Malifaux Game: Dreamer Takes on Vikki's

Over this past weekend, I took Saturday morning and headed in to Huzzah to play a game of Malifaux against Jay. I hadn’t played him before, and he was itching to see how his Vikki’s would do against a veteran player.

So we set up our terrain for a 30 stone game and I pulled out the Dreamer with his three Teddies, while Jay hit the table with the Vikki’s, the Convict Gunslinger, the Student of Conflict, Johan and Taylor. Taylor’s a beast in combat already, and facing constructs, of which all three of my Teddies were, she was that much better.

Our scenario came up with Shared Slaughter. Jay hadn’t played a Shared mission before, so we just flipped on that chart. Both of us had duel masters, so that worked out well. For secondary objectives, I took Bodyguard on my master and Grudge on his highest point minion: Taylor, both announced. Jay took Thwart to try to stop my secondary objectives, and Grudge against my Teddy with Alice on it.

I started with everyone buried save the Dreamer, as per usual. I won the initiative and moved out near some buildings nearby. Jay moved his people in two groups: Gun Vikki, the Convict, and Student of Conflict all stuck back a little near another building, while Johan, Taylor, and Sword Vikki all headed up closer to the front of his lines where the Dreamer was.

On turn two, Jay won the initiative, moved Johan out and shot at the Dreamer, but failed to hit him. The Dreamer went, dropped all three Teddies on the field near that group, and turned into Lord Chompy Bits next to Johan. Taylor activated next and I learned two things: first, she doesn’t care about Terrify. Second, she will kill any Teddy she faces in three hits. Down went one Teddy, full to dead, no chance to stop it. I activated one of my Teddies and moved in on Taylor, only managing a couple of damage. Vikki went and moved in on the LCB and other Teddy, having to cheat to not run away from the Terrifying they had. She did four damage to LCB. LCB turned around and with Teddy’s help, killed Vikki, and healed himself back up to full. Jay’s second group moved up and got in position.

On turn three, Jay again won initiative, which I knew spelled the death of my second Teddy (fortunately not my Alice Teddy, since I held that one in the most safe place of the three). Sure enough, Teddy died. LCB went and killed off Johan, then moved up on Taylor, and my last Teddy got shot by the Convict. He managed to regenerate it back up, moved in, and did some more damage to Taylor.

On turn four, Jay again won initiative (this was getting frustrating). With LCB standing right there, Taylor went and killed him off, popping my Dreamer back out. The Teddy killed off Taylor, finally, and then got shot for his trouble. The Dreamer went and buried my Teddy, trying to keep him alive. At this point, Jay had Gun Vikki, Student of Conflict, and the Convict Gunslinger while I had the Dreamer and a wounded Teddy. Things were not looking good.

But I realized I had both of my schemes successfully at the moment, keeping the Dreamer alive and killing Taylor. I had stopped his Thwart, and if I could keep Alice Teddy alive, I would stop his Grudge too. That might give me enough to squeak out a tie or win.

So on turn five (which Jay again won initiative), I had the Dreamer fly out of range of the Convict Gunslinger and stay hidden. The Student of Conflict gave Vikki fast, and she rushed around the building to where the Dreamer was, but was off by about an 1”.

Finally, I won initiative on turn six and flew the Dreamer away from Vikki. The Student of Conflict was too far away to be able to give Vikki fast again, and he wasn’t able to reach me. Jay flipped the last card to see if we went on, and we didn’t. Game ended there.

Tallying up points, Jay got 2 points out of Slaughter and none from the schemes, while I got 1 point out of Slaughter and four for the schemes. Close game, and one of the most violent that my Dreamer list has ever faced. With Taylor’s massive hammer, I wasn’t sure how the Teddies would be able to stand up to her. Sure enough, they couldn’t. Losing two Teddies and LCB to take her down was unfortunate. The Dreamer always losing the activation war was pretty rough on me, and missing the initiative on the entire middle of the game (each time costing me a key model) was also hard to deal with. Jay put up a great fight – can’t wait for the rematch.

