Five Parsecs from Home turn 6 - Escort the VIP

 Invion. A planet with a dust problem. From 400k klicks out it doesn't look like much, but the nearer you fly, the more impressive it looks. Reflective dust swirling in the atmosphere gives the impression of a constantly moving, crystal-like surface, but beneath the dust, there lies a thriving mineral-rich ecosystem. As such, many groups have set up camp here, some more centralised, some independent, some less than legal, but all with one common goal - exploit the mineral-rich atmospheric dust. 

When approacing Invion the crew of The Pelican realised that jobs would likely come easily, and it would be an interesting place to try and lay low for a time. Sector government, local ground level government, individual settlement bosses would all have things they would need some hired guns for, and during their final approach to one of the spaceports a number of stock introductory messages popped up on the comm system. The crew could filter through them later.

As the dust settled and the hydraulics creaked a figure approached The Pelican. Dressed in what looked like a uniform she insisted on a meeting with the captain. The Dockworkers' Guild of Launia it would seem maintains a network of communications with other dockworkers' guilds, who in turn share with allies. Thanks to this network the local government of Pickmouth Heights (a mayor and a few long term business owners) had decided to hire the crew of The Pelican to help them out of a predicament. A person needed to be escorted to a... quiet location for extraction off planet. The less they knew the better, but people wanted to stop this happening, and enforcers were on the way. Enforcers with money and training behind them.

The journey to the landing pad was uneventful. Out of the way, private landing areas like this are quite widespread on the rim for people wishing to have options. If anything was going to happen, it would be here, now, in this fairly exposed area.

Two figures approached. They were well armed and well armoured. 

Splitting into three pairs the crew advanced. It was cautious. Their VIP remained to their rear, in order to avoid any unwanted attention. She was wearing a similar uniform to that of the person who approached the crew upon landing. 

Taking up well covered positions the two figures prepared to ambush anyone silly enough to cross the landing pad. This would be simple, they had both served together for a long time and had fought some of the deadliest opponents possible.

Estelle Phillips and Aralay Brenko began rushing up the centre. Estelle chanced it, in order to circle around the back of the landing pad and cover from the rear. Aralay was more cautious, remaining in more solid cover.

Holmes tucked himself next to one of the buildings and looked down his scope. Movement behind the crates! He fired off a burst, adrenaline pumping!

One of the figures staggered back, his helmet emitting a red spray, then fell to the ground. His partner looked down, checked his weapon was charged and hugged his cover tighter. He knew a fatal hit when he saw one and there was nothing he could do. "See you soon, brother," he thought.

 

Lars decided to flank around the outskirts, in order to cover a large area with his large calibre gun, while Mao and Oslan Baratski hugged cover on the left of the group. The shooting had started, so it was time to take extra care!

Oslan tried to remain hidden behind the shipping containers, but the mysterious figure moved, fired, and took her down with a glancing shot across the abdomen. She dropped, rolled and hid behind the container while opening her med-gel.

Mao and Holmes opened up on thier tormentor, but their shots did nothing more than tear chunks out of plasteel crates, and throw up dust plumes. 

The figure returned fire, less successfully this time, his beam slicing gouges out of the truck Mao was using for cover.

Thus distracted, Estelle saw an opportunity. She ran up, let loose a grenade and dove to the ground! The crumpling thud and smoke plume gave little away. Cautiously she looked up and saw the armoured figure lying on his back. 

After some careful movement and searching the crew realised no-one else was here. It was safe to bring their VIP up to the landing pad and await transport.

She explained that she had information about the planetary government's rampant corruption and was hoping to take it higher if she could just make it off planet to the sector overseer. However, there had been goons following her for a while now. Getting this information out there might give the local communities a chance to be heard and have to stop paying protection money to those corrupt officials.

A scream of engines rose slowly, then quickly until it filled the air around them. It was time to step off of the platform.

Payment organised. The sector representative and her armed guards took the VIP into their custody with little more than a nod. 

The crew checked around. One of the bodies was carrying some grenades, and there were some useable starship parts in one of the sheds. Oslan Baratski would have to spend some time in the med-bay but otherwise today had been a successful payday. 

Mag Train and fir trees for the Ardennes.

 The trees are for the Ardennes, not the mag train. Although it might have stolen artwork hidden on it...

