Monday, July 18, 2011

trying minis again

Every time I go to my friendly local game store for game night I do a quick scan of the used games section before I sit down to set up the evening's scenario.  This week I spotted a copy of the Age of Mythology boardgame for only 25 bucks.  Upon inspection I discovered it was opened but unpunched.  I have no interest in playing the game per se, but it comes with a metric crapload of vaguely 1:72 figures, including a bunch of monsters.  And all of them are pristine on the sprue.  I already own a couple of boxes of medieval knightly types, so I think I'm going to get serious about trying some dungeoncrawlery in miniature.  I'm not much of a figure painter, but I've long wanted to try the dipping method.

Someone on the OSR blogosphere uses Jenga blocks for dungeon walls, but I can't remember who at the moment.  That strikes me as a good middle ground between flat terrain drawn on the map and the fullblown Dwarven Forge/Hirst Models route.

11 comments:

  1. I've used a black and grey, flat set of place mats that had a one inch grid on them with Jenga blocks to make the ruins for Hollow's Last Hope (twice) which was fun.

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  2. This is the good stuff for dipping minis: Army Painter Quickshade.

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  3. If you have any Half Price Books stores in your area, a lot of them are selling new copies of "Beowulf: The Movie Boardgame" for five bucks - it comes with 40 pretty decent looking miniatures. I think they are clos to 15mm or so...

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  4. Whoa, thanks for the dipping link. My armies may indeed someday get painted!

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  5. thanks for the dipping link.i like your blog.

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  6. Jim has a post re: Jenga: http://carjackedseraphim.blogspot.com/2011/06/mapping-with-jenga-blocks.html

    I've also used them in the past: http://www.welshpiper.com/chimera-rpg-dev-5/

    WV: "cocatick" which is silicon-eating arachnid whose gaze turns victims to stone.

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  7. I have a love/hate relationship with minis. Sometimes I love what they add, other times I hate how they limit me and steer the player's imaginations a certain way. Try finding a mini for a 3-headed gorgon or a spidergoat, for example.

    That being said, someone needs to make some inexpensive dungeon legos. I imagine them like Duplos but with dungeon brick patterns on them. I would buy.

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  8. @Aplus: Second that suggestion.

    Added bonus: check out the croc being fed a Duplo steak here: http://duplo.lego.com/en-us/products/default.aspx#5634

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  9. Dominos make reasonable dungeon walls and I've used them over the years to good effect. They're certainly cheap as chips. This past weekend when I ran 0E for my sons and nephews (average age about 9), we used an oversized chessboard matt and dominos to play out Dyson's Delve. worked just fine.

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  10. Jenga blocks are a good idea. I actually used dominos myself, back when I first got my Moldvay Basic Set and made my first attempts at playing.

    I was pretty negative on minis for a while, but I’ve started using them again on occasion. (Well, actually, pawns or paper minis.) But I’m making an effort to keep away from playing like a skirmish wargame and just use them as visual aids.

    (Well, except for the fact that I’m currently trying or retrying a bunch of systems, and I prefer to try to play such games fairly by-the-book for a bit.)

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  11. One of my players owns a few sets of heroscape and we've used them on occasion for battles outside of dungeons.

    I tell them the basic terrain layout and let them do the legwork.
    From my point of view the players get a lot more into it when they're the ones building the landscape one green, brown, or grey hex at a time.

    Personally I've always been a fan of miniatures, not for the tactical combat but mainly for the interesting mix the players choose as their avatars.
    Most recently the party consisted of Spartacus, a Valkyrie, A clone trooper, and Spiderman oh my!

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