Topics

31

The Shipyard / Armada Conversions

« on: November 16, 2021, 01:00:32 am »

I have been testing out different options before starting to assemble my Armada ships, and my first priority was to find out what I could add to set my fleets apart.  The scale on the ships is fluid, to be charitable, which is usually an issue for me, but the the skewing of the models is consistently more pronounced at the bow and stern which leaves the center as a good focus for conversion...



I have not yet seen anyone post additions of scale crew, so taking advantage of the open decks of the Orc Smasher, I estimated the local scale to be 1/300 and put together several poses of crew for the cannons.



After tacking them on in several different arrangements, I think their height is close enough to work and 8-10 on the deck of the final ship will be the final plan with a brighter color scheme so they can stand out against the rest of the model.  Next up will be figuring out how else I can integrate in more crew...

32

The Shipyard / ...and he never painted again...

« on: October 21, 2021, 11:22:28 pm »

I started my 25K Star Wars project as a New Year's resolution to start painting, and have finally made my original goal...


...one ship a day, every day, to reach 365 by the end of the year.  Including the fighter tokens, I am now past 365, and with 70 days to spare that I will need to finish out my storage for these, finalize the basing, and cover up the mistakes I saw while setting up the shot.

I was planning on sealing everything after the end, but there is no way that I can have them coated before the weather turns so the new plan is hope any issues with paint damage are minor until spring arrives.  But then again, quantity is always my choice over quality (see above) so I may not seal them at all.

33

News and Rumors / SW Armada Campaign: Hunting Season

« on: September 09, 2021, 07:31:42 pm »

Atomic Mass Games has opened up a three day campaign as part of their 2021 Ministravaganza event, Hunting Season, tying together Armada, Legion, and X-Wing.

https://www.atomicmassgames.com/huntingseason

The tracker for this campaign is not split among any of the existing factions for the games, but instead you choose whether to participate aligned as a Hunter or aligned as the Hunted.

For Armada, the campaign is set around free squadrons attempting to board a flagship, and for X-Wing the campaign allows free agent ships to be used in the game.  The unique part of the campaign is that for each system both players receive a campaign perk based on their chosen alignment, and a new perk is being released each of the three days.

34

News and Rumors / Armada Campaign: Fight for the Rift

« on: August 27, 2021, 02:36:23 pm »

Mantic has opened up their global campaign Halpi's Rift, and while it is mainly focused on Kings of War, I was glad to see that they have included Armada in the campaign tracker.

https://www.kow-campaign.manticgames.com/campaign/fight-for-the-rift/

There are four sea regions included from their new world map, and the campaign supports reports from six fleets (five current, and one pre-release) over five different scenarios.  Even though there are twenty base scenarios now, the first five they selected for the campaign are all different, scoring by enemies destroyed, damage to a neutral target, proximity, pickups, and target survival.

I am not prepared to participate in this campaign, but am definitely looking forward to the next one.

35

News and Rumors / Star Wars Armada 2022 and beyond...

« on: August 20, 2021, 11:47:34 pm »

Atomic Mass Games released the following today on the future of Armada...

As we move into 2022 and beyond, we are excited to continue support of Star Wars: Armada by prioritizing reprints of existing products and through Organized Play initiatives.  However, we currently do not have any new Armada products in development.  We will provide additional information as it becomes available.

...I would have posted a link, but Atomic Mass only posted an image of the message on social media.  There still isn't any dedicated page on any of the legacy Star Wars games they were assigned on their site, besides the press releases, but I am positive it is only a matter of time.  It hasn't even been 10 months since the first announcement and these things take time, apparently.

36

Naval Video Game Discussion / Rebel Galaxy

« on: August 13, 2021, 09:23:51 pm »

Rebel Galaxy is free this week through the Epic Games store...

Fly a corvette through an open system, delivering cargo, escorting merchants, mining asteroids, and collecting bounties on pirates that coincidentally make up 30% of the population apparently.  The mission system and game economy tied to station nodes is based off Privateer from the 90s but with current high definition graphics.

The world is 2.5D instead of 3D with ships being assigned to slightly higher or lower planes as they come into close proximity, and the controls are much more simplified than a true space simulator.  Each ship has multiple weapon systems with an AI taking on firing whichever system the player is not currently controlling, and upgrades can be purchased that improve the targeting.

