as our entertainment of choice for the evening. Its been a bit of a struggle getting the group together for a game recently. We all have the sort of busy lives that prohibit anything like a regular schedule of games and just getting together a minimum number of attendees can be difficult to say the least. Around midnight when the guys have gone home and I have finished tidying up I'll probably find myself thinking about where we are going and worrying about the future of the group, just like I do after most game nights.


[This has morphed into quite a long post and sort of an 'open letter' to The Delvers; so you might want to get comfortable and settle down before reading it. Alternatively just hit the +1 button below and pretend you've read it!]  


The Times They Are a-Changin'

According to the Bob Dylan song "Then you better start swimmin', Or you'll sink like a stone" and he was right. If we don't make an effort to change the format of our group it'll sink without trace and before we know it the Delvers will be no more. We've been discussing this issue for years as our schedules have got busier and the games have become fewer, but the catalyst for this latest round of naval gazing has been the demise of our 4e campaign. Our GM has effectively left the group (although he seems reluctant to admit it) and what started as one missed game night has turned into 8 months of missed games with no end in sight. Its not his fault, he has kids, commitments and a demanding job - life has temporarily got in the way of gaming for him.

Other members of the group have their own issues and commitments to deal with. Three are actors and the very nature of their work means they are either away on shoot's or tied up in the evening with performances etc. They make those game nights that they can, and we all appreciate the chance to meet up, share news and relax. Of the eight members of the group probably only two of us have something that could roughly be described as a 'regular' job with regular hours. So a rigid schedule of games is bound to fall foul of our lifestyles.

Multifaceted Gamers
Most of the gamers I know have more than one hobby. I have a theory that if you are inclined to take up a hobby you have already crossed an invisible dividing line between those that do and those that don't. Once across that line, the barriers to taking up another hobby - and another and another - are only limited by how much spare time you have. So most 'hobbyists' (for want of a better phrase) have multiple demands on their time, and gamers are no exception. I'm a roleplayer and a wargamer, and I love Photography, and reading, and painting, and living history, and... well, you get the picture.

So expecting every member of the group to have the same level of commitment to roleplaying games would be pointless. Aside from our busy careers and home lives most of us are also trying to find time to squeeze in several hobbies and spending days and weeks planning an RPG campaign is increasingly unrealistic. Our last GM discovered this last year and so far none of the other Delvers have been able to find the time commitment necessary to run a campaign of our own and I'm just as guilty. I started preparing a HEX campaign but progress stalled because I got sidetracked by other things (namely my 6mm North Africa project). The lesson I take from this is that we need a much simpler approach to RPG's with a focus on quick, single session games that don't require lots of planning.

Shiney!
I'm the only wargamer in the group but I can still see an element of the traditional gamers desire for 'the new' in my fellow roleplayer's. They may not be out buying miniatures (there are only two of us that own a painted mini let alone paint them) but the desire to try new stuff is as strong as it is in any wargamer. The drain on our collective wallets is constant and never ending.

Over the years we have indulged in Fantasy RPGs (D&D, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay), horror RPGs (Call of Cthulhu), Sci Fi RPG's (Dr Who, Traveller) and Super Hero RPGS (Marval Heroic) and there's a very real liklihood we will eventually play some Pulp games (HEX) as well. We've dabbled with CCG's (Babylon 5 and Magic: The Gathering) and countless boardgames of varying genre's. Variety is the spice of life as they say and you don't get much more varied than the gaming tastes of this group.

As a group we clearly like variety and don't like to be tied down to a particular game. We also all have different opinions about what makes a good RPG game. Some like them complex, others hark back to simpler days, some like miniatures based games others prefer pen and paper only. I think this goes some way to explaining why we have found it increasingly hard to hold down an RPG campaign, especially in recent years. With our erratic schedules it just takes too long between games for us to progress with a story or keep up to speed with the rules. Eventually some of us loose interest [Sorta like reading this post!] and when the group is in discord things just don't work properly.

Location, Location, Location
Another problem we have is the lack of a suitable games venue. For years most of the games have been at my house, but this has meant packing my family off upstairs out of the way. That was OK when the kids were little, and entertaining them was just a matter of finding a suitable film to watch on the bedroom TV. But my kids are getting older and don't want to be exiled upstairs whenever I have a game... and for that matter neither does my wife. She's a great sport, and dutifully trots off into internal exile on Friday nights, but its not fair on her and I know it.

When I win the lottery and buy a big house I'll make sure I have a large purpose built game room, but in the meantime we'll just have to make do with what we have. And what we have are seven semi regular players and therefore seven potential venues to meet at (hint, hint!). One of the advantages of sharing games around like this is that everyone gets a chance at an evening where they don't have to pay for a taxi or get the bus or a train. Hosting a game needn't be strenuous.

