Dead Man's Hand

After accidentally buying lots of Wild West figures, terrain and buildings for Malifaux, the inevitable has happened and I have expanded into the Dead Man's Hand Wild West game.

I know it's been out for several years already, but this is my first game of it, and I must admit that it was a real hoot! Easy to play and learn, very simple but still delivering a cinematic cowboy experience as well.

See what the hand of fate dealt me in a 3-linked-games match report that is also a review of the rules and walk-through of the key mechanics as well.

Unusually not all of the pictures have captions, but that's because I've tried to play with some different effects to make some of them look "old" - see what you think!

Gertfaux - a Malifaux Competition!

After almost 5 games ever, Mei Feng and her Rail Crew take to the competitive table at Gertfaux in Bristol!

It's all on the turn of a card as Giant Robots take on resurrected Irish Labourers, Little Green Men try to avoid falling into an industrial threshing machine, and a 4-legged man wearing a dress tries to avoid being run down by a big a metal horse with it's own colony of self-detaching sub-zero temperature haemorrhoids with bad attitudes.

There is also Steampunk Hannibal, and some silly captions. As if they were needed...

This site, reviewed in Miniature Wargames!

Some nice words from Henry Hyde at Miniature Wargames about this site, as Madaxeman.com is the "Blog of the Month" for February 2015!

"This month, get yourself over to the Madaxeman site at http://madaxemandotcom.blogspot.co.uk

which is rammed full of excellent stuff. One aspect that I really like is where he tests various rulesets, such as a recent tryout of L’Art de la Guerre Ancients rules at http://www.madaxeman.com/reports/

Art_de_la_Guerre_review.php. There’s a lovely sense of humour underpinning the site, with lots of variety, recently including a photo report of a Field of Glory Renaissance tournament complete with comic strip speech bubbles! Great stuff. "

Fame at last!! 

New Rules, Same Incompetence? Romans take to the field under ADLG

The Legions of Roman take part in what is probably the first ever UK event for ancients ruleset L'Art de la Guerre. They play Indians, Middle Romans and Palmyrans in three tightly themed standard sized games in one day.

The rules are translated from French, but did the Romans find it was all Greek to them ?

Find out for yourself in a series of 3 reports with lots of rules-learning tips in there too

Photo Galleries back online

The 15mm Ancients, 10mm ACW, 10mm WW" and "Real Vehicles" galleries are now fixed, upgraded and secured...

If you are using Chrome as a browser you may still see a Google security warning before accessing the 10mm/Real Vehicle galleries, which I've requested be removed now I have done the update - so it should hopefully be gone in a few days.

• 15mm Ancients Gallery
• 10mm WW2 Gallery 
• 10mm ACW Gallery
• Real Vehicles Gallery

(I also managed to "find" a lost database with more information that was originally included in the 10mm Gallery, which it now appears I managed to lose by making a typo in one upgrade cycle... so, if anyone out there knows about how to merge the contents of two SQL database tables, do let me know!) 

Photo galleries offline

Both the 10mm and 15mm photo galleries on this site appear to be a bit knackered at the moment - it seems as if they have been subject to some sort of rogue code attack.

That does however have the positive benefit of rendering them unreachable, so you are safe from any risk of stumbling across something dodgy... however, as they do link to a lot of other pages on this site you may well find that "normal" pages just stop and cut off half way through, or are covered in gobbledegook. I'm working on an upgrade, so fear not, they will be back as soon as I work out how to fix it ...

Mei the force be with you - Malifaux Battle Report

In the 2nd ever Malifaux report on this site, Evil Steampunk-magic-using Marxist Drug-runner Mei Feng takes on a man on a horse and his big fat Edward Scissorhands best friend in a strange urban cowboy landscape as two players struggle again to get to grips with what the hell they are up to ..

There is kung-fu, there are dogs and eagles, there is a Sikh with a machine gun and there is a lawyer (sending guns and money..?).

Who knows what it all means - but as long as everything gets set on fire, it will surely all be good in the end!

The Danes at Warfare 2014 - top table action!

The last event of 2014, and the Early Danes get yet another outing at FoGR down by the banks of the Thames in sunny (cold and dark) Reading.

