The Painted Thumb

This weekend there will be a Khet Tournament at Dragon's Lair-San Antonio to benefit the American Cancer Society-Relay For Life .  Khet is a chess-like game, but instead of capturing the opponents pieces by moving your piece to an occupied square, you use a small laser beam to target the enemy piece.  The units in play all have reflective mirrors that can redirect the laser beam away from friendly pieces or toward enemy pieces.  It requires some strategic thinking in a similar way that chess does. Most importantly, this is a charity tournament, so the proceeds go to the American Cancer Society and their efforts.  My wife and I were heavily involved in the ACS.  We participated by coordinating the local Relay for Life for three years. It was truly satisfying work, and I am glad to be able to help again.  My wife lost a very dear family member to cancer.  We recently lost one of our relay committee members to this horrible disease as well....

I finally got the chance to play some 'Lord of the Rings: Strategy Battle Game'. I bought a copy of the GW 'Fellowship of the Ring' boxed set at the Milleniumcon swap meet.  The game has been sitting on my shelf collecting dust ever since.  Little did I know there was a local contingent of players meeting at Ted's house.  I had no idea what an awesome game this is! We setup a 'King of the Hill' type scenario with Rohan forces vs. Uruk-Hai. Tony and I took the combined Uruk-Hai/Worg force setup the defense of the hill setup in the middle of the table. Ted and Brett took a combined warband of Rohan Riders and archers. A great time was had by all but for some odd reason Ted insisted on calling me 'Bob'? Ted wrote up an excellent After Action Report. I have posted it with permission. Well here goes and honesty first. The Setup Sat afternoon saw Tony, Mark (aka Bob), Mike and I gathered around a 4x6 table. Alphonso showed up a little l...

LSHM-San Antoni o held a one-day Warmaster Fantasy Battles Tournament at Dragon's Lair on Saturday, March 24th. We had four participants and several bystanders watching with rapt attention. The participants included: Mark R (Dark Elves), Dave (Chaos), Jake (High Elves w/Dragon), and Mark L (High Elves w/Cavalry). The tournament lasted two rounds with Mark R. defeating Jake's High Elves and Dave's Horde's of Chaos to take the Championship award. Warmaster is an older game but many players have fond memories of it. LSHM-San Antonio plans to hold more Warmaster events so dust off those old armies. We would be happy to see you at the next event. Mark L's High Elves Chaos chariots pulled by Harpies   Jake's High Elf Dragon High Elf Eagles High Elves vs. Chaos Chaos vs. Dark Elves

This time of year everybody seems to have a tournament bracket for something. I was listening to the SiriusXM Pops channel and they announced an interesting programming scheme in honor of 'March Madness'. They have replaced the name of every team in the NCAA bracket with the name of a famous composer. When a composer "wins" a game they progress to the next round and the station plays a selection from that composer. Classical goodness! For the fans who want to follow the "Suite Sixteen" (har, har!), the station has used a great online tool called http://www.challonge.com . It's a free website that let's you create a tournament bracket for your own personal use. So, I used it to create the round robin Warmaster Tournament to be held this weekend. Each victory will get a player one point. Draws and losses count for zero points. If a player misses a game then the match counts as a draw. Since some of the players may not make it to the earlie...

Getting a bit behind on my blogging this week.  Spring break is always a weird time at my household.  We don't have any children so spring break is usually the biggest non-event of the year.  Nevertheless, we always find a way to be busy. Desert Scribe sent out another call for Starfleet Wars players to resolve the next engagement of the ' Chancellor ' campaign.  So, me and some of the LSHM guys from San Antonio made the short trip to the Scribe's place to play it out.  The game was over far too early, but that's how it goes in campaign games.  Not every battle will be a nicely balanced fight. Below are my photos of the event. Desert Scribe posted his photos and full AAR on his blog here .  Highly recommended! We started with a large convoy of transports, escorted by a large complement of Avarian ships. I commanded a flight of four Falcon-class cruisers and covered the right side of the battlespace. The enemy Valiant-class Dreadnought, m...

This week, I finished the first book in the "John Carter of Mars" series, titled "A Princess of Mars" by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Not a day too late either because this weekend is the opening of the big-budget Disney movie with the shortened title, "John Carter". I don't know why they shortenend the name by dropping the 'of Mars' part. Perhaps they were afraid the original title couldn't fit on the marquee? Who knows. So, about the book? Yes, well, the book was published in 1912 and written by Edgar Rice Burroughs, who is best known for writing the original Tarzan stories. However, Burroughs chose to write a very different story with 'John Carter of Mars' and introduced to the world the genre of 'epic space fantasy'. The book is the story of Burrough's fictional uncle John Carter, a Virginia gentleman (with the emphasis on the word 'gentleman') who passes away after a quiet but productive life. Uncle John...

Just as a test, I am embedding the Photosynth panoramas into my blog.  If it works and they amuse you, I will post more. 72 point HotT battle. Zoom in to see the Mouse Guard Starfleet Wars - Battle of Vertex Empire vs. Empire HotT Battle Joe's WWII Skirmish game played back in November. You really need to zoom in to see the figs.

At the regular, end of the month, Hordes of the Things night, we tried something different.  The participants were myself, Chip, Brian, Johnny R., and John G.  We had an odd number of players and were really eager to start playing, so, we setup an unusual 3-against-2 HotT battle.  Chip and Johnny R. took the short side with only two generals.  Me, Brian and John G. took the other side with three generals.  Both sides had 72 points total in the armies.  My side got one extra die for PIPs but oddly, we struggled through most of the battle. I took some panoramic pictures to show the massive 72-point battle lines.  Even with the panoramic photos, Brian's 'Mouse Guard' army, on the far right flank, didn't quite make it into the frame.  They were hard to photograph because, well...they're mice! My 'League of the Scarlet Falcon' marched down the center of the field. John G. commanded the purple Dark Elves on the left flank but couldn't make a brea...

Here are the details on the Warmaster tournament In cooperation with Lone Star Historical Miniatures – San Antonio, Will commence on: Saturday, March 24 th , 2012 between 11am-6pm at Dragon's Lair-San Antonio. We will be using 10mm Warmaster figures;   Armies to not exceed 1500 pts.;   Army lists must come from the updated rulebook or the official army lists Tournament will consist of three rounds.   Each round will last two hours and must meet a minimum of 5 turns.   Terrain will be provided but feel free to bring any terrain you might have.    Exception: no castles, fortifications or built up terrain please. Please RSVP via email to Holdfast at leroux@sbcglobal.net .   Hope to see you there!