Do You Even Kanban?

Posted by Comrade on February 2, 2023
Posted in: Posts. Tagged: , , . 4 Comments

As I prepared my workshop for 2023, I went through the annual ritual of clearing and resetting my kanban board. In doing so, I once again reflected on how helpful and nifty this minimalist tool has proven to be over the ~5 years I’ve been using it.

At its heart, a kanban board is a super simple way of visualizing a workflow or process. That’s it – all the rest, the breathless blog posts and TED talks and online courses on how to maximize your kanban – is probably just ASMR for process geeks. I prefer to embrace the simple, diamond-sharp core of the kanban board: help me see what I’m working on right now, what stage it’s at, and what’s coming up next.

As you can imagine, this approach works perfectly for painting and modeling. It’s already an inherently visual hobby, so a visual planning tool slots right into the mix. Several friends in my local game group are engineers of varying sorts, and they introduced me to the concept of a kanban board a few years ago.

Here’s a look at my current kanban board. Literally it’s a piece of paper with 4 columns, each with a label suggesting successive steps in the miniature painting process.

Each project, large or small, gets a sticky note. If it doesn’t have a sticky note, it’s not on my radar and probably won’t get done. As projects move forward, you simply move the sticky note to the next colum, showing progress toward completion. The columns also suggest the tasks required for that step in the process, which helps me match up my desired hobbying effort from day to day. If I’m in the mood to do some painting, I probably won’t pick up by dwarf ram riders, because as you can see in the photo above, they’re still in the “needs assembly” phase. On the flip side, if I decide I want those ram riders in a game 3 weeks from now, I can see that I’ll need to dedicate some effort to moving them along to completion.

This approach also aligns with my current hobby interests. I’m no longer painting entire armies in a single go – those days are behind me. Nowadays I’m more likely to tackle a small group of models from a Kickstarter, or a batch of long-delayed reinforcements for one of my existing armies. So my kanban board projects are almost always small morsels, relatively easy to pick up and work on, with a clear end point that allows me to finish them up and move on to something else.

Anyway, this approach really oils my gears in a weird, lizard-brain sort of way. I’m really not a terribly organized person – I sort of thrive amidst low-level chaos – but this simple sheet of paper helps a lot. I’ll probably redo the labels one of these days, because I literally came up with them in about 5 minutes when sketching this out in Word.

My favorite part of using my kanban board is the “complete” column. I know you’re probably supposed to remove finished projects shortly after they graduate to the “complete” column, but over the last few years I’ve kept them there for the entire year, slowly accumulating sticky notes like a stack of dried butterflies, giving me a deep sense of satisfaction as my hobby achievements pile up slowly over the year.

I’d like to hear from you, gentle reader. How do you organize your projects? What tools help keep you on task, while also leaving room for the creativity that is so essential to our hobby?

The Seekers of the Fractal Schematic

Posted by Comrade on January 24, 2023
Posted in: Posts. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . 3 Comments

Miniatures purists, take note – this post will give you fits. You have been warned!

Late last year, as our group began grumbling and muttering about some sort of grimdark Inq28-style skirmish campaign in 2023, I started putting the wheels on my latest warband. As a longtime Chaos player, I’ve always wanted to build a small collection of miniatures representing an insane, techno-heretical cult of the Machine God. In 40k, these guys would be called Dark Mechanicus.

But I didn’t want to just say “Adeptus Mechanicus, but bad guys.” I also wanted to blend religious zeal and biomechanical horror and see what comes out of that stew. I wanted to aim for a collection of miniatures that looked like the frantic pencil sketches that filled the margins of the old Rogue Trader rulebook.

The results were The Seekers of the Fractal Schematic. I wanted to give them an evocative and mysterious name that hints at some of the narrative territory I’d like to explore in our upcoming game. What is the Fractal Schematic, and why are they seeking it? Let’s find out together, etc. I’d say about half of these models already existed in my collection, and the other half I’ve painted up to match their brethren over the last few weeks.

