Conan and the Lamentation of Kickstarter.

I'll admit to having a Conan fetish..It all started with the Savage Sword of Conan black and white Comics I started picking up around the late 70's , a time when the rest of my friends where all about the original Star Wars movies. I quickly started gobbling up the original (BWS) Marvel series as well so by the time I was 16 and the Conan the Barbarian the movie came out, I was freaking out as I owned literally 100's of various Comics and Books, reading all the original Howard stories I could get my hands on at the time. Flash forward 30 something years and I of course picked up Age of Conan , The Strategy Board Game, at the time published by then hungry for titles- Fantasy Flight Games.

The thing about board games is I own very few because I rarely play them. I do like playing them very much and I often revel in memory of my one and only 8 hour Twilight Imperium Session. However these heady board games are of no interest to my wife, and any gaming time I do get I am always with serious miniatures hobbyists, so despite all our love of board games, it was only on a proverbial blue moon that we actually stopped playing "X"  miniatures games and played a board game with a decent group.

Still back in November of 2014 , 16 months ago..that fact I had never actually played Age of Conan, The Strategy Board game..didnt stop me for getting in the Kickstarter that Ares Games , new owners of the games license had launched  re -publishing the game with a hefty expansion. now coined. "Age of Conan, Adventures in Hyboria."

great box  art , in fact all the art on the new cards and in game is very much to my liking classic 70's Conan.

So this expansion has arrived today, since I owned the base game, I just got the expansion and retooled original components and put up some extra for some very nice "King Conan" official coins that can be used in place of the coin counters in the game and also for whatever type gaming you like.

The expansion is packed solid with all kinds of neat stuff including miniatures that expand the core game and its play style. All of which I have zero clue of what they do or are used for -because I have never played this game, even thou Its been in my closet since probably 2010.

The additional  conundrum I faced is right after I bought into this, not 3 months later in February of 2015 is that from out of nowhere Monolith Games launches it own Kickstarter  for its very own Conan Miniatures games with amazing 28-32mm plastic figures!, of course I freak out and buy into that too...( after many delays due to miniatures QA and delivering so many miniatures from the factory, we are currently looking at delivery late this year, 1 year past the original est. delivery date.)

 Now the Core pledge here , which I bought into with only a select few add ons, is literally 100's of miniatures. I've been working hard to prune my collection the last year and have done a pretty good job. although I still have along way to go just to shed myself of stuff I havent touched in 5+ years! let alone the host of vintage items, I have come to terms with parting with.  SO. To get to the point of this post, despite my Conan fetish I need both of these like I need  a hole in the head. Its extremely unlikely I will ever get around to playing either of them, despite my best efforts to and even thou I would really like to. but its just doesnt seem feasible or realistic. So the reality is both of these will be going up for sale , the board game with expansion, ASAP, (thou I am keeping the Coins) and the Miniatures game when it arrives. Although there I am keeping the extra Yag Kosha and Brom based sculpts of Conan and Belit  to paint up for the shelf here.

The lamentation of Kickstarter is a powerful thing, these things all seem like great ideas at the time because you are waning nostalgic and invested in the intellectual property enough that it hooks you in like a shark in a feeding frenzy.  Then when the euphoria is long long gone, most likely 2 years later it finally arrives and you find yourself saying wow this is really cool? but so what?. In reality I have shed all of large format army games over the last 2- 3 years, Warhammer, Hail Ceasar, Flames of War. because its really only realistic that I make time to paint and play smaller skirmish type war games. There comes a certain point where you must challenge your hobbies aspirations, look yourself in the mirror and say "what the hell am I doing?"  (I find even my love for Bolt Action being tested just recently due to investment of hobby time versus the actual payoff of return in the fun department.)

In Schwarzenegger's 1982 Conan, he has what has become one of the most well remembered lines of the genres history, when asked by the Mongol General, "Conan, what is best in life?" he replies

"Crush your enemies. See them driven before you. Hear the lamentations of their women."

Conan never had to worry about Kickstarter.

Conan

In miniature/ board game related news, I have been watching for sometime the development of Monlith's new Conan miniatures/board game. Anyone that knows me more than casually, knows I am a lifelong fan of two things- Lord of the Rings and Conan, while the latter has been seriously neglected in the Miniatures department.  I have far more literature in my collection from Robert E Howard and his disciples than I do from Professor Tolkien by about ten fold.  The sculpts are what sold me on this, and unlike others on the fence over at the LAF, I'm not worried about the scale ( 32mm) here as I like then as a self contained set, Ideally I'll paint them but it really depends on the quality of the plastic, heres to hoping Monolith gets it right on the material they use., Another Reaper Bones/ Sedition Wars type polymer will be seriously disappointing and waste these epic sculpts.

We will see as I am in on the $135 Pledge, check it out here!.

Ok, back to painting my Germans!

DungeonQuest

I've recently picked up DungeonQuest by Fantasy Flight Games. A remake of 1985's DungeonQuest as with all things FFG they try to make it bigger and better and generally it succeeds. The game has a great presentation, with a colorful and study board, chits, cards and miniatures. The object of game is navigate a series of individual rooms (tiles) to get to center of board (the dragons treasure room) collect as must loot as possible and get out before the sun goes down. (24+) turns.

Of course the Dungeon is filled with numerous monsters ,traps and obstacles..doing its best effort to kill you all the way along. Standard play is up to 4 players or solo. I've played about a dozen games now, 3, with 3 players and the rest solo. While this is a random beer and pretzels type game, there some strategic thinking going on for sure. The most contested issue with game is the new combat system which is a rock, paper, scissors (RPS) combined with "war" (the generic card game)..While I had few problem with combat, myself I have found a lack of clarity with the use of "power cards" (special cards each character or monster has, that gives them a special attack or ability in combat) to be slightly annoying. Also the RPS mechanic that every character has access to all three types of attacks (Melee, Ranged, and Magic) isn't very thematic in terms identifying with your character, I've found it makes combat too easy and everyone feels the same. While no one has survived in my multiplayer experiences yet..(very close), I have survived the solo game numerous times, thru luck of the draw and and having figured how to play the combat when drawing against a blind deck.

The back of the rulebook also provides numerous alternative ways to play which is always nice, I spent some time over this long weekend figuring out way to create an alternative combat system that makes each character and monster somewhat unique, cutsdown on the RPS randomness and give you a reason to actually try to escape (a little used combat option, I found in my play) I feel it fits the scope of the game nicely and works as an alternative play type. (particularly in solo play) Obviously if you don't play DungeonQuest this is of little interest to you so I am writing is as a separate piece in my "featured articles" sidebar.

In short FFG's new Dungeonquest is great game, while along the lines of Talisman it plays in a quarter of the time, and the learning curve is really like 5 mins..you can just sit down and play. On our last Club meeting 3 of us sat down for an hour or so and had a great time in Dragonfire Dungeon before hitting the 4 x 6's for some 8th edition Warhammer.

If you do play check out my alternative combat system there are still a 1000 ways to die. I'd just tried to make the combat a bit more interesting.

Chaos in the Old World

Might be time to talk about more boardgames here at Plastic Legions...while we had a blast on our last drunken foray into Talisman, FFG pulls out the suprise with this. I am sure this has a little more meat on its bones being an FFG designed game than the former does and that makes me very interested. I am sure I am not the only who stops by here who is interested in giving this a spin!, Warhammer board games with cool miniatures? Whats not to like. Personally I can't wait, a nice alternative to the GW re-release of Space Hulk for the Fantasy inclined.