Shave and a Haircut

So on Saturday I took a trip out to get a haircut for the wedding. I figured I'd get it cut short and let it grow back in. Not a bad plan, except the guy who was cutting my hair shaved part of my beard, so it looked all strange, and I had to shave the rest of it off.

So I'm in my bathroom with my razor and think to myself, I don't really need to shave ALL of it, do I? Of course, the answer is "no"! I can leave myself an awesome mustache.



It's beautiful - I can let that grow out for another three weeks so it's a little more bushy like the ones in Tombstone, and everyone will be jealous of me. Women will want me. Men will want to be me. Life will be great.

Only, Laura does not agree.



So instead I have to shave it all off. Sigh. She wouldn't even let me wear it around for the weekend, just for fun.

Lord Chompy Bits Eats Colette

So last night I headed back out to Huzzah Hobbies, the new store out in Sterling. It’s nice to have a game store only five minutes from the house. Makes it pretty easy to head out there. I picked up a couple new paint brushes while I was there, trying to support the place so that it stays in business. They’ve got a nice selection of paints and hobby supplies going, and I put in a special order for the new Colette box when she comes out. Laura liked the look of the Showgirls and was looking forward to painting them.



Anywho, I ended up getting two games in again last night. The first game was against Chris S. Most of the people playing at Huzzah are new to the game and so I’ll usually spend more time teaching them the game than playing the game, but Chris is no newbie to this game. We both got to pull out some pretty fun models to try out. I hit the table with the Dreamer, Lord Chompy Bits, and three Teddies (6 stones remaining). Chris put down Colette, Cassandra, a Performer with its Mannequin, and two Coryphees (6 stones remaining).



So we flipped for our missions. I got Distract and he got Deliver the Message. Great. Both of these missions require maneuverability, which he has a lot better than I do. I have to keep his Master, Colette, from reaching my side of the board by the end of the game, and she can teleport up to 18”. Ouch. And his mission is just to get one of his models to mine and pull of a two-action Interact to give me a message before I kill him. Double ouch. I’ve seen Colette’s crew move. They move FAST!

To add insult to injury, he took the two scenarios for the Archanists meaning he had to Sabotage a building on my side of the board, and he had to reach all four corners during the game. Piece of cake. I knew I couldn’t out-maneuver him, so I took Bodyguard on my big guy, and Grudge meaning I’d have to kill Cassandra as his highest point model.



The only way I could stop Colette from reaching my side of the board was if I killed her. So my goal became killing both Colette and Cassandra, the rest of the mission be damned. He could take all the points he wanted, but if I could kill Colette and kill anyone who got close to me, I should be able to win.

So deploying. He got everyone up on one side of the board where he’d have extra cover running up the board, except one model who started near the other corner. I deployed the Dreamer in the middle of the board. Everyone else began buried.

I won initiative and made him go first. His Performer tagged the side of the board next to him and started heading in to the middle of the board. The Dreamer stepped up to the middle of the board, and then I was done. So everything else in his army moved forward, save one model that tagged the back corner of his board, and Colette, who summoned a Dove as well. He was already half-way to achieving one of his goals, and Cassandra was already more than halfway to my side of the board.

Next turn, he flipped the Red Joker and won initiative, making me go first. I moved the Dreamer as close to Cassandra as I could and raised a single Teddy near her, hoping to catch her in the Terrifying range. I was just out and Cassandra rushed past me, tagging a third corner. Teddy moved back towards Cassandra, trying to pin her down a little, and I was done with activations again. The Coryphee’s moved up, joined into a Duet, and moved up next to the Dreamer. Eep! Colette summoned another Dove and kept one near her while the other started heading out. His Soulstones were still hovering around 4-5, so he was feeling pretty good.

On turn three, he again flipped the Red Joker for initiative. I was scared, but rather than taking the Duet after the Dreamer, he took Cassandra after my Teddy. I cheated a few times to keep him from doing enough to kill me, and Teddy’s Hard to Wound 2 kept him alive with 4 life left. My action, and I activated Teddy. He Regenerated two life and moved around, engaging both Cassandra and the Duet, as well as keeping within 3” of the Dreamer to protect him. Since Cassandra had popped her ability to give me (-) flips on attacks and damage against her, I hit the Duet instead, knocking it down a couple life. The Duet went, but since the Teddy was within 3” and targetable by the Duet, the Duet had to attack Teddy. It took all the strikes it had, and a Soulstone, but the Duet killed Teddy. Noooooo!!!!



