When Imagination Fails

Some progress on Star Bright

With Ravenstar's new Mauridian star ships out, I started updating my Star Bright star ship fleet combat rules.  I liked some of the card based command/action systems out there, so I borrowed a few ideas and set to work.  Not complete yet, but the basic mechanics are fleshed out.

Update

I ran a playtest of the star ship rules I have been working on.  It was a faceoff between a Battlestar Galactica fleet and a mixed Earth/ISA/Deisho fleet.  I will post pictures and an update to the rules, now to be called Star Bright, soon.

Additionally, I found a pretty decent sent of free ancient naval rules called Fleet of Battle at Wargames Illustrated.  It uses a card based command/control system that factors in the quality of the crew and commander.  Looks like my triremes moved up on the painting priority list.

FFT NATO (UK) vs Soviet Game from a year ago

A year ago (cannot quite believe I am saying that) I finished enough of my UK moderns to run a decent sized Fistful of TOWs 2 game.  I have played or run a few Fistful of TOWs games, and it is my favorite rule set for this period, but, for this game, most people had not played the rules.  So it was a learning experience.

The scenario was a simple meeting engagement between two Soviet T80/BMP2 battalions and two companies of Challenger 1s with FV432 and Recon support.  It did not go well for the Soviets and if I run this scenario again, I will increase the size of the Soviet forces.

I created a slide show of the game.  The Flickr set is here.

Finally revised my star ship fleet combat rules

I finally revised my star ship fleet combat rules with the comments from the last playtest.  I added a few more changes to the mechanics and a number of additions as well.  Expanded the number of ships for which I have stats, though they will need to be revised as we play with them. 

I also wrote a summary sheet that players can use to keep track of their ships during a game.  Each ship is on a single line which is an idea I got from A Fistful of TOWs.

Here they are:

• Rules
• Ship Chart
• Player Summary Sheet

We will do another play test and then I will release it to a wider set of folks. I plan to keep it to two pages, if at all possible, though I may add one more page with my design notes and motivation.

Suggestions for a name for the game are most welcome.

Third play test of star ship rules

We ran another play test of the star ship rules for fleet sized games we are working on.  It was Deisho vs Whitestars.  The Deisho proved to be more powerful than they should have been, raining missiles and fighters on the Whitestars and losing far too few ships considering their technological level.

I put up the pictures I took of the game.  The Deisho ships haven't been fully detailed yet.

Lots of good feedback on improving the rules.  I'll post them once we have another playtest, but if you want to see them now, email info at whenimaginationfails dot org and I will send you the version with the latest edits when I add them.

Narn completed

I finished gluing together three of the painted Narn ships I had. 1 remaining G'Quan was partially primed.  My next ACTA game will probably be a meeting engagement of a the Bin'Tak and 2 G'Quan against 2 Brakiri Avioki and 1 or 2 Earth ships.

What is it about miniature game designers and poor graphic design

I just picked up a copy GHQ's post-WWII rules.  What is it about miniature game designers and poor graphic design?

Is is really so hard to make your section headings in a larger font size than the body text?  I know the headings are bolded, but that just isn't enough.  And why don't they use a San-serif font (i.e. like Helvetica or Arial) for the section headings and a Serif font for body text?  Why is the font so tiny and cramped?  Hasn't anyone ever heard of white space?

It is not just GHQ's rules.  Crossfire, which I like and think is incredibly imaginative approach to company and battalion scale games, does the same thing, as do others.

I know WRG used a similar style, but it is 20 years later and page layout has improved noticeably.  Actually, my 25 year old WRG moderns rules were laid out better. 

Come on game designers, lay out the rules so we can read them easily and find what we need!

Posted Pics of PsiCorp vs EA/ISA Game

I posted pictures of the PsiCorp vs EA/ISA Game we played today.  Start at the picture linked here and click the right most thumbnail picture in the "whenimaginationfails' photostream" set of pictures on the right. Keep clicking the right most thumbnail picture to cycle through the game. 

Suffice it to say that my EA / ISA forces got their clocks cleaned with the all three Earth ships either exploding or being reduced to no hull and crew.  After the Omega died in turn 4, the White Star opened a jump point in turn 5 and performed an All power to engines special action to get out and tell others what had happened.   I'll post a more detailed turn by turn account when I can.

Photos from Torvalus vs Shadows Game

I put up the two most interesting photos from my Torvalus vs Shadows game.

Torvalus had bet on the development of the younger species at GLrdBffVb.  When the Shadows started to interfere in the GLrdBffVbians development and affect the Torvalus' bets, the Torvalus sent their Dark Knives to enforce a blockade of GLrdBffVb.

The Shadows decided to force the issue and run the Torvalus blockade.

In the picture below, after the initial clash, the Dark Knife in the lower left used its super maneuverability to retreat and get a side shot on the ancient Shadow cruiser while the others moved to engage the other ship.

The view from the other ship:

We had to cut the game short and so we never found out who would win.  Unfortunately, I couldn't find my normal camera and had to rely on my cell phone camera instead.

A bit of trimming

Fall is here and with it the cold.  I am in the process of cleaning and trimming the miniatures I want to prime before it becomes too cold out doors to do it.  This includes:

• 1 Minbari Sharlin
• 2 Brakiri cruisers
• 4 Brakiri Halik frigates
• 2 Shadow Hunters
• 6 Shadow scouts
• 1 Shadow cruiser
• 8 stands of Shadow fighters
• 8 stands of Vorlon fighters
• 8 stands of Minbari Nial fighters
• 9 stands of Narn Frazi fighters
• a whole bunch of Mauridian & Deisho from Ravenstar's Cold Navy line.

With any luck, I'll also finish trimming 2 Shadow Omegas.  A bit under half way done so far.

Also, I ran a game where the Shadows try to run a Torvalus blockade.  We had to cut it short due unexpectedly.  I'll post the pictures I shot with my cell phone soon.