In true Comrade’s Wargames fashion, there are at least 5 different manufacturers represented in this photo. Shall we name them? Obviously we have the Asphyxious figure from Warmachine’s Cryx faction. He’s a standout grimdark model that perfectly represents my image of what a fallen Mechanicus heretek might look like – swollen with power, bereft of humanity, just a few tattered scraps of flesh held together by a fearsome mechanical frame, eyes burning with vengeance. Of course, he’s got a new name. Now this figure is known as Rho-Terak, the Enslaver of Logic, leader of the Seekers of the Fractal Schematic.

There are two other Cryx models in the mix up there… a biomechanical serpent coiled atop a heap of scrap, and a stooped, withered chap hefting a ramshackle banner made of clinking vials or censers. In my headcanon, he’s the second-in-command, the executive officer, so to speak.

From there, we have two GW models – an old metal Chaos cultist and a metal Necromunda Redemptionist hefting an autorifle over his head. In the foreground we have a hunchbacked mutant from Mega Minis (which is a great source of Rogue Trader-inspired models). The little Roomba from hell is a terrifying monstrosity known as The Flesh Engine, and he’s a kitbash using pieces from Star Frontiers (!) and a head from Pig Iron Productions. The blood-spattered cyborg on the far right is from ThunderChild Miniatures (painted by sculptor Jaycee and gifted to me after I won a contest, what!).

I speedpainted up a few more generic cultist models to bolster the ranks a little bit. Every cult needs some fearless cannon fodder to sell their souls in a blaze of glory, right? Contrast paints did a lot of work here.

In the image below, the guy on the left with the pistol and axe is converted from a Frostgrave soldier model. (Oops, forgot to paint his base rim.) The guy on the right with the flamethrower is a monopose model from Ramshackle Games.

You can never have too many cultists! In the photo below, the guy on the far left with the axe and cluster of dynamite is another conversion from the Frostgrave soldier sprue. That kit is very flexible! All it takes is a couple sci-fi bits to drag a medieval-inspired model into the grim darkness of the 41st millenium.

The other two guys with assault rifles are from Pig Iron Productions, from their excellent Kolony Ferals range. I’ve got dozens of Kolony Ferals in my collection and they are some of my very favorite scrappy scavenger/cultist type models. Lots of gas masks, rebreathers, and creepy machinery poking out of necrotic flesh.

The two bruisers with clubs and shields in the photo below are from the Dark Age miniatures game. This is a super niche skirmish game based on Brom’s creepy fantasy/sci-fi art. Imagine that, a minis game inspired entirely by the work of one artist?! But here we are, and the models themselves a quite nice. These guys are from the Skarrd faction, and they’ve got a scrappy wastelands vibe with lots of twisted metal and weird cybernetics, not to mention assless chaps and exposed buttcheeks, and it all fits really well with my warband.

I absolutely love the challenge of combining miniature from many different manufacturers and sculptors to create a cohesive warband with a shared aesthetic. Nothing tickles me more than picking a figure like ol’ Asphyxious from Warmachine, giving him a new name and dropping him into a warband alongside a half dozen or more other distinct models from different makers. My goal as a painter and hobbyist is to create either a visual look or a narrative hook that ties all these models together and helps tell the stories that are swirling around in my head.

I’ll continue to build on the Seekers of the Fractal Schematic. My goal is to make each model fairly unique, so this won’t be a warband that I can use in games that require multiple squads of dudes, like Warhammer 40k. It will be, however, a great choice for skirmish games focused on individual models and small units. Stay tuned for more!

Apoc-Luck 2022: The Gathering Storm

Posted by Comrade on January 17, 2023
Posted in: Posts. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . 9 Comments

I’m back with a gameplay report for our December 2022 Apoc-Luck mega battle, featuring some stunning and dramatic photos. Recall from my previous post that we set out to do a large multiplayer game using Age of Fantasy. We rented out a local community center, gathered our armies large and small, and arrayed them for a glorious clash. The final tally put the combined points at roughly 15,000 per side, for a total of 30,000 points of toy soldiers on the table.

This post will share some incredible photos from the games themselves. I regret that I didn’t capture much of the turn-by-turn flow of the battles, as I was trying to both snap photos and pilot my chaos army to victory. In the later turns, I had to unfortunately step away for a phone call, which further inhibited my ability to capture the narrative flow.