In four thrilling match reports they take on everyone in the world, from the Indians to the English, all whilst doing their very best to shoehorn references to bacon and Carlsberg into the narrative at every opportunity....and end up doing surprisingly well !

Lots of pictures, some barely-relevant YouTube videos and some very odd things to buy from Amazon as well all grace the reports - so, grab yourself some pancakes and maple syrup, pull up a chair and dig in!

Xmas painting session for Malifaux

In between turkey and wine, I have snuck in painting up a few more Malifaux models over the past 2 weeks.

A lot of these are proxies from Black Scorpion.

Guild Guards

A shooter..

Showgirls and a Mannequin

December Acolytes.

Many more on the website 

Happy Christmas...?

If you woke up this Christmas morning and found that Santa had brought you all of the wargaming goodies that you wanted, congratulations!

If you didn't get what you wanted, and so you happen to find yourself browsing the web over the festive period don't forget that Madaxeman.com now has loads of pages with various cleverly targeted eBay listings all grouped together to make it easier fro you to find what Santa didn't leave for you under the tree!

The UK eBay listings include:

15mm Ancients

15mm "Buy Now" Ancients

15mm Renaissance

20mm Moderns

15mm - Complete Armies

28mm Plastics

25mm Renaissance

28mm Plastic Renaissance

25/28mm Ancients

20mm Ancients Figures

WRG Armies & Enemies Books

FoG Rules & Lists

15mm Napoleonic French

15mm Napoleonic British

All 15mm Napoleonics

15mm Napoleonic Prussians

15mm Napoleonic Russians

15mm Napoleonic Austrians

6mm Listings

Varnishes & Quickshade

Bases and Magnets

10mm - All eras

1/144th Scale

15mm Flames of War

Wargames Terrain

Flock & Grass

Hedges & bushes

Trees in Bulk

D6 Dice for Sale

40K Figures & Stuff

Epic 40K for Sale

Warmaster Listings

Malifaux Arcanist listings (UK)

Malifaux Guild listings (UK)

Malifaux Neverborn listings (UK)

Malifaux Ten Thunders listings (UK)

Malifaux Outcasts listings (UK)

Malifaux Ressurectionist listings (UK)

Malifaix Gremlin listings (UK)

and there are also US eBay listings for:

15mm Ancients

15mm - Complete Armies

28mm Plastics

25/28mm Ancients

28mm Ancients

15mm Napoleonic French

15mm Napoleonic British

15mm Napoleonic Prussians

15mm Napoleonic Austrians

15mm Napoleonic Russians

All 15mm Napoleonic listings

There's also a bookstore on this site that has organised thousands of books on Amazon by FoG Ancients army list - so a separate page for books about any army in any of the FoG army list books. How neat is that?

It's always easier if you just buy what you want yourself, isn't it....

A few more Malifaux proxies...

If you're going to be a Wild West Exorcist, why stop at just a crossbow... He also has a little of the Billy Bob Thornton character from Fargo about him. Which is probably not a good thing if you are about to be exorcised... 

Joss is only available in a box set where I already have the other figures... so here's a £2 proxy 

Home made mechanical toolbox from two 15mm/6mm drones

Brass Arachnid - another model only available in a box set I own already, scratchbuilt instead from drones.

An edited and cleaned up shot of the Exorcist

In my version of the fluff, Johan is actually a wise old union official... and may even be Kang's father... 

Blokes in hats with guns. 

There are plenty of them out there... Guild Guard anyone..? 

I also now have auction listings for Malifaux figures, scraped off of eBay. Have a look here

A Double Dose of Piracy!

One of the most inept yet strangely effective armies in my inventory makes a return in a 500AP FoGR Doubles competition, as the Pirates sail into view yet again.

Marvel at the depth plumbed by the puns, shake in fear at the assault of poor jokes and fall asleep counting the number of times the men say "arrr!" as the Pirates engage in 4 games of hand to hand fighting and general bloodthirsty carnage in which the lowest percentage of casualties suffered by any of the combatants in any game hovers around the 45% mark....

Corvus Belli miniatures - listing updated

I've just updated the 15mm Suppliers listings for the Corvus Belli range, after the manufacturer suspended production "indefinitely" in Autumn 2014.

