Fantasy Gaming (4) - A City Fit for a King

 I've been threatening to play Mordheim for years now. One of the big barriers to entry however, for anyone familiar with the game/genre is the high amount of terrain needed. I've been printing scenery for it off and on for the last couple years and last weekend decided it was time to break it all out and get it painted for an upcoming mini Frostgrave campaign.

These were all painted with a friend on Saturday and I spent a few hours Sunday and Monday finishing them up. They could stand for a bit of a clean up especially on the wood color but en masse I don't think its really that noticeable. Quality, Quantity, Etc... 

The buildings are currently a mix of two manufacturers. The overwhelming majority are from the Shadowfey ruins set from Printable Scenery. The small corner ruins, small 2 floor corner ruins and the single building in the center with the iron bars on top are all from the Hexengarde range from Tiered World. 

There's still a few details to finish, but it's all very minor stuff. I think I'm going to do the clock face in brass instead of silver but I was rushing to finish before a work trip. I think there's one tiny roof section for one of the larger buildings I need to print. In short though this is all but done and ready to play. I was hoping to take some more set up table glamour shots but that will have to wait until I get a game out. 

For now most of the project fits neatly in this tub. I have a second tub for the wizards tower as well as eventual scatter, bridges, and other bits. 

I think we spent all told around 10 hours painting, but its all done and for that I'm quite happy. 

Fantasy Gaming (3) - The Dwarven Mountain Hold Marches Forth

 As mentioned in the last fantasy post, I've been working on stubby little dwarves. Here are some photos of the "army" in its current state. 

The force so far is the basic contents of the newish starter box for The Old World though I've gone ahead and swapped out one gyrocopter for a Dwarf King from the Skull Pass set. 

So with this, we're ready to play some games. I've already looked ahead a bit towards a couple of the other rule sets and have noticed there will be a few things I need to add. I'm still going to be starting with Old World but am forming a bit of a plan to try other games sooner. I set out originally planning to just commit to these square bases and not think twice about it but as I've been doing rules research I'm much less sure I'm going to like the old world enough to make this the one I've commited to. Well see. 

Next fantasy posts will probably be another subject though I already have more dwarves on the bench. 

Top 5 "New To Me" Boardgames of July 2025

Believe it or not, it's that time again. July saw 33 games played, bringing the yearly total up to 187. I played a few favorites, (Toy Battle 4 times in a row for example) Scout, Ark Nova, Ironwood. I also played a few unplayed titles. As you can tell I'm sure, the pendulum has been swinging back towards wargaming though to me, its all linked. So as usual, let's begin with;

Honourable Mentions

Black Sonata

Black Sonata is a solo deduction and hidden movement game. If you're a solo gamer that sentence either sold or stopped you from getting this one. Mechanically (though it took me one completely messed up game to figure out) the game is really sound and super interesting. It feels like a very real game. I did something very different with this one. I downloaded the free Print and Play version and spent weeks cutting, gluing, holepunching and sorting stuff. It was worth it for the experience and to ultimately say "I won't do that again"

Top 5 of July 2025 

5. Galileo Galilei

A dry euro from Capstone, designed by the same designer of SETI, sign me up. This is a game that I saw on several Origins haul posts. When it arrived at my FLGS I grabbed a copy and it hit the table pretty quick. There's not a ton to this game in terms of innovation but it is a solid Euro experience and it does what it does very well. The iconography was a lot to process at first but by the end I was quite impressed. A very solid game.

4. Farm Hand

The first of two Kickstarter games on this months list, Farm hand is a small box trick taker. In a ever evolving world of "Trick taker games with a list of twists to the formula," Farm Hand sure is a "trick taker with a list of twists to the formula." I happen to love these but YMMV. In short, this is a trick taker that has things like, increasing number of cards each round, if two players play the same number they're out for the hand, and bigging on number of wins. Its also a solid experience and one I'd break out at any chance. 

3. Rome In a Day

This is a classic I'm told. It uses a "I cut, you choose" mechanic which is pretty unique. It fits my usual theming, tile laying interests. There's not a ton to say about this one but I found it super enjoyable and different from most of what I've played lately. Each turn you take your tiles and split them. Each player then chooses to take either the large pile or the small pile from their neighbor. You keep what they don't take. It leads to a lot of interesting decisions in a very short time. 

2. Twinkle Twinkle

This is the latest kickstarter from Allplay to deliver. Twinkle, Twinkle is a tile laying tableau builder. Much like River Valley the game is simple but offers some fun "high score chasing" gameplay. Its quick to play and has rather nice clear tiles that allow for all sorts of placement. Theres a rather large expansion and my only real criticism of this one is that the core box is too small to fit the expansion content. 

1. Tango

Two player trick taker. Trick taking games typically need more players or have some sort of core change to the rules to allow for two. This is a purpose built two player trick taker. The main mechanic involves what is effectively a dummy team mate but it all just works so well. I really enjoyed this one and it fits in my "break it out and get in a quick game on a school night" box. It's rather simple but the game is real snappy and I enjoy trick takers. 

So there you have it. The games this month all fell on the simpler side but it was a nice batch to try out. The pendulum has been swinging hard back towards wargaming and painting lately so even though I've been keeping up on the board games my main interest is gravitating towards painting again. I've nearly got the dwarves totally done and am nearly ready to get in some games with them. I managed a horus heresy game as well as a barons war one. Lots of exciting stuff.