7Tv game at the Club - 10th May 2011

After the Department X raid on their Slough branch, United Radionics have relocated to a run down industrial estate in Bracknell, where it is believed has been left some interesting clues to plans made during the Korean War for a new form of Sonic Weapon. Department X arrive by some fluke at the same time and so followed a "gather" mission (see 7Tv rulebook). Each building contains a clue counter each of varying value.

DX are joined in this special edition by the cast of Police series "Beat". UR have joined forces with the mysterious Guru who runs the SHIVA organisation.

DI Skelton's favourite snitch "King Tut" Tuttle is deployed in an Infiltration role, hoping to make the most of his saboteur and repair abilities.

A crazy camera angle shows Pandora King and Hugo Solomon finding a clue.

The Guru played by Roget De Lago leads his fanatical SHIVA cultists.

Genral Gordon's troops form line in a strangely dated manouver.

Head of UR in the UK, Lancelot Cray with his favourite Femdroid, his bodyguard Lionel and a stray technician make for the largest building.

With much tyre-screeching - it's the Rozzers, led by the intrepid WPC Cathy Black (once she has finished the tea).

The heroes of "The Beat" make their guest appearence. Slumming it in a Ford Escort this week.

Battle is well and truly joined as Pandora takes down a Cultist leader and battles against one of the Guru's Thuggee bodyguards. Solomon sees stars after an amazing one followed by a re-roll of, you guessed it, a one leaves him confused by the Guru's mental powers just in time for his ward the lovely but deadly Kali to cause him a wound with her poisoned knife.

A star is almost born as PC Extra hurls himself out of the back of the van, which has itself just done a handbrake turn, and into combat with a nameless minion. What could possibly go wrong? Oh, that would be another one rolled! Good effort nonetheless.

The confused Solomon is clobbered well and truly by the lethal Kali who takes full advantage of the befuddled but well dressed agent. Pandora fells another Cultist but another Thugge is on the way.

A fierce exchange of fire with Femdroids thins out the General's troops. Perhaps line in the open was not the best idea. The General is himself only saved by his superior toughness.

How did we get here? Pandora uses a teleportation gadget to transfer herself an the two Thuggees she is fighting into a building where DI Skelton's surving cast members are holed up after clearing it of minions and frigtening off the Man in the Lead Suit with a fierce one liner about his parentage. The Thuggees are felled by a swift roundhouse from Pandora.

The game came to a close as the 10pm watershed approached. Victory to the forces of naughtiness as they found by far the most clue counters. Although, the good guys lost a lot of constables and soldiers early on, none of the casts got to the morale test stage so it was a close run fight.

Figures from the usual suspects, Crooked Dice, Killerbgames, Copplestone and Artizan. Cultists are from Pulp figures as were Kali and a couple of the technicians. The Thuggees are Tong from Brigade Games in the USA.

The buildings are gift boxes. Lids have been spray painted with fleck spray. The walls are done using Model Builder software again from the US, printed and pritt sticked (stucked?) onto the sides of the boxes.

1938 British Civil War using Mud and Blood

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Trouble in the Piddle Valley

PVDF Briefing

The annual Martyrs rally at Tolpuddle although declared illegal has once again attracted all manner of leftist loonies from the Socialist areas of the country. One such party of Socialist miscreants has been spotted heading north up the Piddle Valley. The Cerne Abbas unit of the Piddle Valley Defence Force have been mustered to prevent any trouble and to stop the Socialists from passing through the village. You have blocked the road and intend to keep the village “red-free”.

PVDF Platoon (Blues)

Sergeant Steve Butcher - Blue Big Man 1 (status 3)

Cpl Craig Baker - Blue Big Man 2 (status 2) Deployed at the road block.

L/Cpl Bob “Candlestick” Mayker - Blue Big Man 3 (status 1)

28 Green troops with rifles (Good Morale)

2 Regulars with Lewis Guns (Good Morale)

All troops start on blinds at the Northern edge of the table, apart from Baker whose squad are at the road block and can remain hidden until spotted in the usual manner.

Objectives – Prevent the Socialists from getting through the village. Capture any Big Men for interrogation.

