Metro League Updates

View fullsize

View fullsize

Malifaux – The metro league has been in full swing. Currently wrapping up week 4 and moving into the final week of the league. 

I tried something different with this league, making a 3 game max with your average determining your score for the week. This system allows players to play multiple games but doesn't penalize players that can only get in one game per week.

To encourage the story driven aspect of the game, players that submit a write-up with photos can earn an extra league VP to be added into their average. Players that do this can put in a little extra effort and are rewarded for it. In the battle report section you can read some of the stories/reports players have submitted.

Special thanks to Jeff E. [mrhobbito] for snapping some photos of Lord Chompy terrorizing the showgirls.

Back-to-School Beginner's Malifaux League

I'll be running a four week beginner's league at Gamer's Gauntlet. This is a great chance for new and old players to get started with the game. The league is set up to award players for building and painting a table ready force.

Each week players can score a number of league points by playing games and painting models. Each point equates into a lotto ticket for the prize draw at the end of the league. The league is FREE to join and will begin 9/11/12. Weekly scoring sheets should be turned in by 10:00pm Tuesday each night of the league and the final drawings will take place 10/2/12 you must be present to win.

Gamer's Gauntlet is located at:

20564 Hall Road 

Charter Township of Clinton, MI 48038

(586) 412-6677

League play takes place 6-10pm Tuesdays.

Mini Malifaux League - Week 1

Malifaux – Week one went off without a hitch. We had 13 players signs up for the three week league with every faction represented. Everyone showed up on time and game wrapped up by 10 pm (most before that). I was happy to see some new faces participating in the event as well as the regular crowd.

Week One used the "Break the Seals" scenario that was featured during the GenCon 2011 event. A fun scenario that involves three columns in the center of the table. On player has to defend the columns the other has to destroy them. The scenario was quite fun, although I did have one player voice his concern that the defender has an advantage. Based on the results I would have to say it is a minor advantage if anything. 

We did have several tables of TerraClips set up and players seemed to enjoy them. I still prefer more three dimensional terrain, but for what they are and the easy of storage TerraClips is a great product. I will say you need to either add additional elements to the board or give height to some of the printed elements to get the right amount of terrain on the board.

Mini Malifaux League

Malifaux – RIW Hobbies will be hosting a Mini Malifaux League beginning August 16, 2011. The league will be basically a three week "tournament" in which players will play one 40 Soulstone Encounter each week. This is the prefect opportunity for players to test their new toys presented in Malifaux Book 3 - Twisted Fates, proxies for unreleased models are allowed as long as they are a close approximation of the model they represent.

I've posted the scenarios up on the Paperbag Warriors page. Buy in is $5 and prizes brought back from GenCon will be awarded based on attendance. 

Format is:

• Single Faction

• Domination Format (per Gaining Ground)

• Story-based encounters 

• Painting is encouraged but not required

• Games begin at 7:00pm sharp 

Badab War - Expansion Reviews

View fullsize

After the initial week of the campaign I'm looking into adding some of the 40K expansions into the mix. These supplements add new levels to the game and allow for interesting choices. While not necessarily the best for pick-up games, planning ahead for their inclusion into a campaign is the best way to use them in my opinion. That said let's look at what each of the expansions has to offer.

Cities of Death
Released near the end of 4th Edition the Cities of Death expansion revisited and revised the original City Fight ruleset. This expansion also brought stratagems into the game. Stratagems allowed players to give units or buildings special rules to reflect the special forces aspect of fighting in an urban environment. This expansion also modified the way buildings work (and was subsequently incorporated into the 5th Edition ruleset). For campaign games this ruleset is a great way to contest urban environments and makes for a very different style of play than a typical "open field" style game.

Planet Strike
The big release a few summers ago, this expansion saw the release of special terrain elements in the form of numerous plastic kits. Playing a Planet Strike game requires quite a bit of prior planning on the part of both players, as your force organization changes dramatically depending on if you are the attacker or defender. Also special terrain such as fortifications, craters and defense lines are a necessity. For campaign games  this ruleset can be used to simulate boarding assaults as well as planetary invasions. Given the nature of this style game players will need to be notified well in advance so they can prepare.

Spearhead
The vehicle expansion was released in White Dwarf over the summer and a pdf of the ruleset is available for free on Games Workshop's site. Like the other expansions this ruleset dramatically changes the way the game is played making tanks and squadrons scoring units. You also play using length of the board rather than the width. While this seems like a fun thing to try, not every player has access to a lot of tanks and as such requires much planning to set up a game. For campaigns this is a great way to simulate a force charging across the wastes to assault a position. Again given the nature of this type of game players need to be notified well in advance so they can prepare.

Apocalypse
This expansion removes the force organization chart so players can use any model in their collection as well as super heavies. It requires a larger table and takes a relatively longer period of time to play a game. Playing a game requires a significant amount of planning, space and time. For campaigns this is typically the final game allowing all players to field what they want and all play together. Of course if their are titans or other super heavies on the board, you may spend most of your game setting up models only to remove large swathes of them before you even get to move. 

Imperial Armour
Volumes 9 and 10 provide the meat for my current campaign. Not only do they include special characters and army lists, but also a well thought out campaign system. Also included in volume 9 are rules for boarding actions. This is a cool mini expansion that adds stratagems, and special rules to simulate fighting onboard starships. 

Badab War - Campaign Begins

Warhammer 40K – Sunday was the first day of the Badab War campaign I'm running with several members of the Paperbag Warriors. We started earlier than usual and began the campaign with a draft. Two of the players in our group insisted on playing a specific chapter from the Imperial Armour Books, and luckily one was a loyalist and the other a secessionist. These two players became the captains of theirs respective teams and than took turns drafting players for their side.

