Damn you! Deadzone Kickstarter

For some reason I've just pledged for the Deadzone Kickstarter from Mantic and I'm not too sure why. I've had a couple of looks at this previously but it didn't really grab me. I think what's happened is a combination of "Ohh! Shiny" and "that looks like a really good deal".

So what happened? Well Beasts of War had a banner up saying 'ending now' so I clicked to take a look at how things were going. What grabbed me was their rather clever marketing with the 'Optimum Payload' banner. I had a look at it and it seemed like a really good deal. You get five faction starter sets, nine of their terrain sprues, the 2'x2' gaming mat, as well as the rules, dice, counters, artwork, e-books and various other freebies all for $150 (about £100). Given that the starter sets as addons cost $35 each your getting $175 worth of figures for $150 plus the terrain, game mat etc so you're probably getting everything at about half the retail price.

I figured I could keep a couple of starter sets and the rest of the stuff and sell the other three sets making the whole thing even cheaper. (It never ceases to amaze me how we wargamers manage to justify our random purchases.)

Anyway here's a graphic of  the pledge level I chose.

'All Quiet on the Martian Front' KickStarter

I'm starting to hate KickStarter. Don't get me wrong I think it's a great idea and you can get some great deals. But it keeps siphoning money out of my wallet. So far this year I've backed Commission Figurines and Heroes of Normandie. Now 'All Quiet on the Martian Front' is calling to me.

The game is based on H G Wells 'War of the Worlds' but set a few years after the book. I like the look of the models particularly the Martians but I was put off by the added cost of VAT and import duties as it was coming from America. But now the bastards have done a deal with Renedra to ship from the UK so no extra VAT or import duties.

The deals on offer are pretty good. I'm looking at either the Deluxe Invasion or Tank Major pledges, both are less than half the retail price. Plus you get a bunch of freebies making it even better value. They've also teased more forces so I may wait to see what they look like before pledging.

My only other concern is the rules. What's available so far seems a little simplistic but they aren't finished yet and being from Priestley and Calvatore they have decent credentials so fingers crossed they'll be ok. Sadly release date for all these goodies is Dec 2013 so a long time to wait. I'll post an update if and when I commit to a pledge.

I get lucky with Wargaming Girl!

Sorry Tamsin, but I couldn't resist! Perhaps I should clarify things. Last night she published the result of of her first prize draw and I won! Soon to be winging it's way to me is a box of Warlord's 28mm British Infantry for Bolt Action, thanks Tamsin.

The prize what I won.

This looks to be an interesting box with lots of options like Piat's, sniper rifles, smg's etc so it'll probably take me ages to decide what I want to build. I'm hoping I can make a 500 pt force out of this box but I think I'll fall short. At least I'll be able to use my Churchill with them, even though it does have Rusian markings. I'll do a review of the set when it arrives and probably at least one more on my force choices and points total.

Wargaming Girl's Prize Draw

Time for amother quick plug of the Prize Draw over on the Wargaming Girl's Blog. Tamsin has made the 100,000 hit mark on her blog. So she's doing a grand celebratory give-away this week. Today's prize is a box of 28mm plastic Spartans from Warlord Games. I've already put my name in the hat for this prize and all you need to do to take part is become a follower of her Blog and leave a comment.

By Fire & Sword: Swedish Skirmish set update

I posted a couple of weeks ago about the casting issues I had with the Swedish Skirmish set and then about how Wargamer.pl had got in touch and were going to send me a replacement set. Well now the replacement set has arrived and the quality of the castings is great and there's none of the problems I had with the original set. It did take almost two weeks to arrive and I was getting a little worried but out of the blue they e-mailed me to see if it had arrived yet which I thought was good customer service and anyway it arrived the next morning. Overall I'm happy and will be buying more figures from them, probably a Cossack skirmish set but I'm going to wait for the rules to come out to make sure I like them before investing more heavily.

