All That Remains at IPMS Thornbury

A much delayed post about ATR at IPMS Thornbury last month.

Real life and other painting priorities are delaying work on the game for now. You can check out the other work and more pics from Thornbury on my main blog.

Have some pics!

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Sebastian

Setup

 

Note: Do not leave cavalry exposed, apply directly to enemy

Penants

A quick update, I've given some pennants to The Flying Squad.

So what now?

Things might be a bit quieter here than they were pre-Salute, but there's still plenty to do.

Painting wise I'm going to be focusing on other projects for a while, mostly Flames of War, 6mm modern, other Post apocalyptic stuff and misc. RPG models, but I'll get back to the coalition after the break. I've got extra figures for the Cartel, to bulk out their squad and I want to put together a second rifle squad for the Manchester Guard - after finding a less labour intensive manufacture process of course!

I also want to expand the HQ selection for the guard.I've got a flag for a standard bearer all lined up, and one of the takeaways I forgot to mention in the last post is that you need a robust command structure or a good counter-sniper setup. Otherwise your going to have a bad time.

The obvious goal for now is the rules. I think I'm going to need another two months or so.

I will, however, be uploading a pdf of the Fog of War cards this weekend.

Salute roundup

Salute was certainly an experience.

The support from various friends and acquaintances was outstanding and I never found myself there alone.

I managed to run two games and get a small amount of time to look around the show myself. Interest from the public was muted but constant and I managed to give out a reasonable amount of cards.

It was also a learning experience as far as the game was concerned, especially as this was the first time it had been played.

Both games were rather a-typical however.

The first resulted in a the slaughter of the coalition, with minimal horde casualties, but this may have been compounded by the fact that my lovely assistant had a rather liberal interpretation of 6" and seemed to have trouble understanding the phrase "no doubling through terrain". I let this slide as I didn't want to start being belligerent that early into the game. Adding to this, his young opponent seemed to have a rather lax grasp on tactics in general and managed to wander his cavalry into charge range for the Karns command group.

The second was a complete reversal, with the horde being mowed down while charging SMG armed veterans across open ground. Apparently, early on, the players mistook me saying "no doubling through ruins" as "no moving through ruins" and thus they proceeded to manoeuvre down the fire-lanes recently constructed by my assistant in a rookie table dressing error.

Despite this there were some useful takeaways. The Sentry special rule is under-pointed, as is off map mortar support and off map sniper support. In fact, the ability to fire more than once per phase is under-pointed. It's not that primitive firearms may not be able to move and fire that makes them less valuable, its a modern firearms ability to move, fire, and then fire again at full rate of fire in defensive fire that makes it valuable. So point bumps all round. Cavalry charges also probably need a slight nerf, something along the lines of not being able to insta-rout units more than twice their size.

Also, for display games, units should be uniformly armed.

Here are some pics

Manchester Veteran Guard and Cartel troops manoeuvre through the village

A horde cannon advances through a forest after deploying behind it for some reason

Advancing warriors

Yours truly playing the final turn for the embattled coalition

Horde warriors take cover in a tactically important animal pen.

Unable to form an effective firing line the coalition leave themselves open to assault

Overall it was a great experience, but given the cost, the effort that went into getting there, and the stress of effectively going it alone right in the middle of what turned out to be an academically important moment as well as an impending house purchase I cant honestly say it was worth it. I think Salute always inspires me. I look at all the great games and get intoxicated on the atmosphere, and think "I too want to be here" but in all honesty I think I should have reigned in my ambitions and gone to some local shows, at least initially.

Speaking of which, come see and play All That Remains at the Table Top Sale, in Lincombe Barn on the 8th! And possibly Blastastic! in October if I get round to asking the organiser soon.

Update: Salute is on!

The Horde

I've taken delivery of Xanders force for Salute. Gratifyingly both forces fit in a single case, which is a little surprising given the size of this one.

I love this force. At a distance it looks like some sort of  Viking army,

but the closer you get

the

weirder

it

gets...

I love it! combined with Xanders painting, it's a beautiful force.

I've also managed to point it up.

We were slightly worried that the Coalition force would outstrip it in size, but nothing like that has happened. Even stripped down to basically men and equipment, the horde significantly outpoints the coalition. I'm hoping that this will provide an opportunity to fine tune the points values for firearms.

The horde is composed of elite troops. If they don't have the numbers or experience to cross the battlefield without getting cut apart then I know we have a  problem.

Gubbins

Some of the gubbins for the game.

Logistics points, pinned, overwatch and activate markers, and jumbo d20's to act as suppression trackers.

Also business cards!

Terrain

This is the first time I've ever really applied myself to making terrain and - even if I say so myself - I think I did a pretty good job! After months of effort, I really think I've put something together to be proud of.

Here's some pictures.

The road system was made with a wood base covered with sandpaper. I'm not entirely sure the sandpaper was worth it in the end. Up close you can see the effect, but at any sort of distance, it just looks uniformly grey.

The building shells were supplied by Xander to which I applied buckets of poly-filler and tubes of Hobbycraft acrylics. The connecting piece was made out of foam supplied by Xander's partner. I think it fits in rather well.

To this will be added dark age era housing, again courtesy of Xander, some autumnal trees I picked up on the cheap a while back and it will all be mounted on a couple of grass boards loaned by a local gamer king.