PBM Briefing (Reds)

The Huntley and Palmers branch of the People’s Biscuit Makers are lost. They took a wrong turn after being chased out of Tolpuddle whilst attempting to honour their illustrious predecessors at the annual (and now illegal) Martyrs rally. They managed to escape the BUF Durnovarian Guard outside of Dorchester and have headed North along the Piddle Valley. They have met Brother Socialists on the road, who have warned them that the locals up ahead are armed and are stopping anyone going through the village of Cerne Abbas. The HPPBM pause for a sub-committee meeting and decide (eventually) that enough is enough. They decide to teach the reactionary villagers a lesson and head towards Cerne Abbas.

PBM Forces

Comrade Chairman Tony “Dunker” McVitie - Red Big Man 1 (status 3)

Comrade Secretary Billy “Cracker” Jacobs – Red Big Man 2 (status 2)

Comrade Minute Taker Tom “Hob Nobby” Clarke – Red Big man 3 (status 1)

Comrade Tea Maker Jack “PG” Tips – Red Big Man 4 (status 1)

36 Green troops with rifles (Good Morale)

3 trucks

All troops start on blinds on the Southern table edge having debussed from their trucks.

Objectives – defeat the local defence forces so that you can clear the road. Capture enemy Big Men if possible for propaganda purposes.

The southern edge of Cerne Abbas. The PBM have seen the roadblock by the bridge and debus onto blinds at the southern table edge. They start to make their way cautiously through the dense terrain spotting as they go.

The PVDF spot a blind on the road by the trucks and forcing them off of their blind pour fire onto the unfortunate socialists. "Hob Nobby" Clarke and "PG" Tips squads take so much shock that they never really recover.

Now that the first group of PVDF have revealed themselves at the roadblock, "Cracker" Jacobs leads his men on a blind along the hedgerow until they are in a position to open fire.

Corporal Baker and his squad man the roadblock, "You shall not pass!"

"Dunker" McVitie crosses the church yard and deploys on the right flank, opening fire on Baker's men.

"Don't panic! Don't panic! Them Reds don't like it up 'em you know." Baker calms his men. Amazingly, despite taking numerous casualties, barely any shock effects the brave men of Cerne Abbas and they remain steadfast at the roadblock whilst they await reinforcements. main issue for Baker is the frequent jams from the Lewis gun.

The reinforcements begin to arrive in the form of L/Cpl Bob "Candlestick" Mayker. Armed with a flag and a cucumber sandwich he eventually takes position on the PVDF left.

McVitie continues to approach the roadblock, firing as they go. They are now under fire from Mayker's squad.

"My regards to you Mr Baker. A split tin loaf for Mrs Butcher after all this is sorted if you would". Sgt Butcher arrives casually on the PVDF right and then sweeps forward towards "Cracker" Jacobs men.

It's all too much for "Cracker". His men fall back to the trucks under the weight of fire.

They are soon joined by McVitie's men. The People's Biscuit Makers will have to find another way back to their Reading factory base.

The rules used are the "Mud and Blood" by the Toofatlardies.
Figures are mainly from Under the Bed, Great War, Musketeer and Foundry.
Trucks are Sloppy Jalopy and Corgi.

Dead Walk Again - Zombies in Reading 27th July 2011

The Miracle Child - Scenario by Steve H

In a secure compound The Umbrella Scientific Organisation have been experimenting with a cure for the zombie plague, but have so far been unsuccessful. However a few months back a child wandered out of the dead zone totally unharmed. Furthermore the zombies near the entrance to the base simply ignored her as she walked amongst them. The doctors carried out numerous tests, but pulse, blood and other assorted medical tests came back normal. She seemed normal, quiet, in fact she would not speak, docile, submissive even…she even ate normal canteen food. She certainly wasn’t infected. When placed in a test room with ‘captured’ zombies they simply ignored her (as if she was one of them). Why was she immune? One scientist (who was going a bit stir-crazy) believed it was psychological and thought that the girl could control zombies with her mind, his fellow white coats thought he was an idiot. Deciding he was correct, he smuggled the girl away on ‘field trip’ to the local infected town, leaving a note that he was off to prove his point………

Chas and Spike - Guns for hire

Chad and Cherelle from the trailer park (she's goigious!!)

