Sunday July 29

Today's meeting was an afternoon for the short, fat, bearded dudes with axes and beer, and for tree huggers - Dwarfs and Wood Elves rocked! There were also games of Dystopian Wars and Ancients.

Simon (Dwarfs) played Neil (Warriors of Chaos) and Wills (Dwarfs) played Jacob (also Dwarfs). The short, fat, bearded dudes with axes and beer won both games. The other Fantasy Battle game was Gavin (Wood Elves) vs Aaron (Ogres). Yep, the tree huggers won.


Craig and Ross played Dystopian wars, a steam punk game of navies and fliers. Craig (Federated States of America) let his son, Ross (Republique d'France), win.


Vince (Early Imperial Romans) and Phil (Polybian Romans) tried DBMM 200, a half-sized variant of the DBMM Ancient rules played in 25mm on a 6'x 4'tble. The game was quick, it was finished in two and a quarter hours including the time it took to unpack the car, and fun. Highly recommended as a smaller scale game. Yes, the Romans won.


Vince

Wings of War

You may be aware that over the past 18 months or so there has been little activity in the 'Wings of War' arena, primarily because the European company that published the games (Nexus) curled up its toes some time ago due to the global recession.

In more recent times a new company (Ares) has taken over the publishing role for these games and minis, and we're at the stage where the first new items have started to reach New Zealand's shores -- a great day for aviation gamers!! For your reference the game ranges have now been renamed 'Wings Of Glory'.

We at the Historical Aviation Film Unit have decided that we will continue to provide a local New Zealand on-line source for these Wings Of Glory items, as a service to those enthusiasts who are interested in playing the games and/or collecting the miniatures as they're released.

With that in mind we've just spent a couple of days updating the Wings Of Glory parts of our on-line store, updating it with new details, adding new pricing information, and also linking back to the New Zealand importers website so that you can check on the local availability of any items with a couple of mouse clicks -- gone are the days when you need to ask us if we have stock, and then we need to chase up the importers (PixelPark) to find out if they have any.

You can find the World War One items here:

      http://www.aviationfilm.com/shop/games/wog_ww1.shtml

And we're now going to offer the WW2 items as well:

      http://www.aviationfilm.com/shop/games/wog_ww2.shtml

For those of you who have only previously used one or the other, please note that the game mechanisms vary somewhat between the WW1 and WW2 versions. They're not interchangable.

Here are a few other things you need to be aware of:

* We've dropped the per unit pricing of almost all the items as we no longer build the shipping component into the individual prices.

* There will now be an additional one-off  shipping charge of NZ$11.50 for any order containing Wings of Glory items from our website. Sorry folks, but shipping costs just keep going up and we can't absorb all of them.  This charge will be added to your order whether you select the appropriate shipping method on the checkout page of our store or not!

* Because of the cost of these items, and the small number of customers purchasing them, we're not going to be keeping a large amount of stock on hand.  Rather we'll generally be purchasing it from the NZ Importers on an as-needed basis.

* The individual page for each item (e.g. http://www.aviationfilm.com/shop/games/ww2_items/hurricane_kuznestov.shtml) now has a direct  clickable link so that you can "Click here to double-check current NZ stock levels".  That is you can use this facility to double-check and see if there is stock on hand with the NZ Importer -- if there is, there shouldn't be a problem filling your order.  If there's not, then you may want to check with us first and see if we have any stock left.

* Please bear in mind that we're not selling these items to make a lot of money. In fact one of our partners keeps asking why we're selling them at all as the profit margins are so negligible. The reason we're offering this service to NZ gamers who live outside of the range of any brick and mortar stores selling WoG items is because we're passionate about aviation and gaming, and we want to be able to offer this as a service so you have a local online source for these items.  Some of our prices may be a little more expensive than brick and mortar retailers who do nothing but sell toys and games, but we hope you will support us anyway.

