Salute 51 Part 1

 

It's that time of year again Salute is back and It my first visit back since 2019 and I have been looking forward to walking around the Salute hall.

The sun was out and I was ready for a good day of miniatures and miniature gaming.

Review: Products For Wargamers House With Tall Roof

 

On todays blog post I am reviewing and making some terrain from Products for Wargamers.

I met James from Products for Wargamers back at SELWG and he kindly gave me one of his buildings to review for you.

So let's take a look.

Salute Part 3 Fabled Realms Demo and more...

Off  I went to the table for a quick demo game

I was playing with the Druggoi the infected band of monsters that where once men.

I called him Fluffy

Salute 2017 Part 1

On Saturday Salute 2017 was upon us. I got up a stupid o Clock and made my way down to the excel centre for a day of gaming heaven.

I arrived really early and was in in the front of the line but it soon begin to fill up in the hall.

It hits 10 am and we are ushered into the main hall to start exploring the stalls and tables at Salute.

Ale and gaming why not.

Ed finally moved into his new flat and invited me to christen his new gaming board with some Ales thrown in. How could I say no..

It was Eds Retribution vs Khador. well Butcher...

Don't Like the look of that big fella!

Armour and more Armour

As we did not have any steam roller packs we decided just to go smash. Ed won the roll and started first.

As normal in war machine it was run run run first turn even though I tried a pop shot with my destroyer.

Ed starts to move in and his infantry start to move in position to cause my jacks some pain! then the big fella moves in!

Ed begins chipping away at my jacks but luckily the mechanics are more the up for the challenge to fix them.

I kill his mage hunter assassins and some of his infantry but they have vengeance. Its not great.

I have to feat but I can only managed minimal damage ( Khador dice rolls strike!) to his colossal  while he manages to destroy 3 heavies 2 on the charge and with models that have weapon masters and it hurts..

The only thing I can do is try to protect butcher from all sides by blocking with other models and see if I can do an epic butcher vs colossal match up.

But even with my remaining models chipping at the remains of Eds infantry and colossal butcher is defeated..

A good game that would have been a lot tighter I feel if my jacks lasted longer but Ed had favour with the dice gods and rolled well evan triple 6's at one point, but all in all a good game and happy to have the first game at his new home.

Later on in the evening I was given my christmas present from Ed

this guy!

I was given this before the errata but I was not into mad dog spam any way and can't wait to build this as I recently made a Drago out of the old metal version.

you can view this Here

Looks like christmas will be busy building as I have these two to do as well.

Better crack out the magnets.

Bring The Metal!

Another night another game! its been great to get some regular games in lately.

Mark and I arrived at Lano's gaming den last week and proceeded to battle it out Menoth vs Khador....Fire vs Ice.


It was steamroller format each of us had a flag caster base to base to score on own flag for one point or dominate the zone or appoints flag for 2 points. First to 5 wins.

Rush to the centre and get to the flag butcher!

Mark trying to unpick the puzzle

In the end Mark felt he could not win after a MVP Koadik throw.....Later on Mark realised he did not use his feat and could have won the game... but in the end we both had fun and learned more about our armies and lists.

This week I was back at Lano's and had some games using Vlad 1 and Butcher 1 vs  Lano's trolls and some pigs from his minion faction. Both of Lano's armies were awesomely painted.

I got to try out some cavalry with Vlad 1 and tweak a few things and again learn about what works and doses not in my list as well as tactically.  I must say on a side note War Room has been so good and easy for me to get lists its one area I found tricky and I can now do this on my travels.

I am glad I managed to get a few games in over the past couple of weeks more then I have been able to play in the last 6 moths or more. I just hope I can keep up with playing over the next coming months as its great to see some mates and play against so many different armies.

It's Finally here!?! Games and Gear Battle Board.

I said some where on this blog that in dec 24th 2013 I backed a Kickstarter project from Games and Gears for a modular battle board which would come with adds ons of dice trays and army trays that clip on the side as well as some hell world style terrain.
At the time I wanted something that I could store away easily and also not to expensive with a design that would fit a multitude of games. Therefore I chose the Hellscape board.

This board had some strange daemon like markings that would fit my chaos army (when I was playing 40k a lot) and was generic enough for other games to.

It was all going well with positive news completing and adding to stretch goals. An enthusiastic vibe was set from the company and the 982 backers from around the world with promises of possible storage boxes/case for the boards. What was also god but I believe was part of the undoing was the fact it was free shipping also...

On Christmas Eve 2013 all 5 designs were  successfully  funded. one was a 10mm Dropzone Commander city boards as well as a 28mm version. A sci-fi space ship design a cobbles street style board and Hellscape.

So what happened...

It should have taken only 6 months to get these boards out as we were led to believe that all moulds were made and ready to go but during a 2 year period we had news of a flood in china that destroyed all of the boards. We then were told there would be delays on remaking them all.

We got conflicting updates witch were seen to make no sense as well as promised delivery dates that were missed. Also there were photos of the products being made even to this day we have seen maybe one or two and that's for 5 boards.

This lead to a backlash on there Kickstarter page with it now holding over 5000 comments which G and G do not replay to anymore.

I heard of news that people were complaining on there Facebook page and Comments being deleted but I found the best place was PMing the company via the Kickstarter messenger section.

To be fair I seemed to always get a response. I was supposed to get my hell world terrain but they missed me. I sent a PM And they were sent out very quickly after I pointed it out. I know other people have not been lucky.