Kurt Bustle (Elvis Impersonator) and a strangely un-named SWAT fellow.

Hannibal and BA - Awaiting a plan to come together

A team of mercenaries and a few armed scientists have been sent to find the young girl, she must be returned at all costs. The SWAT/Security van can only get so far through the streets and so the team has to proceed on foot. Get into the town, find the girl and get her out. At least one member of the team has to survive to get her back to the compound.

She's out there somewhere...

The team leave the SWAT van and Chad and Cheryl waste no time in heading straight for the Plasticville Hospital, only to get a nasty shock as the patients and staff make a break for the open door.

With a little help from their friends, Chad and Cherelle clear the hospital of Zs and the team move on to the next block and after a little discussion head towards Central Park.

Zombies are still quiet up to the point that Chas and Spike let rip and SWAT man opens up with sustained fire, killing a numbers of Zs but attracting 7 more.

Elvis impersonator Kurt goes for the "Little less conversation approach and gives a Z a short range shotgun blast.

Zs start to close in from all sides, attracted by the gun fire.

Cherelle in perille! Our Trashy heroine does what she does best and hangs around a street sign. That girl cannot resist a pole.

The boys step in and ave the girl but Zs are now into contact for the first time. The pressure mounts on the team.

BA cannot resist popping into Texas Steve's Auto Parts. Surely not the time for shopping?

Chad makes a stand in the park. "It's okay, go on without me". I am not sure he really said that, but his teammates were convinced so they went on without him.

Hannibal guards the door of the autoparts store. BA searches through the store and finds the girl. My, she has grown up (and outwards).

Chad falls after sustaining multiple wounds.

And promptly gets back up again - Zombified!

The un-named SWAT man fails a fear test and is dragged down by the Zs now led by Zombie-Chad.

The gang make good their escape. What secrets will the Miracle Girl reveal....?

An unusually successful mission for the survivors. I obviously was not tough enough on them!



Rules used were Dead Walk Again. Join the Yahoo Group and get the rules for free at

http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/deadwalkagain/

Buildings are from Ainsty, Plasticville and various in card stock.

Zombies are from the excellent Dead Will Walk range by Cold War, survivors are mostly from Foundry

The Curse of Pirate Rules - Strange Grogge 22 June 2011

Why the Curse of the Pirate Rules?

At the Reading club we have been looking for some time for a set of pirate rules that will cope with our stupidly large collection of pirate figures. This now includes a number of fantasy races from the likes of Black Scorpion. Throw in the fact that we like to do multi-player games, we have been left scratching our heads somewhat.

Last night we had not really organised anything so threw together a small three player Strange Grogge.

Richard H "buried" treasure under a marker and then scattered the rest around one corner of the table in an abandoned settlement. He rolled up an undead crew to defend the treasure from two marauding crews - one dwarf and one orc.

I rolled up a pathetically small band of orcs/goblins.

Richard S rolled up a numerous Dwarf crew. Stout fellows all.

Things started well for the Orcs with an initial assault storming the settlement boundary fence, although the orc in the green coat at the back took a nasty shot as he crossed the open ground.

This proved to be a high tide (!) for the orcs as they managed to drop their weapons with alarming frequency. The Skellie with the musketoon in the background kept backing off and picking away at the orcs. The double one from Richard H sealed the fate of the red coated orc in the centre of the pic. Not the only outrageous throw of the evening.

Hurray! At last the Dwarves arrive. Having taken a surprising amount of damage crossing the terrain with no elan whatsoever (they are quite tall fences I suppose).

The musketoon skellie who gave my orcs so much trouble is dispatched with embarrassing ease at the first Dwarf attempt with a critical success roll.

Devasting dwarf pistol fire keeps the boneheads at bay.

As a blurry dusk falls the dwarves find the gold and make good their escape. Well done Richard S! My orcs were down to the last two by this stage and had lost their captain (who had dropped his sword again).

I like Strange Grogge but they cannot handle loads of figure groups. Really nice for more detailed skirmish though.

The quest goes on.........