Posted By RockoRobotics

The Tabletop Battlefield Presents The Recon Report

News Stories Covered

Most Recent Episode

Posted By RockoRobotics

Review of Monsterpocalypse by Privateer Press

Posted By RockoRobotics

G.U.A.R.D Battleforce

Posted By Semaj

Into the fires of battle, unto the anvil of war!

Posted By RockoRobotics

First Look at Monsterpocalypse By Privateer Press

Posted By RockoRobotics

Making Warhammer 40K Exceptionally Violent

Posted By Blazing_Pheonix

Knights of the Square Table

Posted By RockoRobotics

Avalon Hill has created a simple and clean set of rules to simulate World War II Squad combat. Too bad they decided to go with the "screw the customer" route by selling the game in blind boosters.

Though since the game is 15mm scale, you can play "Screw Avalon Hill" because 15mm World War II figures are commonly available.

If you are looking for a simple World War II game, try this one out, it will probably be worth the money for the starter set.

After having negative experiences with several collectible miniatures games, it's quite difficult for me to get excited about starting a new one. Monsterpocalypse seems to be an exception to this rule, but we will see how that goes next month. In the mean time, I was able to get a hold of a starter set for Avalon Hill's Axis and Allies collectible miniature game. While this game has not got me back on to the side of “collectible miniature games rule!”, there are quite a few nice things about this game.

The starter set comes with 10 pre-painted plastic figures. Four of the 10 figures are tanks and the rest are infantry. In terms of nationality, there are four German pieces, four American pieces, one Soviet tank, and one British tank. Two beautiful and effective maps provide ample space for small games. A quick start book will help explain the basics of combat while a complete rule book includes all of the rules for the game. Each of the 10 figures has a matching full color start card and a stat card for the Panzer IV tank can be found in the rule book. Dice and counters are also included in the box. Despite the number of items in the box, there simply isn't enough figures in the box to properly enjoy the game. Thats why in the pictures of the review, we are using Starcraft pieces to expand the game.

Collectible miniature games tend to have incredibly simple rules. In this case, the rules are simple and work quite well. The hex based maps allow for easy movement, quick range measurement, and effective line of sight checks. When it comes to combat, each card has a simple table which tells how many dice to roll for a given target type at a specified range. Unit damage is tracked with a set of simple tokens. There is a lot of dice rolling and many attacks will have little effect on the enemy, but once a solid it or two scored, tanks start dying quickly. To some extent, this probably accurately reflects tank combat because an attack on a tank which either breech the armor or bounce off. Rules for aircraft support are included, but there are no aircraft included to test these rules. Another knock on the starter set game play is that the two sides are not balanced. The early war Panzer III tank included in the starter set cannot stand against the more powerful Allied tanks. Though allowing the German player to use the Panzer IV stat card found in the rule book should make things more balanced.

Axis and Allies is distributed in five figure blind boosters which retail for around $10 to $11. Though I say screw Avalon Hill and their blind booster system. Axis and Allies figures are in 15mm scale.(Though the package says “Now with Bigger Tanks, so maybe the tanks are not quite 15mm). 15mm World War II figures are commonly used in other games such as Flames of War. Just look on e-bay for the stat cards you want and then purchase the figures from another source. But if you really want to know about the figures for this game, they are on par with other collectible miniature games. The tanks have a basic coat of paint with a wash or two applied. The infantry have average paint jobs as some of the colors are a little sloppy. I didn't have any problems quality-wise with any of my figures.

When purchasing this game, don't look at it as if you are buying into another collectible miniatures game. Due the availability of 15mm World War II figures, think of it as more of a traditional game system. Avalon Hill has a quick playing and clean set of rules here. If you want a simple World War II theme game, try this one out.

Review of Axis and Allies Collectible Miniatures Game

Posted By RockoRobotics

As Wizkids support for Mechwarrior dries up, local player groups will pick up the slack and continue to carry the game. The problem that we will encounter is that the local groups will modify and adapt the rules to their liking. In order to allow players to move from group to group these rule changes need to be accessible to all players. My goal is to collect as many rule sets as possible and make them available here.

If you want to contribute, either send me a your rules, or better yet, post a page here on the Army Showcase.

MechWarrior House Rules Project

Posted By Ivarr

First, thanks to Bolter and Chainsword for the marine painter that made the image above.

This army will showcase the wonderful models from the new Assault on Black Reach boxed set. With the flexibility of combat squads, this army has the potential of having 12 scoring units for objective missions while only presenting 10 points for Annihlation missions.

Obviously, the lack of armor/mobility could be a problem, however, there are 91 marines in the army which should make up for mobility with volume of fire and good armor.

Black Widows

Posted By RockoRobotics

MechWarrior - Life After Wizkids Prize Support

Posted By Handbag

Short ranged firefighting.

More to come.

Salamanders Promethean Guard

Posted By RockoRobotics

WARMACHINE Assassins Multiplayer Game

Posted By r4r2d

jace

Posted By RockoRobotics

Is Privateer Press Learning From the Past?

Posted By RockoRobotics

Anyone who plays miniature games will agree that most figures are expensive. This can cause a dilemma for many players because they don't want to purchase a figure which they may end up hating.

This is where proxy figures come in. Proxy figures are something that stands in for a real figure. This way, a player can get a feel for a figure and be able to make a more informed purchasing decision. This page demonstrates how to make simple proxy figures for the game WARMACHINE.

Building Proxy Figures for WARMACHINE

Posted By Moriar

Dante's Task Force

Posted By RockoRobotics

While I would like to believe that the Tau have enough firepower to keep our enemies from reaching our front lines, the reality is that eventaully someone is going to get close. This team is designed to work well in close combat. No weapon has a greater range then 18" and several of the squads can perform decent in Close Combat. The one thing I am not too sure about is how the twin linked burst cannons will perform. Though Twin linked BS 4 shots gives each shot an 88% chance of hitting.

Tau Forest Tigers - Close Support Team

Posted By CyberMurph

Posted By CMDRJeff

Mighty Men

Posted By Lord_Lucius

As far as the imperium knows the Angels of Caliban are a succesor chapter of the Dark Angels. The truth however stems back to the end of the Horus Heresy and the Dark Angels terrible secret.

I am now done working on a Baneblade,M new command squad and Master and have started my Macharius Vulcan Tank,and Devastator squad
I will hopefully have a site up for my necrons soon as well.

ANGELS OF CALIBAN'S 3RD COMPANY

Posted By RockoRobotics

With 5th Edition 40K, I broke the Forest Tigers up into a core 1000 point squad and a number of 500 point teams which can be attached to the primary core squad. This team is designed to bring lots of heavy firepower to the Forest Tigers. In order to use this team, the two Broadsides in the core squad must be merged as the two Hammerheads here fill out the remaining Heavy Support choices.

The Railhead will engage and destroy enemy vehicles while the Ion head and Death Rains will take on the more lightly armored units.

The Core Squad of the Forest Tigers

Tau Forest Tigers - Heavy Support Team

Posted By ian00107

Cadian 38'th & the Templar Exemplars

Posted By clansittingducks

Warhamster 40K

Posted By puredistortion

WFB - Orcs and Goblins