Put it out of it's misery, or find a solution
I remember reading a great article on GnomeStew a few years back about the GM that decided enough was enough and dissolved his gaming group. At the time I read it and thought "I'm glad that's not my group" but now I realise it is us.

We have reached a decisive moment in the Delver's history and we need to change what we do or the group will fall apart. Sooner or later we will call it quits and go our separate ways, and that scares me because I know that 'the group' has kept us in contact with each other even as our lives have diverged and members have moved away. More than that it has given us thousands of hours of shared adventures and stories that can never be replaced. I'll be an old man - sucking food through a straw - and I'll still be telling tales of my adventures in Greyhawk and Krynn, Pelinore, Ravenloft and the Forgotten Realms.


Ramming home my points in 'The Conclusion'
So there are my thoughts and ideas. We need a more flexible approach to game nights, with 'event' games rather than a schedule. If we are going to play RPG's we need to find systems that encourage single session adventures and are easy for the GM to prepare and run. When we aren't playing an RPG we need to embrace a broader range of games to keep things fresh and interesting. And we need to be a bit more creative with where we have games, sharing the load a little better. Whatever we do we need to do something, because the status quo just isn't working.

I hope it hasn't sounded like a long moaning rant, because I don't feel like that at all. My main concern is ensuring we stick together as a group and if that means shaking things up a bit then that can only be a good thing.

My Gaming Year - 2012

Following on from my post earlier today listing my resolutions from 2012 and the new ones for 2013 here's a quick run down of my gaming year. Twenty Twelve was a busy and pretty productive year for me although it didn't start well from a gaming point of view. My job (the real one, that pays the bills) has been growing and developing all year and I have at times struggled to fit in time for painting and gaming. But looking back I have still managed to get a lot done.

January

Oh my, January...shudder! I was ridiculously bust at work in January with two intensive business trips taking me away from my family and my painting desk. Free time was a luxury I didn't have, games were missed and I got virtually nothing painted. However this fraught period also inspired me to put together a Mobile Painting Box which has enabled me to get some projects completed while I travel or in work during my ever decreasing lunch-breaks. I was able to use the kit to great effect before the month was out to paint some Battlefront MG Bunkers.

February

Things settled down a little at work and I got my first proper game of the year with the Rejects. The Battle of Mackenzie Ridge was a defeat for my side, but I didn't care because I had a great time in good company. February also the first of many museum visits with the family with trips to the War Horse Exhibition at the National Army Museum. The Rejects also attended our first game show of 2012,  Cavalier. 

March

This was the month when I got my hands on the mini handbook version of the new FOW 3rd Edition rules. I also ran my first Prize Draw in March (something I'll have to repeat this coming year) and in the middle of the month I took my youngest daughter to Skirmish in Sidcup. This was also the month when I painted a heard of dead cows! But the most exciting thing about March was the fact that I had tickets for the very first Tiger Day at the Tank Museum in Bovington. My Brother-in-Law and I made a long weekend of it and visited the D-Day Museum at Portsmouth on our way. 

April

The month started with another large set piece game with the Rejects. The Battle of Boars Back Ridge was the start of what turned out to be a run of bad luck on the games table that made me question my faith in random number generation. April also saw completion of a long running project to paint a company of US 101st Airborne Rifle Company another visit to the RAF Museum at Hendon and of course Salute. The month was the rounded off quite nicely with another Rejects game, The Battle of Salutesville with three invited guests; Curt from Analogue Hobbies; Tamsin the Wargaming Girl and Sebastian of Back to the Minis. April was also the month that the Delvers branched out into a new game, the Marvel Heroic RPG.

May

I completed quite a few painting projects in May, including an US Airborne LMG Platoon, a Mortar Platoon and an objective marker or two. I also managed to re-base one of my Panzergrenadier Platoons although sadly I still haven't completed the companion platoon (I hang my head in shame!). I also visited the Combined Military Services Museum which holds an excellent collection but also has an annoying photography ban. I ended the month with the Southend Air Show and a visit to Fort Amhurst.

June

June was a big month for the Rejects as we put on our first ever Demonstration game at the Broadside show. We ran a WWI Battle of Amiens game and it seemed to go down well with show attendees, winning us 2nd place in Best in Show! This was also the month when I kicked my museum day trips and living history events into full gear with visits to Queens Own Royal West Kent Regimental Museum, Upnore Castle, The Royal Engineers Museum, and the Spar Valley Railway. However I did also manage to get some painting done, completing a Tom Meier Giant that dated from 1977!

July

I played my first 10mm Boar War game with the Rejects in June. This got me thinking about smaller scale gaming and the idea began to take root as the year progressed. June was also a significant moment in the life of this blog as BLMA reached half a millions hits. As the month drew to a close I missed a Rejects game as it clashed the War and Peace show which I had been planning on attending for some time. I went over two days and even that wasn't enough. Next year I may try to go for three days but I'll have to see what my schedule looks like first (meaning I need to bribe the wife into letting me out to play on my own!)