Best regards,
Allan Udy

Historical Aviation Film Unit:  http://www.aviationfilm.com/
Find our YouTube Channel at:  http://www.youtube.com/HAFUVideo#g/p
A Division of  Golden Micro Solutions Ltd,
Box 590,  Blenheim,  New Zealand  http://www.golden.co.nz/

June 8 meeting - it's a sign!

At the Friday June 8 meeting Harley (King Arthur) and I (Saxons) played DBA. In the first game the Saxons attacked a wider British line at a disadvantage and I promptly rolled my first three combat dice, 6, 6, 6 . It's a sign! Once the warbands are that fired up it's hard to hold them.

Harley, son of Uther, ponders the battlefield.

In the foreground the British are forming their battle line. Arthur has the Red Dragon.

The view from the Saxon side.

We used the very easy to learn DBA rules. If you would like to learn get in touch with me. I can provide dozens of armies in 15mm, which Harley and I played, and 25mm. My contacts are 379 6107, 027 344 1073 and vincecholewa@yahoo.com

There were also two games of Fantasy Battle and one of 40K, with a surprising number of people dropping in to see what was going on and to talk toy soldiers.

Callan's Space Marines were fueled by "Demon" and chocolate (not in the picture) as they took on Ben's Blood Angels. Was that a wargamer's dinner?

James used his new Mantic Games Vampire Counts against Jonathon's Chaos Warriors.

Gavin (Wood Elves), sporting an unseasonably short new hair cut, took exception to Simon's  Dwarfs. They had axes (aaaaaargh). In the end, the tree huggers prevailed.

Vince

Sunday, May 27

Three tables were being used, all for multi-player games. 

 Whatever happened on the Fantasy Battle table it was all Wills' fault!

Jacob and Wills used Dwarfs against

Aaron's Ogres and Jonathan's Chaos Warriors.

The other tables had a Dystopian Wars "steam punk" game and the board game Game of Thrones.

Craig brought along his Dystopian Wars rules and very cute models.

James and Harley (Federated States of America) played Ross and Craig (Empire of the Blazing Sun).

Neil brought along Game of Thrones and, he, Peter, Simon, Gary and Vince played. Peter was summoned away by a telephone call and Neil cunningly exploited the power vacuum left to win!

Vince

For your listening pleasure

Hey guys, just thought I'd share with you something I've been listening to a lot lately - The Meeples and Miniatures podcast.  This is a really good podcast, covering all aspects of the wargaming hobby from historic to boardgames.  He doesn't really touch on Warmachine and GW too often (or at all), but there are plenty of dedicated podcasts for both of those!  What Neil does is cover all the other parts of our hobby - my favourite so far is Episodes #24 and #25 where he interviews the owners of Hasslefree miniatures (http://www.hfminis.co.uk/), a husband and wife team who make some fantastic minis, and an interview that also manages to cover the business side of miniature making.  Anyway, at over 100 episodes now, Meeples and Miniatures is worth having a browse - I'm sure you'll find something interesting!

http://www.meeplesandminiatures.co.uk/

Also available on iTunes, which is where I discovered it.

James

Models need painting? Call Sam!

Heaps of models lying around?  Painting queue taking over your house?  Sam Whitt from over the hill has set himself up as a painting mercenary!  Just drop him a line on  bungdoc@hotmail.com to find out prices etc.

Warhammer Achievements - A Skaven Tail

Hey guys, this post is to give you all the heads up about a very exciting tournament coming up in June.

 

Its a one day, 3 game, 1600 point tourny, where there are many different ways to "win". Very much suited to the more casual gamers and those new to tournaments. Basically you get pints for achieving certain things in your army list design (e.g. including a monster), in the play (e.g.failing a stupidity test, charging a solo character into a large unit), scratch built models, converted models etc.

 

That combined with fun scenarios will cause lots of upsets to throw the more experienced players off their stride.  It's ideal for people new to tournaments, or those of us not of the straight-up competitive bent.

All the information can be found here: http://www.thefieldsofblood.com/2012/04/warhammer-achievements-new-hobby-event.html#links

James