Time for revenge. The Dreamer when, summoned the other two Teddy’s between the Duet and turned into Lord Chompy Bits next to the Duet. The Mannequin and Performer came up and tried to Slow some of the new army that just appeared, but failed. Lord Chompy Bits ripped into the Duet, killing it on the third strike that also Calmed it so it turned back into the Dreamer, giving it a little defense. Colette tried to get Cassandra out of the way of two Teddies, but failed, even with a Soulstone. Both Teddies attacked Cassandra, but she burned a couple more Soulstones to prevent me from killing her. As it was, she still took 2-3 damage. Now Colette was down to a single soulstone. Good deal.



On turn four, he won initiative again. Colette activated, dropped two cards for a Soulstone, and successfully pulled Cassandra out of the certain-death spot she had found herself in. The Dreamer went, buried both Teddies, then raised them again further down the field near the Mannequin and Performer, then turned back into Lord Chompy Bits again. The Performer went, trying to slow down the Teddy assault, and managed to pull off Slow on one of them. The Mannequin sacrificed itself to give Cassandra a heal, but only removed one wound. The slow Teddy went and shredded the Performer, who, in her death, gave Colette Reactivate. Colette was sitting a little rough with a half-dead Cassandra, herself, and one Dove left, with only a single Soulstone in her cache. Meanwhile, two nearly-fully-healthy Teddies (one had taken some damage when Cassandra started breathing fire at me) and Lord Chompy Bits stared out across at her. Colette activated and tried to get some defenses going, but with her Soulstones depleted, she was not in a good way. Teddy activated and charged Cassandra, but failed to hit her as Colette used her last Soulstone. Lord Chompy Bits then leapt across a fence (crushed it under his feet, maybe?) and caught the Dove in his claws. I flipped and got a 16. He flipped to a 17, with a 12 as his flip. I weighed back and forth and finally decided to spend my 4th Soulstone (I had used a few to kill off the Duet) in order to kill the Dove.



At that point, Chris conceded. He needed Doves to restart his teleportation tricks, and down to zero Soulstones meant he would have to use all his resources next turn just to summon a Dove, and that would leave Cassandra and Colette a little defenseless against the onrushing Teddies and Lord Chompy Bits. So it turned out that there was another option to how to win the game other than kill Cassandra and Colette: kill everyone but Cassandra and Colette. He had no way to get close enough to my master to deliver him a message (which, I assume, read “Please don’t kill me”), and I had cut him off from both the last corner and the building he wanted to reach. He would have to end up pretty close to my army to try that goal. All in all, a good showing for the Dreamer and his pals.

Dissatisfaction with Food

I love barbeque Fritos. For my money, it can't get much better than that. They're not that easy to find, though. People stock regular potato chips and the like before they bring in the tasty goodness of barbeque Fritos.

But my vending machine here at work stocks them. Great news, right? Well, I thought so too. But when I went to get one today, I noticed the bag was nearly deflated when I pulled it out of the machine. Well, that's no good, I said to myself. And then when I opened the bag and started eating them, they were stale! Oh, the horror of it all! So what was going to be my wonderful snack turned out to be just a depressing bout of awfulness. I couldn't even finish the bag, they tasted so bad.

Oh, life is difficult sometimes.

Two for the Road

So we ended up doing some more painting last night and I finished off the pumpkins for the bases and the murder of crows, while Laura finished off Lord Chompy Bits.

More Malifuax Models Painted

So I got a few more models painted up this weekend. First up are four models that I had painted a while ago, but never got around to displaying. They're to be used for objective markers. I have another one on deck - a murder of crows - but I'll wait until later to show that one off.



Next up is the Dreamer. I had most of him finished a little while ago, but was waiting for the pumpkins to add to his base. Gives him a little more color than gray and blue, which is pretty cool. When he turns into Lord Chompy Bits, that monstrosity is going to have a bunch of jack'o'lanterns on his base instead of just pumpkins. Laura's working on him right now, but he's a massive model, and will probably take a while to get all finished up. In the meantime, here's the Dreamer.