The round stands are far, far superior to the previous square stands. I will keep the square ones until I have enough of these to make them unnecessary. 

The Angel Barracks/CP Models grav/mag train. I have had this lying around for ages and decided to paint it up. The track is unpainted card from the box of the boardgame Dominion. I have since sprayed it and will figure out how to paint it in due time.

Ready for some thrilling heroics.

The Defense of New Charon pt. 5

 I managed to get off my butt and play a spontaneous game the other night. It was quick, a little bit lame, half hearted by myself, and stopped when I started paying more attention to the TV show "This Is Us", that my wife was watching, and I was kind of half keeping up with. Great show so far (2 episodes in). 

New Charon Militia:
P2 Mech HQ Unit
P2 Mech - heavy hitters
P3 Heavy cavalry
P1 Light infantry x5

NCU
P2 Mech HQ unit
P2 Mech
P2 Light cavalry
P2 Light cavalry
P1 Light infantry x4

A frontier on a frontier. That is how Natalya Phillips would describe this place. New Charon was meant to be an escape, a fresh start for so many. It was out of the way enough to avoid UCS attention, and for those who wanted to avoid even the centralisation of a few settlements coming together to govern each other it was possible to pack up and drive off into the sunset, find somewhere, irrigate, grow, harvest and live a simple life. The handful of locals left in this community called it Sprucewald, but did a landing pad and a few prefabs really need a name? 

As part of the ongoing hunt for the mysterious invaders, Natalya's job was to rest here, refit and await resupply. Her militia were weary of the seemingly endless skirmishes, wary that there was no end in sight, and hoping to be taken off the line (if it could really be called a line). 

Suddenly shells begin bouncing off a prefab. The sentries within jump on the comms back to Natalya. 

"We need you up at this end, incoming fire".

Natalya responds, ordering all of her militia up to the edge of the settlement to return fire. 

An exchange of fire between the sentries and the enemy vehicle causes a little damage and a casualty, but nothing too serious.

Dunn Harrison, prowling on the left flank sends HEAT rounds punching into another enemy vehicle, smashing through the armour, damaging important components.

The enemy responds by trying to get out of sight and close the gap to make their armour piercing chain guns more effective. Infantry rushes forward in an attempt to flank Sprucewald and take the militia in a wicked crossfire.

The militiamen garrisoning the prefab keep the enemy armour engaged in long range sniping, shells bouncing off of the outer walls. They just need to keep them distracted until Natalya and the rest appear.

Natalya and some more footmen arrive, Natalya charging into the village to support the infantry, while the footmen move up to support Dunn.

Dunn exchanges fire with the advancing infantry, taking some damage to his vehicle, but manages to lay down enough HE to scatter an enemy squad.

Natalya lets rip with her CSMP, sending off rockets that tear the enemy vehicle to pieces. No-one was seen leaving the wreckage. At this point the remaining enemy withdraw. This short, sharp skirmish just another in the seemingly endless short, sharp skirmishes taking place out beyond the Reaches. Another firefight, another report for Natalya to write up and send off to Command. Just what she needed on a Tuesday.

Not the most exciting game. It was more about having an evening where I wasn't playing World of Tanks Blitz and didn't feel like painting. This was a fun game to put together, but I want to work harder on making better scenarios.

Edge of the Storm part 4: Into the Jungle

It has been a while. This must be the longest running campaign I have managed...even though it is only four sessions. 

Corde and Lief are trying to unravel the mystery of why these people are here and who they are. 

The shotgun-armed lady is Tonita Wildner - de facto leader of this small community of escapees. 

"Escapees of what though" Lief attempts to gather further information.

"Slavery. Dancers, house maids, other more nefarious things. You name it, we have escaped from it. Some of us have been on the run for years, decades even" explains Tonita.  "Every now and then attempts are made to find us, but we have managed to settle here on Deon B for a while now. We were hoping this might be a long term situation.Your presence and loud entrance probably mean we need to get packed up and move on. There are more of us in the jungle. We are just the farm community, growing these nutri-pods in order to feed the rest of the community.

They had planned for this. Everything important was packed up within the hour and the route was planned through the jungle to the central hub where the rest of the escapees were ready to ship out and search for a new home. 

 Ready to enter the jungle, it would be a three hour trek to the central community hub.

