After a little bit of radio silence with life stuff and drama I’m back folks.

A friend of mine foolishly sent me a photo of the scene that greeted him when he arrived home today.

From this brief exchange you can see I was supportive and empathised with the situation.

Naturally HHH and his entrance music came to mind.

This afternoon Diego and I had a gaming session round his. His Atlanteans beat my Romans in Imperial Settlers.

Whilst I managed to trade my way to victory in The Voyages of Marco Polo. A game that hadn’t hit the table in over a year. And had only just made my collection this past weekend. I managed to get a second hand copy with the mini expansion and a wooden insert for a real good price.

Both games the end scores were pretty close. Especially considering during the games it looked like there was a run away winner each time. In Imperial Settlers Diego had the lead, and a late end game scoring saw me within 2 points of him. Then during Marco Polo I was in front for the majority of the game. Briefly lost the lead in the end game scoring and then snatched victory by 2 points.

It was a great afternoon gaming. Nice to meet Diego’s daughter (months old). There was even cheesecake between games.

So I’m playing a halfling wizard in the D&D campaign/scenario we started last week. I wasn’t sure I’d get a mini to represent my character. But the internet has not disappointed. Even better I was able to get them in the UK. So no importing and excessive postage fees.

In fact there were male and female halfling wizards. So I went with 3 of the minis that were wizards, and a cool looking halfling dressed for winter.

I suppose over the Summer I should attempt to paint them. My north of the border version of me will for sure be nagging, correction encouraging me to paint them. I fancy Gandalf grey for the hat and cloak.

Earlier in the year, might have even been before Christmas I got the source book for the FFG Genesys RPG. It’s a generic system that seems to focus on narrative and story telling. This version of the system is an updated rule set based on the FFG Star Wars system and an earlier Warhammer RPG I believe.

Within the core book there are suggestions for world settings such as Android, Tannhauser, Terrinoth, Twilight Imperium, plus one or two others. The Terrinoth source book is the first to hit the market place (I have a copy on the way) and is their fantasy setting. Which makes sense. It shouldn’t be hard to get hold of Descent figures to use with the game. But then again generic D&D figures should be usable also. Although I can see using Descent board tiles to make the dungeon maps as a good idea.

I’d love to play a cyberpunk style game, and the Android universe would be that ideal setting. I love that world from my time playing Netrunner. I have what effectively is the the world source book in The Worlds of Android book I have. But there is no hurry to play in this universe, so I don’t need to put time in fleshing it out, knowing that the next FFG source book is for Android. I’m not reinventing the wheel.

But listening to a Genesys specific podcast recently I got thinking obviously I’d love to play the odd Star Wars campaign (along side the classic RPG). But there are other worlds I’d love to explore. Such as Elfquest, I’d love to turn the old RPG into this new system. I was, and still am a big fan of the comic books. They were a fresh take on elves. I also loved the relationship between the wolf riders and their wolfs. That’s me and my mutts, and a bit of the influence for calling us the Wolfpack.

I think there was also a Judge Dredd RPG back in the day (did I just type that?), would love to have an updated RPG in Mega City one playing a Judge. Plus with there having been a miniatures game out for Dredd, getting minis shouldn’t be too hard either. I love Judge Dredd, and have done so since I first read the strip back in the 80’s. The Cursed Earth and The Day the Law Died, two epic story lines that I still fondly remember today.

I’ll briefly mention once more the Planes shift material and the art books for MtG as potential worlds to explore in Genesys.

A zombie apocalypse based game might also be cool. I’m sure there must be systems out there already. But it shouldn’t be too hard to create something, especially using the Zombicide figures, and maybe tiles.

I think it’d also be interesting to do a modern day conspiracy theory, big brother , cyberpunk setting. Think the likes of the tv series Condor, the film Enemy of the State, Hackers, Black Hat, War Games, the fourth Die Hard movie, and the book Little Brother by Cory Doctorow. Snowdon, Wikileaks, Stuxnet, cctv, mass surveillance, the establishment, the 1%, vote rigging, Homeland, rendition, water boarding, Anonymous, you get the idea.

I’m stoked for the alt history Tannhauser which I hope they do release a source book for. But there is one other alt history setting I adore, and happens to be the setting for my current all time favourite game Scythe. That alt 1920’s Eastern Europe with the mechs. Just love it, the art by Jakub Rozalski is soooo amazing. If I was going this route I’d need to get the art book for Scythe. Actually it’s shocking, neh borderline criminal that I don’t already own it.

As you can see the Genesys system before you even play it has you bouncing ideas around.

Mum Update

Monday they kept mum in for another day after she starting being sick again. Apparently mum wanted to be on the floor while vomiting. Naturally the nurses wanted mum back in her bed. I’m not sure whose will was the stronger. I just know mum can be a stubborn bugger when she wants to be. Something I’m sure she has inherited.

Which means Nan, the dogs and I have to survive another day by ourselves. I will say that my washing up skills are still second to none.

It’s funny where you end up talking about board gaming sometimes.

Yesterday after a night of forcing matter of differing types out of both ends of the body, and severe stomach pain, Mum ended up being taken into hospital for further investigation and some magic pills/injections to take away the pain and stop the sickness.

Which meant I was left holding the fort, and having to clean up the aftermath. Lets just say if there was a list of things not to put on a bucket list, I hit three of them recently. One of them happened a couple of weeks ago, and the other two were yesterday morning. I swore the messy one was something my brother was down for doing.

After feeding the dogs, cleaning up after the dogs (second time I’d done a similar job that morning), feeding Nan, I headed off to be with Mum at the hospital.

When I got to Mum she was on the happy pill and the pain was a far and distant memory.

To while away some of the time I had taken the player guide from the bundle to look at. It was this booklet that was to start a couple of interesting discussions about gaming.

The first was at the hospitals Costa while I was being served. I had just ordered a blueberry muffin and a cortado (it’s my favourite drink they do) when the assistant serving me noticed the players guide, and mentioned there was a new set out soon. To which I replied this weekend, and the Prerelease was last weekend. He was a MtG player too, and we chatted about cards, and Prerelease events.

As I was returning to Mum they were just wheeling her away for an x-ray. So I went with her.

Apparently this wasn’t her x-ray. But while waiting around the x-ray department the male nurse asked me about my players guide. He thought it was something to do with actual magic. So I handed over the players guide and explained it was for a collectible card game, and told me all about the new cards. We then got onto boardgames. He remembers really enjoying Escape from Colditz. I told him about the anniversary reprint, and the slightly updated rules. He seemed quite interested in this. I wouldn’t be surprised he ordered a copy. He’d also played Risk (I told him about Risk Legacy, and explained what a legacy game was). The last game he bought was Star Wars Monopoly. I can kinda understand it, it’s got Star Wars on it.

After the x-ray, and seeing Mum back to her room. It was time for me to head home and look after Nan, and save her from the dogs. Don’t worry Mum wasn’t alone for long. My step-sister and her husband spent all afternoon with her, keeping everyone updated on events or lack of a doctor seeing Mum. That was way beyond the call of duty and I’m very grateful for them doing so. It allowed me to be in two places at once so to speak. Mum was going to be kept in overnight for observation. Even then she had company for the evening. Which was handy because I was able to text through what tablets she was taking, and have a quick chat to reassure her we were doing ok this end.

Even if they don’t find anything and send her home later today (at the time of writing no idea what is happening) I hope Mum has been able to rest and enjoy a break.