Following that, I have two totems to show off. The first one is the Jackalope from Marcus. This rabbit's got horns and tends to be used as a missile - attacking at great speed, doing some damage, and then being killed off only to rise again and repeat it all. So I decided this guy was something of a bloody mess. Other rabbits just look down on the Jackalope, fearing that he gives the rest of them a bad name.



The last one for this round is the Primordial Magic, which, in painting, I grew to like the look of more. I thought it was a worm-like thing before. But as it turns out, it was some soup that was cooking up in a cauldron, and when it tipped over, it coalesced into this long thing. Looks pretty neat that way. Still, I added a little mini-worm next to him that's trying to grow up to be just like daddy.



Next up: the Murder of Crows, maybe the Miss Pack, the Lord Chompy Bits... and then who knows?

Two New Models

Last night, Laura and I painted up a few models. I started working on the Dreamer, but he's not quite done, so I'll hold off on him. In addition to him, Laura finished up Jack Daw, and I painted up one of the Apparition random models I had. I mean, why not? He's a cool looking model. I figure I'll use him as Coppulus until the real model comes out.

Nightmare

Last night I had a bad dream. I was back in high school, and both Brian and Dan were in my class. The teacher was asking about a math problem, and had us all figure it out. I figured it out, and I knew I had it right, because I had figured out the trick in it. At the end, she called on Dan to give the answer. He gave the wrong answer - the one you can reach only if you forgot that the number problem did not involve a simple multiplcation, but actually involved a reducing addition (so instead of 4x6, you'd do 6+5+4+3 - that kind of thing). Brian jumped up and yelled, "yeah!" and high-fived Dan. The teacher asked me what I thought the answer was, so I told her the different answer. She shook her head and said:

"I'm sorry, Mike. Brian and Dan are right, and you are wrong."

I woke up in a cold sweat. It was terrible!

Grilled Cheese Tastes Good

So I just found this video on CNN.com about how to cook a grilled cheese correctly. Usually I just skip their fluff-piece videos, but this one caught my eye and I had to watch it. Why? Because I love me a good grilled cheese.

The person puts forth three main rules to a proper grilled cheese sandwich. I was glad to see I was already obeying two of them. They are:

1. Grate the cheese before putting it on the bread. The reason for this, naturally, is to speed the melting process. Cooking a good grilled cheese is really the art of a race between trying to get the cheese melted before the bread burns. This brings us to #2.

2. Always butter the bread. This one I do religiously. Buttered bread will burn slower than non-buttered bread. Additionally, putting the butter in the pan doesn't work quite right. The butter won't be soaked up evenly, and you'll end up with some spots of your bread burned, and some not.

3. Use a non-stick pan. Again, I follow this one too. You want to be able to nab that melted cheese and keep it with the sandwich, and to do that, you need a non-stick, no question.

She also suggests adding a pickle, onions, or an egg with the sandwich to give a nice counter to the taste. I always serve my grilled cheese with a pickle, so I got that covered.

But I tend to add one more thing to my grilled cheese meal. After the sandwich is done (which must be cut diagonally, and in quarters), I fry up a couple of slices of cheese too, one at a time. Let it start melting, then fold it in on itself until you have a bunch of melted cheese with a crispy cheese outside. Mmm... tastes sublime!

I'm not sure I'll try to grate my cheese. I use thin-sliced cheese from the deli counter, which means it melts pretty well already. No need to break it up, I don't think. Though I could cut it into small pieces and go that route. Maybe I'll try that next time...

A Few Good Models

Over the weekend, I finally broke out my modeling and paints for the first time since the flood and Laura and I started painting up a bunch of stuff. Here's what we did this week:

Teddy #2 - painted by me, I stuck some wings on him and whipped him through.


Poltergeist - painted by me, I put a dead skeleton on his base. But wait... what's that? The skeleton has the same red glow-ey eyes as the Poltergeist? Oh no! Crazy magic's about to start!