August

Following on in quick succession from War and Peace were several other events that I visit in August. These included the Military & Flying Machines event in Rainham, and the Spitfires & Merlins Airshow at Duxford. I was also able to sneak in another visit to the Muckleburgh Collection in Norfolk while on the Family Holiday. It wasn't all museums though as the Delvers continued to experiment with various board games and I began to consider seriously running a HEX game.

September

I was back at Duxford in September for the big Air Show of the season and decided to become a member of the Friends of Duxford as I'm sure to revisit many times more. The family also visited the 1940's weekend at Chatham Docks. We also rounded the month off by visiting the second Skirmish show of the year. I'm not sure what my wife made of it all by my youngest daughter seemed to enjoy herself building an Armourfast tank with a little help from yours truly.

October

The month kicked off with another Rejects 10mm battle, this time set in the early days of WWI. By now I was finding myself with an itchy trigger finger and very few models left to paint. As all wargamers know one should never paint your last model so I planned some serious retail therapy to take place at the SELWG show at Crystal Palace. As it turned out - with a little help from the other rejects - I found myself buying 6mm Micro Armour! Before the month was out I had decided I wanted to play FOW in 6mm focused on the Western Desert in WWII and was painting my first 6mm tanks. I also enjoyed a work related meeting held at the Brooklands Museum.

November

As the autumnal conditions took hold here in England the family and did one of our last Museum visits of the year, this time at the Science Museum. This was also the month in which the Dice Gods turned their backs on me. The Battle of Hal was a fictitious 'what if' game set in the aftermath of an allied defeat at Waterloo. My cavalry took what can only be described as the ass-whooping of a lifetime as dice roll after dice roll went against me. The only plus to come out of this game was that I bought a huge collection of 6mm figures from fellow reject Smiffy. By the end of the month I was already painting whole companies of 6mm Italian tanks.

December

This month has been somewhat quieter although I have managed to paint several platoons of German Tanks including Panzer III J's and Panzer IV F²'s. I also completed the core of a British 8th Army Infantry Tank Company and started work on a troop of 25 Pounder artillery. This latter project has stalled a bit over Christmas as the inevitable family activities have pushed gaming and painting to one side for a while. Mind you its not all bad because we went to see The Hobbit before Christmas and I loved it.

Well there you have it, that was my gaming (and other activities) year. I'm tired just thinking about all of that and I have plans for a lot lot more next year. Thanks for coming along with me and I hope I can continue to share my hobby interests (and everything linked to them) throughout 2013. I'd just like to sign off by thanking everyone again for following and reading my Blog and wishing you all a very Happy New Year.

Hex RPG coming together

As recently announced I have looking at writing and running a Hollow Earth Expedition role-playing game for The Delvers. We all seem to have lost heart in DandD 4e, especially as yet another edition is looming on the horizon. I'm still hoping we can complete our current campaign but in the meantime I thought I would give the Evil GM a breather and run something a little bit different. 

I'm rather enjoying getting back into story writing for an RPG game and my preparation is coming together quickly. There are several pre written starter adventures available online but I've never been one do things the easy way. I may well nick ideas from these scenarios but essentially I wanted our first adventure to be something original and potentially part of a much larger campaign arc. Obviously I can't discuss the details here (you never know, some of my friends might actually read my Blog!) but I want something that captures that cinematic and high adventure feel that you find in 'pulp' adventures like Dan Dare, Doc Savage, Flash Gordon and the like.

I have the framework for that first game laid out already, using the excellent (and Free!) flowchart program, Lucidchart. I am now working on some of the details but I'm deliberately trying to keep this part of the planning minimalist leaving descriptions and exposition brief. In short I'm putting faith in my improvisational skills...and its a scary but exhilarating prospect. I've bought some special dice for the game (yes I know I already have thousands of dice, but these are special) and I have even treated myself to the HEX GM's screen so I have all the essential rules to hand and won't need to rely on the rulebook too much during the game.

I'm not sure I can get everything finished in time for the DDD's next planned evening in a weeks time, but I'm confident I'll be ready to go before the following meeting. I'm rather looking forward to launching my players into an alternative 1936 where high adventure, secret cults and monsters abound and where magic and weird science merge in dramatic and unexpected ways.

The Delvers do it Differently

Add caption

The Dagenham Delvers met last night for a different sort of roleplaying game. The Evil GM pleaded overwork and lack of preparation so we didn't play our regular DandD 4E campaign game. Instead another member of the group, Dave, stepped up and introduced us to another game system suited to short one or two session games. So on Friday night we donned Lycra (metaphorically) and became Superhero's for an evening.

