Scratchbuilding Tomorrow's War

Having recently been gripped by the terrific Ambush Alley ruleset Tomorrow's War I have started collecting figures and vehicles for this game in 20mm scale.

Since money unfortunately does matter, plastic 1/72 will form up the infantry and some creative scratchbuilding will provide most of the vehicles. In the coming months I will post several sub-projects in this context.

The first among these is the VTOL Black Mamba gunship derived from an old Revell 1/72 Apache Longbow kit. Rummaging through the bit box produced a few jet engines from long gone models and plasticard and putty made it into a menacing gunship.

Another example is some light artillery. Source materials here are plasticard and parts from the bit box, more specifically from a set of EM4 mechs I received from a friend some years ago. Here are the as yet unpainted models shown below.

The smaller Mech types from the EM4 sets turned out to be excellent figures for heavy power armour.

EM4 power armour with a Caesar 1/72 Special forces trooper

RHModels excellent 20mm Imperial Battle Troopers 

Next epsisode will deal with recreating VTOLs from the movie Avatar (or at least something similar) from ultra cheap plastic helicopter toys and some drinking cups and plasticard. Stay tuned!

Tomorrow's War at Ducosim

Last saturday we played a Tomorrow's War participation game at the Ducosim con in Amersfoort. Hosting the game proved a success and we played through the Bonaventure scneario from the TW rulebook three times. The Rebels scored one victory, the People's Republic two with a very narrow last one!

Here you see the table layout. The Rebels have exploded an IED under a patrolling Mech at the far crossing. Mission objective for both sides was to secure the Mech's data core; the Rebels by downloading it, the PR troopers by erasing it. I chose the scenario for its simple makeup and mission goals and the fact that you only play with infantry and one vehicle, enabling a basic use of the rules.

The crippled Mech, the mission objective for the game.

Some staged photo's before the game. I replaced the APC's from the original scenario with a Mech with basically the same stats to make the game look more futuristic.

Here the game starts. The People's Republic advances with their Mech in the front.

Rebels start at several "hot spots" on the table and will receive random reinforcements each turn. 

Here Rebels (very temporarily, as it turned out) secure the location of the downed Mech.

However, trouble is on its way......

PR Troopers use buildings and copses of trees for cover while advancing.

Rebels and the Mech race for the mission goal. The Rebels were occasionally equipped with RPG launchers that proved quit eeffective against the Mech, especially when they managed to maneuver in its back side, where its armour was weakest. In two games, the Mech was heavily damaged this way.

Not in the game (this time) was this gorgeous Arc Fleet grav tank by Critical Mass. More of my money will go that way, I'm afraid. Note that this bulky 15mm tank actually fits in quite well with the 20mm figures I use. 

The Tomahawk/Warhammer Mech is a plastic kit by Bandai. Figures are plastic 1/72 by Caesar, that makes a fantastic modern range of figures. The two smaller walkers in the upper picture are 15mm ones by Rebel Minis, but are also very well suited for 20mm.

Houses are papercraft houses by Tony. Should they look familiar, most of them come from his Falklands pack. Unfortunately Tony's houses are no longer available and I have understood he has had problems with his health. I express my appreciation for his very well done 20th century houses and hope his health has or at least will improve.

As said, we played three games with 2-4 players aged 8 (I think) to mid-(sorry Bob if I do you any injustice here ;o) fifties. The rules proved to be remarkably intuitive and most players picked them up within 10 minutes or so.

The funny thing was that next to me a bunch of youngsters (harrumph!) staged a beautiful 15mm TW game with some stunning scratch-built terrain of with I was stupid enough not to make any pictures. With two TW games on one day, we can safely assume that TW has hit the Dutch convention circuit!

Last but certainly not least many thanks to Gerco for providing most of the pictures, transport for the day as well as assistance during the game!  

Ducosim Announcement!

To all those of you in the Low Countries I would like to extend an invitation to attend Ducosim in Amersfoort! There will be a lot of nice people and interesting games and as if that isn't enough I will host a Tomorrow's War participation game for 2 to 4 players and for at least 3 games for the day.

No previous experience or knowledge of the rules (or indeed of wargames in general) is needed.

Below a sneek peek into what to expect:

Hello? Would you mind giving me a ride....?

DPRG troops checking out a downed combat walker.

Some Bonaventure Militiamen checking out the DPRG troops....



Mech Mayhem!

For the pas few years the kids next door had been standing with their noses against the glass of the showcase drooling over my toys and games. So finally they had me promise them a game. With Robots! Being 6 and 8 years old, I had to adapt the rules somewhat and so they had a lot of fun destroying my giant robots with their giant robots. Twice.

Here are some pictures:

High noon in Robotown!

The models used were Arii plastic kits (the Glaug/Marauder still has to receive its decals) and Revell 20mm moderns, reinforced with some plastic toys.