The first game (The Twilight Forest) featured infantry-heavy armies maneuvering blocks of troops in a wooded glade. My chaos raiders, Paul’s orcs, and Rian’s chaos warriors faced off against John’s human peasant levies and Parker’s sneaky wood elves.

The second game (Blood in the Streets) was more of a “clash of the titans” affair, with lots of solo models and small units of larger miniatures smashing each other to pieces in the cobbled streets of a medieval village.

Here, in roughly chronological order, are pics from the first couple of turns of the first game (The Twilight Forest).

The Twilight Forest – Early Turns

Paul’s orcs looked fantastic together with Daniel’s loaner army (also orcs, also similarly painted).

My giant chaos army featured two (2) dragons, which swooped over the battlefield wreaking havoc.

My Putrid Blightkings led the way on the right flank, soaking up damage from skirmishers on the opposing side. Their advance paved the way for the bulk of the chaos infantry and support units.

Below you can see John’s human army marching to war under the House Begovic banner, along with a contingent of metal automatons.

Blood in the Streets – Early Turns

The photo below shows a closer look at Blood in the Streets, our second scenario which sprawled across a large battlefield dominated by a medieval village and some ruins on the periphery. The buildings are from Lawrence’s personal collection of Tabletop World pieces, and they are absolutely gorgeous – a real treat to play upon!

Lawrence’s Lizardmen raced onto the board and crashed headlong into the undead army helmed by Alex (Jim’s son, the drama!!) and Lawrence’s chaos daemons (composed almost exclusively of gigantic centerpiece models).

The Twilight Forest – Later Turns

The later turns saw the blocks of troops in the Twilight Forest crash perilously into each other. Skirmishers pelted the combatants with arrows and quarrels; dragons swooped over the battlefield breathing fire; and infantry hefted their spears to receive the charge. Epic and glorious in equal parts!

Paul’s orcs did a great job refusing the flank versus Parker’s wood elves. The elves took some early casualties and gave way, melting back into the forest as the orcs advanced.

Both my heavily armored chaos knights and John’s winged pegasus knights roamed the backfield, seeking a ripe target to receive their devastating charges. These units were strong, but fragile, operating more like a guided missile than a take-and-hold unit.

Blood in the Streets – Later Turns

The “big guys” clashed in a decisive battle in the medieval village. Dragons, zombies, dinosaurs, and more dragons sundered the earth with the force of their blows.

Endgame

Blood in the Streets reached its conclusion first – a decisive victory for the forces of darkness (Alex’s undead army and Lawrence’s chaos daemons).

I was focused primarily on the other battle (The Twilight Forest) which was also drawing to a close. We weren’t able to play quite as many turns as the other battle, due to a phone call that I received during the later turns that unfortunately pulled my attention away. But given the outcome of the game in the medieval village (a decisive win for the bad guys) it seemed clear that the forces of darkness would win the day.

Perhaps it’s fitting that the final photo of the game, shortly before we packed up, was a shot of Malathon Scar-wing, the great dragon of the north, swooping low over the battlefield to roast the terrified defenders.

Our 2022 Apoc-Luck game definitely pushed the boundaries of our gaming capabilities and delivered an epic tabletop spectacle. Playing a fantasy game (as opposed to Warhammer 40k) was a certainly a change, but a welcome one in my opinion. Age of Fantasy gave us a highly playable game with an easy-to-learn ruleset, even at a gigantic 30,000 point threshold.

Apoc-Luck 2022: Armies on Parade

Posted by Comrade on December 30, 2022
Posted in: Posts. Tagged: , , , , , , , . 2 Comments

Seasons greetings, gentle reader! It’s been a pleasure sharing another revolution around the Sun with you here on Comrade’s Wargames. This is the first of two blog posts about my club’s biggest annual event: Apoc-Luck!

If you’ve not heard about it before, Apoc-Luck is an extended game event paired with a pot luck dinner, where everyone brings a dish to share. Basically, you play a big game of something, and share a meal together as well. We’ve played out Apoc-Luck games in 2018, 2019, and 2021, so it’s been a rewarding tradition that has helped usher in the holidays.