The Marvel Heroic Roleplaying game has a fairly simple but nuanced game system (known as Cortex Plus) at its heart. Roleplaying and combat are based on a simple set of attributes unique to the character of choice. Characters are pre-generated but can come from any part of the Marvel universe. Some basic knowledge of these comic book characters is useful but not essential as descriptions and histories are provided with each Superhero sheet.

Our stand-in GM is something of a Comic Book Geek so there was no shortage of background information when we needed it. This was useful as most of the rest of the group have a very patchy knowledge of the Marvel Universe and some members of the Delvers haven't even seen the Hollywood movies based on the characters. Despite this lack of background knowledge the game still worked well as pretty much all the information you need is on the character sheets.

I played Iron Man, the Evil GM took on the role of Spider-man and Derek became Wolverine for the evening. Even Andy - living in Lincoln 140 miles away - dialled in using Skype and played Captain America. The game was a relatively simple two act 'beat up the bad guys' scenario. Combat mechanics favour cooperative play, imaginative problem solving and story driven roleplaying. The result was a surprisingly fun and creative session without a miniature in sight.

Its been a while since we played an exclusively roleplaying game without miniatures and it was an enjoyable experience. Combat for instance involved building a dice pool utilising the various attributes on the character sheet. Because combat isn't restricted by simple "I hit with my sword" or "I shoot my pistol" the player is encouraged to be creative and much more theatrical in his/her actions.

For instance Iron Man makes a Solo Attack (Add d10 to the dice pool), and utilises his Cutting Edge Tech, ie his suit (add d8) and Superhuman Strength (add d10) to flip a chunk of broken concrete in the air before hitting it with his Repulsors (add d8) to create a concrete shrapnel blast (area attack add d6 for each additional target) to hit the Bad Guy and his minions. They then use their attributes to build a defence and we compare results to see who wins and how much damage is done. Its a little more complex than this description but its still a simple system that allows for an infinite variety of actions.

We played out the two 'acts' of this scenario which has set up a follow up game for another session. Hopefully next time we can get a little more done as we have a better understanding of the rule mechanics and have fewer technical difficulties (our Skype connection to Lincoln kept crashing). Overall it was fun and challenging which is all you need in an RPG. For more info about the game check out this great review on RPG.Net.

Apparently there is also a fan produced Fantasy RPG conversion utilising the same mechanics and we might give this a try in future.

Big Picture : Harpy Encounter

This was a picture taken during the D&D Campaign I ran a couple of years ago. I went to great lengths to ensure that every key location had a detailed floor plan and props. Looking back it's clear this was probably far too much effort for a game that is supposed to be more about imagination and roleplaying than models and scenery... but it did look damned good!


Here my players characters encounter a Harpy in a tense encounter.

Wargaming Podcast Blues

I've been getting into the world of podcasting recently and I thought I would share some of my thoughts on the subject. I often use an iPod to listen to music while I paint but some time ago I decided I'd try listening to podcasts instead. My favorites are some of the most popular Wargaming podcasts out there and they deserve the praise heaped upon them. These include the truly excellent WWPD News from the Front and Radio Free Battlefront. Other great podcasts that I listen to on a semi regular basis are The D6 Generation, Contact with the Enemy and View from the Veranda by Meeples and Miniatures.

While I accept I'm a newbie to this particular medium (a late arrival at the party you might say) I have developed some clear views about what I want from a Podcast and, more importantly, what I don't want.

First off let me start by saying that just because I don't listen to a particular podcast doesn't mean I dislike the content. My choice of listening is largely determined by the time I have available to listen to a show and by the level of attention required to follow it. I wouldn't listen to a detailed in-depth rules discussion while driving the car for instance because frankly I'd rather concentrate on the road (avoiding the reckless maneuvers pulled by HGV drivers in particular) than following the conversation. And a four hour podcast would take me a week to finish if I were just listening to it in my lunch breaks.

My personal preference (and this is my preference and I understand its not everyone else's) is for shorter programmes or podcasts that offer their shows broken down into bite-sized segments. However I understand that from a production point of view this probably means a lot more work and not all shows have this facility. I think this is a pity because there's probably loads of great content out there that I'd enjoy listening to, if only it wasn't buried in the middle of a 90 minute programme.

Right, now I'm going to put my "grumpy old git" hat on and say that one option I favour for reducing the length of podcasts would be to weed out all the pointless waffle that tends to get included. I get enough rowdy, meandering, directionless gossip from my own gaming group without listening to a bunch of guys telling in-jokes, talking over each other and generally making lots of 'noise'. Sometimes it can be entertaining to listen to other gamer's shooting-the-breeze but its not what I would call Premium Content.

I reckon that's put the 'cat amongst the pigeons' so its time for me to step back and reap the whirlwind! What do you like/dislike about podcasts? And what are your favorite shows, because there seem to be loads of new ones popping up all the time?