Missions have assigned difficulty / risks at the acceptance screen, and as you approach encounters a color coded danger rating comes up on the screen.  The game's definition of moderate risk is not what I would expect, but that is just at an hour in, and with the introductory ship there is a good chance of escaping an overly hostile encounter.  After being destroyed, you reset back at the last station docked at, and there is the option to drop any non-plot missions that are too difficult for your current ship.

37

Misc. Naval Games / Kings of War : Armada Core Rules

« on: July 27, 2021, 11:06:56 pm »

Mantic does have free learn to play rules available, but they are designed to only be a supplement to an initial teaching game, so I thought I would post a breakdown on the contents of the core rulebook for Armada to serve a comparison to the first expansion…

Kings of War Armada – 96 pages – 5060469666419

Introduction, Credits, Components – 7 pages

Background – 39 pages
Flavor text and narratives make up 17 pages to build up the setting of Pannithor, and another 22 pages of composite art, line art, and photos can also serve as inspiration.  Those full pages are apart from the smaller pieces of art that are spread throughout the rest of the book.

Rules – 22 pages
The core rules include multiple diagrams and are much more detailed than the 5 free to download starter pages, also included are the advanced rules for wind and terrain.

Fleet Building – 3 pages
The guidelines for building a fleet are included along with the optional upgrade tables to fill out remaining points.

Scenarios – 11 pages
Ten scenarios are included along with setup diagrams.  There are also alternative map setups designed for these scenarios available as a free download.

Fleet Previews – 12 pages
At the time of printing only the two starter fleets were available, but previews of all four of the first fleets are included along with renders of the ships that were not released at that point.

Reference Sheets – 2 pages

I will put up a breakdown on the contents of Seas Aflame as soon as my copy arrives.  (50)

38

News and Rumors / Spruance Leader from DVG

« on: June 28, 2021, 09:10:40 pm »

Just saw this on Kickstarter when I was getting another Battletech delay notification...  Spruance Leader is Dan Verssen Games' latest entry in the Hornet Leader / Phantom Leader series setting a solitaire player in charge of a task force in the North Atlantic during the Cold War.  The enemies cover air, surface, and underwater targets in the missions across the campaign, and it looks like the inclusion of subs really expands the detection phase compared to their earlier games.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/danverssengames/dvg-spruance-leader

My only other experience with a solitaire fleet scale game was Astra Titanus, which was abusively difficult, and after a scan of the draft rules they have put up on the Kickstarter, this seems much more approachable as each mission is scored against a goal instead of pass / fail like AT.

39

Modeling Q&A / Painting plans

« on: March 26, 2021, 09:31:53 pm »

Just wondering how everyone plans out their projects; single ships painted individually from start to finish, or in small groups / squadrons / units?  Do you try to complete a model in a single session, or set blocks of time to paint?

Personally, I end up picking a color and painting that on every primed model that it will appear on, across units, across factions, across games.  Which I know is probably the least efficient approach to painting possible as I look at a couple of dozen works in progress...

40

The Shipyard / Star Wars first pass

« on: February 12, 2021, 04:36:21 pm »

As a New Year's resolution I wanted to finally start working through all of my unpainted ships, and here is the first pass on the first group.


These are 1:25000 scale Venators that are slightly under two inches.

41

News and Rumors / FFG Star Wars updates

« on: November 16, 2020, 09:24:49 pm »

I just saw a press release regarding SW Armada, SW Legion, and X-Wing all being moved from Fantasy Flight over to Atomic Mass, another subsidiary studio of Asmodee.

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2020/11/16/an-important-star-wars-announcement/

Atomic Mass Games was founded a little over a year ago by designers leaving Privateer Press (Warmachine) and their first product is Marvel Crisis Protocol, a skirmish game set in the Marvel Universe.  I don't know how the new management of the Star Wars lines will unfold as far as established rules or organized play go, but Atomic Mass has had a steady release schedule of new models since their founding, and has had their base ruleset downloadable from the start, which should both be positives.

Also, the majority of their current product line is unpainted / unassembled resin pieces that falls right in line with the production of SW Legion so I am hoping there may be a chance for more SW Armada expansions if they are not restricted to prepaints only.

42

Roll Call / Hi everyone!

« on: February 18, 2019, 10:45:38 pm »

I have been listening to the podcast since 2016, and thought it was time to join the forum for any small contribution I could make.

Collecting, converting, and painting is my main focus as my current schedule does not allow much time for actually playing.  I am working my way through everything I frantically bought for Halo Fleet Battles and Firestorm Armada in the days after Spartan sailed to the west...

Thank you to all, and looking forward to a great new year of naval gaming!

Kelly