My first try at Infinity

 After quite some time and endless delays, I finally got to play Infinity! Wohoo!

We used the minis I painted for my friend, who generously offered to learn the rules -something I was terrified about!

I guess there's no point in making a full review of the game and the rules by now, but I'm happy to share a few brief impressions from a newcomer :)

First of all, we played the Code:One stuff, form the Operation Kaldstrom box. I had been told that the rules here were slightly lighter than previous versions of the game, so I came a little bit encouraged. We played the introductory game, just to get acquainted with the basic rules.

We used my old frosty mat instead of the one provided with the Kaldstrom box

The first introductory game uses three minis per side, and is just an easy going pew-pew thing to get familiar with how things work in here. So perfect for me!

There are some other three people out there somewhere...

The objective here is just to get the enemy killed and keep the own troops alive by the end of the third round. So my first endeavour was to get familiar with activations, how orders work, and specially reactions. This system is new to me, and I have to say I find it quite appealing, as it makes each round really cinematic, with tons of things happening at the same time, and forcing you to cautiously plan each movement you want to play, as an unadverted enemy can really turn the tables if they catch you on the open!

On my first round, my fusiliers simply moved forward, taking care of lines of sight

When I moved, an enemy Zanshi saw one of my troopers, and shot at her:

The enemy is that blurry thing on the corner of the building!

I chose to dodge the enemy fire and, being sucessful, managed to get cover next to the building.

The Zanshi moved to open ground...

...and got one of my fusiliers killed with a skillful shot!!

Well, that was an incredibly against the probabilities shot! Of course that put me in a tight situation, having lost a third of my force without having really made any shot against the enemy! However, a thing about this game is that you can never surrender and must really give a try to your options. 

The fusilier moved upstairs and killed the Zanshi as he tried to reach cover again

Once on the top of the floor he received enemy fire, but cover served him well

He shot back and killed the enemy Zanshi (behind that short wall in the background!!)

Getting the high ground doesn't really have an impact on the game, but in psychological terms I felt things were making much sense :P

It was the third (and last) round and the blurry Zanshi in the background shot the fusilier

With this sucessful kill, both sides had two casualties and one survivor

End of the game! Draw!

I could say it was a little bit dense for a simple tutorial game with just three minis per side, but it was just me getting used to reactions and modifiers. To be honest, once you are into the game, things so smoother.

 

Let's see a second game, this time with a command unit on each side. This time we'll see how Lieutenants work game wise.

Lateral view will provide a better and more neutral comprehension of what's happening

OK, let's go. We have three infantry troopers per side plus a Lieutenant each one. The Lieutenants have their own special orders, so they can essentially do more (and better) stuff than regular troopers.

Yu Jing troops move forward, no encounter during the first round

But oh, the Orc moves upstairs and things change in a second

We considered that there was line of fire, but the Orc Lieutenant is under cover, while the Zanshi and the Jujak Lieutenant below aren't. I'm not sure if we acted according to the rules, but we didn't find that specific situation (I take for granted it is in the rulebook, we simply weren't able to find it and decided to move on). For us it made sense that the one holding the upper floor had better view and cover, getting the poor guys on the ground pinned down.

The use of additional ordinary orders on the Orc Lieutenant ended in him killing the Jujak Lieutenant:

The poor guy hadn't even had the chance to do anything!

The Lieutenant shot the Zanshi on the ground, who reacted and shot back, inflicting one wound

The other Zanshi climbed up...

...and killed the enemy Lieutenant, who flipped over the wall to the ground (in the better 80's tv show style)

So this is the general situation now

A fusilier advances

And the Zanshi climbs up the wall to the upper floor. Surprise, húndàn!

Quite a symmetrical situation!

The Zanshi kills the Fusilier

And moves next to the wall

Where she gets killed by the Fusilier on the ground

This bold firefight ends without casualties

And again! A new draw!!

Both sides had a Lieutenant and a trooper down, and two surviving troopers at the end of the third round. As short as it was, it had been another intense battle!

At this point we discussed some stuff; for example, it looked like there was little incentive to expose self troops, or the benefits of dodging vs reacting opening fire. I guess these things don't unfold so well in such a limited scenario with just three of four models per side. Besides, these scenarios being just focused on killing each other are not as interesting as any other in which you have to get objectives and that kind of stuff.

