Trying out some skirmish rules

My recent urban terrain build has sparked my interest in playing some small-scale games. The question is, what set of rules to use? I have quite a few different rulebooks, a common problem for many wargamers, covering a wide range of periods and genres. Some of these sets of rules I have played a few times, while others I haven’t put on the table even once.

I was looking at 7TV 2nd Edition on the Crooked Dice website the other day, and at one point I was thinking about ordering it. But then I reminded myself that I bought the first edition rules over a decade ago and have never got them on the table. When I got the 7TV rules, I bought a bundle with tokens, cards and two supplements, so I thought I should give them a try.

For my trial run of the game, I thought it would be best to start small, so I built two small 100-rating casts. The main conceit of 7TV is that you are not fighting some historic battle but rather making a TV programme. So, rather than building an army, you make a cast, and instead of points, you have ratings.

The heroes were Kung Fu Kelly, a Hardened Investigator (Star), Little Jim Saxon, his Plucky Assistant (Co-Star). The villains were the O’Hara Gang, led by O’Hara, a Faithful Lackey (Co-Star), and four ‘Eavies (Extras).

The Scenario

I decided to play a simple Chance Meeting encounter. Kung Fu Kelly and Little Jim Saxon turned up in Kelly’s Ford Capri in one corner, while the O’Hara Gang arrived in a Ford Transit in the opposite corner. The two sides would try to eliminate each other.

The O’Hara Gang took the initiative at the start of the engagement. The ‘Eavies moved quickly towards Kelly and Saxon, while O’Hara held back, cocking his submachine gun.

Seeing the oncoming members of the O’Hara Gang, Kung Fu Kelly cracked his knuckles and quickly loosened up, ready to teach the goons the error of their ways.

O’Hara ordered two of his heavies to rough up the two interlopers. One of the ‘Eavies charged towards Little Jim and swung his bat, cracking the Plucky Assistant on the skull.

Kung Fu Kelly sprang to Saxon’s aid. Striking like a snake, he quickly knocked out the first ‘Eavy. He then took out a second ‘Eavy with a flying kick.

Telling Kelly to go deal with O’Hara, Saxon pulled his sawn-off shotgun out of his coat. Kelly heard the boom of the shotgun as he raced towards O’Hara and his waiting submachine gun.

O’Hara’s submachine gun peppered the area around Kelly, but none of the shots hit the master of Iron Bull Kung Fu. Kelly’s first strike knocked O’Hara back, taking the air out of him. Kelly smiled as he got ready to teach this old lag a lesson or two. The sound of two bats pounding on Little Jim stopped Kelly from finishing off O’Hara. He quickly turned back to aid his friend. The two ‘Eavies were surprised to be attacked from behind. They turned and tried to use their bats to defend themselves, but they were no match for the raging fists of Kung Fu Kelly.

Kelly’s timely aid saved Little Jim Saxon, but in dealing with the ‘Eavies, he let O’Hara escape this time.

My Thoughts on the rules

First off, I have to say that I enjoyed these rules. They are nice and simple, but with enough tweaks of their own to make them feel fresh.

A lot of the combat mechanics would not be unfamiliar to anyone who has played Warhammer or any of its offspring, such as Bolt Action. You roll to hit, and then there is a wound table in which Strength is compared to Defence on a chart to determine the number you need to cause a wound.

The initiative, activation and event cards are where the game differentiates itself from these mainstays of the hobby. Although initiative is just a roll-off between the two sides, the difference between the rolls gives you Audience Appreciation tokens that can be used to adjust rolls during the turn. Players will only be able to activate half of their force, which can really lead to some interesting decisions.

These rules are not some revolutionary, ground-breaking thing, but they make for a really good game, and I will definitely be getting them on the table again.

Building a world on a budget. Part eight

 Building a world on a budget

My urban construction has been ticking along quite well. After finishing two street tiles, I thought I would turn my hand to a building. I thought I would be able to get it finished in August, but things just didn’t work out, and I didn’t manage to get it done until 1 September.

Project eight: A biscuit box building

Construction

The pair of terrace shops started their life as the lid from a box of biscuits, whose shape and size seemed perfect for my urban tiles. 

The first thing I had to do was give the box a little more structural strength by gluing some supports into it. I used some offcuts of foam board for the supports. Like the Wombles, I don’t really want anything to go to waste.

I am not the most precise of people, which is why I wanted a box lid, as it gave me a regular shape to work with. Once I was happy that the box could hold up to the rigours of the tabletop, I drew up a plan of the building on paper. I tried to make the most of the square edges that the paper gave me to stop the building from being too wonky when I was drawing the plan.

With my plan in hand, I transferred the design onto the sides of the box lid, and then I used styrene to frame the building out. I had hoped that this would give me a precise, regular building that was true, but sadly I was not as precise as I thought I had been. Framing the building out was a mistake, which I didn’t realise until I moved on to the next stage and tried to clad the building with plasticard.

The cladding was a complete pain. I wish that I could think of something positive to say about this stage, but it was just very frustrating. At least I won’t make the same mistake again. My idea to frame the building first made it really hard to cut the plasticard into the right shape. It was all compounded by my less-than-stellar measuring, which made it impossible for me to get any of the cladding to fit flush with each other. I persevered with it, but by the end I thought that it looked like a right dog’s dinner.

Being really unhappy with the exterior look of the building, I thought that the best idea would be to cover it with modelling putty. I chose Tamiya Smooth Finish Modelling Putty, but other brands would also work. I use Tamiya putty because I am used to how it works, and it is the most readily available where I live. The putty work took the best part of an evening to do, but it saved the building for me. While I waited for the putty to dry, I used the time to make the doors out of plasticard.

I forgot to mention in the previous section that the roof surface was made from very fine-grit sandpaper. I really like the texture it has once it has been painted.

The overall paint scheme was fairly simple. I started by undercoating the building in white, then I gave it a base coat of Vallejo Desert Yellow. On top of the base coat, I first sponged on a layer of Dark Sand, and I finished it off with a layer of Ivory. The doors and the window frames were also given three different layers of paint in green and brown.

Once the paint had dried, I added the downpipes and signboards. I learnt another lesson here, one that I already knew but somehow slipped my mind: painted surfaces are not very good for getting a strong bond when gluing things together. I ended up having to scrape off the paint from the areas where I was sticking things to. It wasn’t much more work, but I could have avoided it pretty simply.

The next thing I did was to wash the whole building with Agrax Earthshade. The wash really helped to bring out the texture and details on the building.

The final detailing on the building was what was going to turn it from an okay piece on my table into a pretty good piece. I started by finishing the windows using some leftover pieces of UV-cut sheet that I had put on the glass doors of my apartment. I like the reflective blue effect that they give to the side and rear windows.

I had planned to just put some names on the signboards using transfers, but Uglub had been following the progress of my build on his Discord channel and kindly offered to make some artwork for me. If you are unaware of Uglub’s work, I can recommend his YouTube channel Uglub`s Armoury; it is a great source of inspiration for tabletop gaming. This artwork was the finishing touch that my building needed.

Now I need to get back to making some more streets, so that I have somewhere to place this building.