Wargaming Girl's Prize Draw

Time for amother quick plug of the Prize Draw over on the Wargaming Girl's Blog. Tamsin has made the 100,000 hit mark on her blog. So she's doing a grand celebratory give-away this week. Today's prize is a box of 28mm plastic Royalist Infantry Infantry from Warlord Games. I've already put my name in the hat for this prize and all you need to do to take part is become a follower of her Blog and leave a comment.

Wargaming Girl's Prize Draw

Time for a quick plug of the Prize Draw over on the Wargaming Girl's Blog. Tamsin has made the 100,000 hit mark on her blog. So she's doing a grand celebratory give-away this week.

Over the next 5 days she'll be drawing for 5 prizes and today's prize is a box of 28mm plastic WWII Late War British and Commonwealth Infantry from Warlord Games. I've already put my name in the hat for this prize and all you need to do to take part is become a follower of her Blog and leave a comment.

Photographs from the American Civil War 2

Here are the next batch of photos. Again click on the pictures to get the full size image.

I wonder if the slope actually deflected enemy shot?

That's a nasty pile of grape shot!

Are they dead or just sleeping?

Clearing up after the battle

Those are some serious dents in the armour!

Photographs from the American Civil War

This isn't my usual type of post but I felt many of you might appreciate it. I received these photos from a friend and was surprised at how powerful the images were and how they made me think. There were over 120 photos in total and these are just a few of them, I'll post some more later this week. To get the full effect you need to click on the pictures to make them full size to see the detail.

I never really appreciated the size of these ships till I saw this photo

I wonder how the barrel got broken?

Hard to read but the shop sign says 'Price, Birch & Co. Dealers in Slaves'

I think this is Washington with the Capitol being built in the background.

Without the clothes to give it away this could be a WW2 scene

Swedish Skirmish set problems fixed

Just a quick update. 

Since my last post, about the quality of the castings in the 'By Fire & Sword' skirmish set I bought, the manufacturer has been in touch with me and is going to send me a replacement set. So you have to say that's excellent customer service. I'll do another review when they arrive.

Quick Review: Swedish Skirmish set for 'By Fire & Sword'

UPDATE 19/5/2013: Problems mentioned below now fixed and I give the set 9/10

My eagerly awaited Swedish skirmish set for 'By Fire & Sword' arrived from Nothstar yesterday morning so as promised here's a quick review.

The models come in a colourful box with a large photo of the box's contents on the cover. The rear of the box has a list of the contents with some nice historical background for the units it contains.

Inside the box are two cardboard boxes containing the figures separated into plastic bags with foam padding top and bottom.

The set includes the figures, nice pre-cut metal bases and a sheet of flags. Everything you need to get going. I particularly liked the separate brass spear/lance for the standard bearer as it's top is pre-ground to a nice shiny point.

The figures themselves are ok. There's a nice mix of figure poses and horses and the detail is about the same standard as Essex miniatures. But, and it's a big but, every figure had a heavy mould line round it and I mean every figure. I've been buying figures for nearly fifty years and these have to be the worst batch I've ever had. We've all had the odd figure in a batch with excess flash or a thick mould line but not on every figure. The photos below give you some idea what I'm talking about. I don't know if all their figures are like this or the moulds need replacing or their quality control is just rubbish. But it's going to take me hours if not days to clean off the heavy mould lines on these figures. If I'd bought them locally I'd be returning them to the shop.

Overall I'm incredibly disappointed. I like the idea of the all-in-one pack and I think it's well executed with the flags and bases etc, and I'm looking forward to getting the rules which sound great. But the castings are just atrocious. If they were ok I'd give it 9/10 but as it is it's at best a 2/10. I was going to buy extra figures from them to bulk up my skirmish force to division and probably buy at least one more faction but I can't see that happening now, which is a shame. It looks like I'll be getting my figures from other manufacturers if I decide to expand on my forces.