I'm a little worried by our lack of linear terrain but if I have time I can panic buy some stone walls, and I've got some cars to weather on the back burner.

Nomad WiP

The WiPs

The nomads muster

I'm here too!
Sorry.  The last few months have been mad... but the nomads (mark I army, pending mammoths at a later date) are getting there. I  have another 20 or so part finished in the work bench, but the current plan is to get everything finished by the end of the weekend.
Alas, you won't be seeing me at Salute as I am likely to be moving house that day.
Still, enough of that...

Here is the painted force as it currently stands - 3 squads, a cannon and most of a command squad... still on the paint desk are another squads worth (a bit more multicultural with a few nods and winks on the shield designs ), the warlord, the rest of the command squad and a sniper team...

Force builder v0.1

Here it is, the first version of the Force Builder for All That Remains.

I've still got plenty of ideas I want to add, even to the first version, but needs must.

It may be a little contextless without the rules themselves, but hopefully it's something of a view into what I'm trying to accomplish here. Please go ahead and have a look. Point up your own post apocalyptic forces!

All feedback is appreciated. You can post in the comments below, take it to the thread on the Post Apocalypse Wargames Forum or email allthatremainsgame [at] gmail.com

Oh yeah. We've got an email now...

Future features include:

• Expanded Cultist faction trait
• Advanced faction trait
• More adjunct types
• More specialist equipment
• Special rules tree for mounted units

Salute Announcement

So there's been a spike in views recently and there's a reason for that.

Salute has put up its list of games and we're on it! This means we have just over a month to get our shizzle together (and I have a stats exam, a paper and a house move to manage into the bargain!)

Luckily, for me at least, stress is a scalpel that cuts away all superfluous activity so hopefully we'll see you all in April with something worthy of Salute (and a photo in Wargames Illustrated maybe?)

Group shot

A quick group shot for your delectation

Manchester Cavalry

The final component for my Manchester force are these dragoons.

I don't know where the figures are from, but they're originally Mexican-American war Mexican cavalry that Xander kindly forced on me, possibly to make me write cavalry rules.

The bases are, perhaps, a little too large, but I think they look good.

Flying Squad officers often wear non-standard uniforms, mostly because they can.

Probably my favourite. The paint job on the horse really stands out here.

The Flying Squad (or, The Lancers) are not a formal part of the Manchester Guard. Early in the city's history a fast mobile unit was put together to counter bandits and generally keep order among outlying settlements. At first this was little more than a posse of well armed busybodies who threw their weight around outside the walls of the citadel. As time went on they developed their own tradition and history but began to deploy regularly alongside or in support of the Guard proper.

Technically any man can join the Flying squad; the only requirements being that he must provide his own horse. In practice this limits membership to rich sons of the Houses or other prosperous individuals. Additionally the use of the male pronoun throughout the Book of Rules, the governing document that describes the responsibilities and privileges of the Flying Squad has been used to limit membership to men only. This reading of the document has been upheld at least once, making this one of the few roles in Manchester from which women are formally barred.

The preponderance of thrill seeking rich among the Flying Squad has, inevitably, created a hostile relationship with the Guard, who know them by a number of insalubrious names. In fact, while their value in providing a visible presence for Manchester's satellite communities is respected by the leaders of Manchester, their actual utility in battle is still debatable. While they commemorate a number of "great victories" their detractors are quick to point out that these were attained against what amounts to disorganised bandits and disgruntled farmers. The armies of the Karn, by comparison, are like nothing they have faced before.

Manchester Guard Weapons Team

Here are some photos of the Guard's HMG, probably the single most potent weapon on our future battlefield (unless you count mammoths...)

Manchester Guard Infantry

I was going to post some background for the City of Manchester, as it exists in our game-world, with this post, but it's late and I've got to get up early tomorrow so, for now, here are some pictures of the completed Manchester infantry.

I'm reasonably happy with how they turned out in the end. Granted they are the drabbest forces I have ever painted, including my 15mm paras in camo! They don't really scream post apocalyptic either, but that's ok as again, Manchester is supposed to be a visionary re-inventor city state. They have the textile industry to clothe their troops identically and the logistical capacity to standardize their weaponry.

In order to escape the curse of true uniformity, I tried to mix headgear up a little, adding WWII helmets, and - as shown in the forefront in the photo above - a greenstuff sculpted helmet.

I tried adding a little colour in the bases as I've been experimenting wit meadow flowers. They are a bitch to get stuck down, and the solitary bloom I put on the Highland Spring Water Traders has already fallen off. I'm probably applying them incorrectly.

The miniature above will serve as an NCO and probably my command figure for the game, unless I can find the time to put some more HQ figures together.

Left for Lead 2: Electric Boogaloo

Here's a photo of the final (entirely) unpainted unit for my forces.

Something tell me they're going to be a royal pain in the ass... It's nagging me...

I can't believe I let Xander bully me into adding mounted forces to the game, and then into adding them to my force, and then giving me some cavalry...

Seriously though, I hate painting animals, although I've found a great - but extremely involved - tutorial for painting horses.

Quick Update - Highland Spring Traders Banner Bearer

The banner is at a slight angle due to the fact that I don't want to affix it for travelling purposes.

I'm thinking of ageing the flag, maybe by putting it in some old tea? Suggestions on the back of a postcard.