The scoring system is pretty simple winning a 1500 point or higher battle earns a team 2 VP, wining a Kill-team or small scale 40K game nets the winner 1VP. The campaign will last 5 weeks playing every other week. This makes scheduling easier and also promotes finishing off models and completing an army.

The Badad War was significant event in the 40K timeline that happened relatively recently. A group of space marine chapters tasked with protecting a remote area of space have a dispute with some of the local system administrations and declare independence. This rebellion ultimately forces the High Lords of Terra to react and send additional chapters of marines to the system to put an end to the rebellion. This minor civil war is the basis for the campaign. Forgeworld has produced 2 books that provide extensive background information and army lists which make running a themed campaign easy.

This event was one of my favorite stories from the old 40K compendium, and I painted (and since have lost) several variations of the old-school chapter schemes detailed above using the old hunch-backed beaky marine kit. Forgeworld has taken some liberties with the old background to make it more "realistic" and I've so far really enjoyed the books. Bell of Lost Souls also did their own variation of the campaign a few years ago.

Metro Malifaux League Week 3

The PLAY DATE 

By B. Ellsworth [paperbagfox]

Meanwhile up in the mountains daybreak was fast approaching as Zoraida, a Doppelganger and a horde of terror tots where looking forward to a day of fun around the train tracks. Now the Neverborn’s way of fun is like no other, on this day the tots decided to bring out the explosives. Zoraida and the Doppelganger wanted to tag along and offer help to the tots as well as making sure that nothing horrible happens to them. The last thing the Neverborn need is to have Lilith go off on a blood rage over her slain babies. While paying close attention to the tots, a strange sensation came over Zoraida and shook her to her core. 

The shiver down Zoraida’s spine forced her to look deeper and discover the source of the disturbance. She was not surprised when the source turned out to be the Guild itself. Zoraida wanting to know what is in store from the Guild, she looked closer and discovered that it was non other then Lady J, the Judge, the Executioner, Santiago Ortega, the Convict Gunslinger and two Death Marshals. Not wanting to allow the tots to have all the fun, Zoraida stated to rummage through her bag of dolls looking for someone to play with. The search did not take long, due to the size of the doll, as she pulled out the fat little doll of the Executioner. 

As the tots ran off to play with their toys, Zoraida started to force her will on the Executioner by making him obey her every demand. Her first demand of the big man was to have him make a strike against Santiago, and the paired claws did what they were meant to do and put a hurt on Santiago. Not knowing why the Executioner was attacking him, Santiago took off in the other direction around the train. As Zoraida watched this happen she could not help cracking a small smile at the confusion of the Guild. But that smile quickly faded as she watched Lady J and the rest of her dysfunctional followers start making their way toward her hiding place behind the rocks. 

Knowing that the Guild scum would be on top of her rocky hiding place, Zoraida made one more controlling prick of the little fat doll in her hand with her pin. Zoraida made the real life copy of her doll chase after Santiago but was not in range to inflict any damage on the already wounded Ortega. As much enjoyment as Zoraida was having she knew that tots were off have fun of their own. But also knew that their type of fun can get them in trouble and with Santiago and the Executioner heading that way, she needed to start heading back for support. With the stench of the Guild bearing down on her, Zoraida pulled out her spell book and case Raven to allow her to fly away from the immediate danger. 

Once out of danger, Zoraida checked in with the rest of the crew finding out that she was too late to save a tot from Santiago. In the distance Zoraida could see that the Doppelganger decided to take revenge for the fallen tot into her own hands by copying Santiago. The Doppelganger took sights with the copied Peacebringers and fired into Santiago, dropping the Ortega with out a second glance. Sensing an on coming attack Zoraida looked around just in time to see the once controlled Executioner thumping toward the Doppelganger with claws ready to kill. Zoraida could not look away from what was on the verge of happing as the bright sun was slowing climbing in the sky. 

The battle was fast and bloody as the Executioner collided with the Doppelganger. The Executioner struck first but was unable to bring her down with his mighty claws. While the Doppelganger mimicked the attacks of the Executioner’s claws hitting the large target, but was unable to bring him lifeless to the ground. That opening left by the Doppelganger was all the Executioner needed to make a quick strike that brought her down in a hurry. Zoraida could feel the strength in the Executioner rising with the lifeless body lying at his feet and needed to gather the forces and get out of the area as soon as they could. 

Relaying the message to the tots that it was time to get out of the area, Zoraida was paying close attention to the Guild movements in the distance. The tots had a other agenda on mind and ignored what the hag was trying to explain to them, and ran off over the tracks to set the other explosives in their string of noisemakers. Little did they know that there was a Death Marshal and the Gunslinger on the other side of the train waiting for them. Even though the tots were able to set the bombs, they did take two casualties in the process. As soon as the tots turned around to head back to the hag the Gunslinger and the Marshal were quick to engaged them, with what looked like no way to escape. 

Sensing that the misbehaving tots were in trouble and the Executioner closing in on the remaining tots, Zoraida was quickly look for a way out of the mess they were in. Her answer came in the form of a large blast off in the distance, and then another closer then the first. Knowing that this was the distraction she was looking for Zoraida called out to the tots tell them to make a run for the forest at the base of the mountain. The third blast came close to the train, sensing the tots heard her and seeing the group of tots closest to her take off down the hill, Zoraida reopened her spells for her Raven spell and took off after the tots. In the background Zoraida heard the last two explosions and the noise from the last tots sprinting through the rocks. 

Knowing that today they were lucky, Zoraida and the tots continued their escape from the Guild. In the back of Zoradia’s mind the thought of some luck is better then no luck, and the day will come when the Guild will loss out on their luck. The feeling that came over Zoraida at the thought of hope that on that day the Neverborn will be there to take advantage and exterminate the slime once and for all …

… TO BE CONTINUED