Dusting of the Warfare, SSU Steel Guard

Hey guys I am back with some freshly painted Dust Warfare minis and my thoughts on the state of Dust Warfare to share with you.  Dust Tactics and Warfare have been in the mini gaming news a lot recently.  Last July Fantasy Flight Games decide to discontinue distribution of Paolo Parente's Dust Tactics and their own spin off, Dust Warfare.  Thankfully Battlefront, makers of the superb 15mm WW2 warfare game Flames of War, decide to pick up distribution rights.

However Battlefront didn't realize until it was preparing to release its updated version of the Dust Tactics rules system that it had full rights to Dust Warfare, so they have been scrambling to keep the Warfare guys happy while pushing their revamped Dust Tactics rules.  One way they are doing this is by releasing Unit Cards for both Warfare and Tactics (they are similar to the ones used by games like Warmachine and Hordes from Privateer Press, with all the units stats, special rules, and points cost listed on each card; making for easy in game reference).  Besides the cards however, not much new stuff is on the horizon so far.  There is a new wave of models that has been slowly trickling out but the Warfare rules are still in the beta test phase (thankfully it is an open beta so we can use them in league games).

I recently finished up 3 new units, all of them from the beta test that I wanted to share with you today. The are from the beta-test SSU Steel Guard Platoon list.  Think of the Steel guard as a cross between 40k Terminators and Dreadnoughts, each suit holds an injured veteran soldier that has been able to return to the battlefield thanks to the Steel Guards Heavy Power Suits.  In game terms they are Type 4 Infantry, meaning most guns will only roll a couple of dice if any at all against them and with 4 Armor Save dice they are very hard to kill.

SSU Steel Guard Command Squad

SSU Steel Guard Assault Squad (the US and German markings on the next 2 squads are Kill Markers)

SSU Steel Guard Snipers Squad

So where does the uncertain status of Warfare leave me?  Well I am worried, but I think that it is going to be a good thing Battle Front has the Dust License. Yes they have screwed up when it comes to Warfare but at least we are getting unit cards (In February Hopefully) and though we will probably have to wait a while, I think Battle Front will continue to support Warfare.  What I really want is a v2 Rulebook with some slight tweaks and better explained rules interactions in a few places (which battlefront can definitely do) and Army Books for each of the factions that puts all the unit information and special rules in one place for each of the existing armies.  Will we get these? Definitely not any time soon, but it would be a good way to assert control over Warfare as a Battlefront brand.  We will have to see.

More as I have it...

Finally a free day: 2013 in Review

Wow the start of 2014 has been rough. I have been drunk, sick, working, sick, working, visiting family, sick, and out of town. All in the first 6 days of 2014.  But that is not important now, lets do a Year in Review for 2013.

At the start of 2013 I set up 10 goals (some with multiple parts and added a 11th which was my Total Painted Model count for the year) for myself to try to complete.  They were ambitious and while I did not complete all of them, they did push me much harder hobby wise this year than I have been in a while, and also allowed me to complete several armies  

Lets look at those 10 (11) goals one at a time and see how I did: (Green is complete, Yellow is incomplete but satisfactory, Red is a fail, and Blue is sold/incomplete-able)

2013 Goals Update!

I thought I would do a 2013 goal review now that we are halfway through the year.  You can see my goal status to the right of this article.  I keep that as up to date as I can.

To Sum up:

1. Dust Warfare -  I exceeded my goal for painting SSU and need 3 game to reach my playing goal.  No progress on Axis (though could change with new announced Wave 8 stuff today).  Sold my Allied Army in hopes of Vrill Aliens that were rumored for Gencon, not going to happen as it turns out.

2. 40K - Little to no progress here, I have paired down my collection to the point where I have a bunch of unpainted Chaos Marine stuff, my Howling Griffons, my 30K Project Death FW Army, and some misc stuff here and there.  To bad I didn't set this as just a GW army project as I am closing in on finishing up 1500pt of WFBs currently.

3. Warmachine/Hordes -  I am doing really well here.  I have just surpassed my painting goal for non-Warcasters/Warlocks this past weekend, I need two more Warcasters/Warlocks to reach my goal, and I have already played over double the number of games I originally targeted for the year.  Though not originally part of the goal structure, I have also painted 61pts and 1 warlock worth of Hordes models on Commission too.

4. Flames of War -  This one isn't going to be successful because as of the beginning of June I decide to sell off the rest of my FoW models since I had not played the game in over 2 years.

5. War & Conquest - I have made a good start on this project, but unfortunately WFB has knocked this project off my painting table for the foreseeable future.  W&C is getting played a bit at my LGS right now, but with out a painted army I haven't been up for playing.  At some point I want to put some time into building a 100 years war W&C army as my Saxon do not really fit time period wise with the other armies owned at the shop which are all from time periods before or after my Saxons.

6. Relic Knights - Unfortunately the release of the Relic Knights from kickstarter was delayed due to Manufacturing delays.  Hopefully we will see models this Fall.