Teddy #3 - painted by Laura, this one's my favorite. Alice stands in front of him with a bloody butchers knife, ready to lead Teddy to another killing field. -shudder- Creepy.



I also put Jack Daw and the Jackalope together, though neither of them are painted yet. The Dreamer and Lord Chompy Bits have been put on bases, though they're not completed yet (I still have some pumpkins to add to them, once they come in the mail). As a bonus, I'll show you two more pictures...




Also, over the weekend, Dan, Ellen and I headed over to the new Huzzah store. Nice place - a lot of cool little goodies all around. Can't wait to head out there again on Tuesday for some Malifaux fun. It'll be nice to have a place nearby to grab all the stuff I need.

So What Did Happen...?

So what exactly did happen after Star Wars? Why didn't Mark Hamill get any more movie roles? I know he did a lot of voice work, and that's awesome, but did he just want to walk away from movies after the whole Star Wars thing, or did he not get many other offers?

Malifaux: Rising Powers - Neverborn

Quick thoughts about the new Neverborn models. Just got my book yesterday and finally got a chance to look over the finalized rules for everything. A little background on me as a player – I favor Lilith and the Old Hag as my favorites. I actually dislike playing Pandora, mostly because I find her playstyle pretty boring. She does all the heavy lifting, and the rest of the crew just sits around.

Also, I did manage to play this stuff in the beta test, so I have some experience using them. At least in their non-finalized versions. By and large, that experience should carry over.

So, without further adieu, the new models:

Dreamer/Lord Chompy Bits – I love this master. I love the teleportation aspect to him, and the mass movement you can get with him. Being able to have a model on one side of the board suddenly disappear and reappear on the other side of the board is a nice surprise. Good for scenarios as well as you can move your models around as you need to. Lord Chompy Bits is insane in melee, but he’s fragile, so make sure you don’t try to strike the entire opposing army with him. Just hit the outlying pieces, and then disappear again. The Dreamer’s decently well defended if you’re careful with him.

Daydream – The totem for the Dreamer is pretty much what you’d want. He helps get you out of a bind if your burying/unburying mechanic needs a boost. Overall, not absolutely necessary for the Dreamer, but he’s a decent boost. He does have a 12” ranged attack, though, which is something we don’t generally get a lot of in Neverborn.

Collodi and Marionette – I admit I don’t really like our Henchman that much, but mostly because there’s a lack of support for him at the moment. On the other hand, his fluff is awesome and I can’t want to see what the model looks like. The special forces feels like it’s going to be a swarm if the Marionette and Wicked Doll are any indication.

Alp – Our cheap nightmare model to match our Terror Tots and our Sorrows. He’s a nice control piece, not doing a lot of damage but stacking up some nice slow effects.

Black Blood Shaman – The Nephilim sorcerer type. Makes growing a little easier by getting a bit more blood, and can use spells to boost your other Nephilim. Also, he’s a graverobber and can fuel his own spells with corpses as well as blood. I like him a lot, and look forward to trying him in Lilith lists.

Coppelius – This guy’s just fun on a bun. A solid 10 wound model (though 9 stones) who can cause Willpower checks whenever he steals someone’s eye. Which he does a lot. He has a spell that essentially creates a check or the opponent falls back. He gets an eye if he does that. Whenever he gets an eye, living models within 3” must WP check or fall back. If anyone loses a Moral Duel within 4” of him, they take 3 wounds in addition to falling back. A whole wonderful chain of terror. Oh, and he’s terrifying.

Insidious Madness – Another ranged attack for Neverborn, but again with little damage. More slow-stuff though. He can make people who are falling back have to continue to test against WP in order to rally rather than automatically doing it. Things need to succeed in WP duels when attacking it or they get penalties. It can target WP instead of DF with its weapon. All in all, a great model for Pandora to stack in more WP checks, and not that expensive either.

Lelu – One of the two Nephilim siblings, this guy’s essentially a vampire. He can bite you and heal what damage he deals. He deals 2 damage to a single model around him at the close phase, no resist. He’s got poisoned claws and is a really solid fighter.