This year we rented out the Girl Scout Center that has served us so well over the years. This is a large, clean, well-lit facility that is conveniently located two doors down from my home, which makes it easy to haul terrain and minis over.

In years past, our Apoc-Luck games have been Warhammer 40k, which has been fun and gave us all opportunities to paint and build big ol’ 40k armies.

This year we decided to do something different, so I planned a fantasy-themed big battle set in Üthdyn, our shared narrative campaign setting. We planned to use Age of Fantasy, the excellent and fast-playing ruleset from One Page Rules, to play out our epic game.

I’ll get to the actual gameplay in the next post. For this one, I wanted to share with you some photos of our battlefield setup, and some pics of the glorious armies that took to the field. Read on, gallant reader!

The Battlefield

We ended up setting up more than 20 linear feet of battlefield, split roughly evenly between a forested scrubland and a typical medieval city. The narrative and victory conditions were outlined in this game handout.

gathering-storm-handout-finalDownload

Players were assigned to two factions: the Forces of Darkness (representing everything savage and vile in the world of Üthdyn) and the Defenders of Dawn (the eponymous good guys and their bannermen). In addition to overall victory for their faction, the individual players had their own personal objectives to pursue (or ignore) on the battlefield. You can read more about those in the handout above.

With that preamble out of the way, let’s meet the combatants! Where possible I tried to capture each army in a single photo, although that certainly wasn’t possible for every player.

Patrick’s Chaos Army

Hey, it’s me! This is the brütal collection of marauders, thieves, and maggots that I’ve been calling my “little ‘c’ chaos army.” I’ve been working on it for several years. It started as what you might call a classic undivided chaos warband, but over the years I’ve mixed in some red-armored berzerkers (representing Khorne when used in the Warhammer universe; otherwise they are just blood-crazeed axemen) as well as some plague-wracked wretches (representing Nurgle when needed). But I tried to keep it suitably generic, so the units and models could be mixed and matched to play all of the glorious rulesets that we embrace here at Comrade’s Wargames.

John’s House Begovic

John has an unhealthy obsession with miserable, grubby humans in all games, so it made sense that he would bring an army swollen with foot infantry and peasant levies. He’s been working on this army for several years, and it’s a true delight to face on the battlefield.

Paul’s Swamp Orcs

Paul assembled a delightful army of the new Kruleboyz models, bringing not just his army but also some loaner models from fellow club member. Both armies were painted similarly, and they looked absolutely stunning on the battlefield together. Check out those swampy bases on Paul’s orcs!

Jim’s Lizardmen

Jim surprised us by showing up with a brand new Lizardmen army! Jim is known for painting armies with relatively muted color palettes, like Imperial Guard with their olive drab camouflage and armored vehicles. So it was a real treat to see him tackle a new, brightly colored army for a change.

Lawrence’s Daemons

Lawrence has always had a thing for gigantic centerpiece models, and Apoc-Luck always gave him a wonderful excuse to drag out all the gigantic models in his collection that didn’t normally hit the table in our smaller skirmish games. Here he brought his beautifully painted Nurgle Daemon army. And lest we forget — Lawrence also outdid himself by bringing a mac & cheese bar for us to graze on during the game. Thanks, Lawrence!

Mark’s Dragons

We weren’t quite sure what Mark was planning to bring to Apoc-Luck this year. All he would say was that it included dragons. Turns out, he built an entire army of dragons for this game, backed up by some Tzeentch-inspired infantry.

Alex’s Undead

Alex’s pre-game prep work went down to the wire … we’re told he was painting the bases of his models just a few hours before our game was set to commence! Regardless, he managed to get it all on the table by gametime, and it looked great!

Parker’s Wood Elves

This was another surprise — Parker had mentioned months ago that he was painting up “some elves” but we had no idea exactly how many he would turn up with. He ended up bringing a respectable and very beautifully painted force of forest guardians! They acquited themselves admirably on the battlefield, despite being pointy-eared leaf lovers.