7. Start Up To 4 New Games/Projects - I am currently at 3 new games/projects for this year, unfortunate they have all pretty much stalled out.  The first is a 15mm Fantasy game called Pride of Lions.  This was big at my LGS for a good while Winter/Spring.  I have a rule for myself, when a new game you are not 100% sold on starts up at the shop, wait 6 months and if it is still going strong, then get into it.  I was burned a few times back in 2010 and 2011 so have found this to be a good rule for me.  PoL reached the 6 month mark in March and I purchased an army but before I could get it built and painted PoL stopped being played in the shop.  Sigh.

The Second Project is 2 small 28mm Civil War armies, Union and Confederates (obviously), using perry plastic miniatures.  I did a lot of research and work on this project this spring, but it is currently on hiatus waiting on a gap in my painting queue to get painted up.

The 3rd project is 'In Her Majesties Name', a cool Victorian Steampunk game recently released by Osprey Publishing.  I'd say it is a bit early to say this game has stalled out as I see it more as a now and then kind of game, at least at my LGS.  I have one organization worth of models for it so far (the models are a mix of Spartan Legion & Incursion minis) and plan to get another one in the near future.  There is an organized Demo at a convention I am going to in the middle of July so hopefully this will generate some more desire to play.

8. Participate in 5 Tournaments or Paint Contests - Last year I fell short of my goal in this category, however this year I have already succeeded, playing in my 5th tournament at the beginning of June.  I am already schedule to participate in another Tournament this month, along with my first painting contest.  I think the big change from last year to this year is that I am no longer the Privateer Pressganger for my LGS, so I am able to play more this year as last year I would have been running the tournaments.

9. Reduce the Size of my Collection - I have already had great success this year, with over 1000 models/bases sold, traded, or given away this year.  I have also made over $1,200 in gift certificates at swap-meets this year to put back into my hobby endeavors.  The 3 big purchases I have made with that money this year are a Retribution army for Warmachine, a Circle army for Hordes, and my organization for 'In Her Majesties Name'.  I also have spent some of that money on WFB stuff.

10. Post 52 Blog posts over the course of the year -  I am falling behind on this one, with just 13 on the year so far (including this one).  I think I still have a shot of reaching my goal as I now am part of a blog/podcast group called the Beer Thralls.

11. Total Models painted this year - I set really high painting goals for myself this year and I quickly decided after posting my original list of 10 goals that I wanted to shoot for 1000 models painted this year.  Well I am doing pretty well so far with 492 models completed since January 1st.

More as I have it.

Intro to Dust Warfare! Part 2

Hey guys, Jay here with part 2 of an Intro to Dust Warfare.  Today we are going to talk about the phase of each round and the basic game mechanics.  I am also going to share with you some pics of some of the cool models for Dust Warfare that I own.  In the future I will be posting articles introducing models and units from all 3 of the factions (Yeah I own armies for all 3).  These articles will include pics of the models (sometime including pre-paint, work in progress, and/or finished paint jobs) in my collection.  I will also try to include some battle reports for both Dust Tactics (I will be playing in a 6 week league starting in late January) and Dust Warfare.  Now lets get on with the good stuff.

Intro to Dust Warfare! Part 1

Hey guys, I have a bit of news for you today.  Recently I was asked to start writing for a new blog on the What Would Patton Do? Network called Outpost Zero.  I will be doing a series of articles for them about a number of games including Dust Warfare, the new Iron Kingdoms RPG, and whatever other games I get motivated to write about.  While I highly encourage you to check out WWPD and Outpost Zero I will also be posting all the articles I write right here on 24 Hour Gamer Geek, just a week or so after they originally appear on Outpost Zero or any of the other Blogs in the WWPD Network.  My first article is part 1 of a multi-part series about Dust Warfare (and maybe some Dust Tactics too down the line).  Part 1 covers the back story or as I like to call it... the fluff to the Dust world.  Part 2, coming soon, goes more into the game mechanics of Dust Warfare.  Enjoy!

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Hey guys and welcome to my first post on the WWPD Network.  My name is Jay Powell but some of you may know me as HuronBH on the WWPD Forum or from around the web.  Starting with this post and moving on into the future I will be sharing with you insights and cool models, from the large variety of games that I play.  While the majority of my posts will show up here on Outpost Zero; I do also play Saga, Bolt Action, and occasionally Flames of War; so you may see posts from me occasionally in those sections as well.  Enough about me, now on to the topic at hand DUST WARFARE!

A New Beginning...

Hey guys and welcome to my new Blog, 24 Hour Gaming Geek.  This blog has been in planning for a while and I finally found some time this weekend (while recovering from a great Friday night!) to finally get it all put together.  So lets get too it, lots of stuff to talk about.

THE PURPOSE:

So why exactly am I starting a new blog?  Well that is a good question.  In the past I have always favored putting everything in one place.  When I wanted to go in a new direction or talk about something else I would just throw it up on my old Blog Blood & Blades, as it kept everything all in one place.  I have even recommend to others just to tweak their old blogs and modify them instead of starting all new ones.  So what drove me to chose a fresh start instead of just re-formatting and going from their?