Lilitu – The sister of the pair, she’s got Lure and 4” reach. She’s kinda the opposite of her brother. She can heal a single model that starts within 2” of her 2 wounds. She can summon a Lelu out of another Nephilim, similar to Lelu summoning another Lilitu out of another Nephilim (and some blood). They both start dying pretty quickly if there’s not their counterpart on the table.

Nekima, the Dark Sibling – Ah, Malifaux’s Revenge. Clocking in at 13 soulstones, I think we’ve found the most expensive model in the game, and man, she’s good. Not quite as much damage as a Mature, but more reach and more abilities to stack off your other Nephilim. Makes it easier to Grow and Mature, heals nearby Nephilim, carries a greatsword, is Instinctual and a Melee Expert, and has a trigger going off every time she hits with her weapon. Plus, the art is just really cool.

Stitched Together – These guys are a lot of fun. They’re a decent price, and can really help with card advantage if you’re willing to risk a little. Ditch a card and there’s a chance your opponent will have to ditch one while you draw two. Got an okay damage spell too. Probably better to use that than his melee weapon most times given he’s better at casting and has a better range with it.

Wicked Doll – A replacement for Voodoo Dolls if you like. Plus, it doesn’t ditch any Voodoo Dolls or other Wicked Dolls you’ve got out there if you summon it. Overall it’s hard to hit but easy to kill, and has a few fun tricks. It can summon more of itself if it kills anything, and can blow up to do a little damage to something near it. For a free summon, it’s probably worth it.

So that’s all I have for the moment. I’d love to hear if anyone else has any thoughts on these guys.

Three Computer Games

I've been having a blast with Mass Effect 2 recently, and got to thinking about which of my three more recent roleplaying games I liked the most. So here are the contestants:


Fallout 3 - This was the first one I played recently. A post-apocalyptic world, sandbox-style game. Great theme, great graphics, and all around good time. Have to stop an evil massive group and figure out a way to help bring life back to the DC region.


Dragon Age - Next came the Dragon Age series. Classic fantasy setting with a wide-open character creation. You can move through a very vivid storyline making choices that will determine things like who is king, all while fighting massive dragons in a huge war against evil.


Mass Effect 2 - The most recent one on the block. I realize I'm about a half a year behind on this one, but I figured I'd try a sci-fi bend to the roleplaying game, and I'm glad I did. Large cast of characters, learning all about their back stories, all while dealing with a sci-fi/horror/conspiracy plot that keeps you on your toes.

So which is best? Well, each one has their own benefits and drawbacks.

Genre. What can I say? I love post-apocalyptic worlds. They're dismal, depressing, and all around good fun. I'd give the nod to Fallout 3 here. When it comes to Sci Fi or Fantasy, I'm really pretty flexible. I like them both at different times. Once I've played enough fantasy, I want a switch, and vice versa. I can't really favor either one over the other.

Gameplay. All three games are so vastly different here. Fallout 3 is a pure first person shooter. Dragon Age is a squad-based tactical battle map. Mass Effect is a combination of the two, controlling your squad as you go through a shooter-style game. Overall, I liked Dragon Age the best with Mass Effect 2 coming in second. I guess I just like the tactical gameplay more in the long run.

Main Storyline. Okay, here's there's really no contest. Mass Effect 2 takes it easily. Part of this could be the freshness of the game, but I don't think that's it at all. There are tons of sidequests, and each time the main story advances, it feels right and escalates. I see twists and turns blindsiding me all the time. Dragon Age comes in second here, with Fallout 3 taking the last place.

Side Storylines. Again, no contest, though this time Fallout 3 takes first with Mass Effect 2 sitting in second. I'm counting all the side missions for each character as "side storylines" since you technically do not need to complete them to continue. Though why wouldn't you want to?

Enemies. It's a tough one to call here. If I'm talking about single enemies, it's hard to talk trash about a dragon. If I'm talking about massed enemies, I think the ones from Fallout 3 will win out. I'll just call it a draw there and put Mass Effect at the end.

Overall. Well, sitting back and taking stock of the three games, I'm going to have to rank them as such:

Fallout 3 takes first for a lot of reasons, though primarily for the theme and the sandbox way it plays. Everything about the game was great, from the music to the atmosphere. I really felt like I was there.