Rian’s Orcs

Rian is new to our group and found out about this Apoc-Luck game a few short days before. In spite of the short notice, he mustered a nicely painted warband of hulking orcs and savage spellcasters for the game.

Stay Tuned for Part II…

So that’s a look at the armies that took part in this stunning tabletop spectacle. Check back soon for a photo-drenched post about the actual games, as near as I can remember them. Until then, I leave you with one more teaser photo of the carnage that unfolded…

Nightwatch: Slaughter at Bloodwater Canyon

Posted by Comrade on November 28, 2022
Posted in: Posts. Tagged: , , , , , , , . 7 Comments

Our Nightwatch campaign ratcheted up another notch at the game last month. This was our fourth session of our anticipated seven-mission Long Hunt, and the threat level was increasing as our heroes ventured further into the Hattendorf Border Marches.

Picking up where last session’s game left off, this game saw the children who had been rescued from a gruesome fate delivered safely to an abandoned minehead located inside Bloodwater Canyon. I’m sure that name is just a colorful local metaphor, right? And I’m certain, absolutely certain, that the mining site was closed down because its local mineral wealth had been extracted successfully. Not abandoned because the crew was dragged into the badlands and eaten alive. Right? Guys?

Anyway, the children were wisely left at the mine site while the heroes set up camp nearby. During the 20 minutes they were gone, however, a band of feral beastmen arrived atop the canyon ridge, war horns a-blaring and skin drums a-banging. It seems the abandoned minehead was not the sanctuary it seemed. To arms, hunters!

This game was an opportunity to use a giant piece of terrain that John had created months ago during the initial worldbuilding phase of our Nightwatch campaign. The canyon wall was placed along one edge of the battlefield to create an imposing physical feature for the beastmen to use as they swarmed into the mine site.

We put two of the four spawn points (from whence the bad guys would arrive each turn) behind the canyon ridge, and by the first turn, the bad guys started scaling the cliffs to menace and mangle the stalwart defenders!!

The heroes initially placed their defenders in the comparative cover of the mining site. They quickly realized that the sheer pace of arriving monsters meant they would be rapidly overwhelmed.

With steel in his hands and determination in his heart, Jim’s bladesman Sir Joshua climbed a ladder to the top of the canyon and stood on the ridge. There he met the marauders in single combat as the sun set and cast a fearsome silhouette against the rocky terrain below.

It was a shaping up to be a real bloodbath up on the gnarled ridgeline. And they just kept coming! Sir Joshua definitely had his hands full.

But this wasn’t the only spot where the beastmen were emerging! Two other spawn points were also located in the grim ruins to either side of the minehead. Per Nightwatch rules, we rolled randomly to select two of the four spawn points per turn to deploy the next batch of bad guys.

So the players had to wisely deploy their defenders to cover the approaches to the mining site. This meant plenty of action for Paul’s elf archer, Vince’s alchemist, Daniel’s wizard, and the various hirelings and henchmen who had been hired over the last few sessions!

By the second half of the game, the really bad guys started arriving — Terrors, in the parlance of Nightwatch. These bruisers are among the strongest monsters that the players will face in a typical Nightwatch campaign.

They emerged howling and snarling in the waning turns of the game, and their sheer brutality challenged the players, whose resources and resolve were in thin supply as the game neared its end stages.

By this point, the ridge was strewn with corpse markers, each one denoting a fallen foe. Nightwatch has several secondary missions that involve looting or harvesting bodies, so we were obliged to track the dead as they piled up. And piled up, and piled up. Poor Sir Joshua was knee deep in the dead by the end of the game!

Despite the absolute onslaught of vermin and terrors pouring into the canyon, the heroes held out — barely. If the tide of darkness had been any stronger, or if the defenders’ resolve had faltered just a bit they would surely have fallen. As it was, they beat the beastmen back, rescued the poor little kids, and spirited them away to maybe a slightly safer venue to rest and recuperate.

Nightwatch provided a great game and kept the tension high. You could see the players’ eyes get wide as the Terrors started arriving in the latter turns! But they kept their composure, worked as a team, and survived this onslaught. Future scenarios will not be so warm and gentle. Enjoy this win, hunters, for it may be your last!