Vexillia have now bought up the entire current stock of 15mm ancient and medieval ranges from the manufacturer in Spain, so what Martin has in store is all that is left in the world basically.

The ranges cover/covered Marian & Imperial Rome and some related armies such as Spanish, Numidians, Kappadocians, Carthaginians as well as a well regarded 100YW range. The figures are sold in packs of 8, with 6-8 variants per pack that are compatible with Essex in size but can sometimes be touch more chubby and short - but also have a more variety and character.

(Corvus Belli Spanish in action) 

Get 'em while they last... !

Me(c)h..

We've all done it, right? picked up some nice-looking models with one aim in mind, and ended up going off on a tangent that may end up being a new ruleset, army and scale?

Well, at Warfare this year I picked up some spider drones from GZG to see if they would work as unusual mechanical spiders for my Ramos Crew for Malifaux, plus a couple of walker drones to cannibalize and make a Mobile Toolkit for the same crew.

However, having scratchbuilt/modded the Mobile Toolkit fairly successfully, I had a couple of spare walkers and I was also a little unconvinced by the Spider Drones - they were just a bit too big really for the look I wanted. One of them is going to end up becoming a Brass Arachnid for Ramos (as it only seems to be available in a box set and I already have all of the other figures in it) but that left 5 spare ones.

So, the idea of having some NATO and WARPAC walkers to add to my Cold War Commander armies started to crystallize... sort of a "Weird World War III" thing going on, or possibly more realistically a gateway drug to 6mm Sci-Fi gaming. A bit of discussion with the ever helpful folks on the BKC/CWC Forum later and the idea started to take shape...

Anyways, these are the initial results:

NATO Combat Walker carefully avoids stepping on a greenhouse.

3-tone NATO cammo helps them blend in...

Well, sort of. I think it's this one from Ground Zero Games 6mm Future Wars range.

Walker supported by NATO 6mm infantry

Parked up next to a Leopard II

Parked and blurred (sorry)

A Russian-build 6-legged Spider Walker opens up on NATO infantry at close range

The Russian scientists had initially found that making a 6-legged walker was a huge technical challenge, however given their role as "the baddies" they felt it was worth persevering with the more sinister and evil look the 6-leg articulation gave the walker, and eventually the Spider Crab Walker was born.

Originally called the Spider Walker by NATO, it was renamed the Spider Crab Walker in recognition of many Russians rather unseemly love of sushi.

The bright green night vision searchlight allows the Spider Crab Walker to be effective in all weather conditions, as well as allowing it to hide effectively under beds.

Walkers and H&R AFVs and infantry

The idea of having Walkers in the same force as an M60 just amuses me ....

Another ADLG Game...

This time it's another usually rubbish army, the Galatians, who take on an enemy Carthaginian army in a very short battle report that features a really good curry.

Pike & Shot(te) Video game review

In a new departure for this site, here's a link to a YouTube video I managed to create in which I do a very bad job of playing Slitherine's new Renaissance video game based on FoG:R, Pike & Shot.

You can see it on YouTube here.

Here also are a couple of screen-grabs of the YouTube video of the game.

Overall it's very simple to pick up, the game rattles along at a decent pace and the AI appears to be sensible - no MTW-style clouds of units milling around aimlessly here!  However the graphics are a little basic to say the least, and it's hard to imagine why they haven't included at least a simple form of Campaign Mode in the core game (I think it's under way and planned for an update soon).

That, for me, means the current price of close on £40 (I think £36 as I write this..?) is probably a little bit on the steep side - even accepting the "this is for a limited audience so the price will need to be different to a Total War type title" argument. Once this isn't "shiny and new" and Slitherine presumably decide to knock a few quid off and it will start to look a lot more sensible - add the campaign mode and this will be even more true. Anyway, a decent game and also your only choice for this relatively obscure and poorly served period in the games market.

See how much it costs on Slitherine's site now!

The Worlds, in Koblenz - 6 FoGR Match Reports

The Worlds in Germany - a brave Swedish army sails on a sea of beer and model railway fetishism towards a date with dice, destiny and pork-based catering products by the side of the Rhine in not-that-sunny Koblenz

The end result is 6 full match reports containing a full suite of the internet's entire content of German comedy video interludes, and some intriguing analysis from Renaissance Hannibal and the much-loved Princess of Sweden.