Mass Effect 2 takes second, this one mostly for the characters in the game. They each have such vast and deep stories to them that keeps me wanting to learn more about the world. Plus its main quest missions come across quite unsettling. From the derelict space ship to the attack on the colony, all good times.

Dragon Age takes third, and that should not be a knock on the game. All three of these are top shelf. Dragon Age has a great interface, being able to control an entire group of four very easily, all with vastly different abilities. The storyline is good, but I feel like the game lacks deep characters and interesting side missions.

Anywho, that's my take. Hope you enjoyed.

GenCon Goodies

So Dan and Ellen got back from GenCon yesterday and I rushed over after work to pick up my new goodies. Take a look:



That's the new Tannhauser rulebook, revised with all the goodies, on the left. Hopefully I'll get a chance to read through it all and it will all make sense and I'll be able to give it a whirl.

All the rest of the stuff in Malifaux-related. The new book on the right (which clocks in about 50 pages more than the first book), the Primordial Magic, Lord Chompy Bits - Nightmare Version (which is, evidently, about twice as big as the Mature Nephilim, the largest model for Malifaux I currently have), Miss Pack (the promo nurse), and the Jackalope. Good stuff all around! I'm very excited about putting them all together. Unfortunately, my glue dried up in my month-plus of non-use, so I need to get another thing of it.

Here's the Lord Chompy Bits all opened up. It came with two bags - one for the LCB parts, and the other for the Dreamer parts. Guess which is which.



Thanks Dan and Ellen for being my ninja shoppers this year! I appreciate it! Can't wait to try out the board games you guys got - especially that one with the hunters and shadows. That one sounds great!

A New Game

Yesterday on the way home from work, I decided to stop by Best Buy to pick up a new game. I had been running through my fifth or sixth game of Civ IV, which usually means it's time to pick up something different to play. I did a little research and narrowed down my choices to two: Mass Effect 2 or StarCraft 2.

In the end, I decided I was going to pick up ME2. I never really liked the original StarCraft that much, though I think that largely had to do with the fact that I was playing it back before I had played many computer games, and never really understood how it worked. Every game went the same: I got hosed by the rush. It got boring, so I put it away.

Besides, Mass Effect 2 sounded much more my type of game. A single-player story that you run through, meeting characters, and playing in a large world. You know, the Fallout 3, Dragon Age type of game.

It helped that, when I got to Best Buy, they had no more copies of StarCraft 2 that weren't the $100 massive box filled with stuff I didn't need.



So I broke out the game last night. I never played the first one, so I'm a little fuzzy on the plot, but I'm filling in details as I go through the story. And man, it's fun! I've only played through a couple of the basic missions so far, grabbing two new characters for my team, but already I can see just how many are out there for me to find. Even moreso than Dragon Age, I'm enjoying talking to the characters. The conversation options are much more dynamic.

Top that off with one of my favorite features. A lot of games try to push the "good" or "evil" track onto characters, letting their decisions influence what they can do in the game. ME2 takes it another step. During the course of the game, you gain "Paragon" and "Renegade" points based on your choices. Then, during cutscenes, depending on if you've got enough of the particular points saved up, you can cause the scene to move in a different direction by clicking your mouse when the option comes up.

So, for example, there's one part where I'm trying to help a guy get free of a bunch of thugs. We're perched up on a building and he sees several of them coming across the bridge. He hands me the sniper rifle so I can see through the scope. Normal cut scene is that I just look and hand it back to him. But if I have enough Renegade points, I can choose instead to squeeze the trigger and knock off one of the bigger bad guys before the fight starts.

Clearly I'm playing for Renegade at the moment. I've already decked a reported on television because I didn't like the interview, and stuck a knife in the back of a thug whose group I had infultrated when I learned he was trying to skew the fight against the side I was going to betray them to.

The fights are fun too. Pretty simple, all said and done, but it has a fun part where you can drop into cover and use stuff around you to keep hidden, lean out and fire. My favorite tactic so far is using my sniper rifle, keeping hidden, then popping out, taking aim and blowing someone's head off before ducking back into cover. Ha!

I'm hoping the game keeps up as fun as it has been so far. We'll see, though...