So all this goes on and  over 2 years roll by some people got their boards which had mixed reactions. Most thought the boards would be painted to a decent standard which was advertised as the next stage in the future of battle boards with some having only basic washes applied and the colours of roads and streets not being painted at all only  colour used was the colour of the plastic itself. This angered some as the painting was the main mission and advertisement of the kickstarter.

Still we got trickles of updates here and there and as my board was the last to be sent out I was starting to wonder if I will ever get my board.

Then I got the news in January 2016 if I don't get my board by the end of feb I would get a full refund and they would quote "send back and destroy the boards" lets just say the comment section of the kickstarter went alight.

I then just decided to make my own board in the end thinking well as we have moved on to battle mats I would get one of them.
I did fell disappointed as you wait that long and nothing to come from it especially when they say they have made it and just going to throw it out.

One night I  was reading the comments section for reactions of the news and one of the backers said they asked for another board design instead of the Hellscape and he got it pretty quickly. I PMed the guys at G and G and said well if Hellscape is not happening can I have the anima board (cobbled street style) but only if it's NOT happening to the February date you self imposed. 10mins later I was told one is being shipped from Germany? So I guess Hellscapes not going ahead then...

So after 2 years of updates, no photos, no real clue on what was the real reason for delays and mishaps low and behold to my surprise with out any warning of delivery I  have a battle board.....

















An example of one of the possible lay outs.

So here is the anima board. It was my 2nd choice of board during the Kickstarter and it funnily enough as it's been so long waiting for this board my games have changes so this would work well for the games I am mostly playing now like Warmachine and Frostgrave etc...

There are some issues with some of the washes as they do match each board and if you look at the board which is just the plan street each half looks different in quality. Also there are some mold lines that are visible.

I have seen worse examples of other boards such as recently the DZC boards a lot of backers were let down as the road markings did not match up and had paint smudged like it was a rush job. Remember  all boards were supposed to been made over 2 years ago with at least 2 quality checks with next gen paint work...

At the end of the day for £60 they are worth the money considering in 2013 you could either make your own board or by a GW battle board for £250. It has taken far to long with to many stories which you did not know what to believe and also now the fashion is roll out mats you feel G and G missed the boat on this one.
After I got the boards I did ask for a refund on the dice trays and side trays as I thought I did not need them and glad I did as backers still don't have them...

I am just glad I got my board in the end as well as my refund. I just hope all the other backers get the boards they want and be finished with this Kickstarter project.

Salute Part 2

So after a quick something to eat I was off to look at what more Salute could offer.

Halt who goes there!

After having a close encounter with the emperors finest I went along to warlord games stand and checked out their new game Project Z and boy was I tempted for this. At just £30 you get some amazing looking minis. The zombies were probably some of the best I have seen.

I think he may need a Dr?

All Those minis at the bottom for £30!

After pulling my self away I took a look at some of the gaming tables on display.

Now thats a battle.

Next stop Prodos games to check out some AvP and to pick up the show exclusive Jezebel model which I will post later on.

And one of my favourite models I saw at Salute..

Heroes in a half shell...

So another Salute comes to an end for another year. It was defiantly a good idea to bring a list but there was so much to see and do no doubt I missed things...

I felt like I ran a couple of marathons from the amount of times I went up and down the stalls this year but it was well worth it.

I think next year I am going to try to get so more demo games in but I was happy to get a KOW demo but missed the Guild Ball demos as the stand was packed due to season 2 and the new Hunters minis on offer.

In my next post I will show some my goodies from Salute this year....

Salute Part 1

It's Salute time again well on saturday anyway. Over 7000 gamers descended to the Excel centre in London to pay homage to all things gaming and buy new toys!

The Sea of Gamers and this was at 9:30 am

After picking up my goodie bag with my Salute exclusive mini, free dice and this year a couple of models from Maelstrom's Edge I bumped into to a few of the guys from The Essex Legion as we were all let into the the huge hanger.

This year I went to Salute with a a plan...I wanted to get a few bits but also to get a few demos in as well.

(disclaimer there will be lots of awesome and amazing in this so be warned)

First I had a look at Siege Studios and I tell you there work is stunning the paint jobs these photos don't do any justice at all.

This fella is ready for action

I heard that River Horse was showing some of the models and test castings for the up coming labyrinth game and they did not disappoint.. This is one game I will get in the summer (dance magic dance)

 

After seeing these I popped over to the Mantic stand to have a look at the new Deadzone game and redeem some of my mantic points ( getting more hammer action for my Dwarfs) and had a go at Kings of War finally.

Of course I was the Dwarfs for this and it was only a basic set up but it was really easy to pick up I even remembered stats that the Standee forgot. It must bean an easy game to pick up for me to remember rules. Anyway it was fast and I liked the wounds stacked up on the unit and the fact its deadly if you are attacked from the sides or behind. Also the fact Dwarfs have access to angry badgers with Slayers on their backs.. How can you not love that.

I am going to see if I can sway Mr2key to have a go with the free rules online.

ttcombat and there huge new building for sale.

As you can see by the faces it was pleasing to see

perfect for frostgrave

Next stop Studio McVey and my word they had The Others 7 sins models on dis-play.  I backed this game on kickstarter due to the pictures of the models and so glad I did my jaw drooped..... So much Awesome I can't wait till I get these in my hands!

After all this excitement and trying to take in all that was going at the show I needed to take 5...