Enjoy The Worlds in Germany... preferably with a beer and a pretzel in hand

More Malifaux Painted goodies

This time its Marcus the Beast Master, and Ramos the man who conjures metal spiders out of scrap

Painted figures include the new plastic Marcus box set, plus some of the older metal figures

The Marcus Crew

Cojo

Rogue Necromacy

Large Steampunk Arachnid

and many more...

L'Art de la Guerre - new Ancients rules, reviewed...

A short battle report and review of the "new" (well, new to English translation, but actually the third edition) of L'Art de la Guerre Ancients rules is now on this site.

Hopefully it will give you a bit of a flavour of what seems a very enjoyable, familiar-yet-different set of rules.

Gettysburg

I was recently lucky enough to get some spare time in the US and took the chance to do a quick visit round Gettysburg battlefield. 

I've taken a load of photos, (rather unusually) as a pedestrian tramping across the park on a gradually brightening up Saturday afternoon in October. They have already appeared on the Madaxeman facebook page, but not everyone sees that, so here they are again:

They start from around Meade's HQ on Cemetery Ridge, follow Picketts Charge (in reverse - or retreat I guess), then go along the woos on Seminary Ridge, recrossing towards The Peach Orchard and Wheatfield and up to the Pennsylvania Monument back at the top of Cemetery Ridge.

What surprised me a little was how shallow the slope was at Cemetary Ridge that the Union chose to defend, but also just what a bloody long way across the terrain Picketts Charge was too. Big and Little Round Top looked like proper "impassable" hills as well, although I didn't have time to go up them. 

My first ever game of Malifaux

There's a vague possibility that there are lots of DBx-based historical miniatures/Malifaux crossover gamers out there, but for those of you who aren't in that (probably small) demographic, I've posted a match report from my first ever game of Malifaux on this website.

Malifaux is a Steampunk Gothic Horror skirmish game with card-driven mechanics and some rather nice models. It appears to be a lot of fun, which is a great relief after having bough the rules and the figures and then spent plenty of time painting and basing them up.

For my (and my opponents) first game we set up an over-ambitious Mei Feng vs Sonnia Criid 50 SS matchup that we managed to get through in about 5 hours, which is not too bad given neither of us had ever played before - some of the combos were rather complex.

A brand new "Steampunk Hannibal" makes an appearance as well as the usual poor jokes and irrelevant video interludes.

But this time there's also a clunking great robot who's almost a train and who hits people with an enormous metal bar as well.

What's not to like?!

The matt varnished Shermans & Churchills

As promised in the previous post, the finished articles are here:  Plastic Soldier Company 20mm Shermans, 15mm Churchills, and Battlefront Bren Carriers all painted in Halfords cammo green.

This really has nailed that "bronze-green" effect I was hoping for!

PSC US infantryman based on a penny for scale.

Not quite sure what's gone awry with the varnishing on this flank of the tank, it's not as obvious in real life as on this photo.

The top decks look great to me - the "puddled" Army Painter varnish on the one in the foreground's read deck is something I'm quite happy about actually - maybe it could have been brushed out a little though?

And the Churchills... again a great result IMO

I am toying with the idea of a final drybrush, but the details already "pop" so much I'm not sure if that would be too much..?

The colour that's been achieved is pretty much perfect IMO

The early version turret AVRE. Several of the transfers have ended up showing their edges, which is annoying as this normally doesn't happen with my "two layers of clear gloss" technique - maybe my gloss poly needs replacing - or maybe they were just old transfers?

For essentially a one-piece casting these track assemblies are fantastic - well done PSC!

The drybrushing really picks out the stowage boxes too.

Morer slightly odd effects on the big blank flanks of the Shermans here - but again, not as bad in the real world, and in some ways quite good to have it so irregular (ish). The driver's face has done really well here.

 With a PSC infantryman in the foreground

The Battlefront bren carriers.

A final close-up of a rather smug chap - probably waiting for his cup of tea! Make sure you saw the first post too in this two-part series.