 Lief and Corde take fire from nowhere! Corde is forced into cover, pinned. Where is this coming from? Unbeknownst to our heroes, atop a rocky outcrop a mysterious figure fires down. 

 Luckily Tonita spots the muzzle flash and opens fire at the shadow, forcing it down.

 The grunts and other community members advance into the jungle.

 The shadow is gone, but fire comes from somewhere! Luckily it has little effect and Tonita and Lief continue to cautiously advance into the jungle.

 Spotted, the shadow appears again and Corde advances, firing but it all goes wide, killing some unfortunate leaves.

 Grunts advance to help deal with the shadow but fall to precision shots. This shadow knows what it is doing.

 Further advance into the jungle. The tension rises as it dawns on the team that they are being hunted.

 More shots from an unknown source. How is this sniper/shadow in so many places at once? Surely there isn't a team hidden in the jungle? I mean the plants can't be shooting at them can they?

 Grunts catch sight of the shadow again and open fire but again the shots go far and wide!

 The escapees try and avoid the fire by taking cover behind a bank of foliage.

 Unfortunately the shadow reappears, killing one of the women as she attempts to flee.

 Then killing another grunt with more precision fire.

 And the other grunts. Things are looking bleak for this journey through the jungle. Something needs to happen and it needs to happen fast or they are going to just keep getting picked off.

 "We stop here" announces Corde.
"Here we stand" agrees Lief.
"These ancient ruins are as good a place as any to die I suppose" Tonita puts forward.
"We form a perimeter and dig in. Let's make sure this shadow has to come to us. I refuse to be hunted" states Corde.

And now we wait.

This was a fairly quick game. The shadow was almost impossible to kill (GM decided) and I wanted to see who would survive. The next encounter may be just as bloody.

Scum for the Starport part 4

Finished my latest batch of characters last night. I am pretty much sold on the small washers for bases, although they aren't battle tested yet. They may as yet prove to be too unstable. They look pretty sexy though.

A group of colonists posing on a patch of crops. This crop has been designed to be growable in just about any place imaginable. It will keep you alive, long after the animals have died.

Sometimes you need the hired guns. One can scrape a living protecting those who can't protect themselves. Of course, if the money is good...it is not inconceivable that sides might be swapped...

Pack animals and travelers. There are those who lead nomadic lives, traveling from one colony to another, seeing the universe. Others can be found settling on a planet and leading a hermetic existence. Either way, one must be wary of such folk.

 And sometimes, you just meet plain old weirdos.

 ...or you bump into assassins.

Scum for the Starport part 3

All week I have been dying to highlight these miniatures in order to get them done. I am pleased with the results. I am still scared of the small bases, but think they will be fine. Although, some of them do not stick to the magnetic strip in my containers very well because they have super glue on the underside. I might need to rethink my storage solutions. The individual based figures are all Angel Barracks miniatures, which are now being produced and sold by CP Models. The group based miniatures are a variety of GZG, CinC, and Angel Barracks.

 Vanguard Company is a small group of mercenaries who will hire themselves out to protect colonists. Often forgoing payment, these grizzled veterans have been to the edge of space, seen the chaos that exists, and are determined to keep that chaos away from the innocent. 

 Frontier Law Enforcement. Out on the Fringe, where the UCS reach is very weak, a person with a gun and a desire to protect fellow colonists can be the only form of law enforcement to be found. Hardened by life on the edge, they are all that stand between chaos and the veneer of civilization.

 Protecting yourself is vital. There is no telling what kind of encounter you could have, and with goodness knows whom. Here we see three typical Fringe colonists, and a mysterious masked warrior.

 Living on the edge of space is not safe. Many have stared into the abyss, only to find the abyss staring back into them. Many of those people become part of the problem, realizing their true insignificance, and the insignificance of their existence changes a person. Many cults, clans and groups of beings who have thrown off their humanity spring up in the Fringe. One does not trifle with them. In fact, the first rule when encountering these groups is often "run first, fight second". On the right we see an example of a barely human being, come to wreak havoc among those who are not yet "enlightened." The rest look like sensibly armed colonists, ready to run or fight.

The Coyotes. A pirate gang, feeding off those in the Fringe, who are unable to defend themselves. Occasionally taking a bite of organised militias if desperate enough. This lawless bunch will salvage and re-use any vehicles they can acquire and keep in running order. They strike fast, take what they want, and leave few witnesses.