So my very brief conclusions from a newbie to anyone who hasn't played Infinity yet: The game is cool. Even more; the game is awesome. It's really cinematic, you get to feel that there's a lot of stuff happening at the same time, which makes the rythm of the action quite quick. You are into an action movie. I wouldn't necessarily say a Michael Bay movie, but at least one in which you get the impression of things going on. I don't see this like a typical WH40K game of long-ranged weapons crossfire and little or no movement. Infinity is quite the opposite, enormously tactical, a game in which you have to seriously consider your movements and the line of sight, and where you don't get to roll hundreds of dice each turn.

The curve of learning can be harsh for a newcomer, but by no means it's a difficult game neither you should feel disencouraged for that perspective. The basics are easy to grasp, the more challenging maybe the mere concept that your opponent can actually do stuff (relevant stuff!) during your turn. I still haven't faced complex special rules nor exceptions, but I don't believe they can be a no-go at all.

Whenever I get a true game of this you'll be the first to know!

St. George and the Dragon

It was a matter of pure coincidence, but I was looking for some other stuff over the net and I eventually found this:

 Oh, you can see how I had no option but to get it, right? It belongs to Reconquer Designs ranges, which have quite pretty interesting medieval stuff, mostly focused in Reconquista, but with some other generic models.

In fact I found it on my local shop's web, which has a 3D printing service, and it made the whole thing much easier. When I got the actual model I couldn't be more pleased. Absolutely delightful and just right like the pic above. The details are stunning and everything was lovely. So I couln't wait to throw some paint on it!

This is technically a Wyvern, but it will do

I thought of doing the dragon red, but in the end I went for a more classic green. In fact I gave it the same treatment as the Orc Warlord on Wyvern from a few weeks ago. I made some research on St. George and the Dragon representations in art through history and there are a lot of different interpretations and readings of both the knight and the beast. However, I think this is the first time I see St. George in this Norman style.

To be fitted later!

Apparently St. George was a Roman officer of Cappadocian Greek ascendance, a Praetorian to Diocletian, and who was sentenced to death for not abjuring his Christian faith. Wikipedia assists me by stating that the Diocletian Persecution of 303 was especifically aimed at Christians within the ranks of the professional soldiers of the Roman Army, and hence when George was caught. He was beheaded at Nicomedia on 23 April 303. So the tradition says.

It seems that the cult to St. George became popular in the following centuries. But what about the dragon? The legend doesn't come up until the 11th century, spreading through Europe during the 12th century.

Yeah, that guy is nothing without me!

 

(By the way, do you see that hole on the dragon's neck? It's designed so the spear can go through it when the model is assembled. Seriously top notch design work!)

Once upon a time... It is said that a dragon built its nest on a natural spring nearby the town of Silene, Lybia, and that the people gave two sheep each day to the beast so they could get water. But at some point there were no sheep enough, so they started to give the dragon human sacrifices, on a raffle basis. The system worked until one day the King's daughter was chosen. Only then people seemed to have a problem with the whole thing (Hello?? No one is making any kind of social criticism here? Ahem. Never mind...). Long story short, George faces the dragon, kills it and the citizens of the town became Christians. Woohooo.

Well, there are way better sources for the story than this blog. Go make some research.

Going back to the model, I had this little frame at home, and I thought it was perfect for this occasion:

Come on, dragon, go home, you're drunk

Some DAS putty to make it more 3D

I had some doubts when it came to painting St. George. There are as many representations as artists, I'd dare to say, so I didn't feel bound by specific colours. I couldn't make his clothes white, as that was the colour of the horse. I thought of green, but it was all too green alongside the dragon.

Besides, I'm getting a Rohirrim vibe here

So this was my final take:

It took me some time to get to this solution

In the meantime, I moved forward with the base:

Barren desert. But the dragon's lair was supposed to be close to a spring

So some vegetation is required

I took my chances with the black edge on the base, I thought it would look better this way, instead of using the whole base as part of the vignette, with land and grass.

This is the final result:

St. George seems to be quite popular all over Europe, being the patron of many countries and regions, revered from East to West, from Russia to England, spanning Ukraine, Hungary, much of the Mediterranean.. and outside that, even Ethiopia! As I googled him to write this post, I discover that Muslims also consider George as a prophetic figure in Islamic sources. I'm happy to display someone who brings together so many different people. We have too few of those.

Something old, something new, something red

Misleading title, I admit it ;)

Long story short, I've used my Secundaris Space Marines Method to build some Blood Angels. Let's get the pic first and the long, boring text later:

Why did I choose to do that, so suddenly? It's quite unexpected, isn't it? OK, a (not so) little digression...

