Year in review and general rambling comments on gaming life...

The end of 2016 is here, and a good gaming year it has been. It has seen a rebirth in my interest in miniature gaming. I suspect that I have played more miniature games this year than I have ever played, not just in any previous year but ever! Now my memory is only so so, so take that with a grain of salt.

Okay, now that I have had some time to think about it, I admit it, not 'ever', but certainly the most games played in the last decade or two.

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act II Chapter 4 Blood Sacrifice 'lost pictures'

As stated before, for some reason we just did not snap many pictures of this game. Pity really, a nice village, a sacrificial altar a giant ape, and lots of two-fisted action.

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act III Chapter 3 The Escape

Victory in the last scenario went to Crash and his Rocket Corps, but at what cost. The Wanders death was the harbinger for the death of the island! The once dormant volcano was now fully active throwing ash and dust unto the sky, and spewing forth rivers of  lava that flowed unabated down the side of the mountain. Here and there globular bursts of lava splattered across the landscape.

 

Pulp Alley - Gang War AAR

Fresh from the recently ended Perilous Island campaign, we looked towards our next campaign, Vice Alley. (New episodes at this blog in 2017)

Pulp Alley Act III Chapter 2 Hell Unleashed

The penultimate adventure in the Perilous Island Campaign!

Pulp Alley Vice Alley scenery test

Testing, testing, testing ...

This past weekend we took a stab at Vice Alley, Gang War.
We took the opportunity to test three things in preparation for the upcoming campaign.

Pulp Alley Perilous Island Act III Chapter 1 Forbidden City

 Having collected the required number of pages, Teddy's Irregulars led the other leagues deeper into the jungle in search of the Forbidden City. 
(Guarded by the Golden Guardian!)

Pulp Alley -(Work in progress) Vice Alley Social Affair

I was planning on taking a break in December, anticipating that work, family, holidays, etc will get in the way. But then as I wandered the dollar store inspiration struck me like a two by four to the face.
The group has been planning to play the Vice Alley campaign, sometime, now that sometime may have a start time of December! So now it is time to gear up for Episode 1 of Vice Alley,
a Social Affair! 

 

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act II Chapter 3 Sinister Swamp

After having chased some of the locals through the jungle and some caves, our intrepid adventurers expanded their search, into the Sinister Swamp.

New Polls are up

Just posted up two new polls, feel free to participate, and leave comments if you want to. I have recently seen post on other sites from people who game on Monday nights. In my mind that might not be such a bad idea as by the end of the week I have more in common with a garden vegetable than I do with a thinking person. On the other hand I can be a bear on the first day back to work...
Saturdays are my choice, and we typically get together from 1:30 until whenever I kick people out of my house. (typically somewhere around 11 pm) So far it is the best chance for me to be pleasant, and to have a semi functional brain!

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act II Chapter 2 Jungle Trail

Updated October 27th with smaller pictures!

So a little bit of a departure this time around, less pictures, but a rundown of two games of the same scenario that we played.

 

Pulp Alley meets Dracula, The Mummy, The Werewolf, and Frankenstein's Monster

We found ourselves at loose ends one night and quickly threw together this Pulp Alley 'Gothic Horror' game. Hope you enjoy!

Armies of Mars

Well here we go with my VSF images of some of my painted stuff.

Rouge Noir, The Purple Terror!

Opinions

So, my first rant...(tip of the hat to Andy Rooney)


Did you ever notice, that we as gamers are often rather highly opinionated?

BFG fleet action Necrons vs Orks

A real blast from the past, I dusted off my BFG forces, and a buddy brought over his Necron fleet and War was declared and battle come down. It was planned as an introduction to a new recruit, so I thought we would start with an easy to play fleet like Chaos, but he would have none of that and instead summoned up his inner Waaagh, and went all Orky on the Necrons. We started late so we are only part way into it, to be concluded nest week, hopefully.

Dystopian Forces

So a sampling of my large, largely unpainted, Dystopian Wars stuff.

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act II Chapter 1 Lagoon of Terror

As the curtain rises on a new chapter in our saga we find our adventurers continuing their journey eastward to a long lost tropical island. Ominous clouds rise from the volcano, something stirs in the lagoon...

Halloween, the most wonderful time of the year...

Tis the season to wander the aisles of your local dollar stores. In Canada we have Dollarama, a truly wonderful shop. I visit it frequently looking at shapes, seeking inspiration from common objects, and checking out the not so common. At Halloween time, the stores are loaded with stuff, but sometimes it is hard to see things through all the 'noise'.

My latest find comes in handy for the penultimate scenario of the Perilous Island campaign. Spoiler alert there is a volcano and of course lava! I was at a loss on how to represent the lava flows. Now independent of my lava quest I had been to the dollar store a couple of times on other missions. However on the third visit I located this.

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act I Chapter 4 Soerabaja Manhunt

Next our adventurers traveled to far off Indonesia! Leaving Francine and her crew in Greece, and abandoning the Cultist to their strange rituals, Teddy Roosevelt's Irregulars, The Royal Navy, and the Tong of the Black Scorpion converged on the port city of Soerabaja.

Now added a poll about Pulp Alley leagues!
Feel free to participate, leave a comment if you have a strong opinion about your choice. 
Boy what fun, what did I do to waste time before I started this blog

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act I Chapter 3 At Deaths Door

3) At Death's Door
Sadly all we have are images at this time. The AAR has been lost in translation. It was another intense struggle between three leagues, The Royal Navy, The Cultists, and The Tong of the Black Scorpions. Yes there are also dragons in the scorpion league, they are not part of the statue collection.

In the end the Scorpion league emerged as the victor. Details of the fight to follow.

Opening moves

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act I Chapter 2 Final Flight

Game two saw Teddy Roosevelt and his league go up against Francine and her league. While both leagues had emerged victorious, and had left Mexico well in advance of their enemies, they found themselves suddenly stranded in Casablanca looking for a means of escape.
Teddy was determined to stop Francine from leaving Casablanca while Francine was equally determined to get Lady Elaine out of Morocco.

The plane awaits.

Casablanca Airport

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act I Chapter 1B Hidalgo Fire

The other version of this game saw Teddy Roosevelt (decked out in his old blue on blue uniform) going up against a large group of cultist.

The scenes is set. Teddy is barely visible at the top, likewise Mark Twain is hidden behind some fronds at the bottom of the picture. Teddy's secret service can be seen scouting out the camp, and Mata Hari keeps an eye on things, while crazy cultist approach from the west.

Pulp Alley - Perilous Island Act I Chapter 1 Hidalgo Fire

We actually played two games of this at the same time!
It was the first game of the campaign, and we had 5 players. I was the GM throughout the campaign.
The prize was to 'rescue' Lady Elaine. While she appeared on both tables only one table was going to find her, so whichever table completed her plot point first would find that they had found the real Lady Elaine.

The two teams that won their respective games then went on to the Final Flight scenario, while the others went on to At Deaths Door. All of these games were played on the first day of the campaign, as I has sufficient space to set up four games. Here is a long shot of three of the games.

First gaming related post, long overdue.

We started playing Pulp alley in the Spring of 2016, and now we are in the dog days of summer, and only just posting a game report now!

and so it begins...
Will this be another of those blog sites that have not been updated since before Obama got into the White House? Will I start strong only to drift off into some other activities, or will this become some all consuming activity that will eat away my free time and sanity.