Blood Red Skies

So as we're nearing the end of the inaugural year of the game I thought I'd have a little look back as this time last year I was eagerly awaiting my pre-ordered christmas present! Unfortunately, we were off to a rocky start as the shipping date was pushed back till the spring, but it didn't appear to dent enthusiasm too much as all the initial wave sold out. To start with we had spitfires, 109's, yaks, p51s and a6m5 Zeros and a singular named ace for each faction. With the huge upswell of demand, Warlord partnered with Zvezda for the planes from their "art of tactic" game, bringing 1:200 scale Blenheim bombers for the brits, SB2 and Li2 bombers and transports for the soviets, ju52 and ju88 transports and bombers for the gerries and the c47 skytrain transport for the americans (minor mod to the li2 model required). We settled in and played for a few months before the next set of releases came out, this time in metal much the the shock of some, but they cam...

Evening all! Been a while since I last posted up new content thanks to the arrival of this little blighter, but things are settling and I'm getting the odd opportunity here and there to sit at the hobby desk and crank out a few bits and bobs. At the beginning of november, Warlord games released the first of the new wave of "hard" plastics, the Hurricanes and the Mosquitos for the Allies and I was super keen to see what the new material was like. thankfully I'd won a box of mosquitos in the BRS tourny at the Warlord open day so I only had to splurge on the Hurricanes and I'd seen both already as "test shots" (pre-production testers) so was aware of the pre-production issues with a few panel lines and such here and there. As I'm primarily a gamer, none of these offended me greatly but I know it is a major issue for many other folk out there. Unfortunately, not all the pre-production issues got ironed out with the hurricanes and there is a panel...

Open day tournament and Bombing rules test Today started with a bit of a drama with getting to warlord on time (damn bendy credit cards and their flimsy chips!) but we soon got underway with a small tournament which settled me down a touch. My first round was against a lovely chap called james who had horrible dice right throughout! The board was lovely, looked like a deepcut mat and some home made cliffs. I'd taken my British mustang mkiv's, 5 of them. ratings 4,3,3,3,3 for pilots which worked nicely to 495 points. James had taken mkii spitfires, pilot skills 5,5,2,2,2,2 and immediately I was wary of the outmaneuvres to come from the enemy aces, but looking forward to being able to bully the plentiful rookies for boom chits. I split my wings 3/2 with the R4 pilot taking the right flank and the 3 3's taking the left. Radar support, superior armament and low altitude were the cards I'd chosen. The traits I used were x3 deep pockets and x2 great dive. Pass 1 bega...

Warlord Open day BRS talk with Andy Chambers 22/9/18 The warlord open day was great, Ken Natt (of "Ready Room" fame) was organising the tournament today and we managed to get two rounds in between the BRS talk and the "breaking the box" heavy bomber rules-test. We dashed over to catch the talk and stumbled in after it had started, Andy Chambers and some other bloke from warlord I didn't recognise and wasn't introduced to was there (pleasant chap!). First up was a discussion on a "ground attack" supplement which we would end up testing an iteration of later that afternoon which will be going for public beta via the ready room soon-ish. The idea is that this will come out next year as a PDF. There was a lot of talk about how warlord had originally pitched the game as a fighter game and wanted to keep it "core" to the experience and were resisting temptation to "mission creep" and build into a much more bomber-focussed game. T...

So after the last naval game ( linky linky.. ) i'd proposed a few changes to make it a little less one-sided and improve the experience. In summary for this game we changed; fleet deployed laterally across a line 20" from my board edge enemy bombers deployed 6" off their own board edge, fighters within 6". Advantage as per "escort duty" mission Fleet had their own pass at the end of the initiative pass. Ships move 1" and can turn through 45 degrees at the end of their move Ships can fire with 9" range as a defensive turret at end of activation "Heavy flak presence" card x2 in the defender's deck as extras British forces (defending) Fleet: Destroyer (Firepower 4) 3 cripple/5 sink Minelayer (Firepower 1) 2 cripple/4 sink Auxiliary ship (Firepower 1) 1 cripple/2 sink CAP: x6 spitfires, pilot ratings 5,4,3,3,2,2 x2 defiants, crew ratings 4,3 Axis Forces: x6 bf109e, pilot ratings 5,4,3,3,2,2 x3 ju88, crew ratings 4...

After all the prep and cooldown of the big naval game in my last post ( convoy attack mission ), Its been back to the workbench to make a dint in some of the rapidly accumulating projects i've set myself. The paint and decal queue has been getting a bit hefty and made worse with a distraction from my other major game system (Infinity) having a spate of new releases too. To that end, I thought I'd showcase some of the stuff thats out there that folk might not have been aware of. Merit 1:200 range Supplied in packs of four, the planes come prepainted with some basic detailing on wings and fuselage Whilst I was researching the fleet stuff for the big convoy game, I happened across a small pre-painted range of 1:200 planes from the pacific theatre. They're made by merit and they're really designed as accessories for a 1:200 scale aircraft carrier. Being a bit brave, I ordered some SBD dive bombers and F4Fs on the off-chance they'd be usable. Thankfully, they ...

All hands to battle stations!!!! The claxons went off throughout the fleet, everyone dashing for the AA pintles and to man their respective posts ready to seal bulkheads and man the pumps. The captain cursed as he saw the incoming attack wave both on radar and through his binoculars out the starboard portholes. How the hell had they known about the deployment? Had they broken the codes? Was there a spy in port? Way above deck, the CAP swung round to face the oncoming bomber wave as the RAF fighters scrambled from blighty roared ever nearer to help intercept the bombers......  So for a while I've been wanting to do some ground attack missions with BRS to see how it handles. I'd seen the "heroes of the pacific" document up on the Facebook group (Ready Room) and was immediately inspired! several hours of searching, posting on the ready room and sourcing suitable shipping culminated with me working my way through a decent haul of 1:700 shipping.  I bought a mix...