My younger, who quite recently just turned 5, has been fiddling/toying/playing with my miniatures for some quite time now. He gets them from the shelves or drawers and just pew-pews with them or makes his own story, whatever. You know this kind of stuff, we all have done it. Needless to say, quite a significant number of minis end up on the workbench again for... extensive repairings. I don't really care. I believe it's more important that the kids enjoy and get familiar with dad's toys. I only keep the most fragile models away from them.

The thing is that he's been playing with my Carcharodons, making them fight against almost anything else around. All kind of beasts, space lizards or whatever. So it's all I like these knights, pew pew. A few weeks ago he plainly asked me if I could make some knights like those for him, but in red. That's important, as it's his favourite colour. He was tired of using those boring, dark grey space knights.

So I got this unexpected commission, one I could never refuse! These were the essential guidelines:

1. They had to be red. My first idea was not to do a mainstream Chapter (spoiler: I changed my mind later), I thought it would be nice to do a different thing, something more characterful. Well, of course I couldn't do something as vanilla as, let's say Genesis Chapter. What kind of dad does that to their own child. In the future it would be something like "-Hey, how did your old man got you into Warhammer?" "-He painted me some Genesis Chapter Marines" "-Uuuuugg". Ahem. I seriously considered the Exorcists, as I've done other Chapters involved in the Badab War in the past. In fact I even started painting them with this idea in mind, as you'll see later. However, this involved the future problem of explaining to my kid the weird stuff surrounding this Chapter, such as daemonic possessions, the Puritans vs the Radicals within the Inquisition... the Inquisition itself... well, you know. Anyway, while I was on the early stages, he saw a pic on my computer of Blood Angels and he asked "-Are those my red knights?" "-Well, son, not particularly these, but..." "-But I like these. I want these." "-Ooookay". No more questions, your Honor. Blood Angels it is. In fact I honestly think that in the end it was the right choice. If he's ever to play WH40K on his own in the future I guess it's better to start with something better known, such as this Chapter. Blood Angels then!
2. They had to be, I wouldn't dare to say sturdy, but at least a little bit resistant. Their primary use is not precisely going to be on a gaming board by adults, but by a 5 y/o. For that reason I didn't even consider metal miniatures. It needed them to be plastic, and with the least possible number of pieces involved. I had a few spare Primaris Marines on their sprues, so they seemed like the obvious choice.
3. Once I was on this course of action, I wanted visual coherence with my other stuff, i.e., my realscale Carcharodons. Please be aware that all this stupid fanfic from 10th Edition, such as the Primaris Marines, the resurrected Primarchs and other nonsense simply doesn't exist in the Suberverse. Don't even bother to mention it. I have large, towering Space Marines, and that's it. That's why I used regular Space Marines helmets. But, as said above, I wouldn't dare to make just but the minimal, essential conversions. I don't want a hundred pieces all over everyday.
4. I can't believe you just read all that. Let's see the pictures!

Raw Materials

You can see that I originally intended to add a Captain, but in the end I dropped it out of the project. It could make sense as an Exorcist Space Marine Captain, but not that much as a Blood Angels Captain.

I even started to paint it!

I'm not a fan of the new large bolters, but I can live with them. I shortened them for my Carcharodons, but I kept them for these Marines, as I feared little broken bits all over the place. However, I shortened the plasma gun, that was too much for me!

I hadn't painted this amount of red in quite some time!

Both my kids helped in the early stages with the base colour. It was one of their first contacts with the brushes and we worked on some of the basics, it was a pretty cool experience :)

As Old School as I could get them

 I went for a Second Edition aesthetics (well of course!), and I must confess that I thoroughly enjoyed the process. The vibrant red, the breast plate eagles in yellow, that kind of stuff... ohh, I felt like thirty years ago, in the middle of the Red Era. This was the kind of work I would have liked to do then but lacked the skills to achieve, so I can say that these five Space Marines have been a total second chance for me!

Here you have them, one by one.

The mohawk helped with the oldschool vibe

As I see this pic now I notice I haven't finished the checkers on the kneepad! :O

I didn't think of the Croatian Marine until I had it finished

The bolter and pistol pose is quite Second Edition too

It can't be retro if you don't use a beakie head

I'm displeased with the decals. I only used the Blood Angels symbol on the left shoulderpads, but I think it won't be that long until I tear them apart and paint them. For now, here you have the final result:

The best thing of all this is that my kid is happy with his new red warriors, and that's invaluable for me.

Oh, but now the elder brother (8), has just asked if he could also get some minis for him! I've proudly answered that for sure, what would you like, kiddo? And I didn't expect the answer... Marvel Superheroes minis. Wow.

Well, I guess I'm looking for the Crisis Protocol stuff now...