Dino’s October 2022
Damn, it happened again - I'm late! Well, I can't really complain, professionally things are going well, but I'm afraid I won't be able to keep my goal for the year. Sure, I'll keep trying, of course, but before I move on to the next project, namely Oathmark, I think I'll have to declare my annual goal as a milestone.
Speaking of which, Robert, a.k.a. Wolpertinger, with whom I've been doing regular painting sessions via Discord lately, converted an old river troll for my Oathmark army.
Stargrave – A Star Wars Story Pt 3
What is Stargrave about? I covered the main rulebook and what it is about in a review on here, and now it is time to start with our Star Wars themed skirmish. We got the rules, what's next? The miniatures.
Asmodee, or Fantasy Flight Games as the coordinating company, has a bit of a problem ensuring the stock of Star Wars Legion, so you maybe not as flexible as you want to be - depending on what kind of army or warband you want to play. I had to order at multiple stores to get my hands on these boxes. Absolutely chosen by the rule of cool, so no meta, weaponry, rule decisions so far. I just bought what I fancied, and would make for a stock of Rebels as well as Imperial troops.
In detail I got to start with;
Stargrave – A Star Wars Story Pt 2
As mentioned in the first article, I bought the first models online on Etsy and printed the later ones at home, so let us see, what you get for your money online.
If you're not a patreon but buying the files individually (especially if you joined later) the question for make or buy was - especially without a printer - not that big of a decision. At 5,20 USD for STLs versus 10,99 EUR printed and shipped it is a close call (in low numbers).
Stargrave – A long time ago on a gaming table far, far away…
I covered my initial rant about StarWars as a tabletop wargaming IP, and where it works and where it does not. And in the mean time, between having ordered 3d printed models for this setting and printed my own as a patreon of Skull Forge Studios, I have narrowed down the rule set(s) and time frame.
As mentioned in the initial post, this is not going to be Star Wars Legion - for multiple reasons - but a skirmish on a troop / squad level and for that, in my opinion among other systems, Stargrave works quite well.
This idea started last year, that prior to me owning a 3d printer on my own, but I already fancied the 3d sculpts by Skull Forge Studios back then. With the models being outside of the patreon around 5-6 USD per sculpt on Gumroad and Wargames3D offering them for 9 to 11 EUR incl. free shipping from Spain via Etsy, I chose to order some. Among others I got myself these:
Dino’s April 2022
There is always something refreshing about this month, as it is a common tradition in western regions to pull a prank at the beginning of the month. Accordingly, I also tempted Bunker Boss Dennis to post an April Fool's joke on the Chaosbunker.
In our persiflage, we've taken the mickey out of a few topics that have recently found their way into the hobby in a lesser good way, but that's a topic for a whole series of articles. For now, let's just say that sometimes it helps to laugh a little!
Stargrave – Mercenaries
The third plastic kit from the initial Stargrave release are the SG003 Mercenaries. Probably the most colourful from the trio, and certainly worth a look. So, let's upon up this box.
Where the Troopers are the uniform wearing military force of a corporation or government, these mercenaries are coming along still as veterans of their trade, but a lot more specialised and unique. You get troops in once again heavy armour, but with more humanoid (and less humanoid) variation in terms of face and a wilder mix of their gear / weaponry.
Stargrave – Trooper
The next two plastic kits for Stargrave after the crew are far more combat orientated, and we cover the SG002. To be honest, if you wouldn't know about Stargrave being a skirmish with role-play elements, you'd assume this is a generic Sci-Fi soldier kit.
The Troopers for Stargrave are an 28mm scaled multi-part plastic kit and has a RRP of 20 GBP for 20 miniatures. This kit is compatible with the other Stargrave kits of the Crew and Mercenaries. And its content is spread across four sprues of five miniatures each, along with two additional sprues covering the 25mm round bases.
Stargrave – Crew
As Stargrave was supported right away with three different plastic kits, there is no real "first" one - but we have to start somewhere, so we grab the Crew kit as it has the product number 001.
We have a 28mm scaled science-fiction kit, covering a total of 20 multi-part hard plastic miniatures for a RRP of 20 GBP. That goes for all of the three initial kits, the crew, the mercenaries and the troopers. The crew is the "core" of most warbands, not just armed up troops, but actually people who make up the crew of spaceship - thus the name.
The Crew box covers 4 sprues of 5 miniatures each, along with two stripes of 20 flat 25mm diameter round bases. Casting is properly done and on the same high level that you get from the Renedra, Plastic Soldier Miniatures or Warlord Games kits. Proper use of the available space, so you have a lot of options for the five bodies to add to, lots of heads, different arms and gear.
Stargrave – sci-fi wargames in the ravaged galaxy
From the gifted mind of Joseph A. McCullough comes another skirmish ruleset at Osprey Games - Stargrave. The sci-fi variant of the very successful Frostgrave was launched mid-2021 and gathered more than 115.000 GBP with its initial campaign.
The very broad pledges of the crowdfunding campaign supplied the new game right away with a hardcover rulebook of 176 pages (25 GBP RRP) with a lovely layout and a whooping three different plastic kits (which we will cover in the coming days) supported by a variety of metal miniatures (we'll cover parts of these as well) to build your own crew of space-faring adventurers.
June review
Managed to get some things going in June. Some new and final arrivals to my collection.
I am a huge fan of the work of Paul Hicks, and one of rarer miniatures (besides the event miniatures he sculpted) is this set of British Napoleonic soldiers, strongly influenced by Sean Bean in Sharpe. After looking for a trader in Europe and trying to get these second hand - but with no results for over almost a year, I decided to order directly with Brigade Games. Shipping wasn't cheap at 28 USD (for a total of ~50 USD worth of miniatures), but went incredibly fast, as these arrived within 10 days - incl. going through customs.
This isn't going to be some mass combat, but really a small skirmish setup around Sharpe's Rifles. So after looking at Osprey Games' Chosen Men, but putting that aside for it being far too large, as it is more like Saga at 40+ miniatures and not what I had in mind for the small battles, I went with Song of Drums & Shakos by Ganesha Games. Tabletop Stories has a review on the rule set. And if you're already there, give their Mecha-Spin off of What a tanker a go.
Like us on Facebook
Follow me on Instagram
Categories
- events (206)
- fantasy (599)
- General (160)
- historical (632)
- Little Big Adventures (4)
- offtopic (5)
- reviews (536)
- science fiction (687)
- showroom (107)
- terrain (117)
- work-in-progress (418)
