Let's Talk Miniature Skirmish Games

This is an area that seems to be booming, but I've not kept up with it all. Who has?

I've looked at Dystopian Legions, Wild West Exodus, Malifaux (sp?), and a few others but couldn't get past the bad 90s comic art or kitchen sink design of the minis.

Steampunk or mashed up genres don't really do anything for me. However, I was really hoping that Shadowrun Sprawl Gangers was going to materialize (RIP).

I've wondered if, outside of GW, I should look at historicals. Not into WWII, am into Napoleonics and ACW, but it seems painting those would be a pain in the ass...plus I don't want to be tied to historical colors.

Is SAGA what I'm looking for? Is it not really a skirmish game, but like Warmachine is a full fielded army game now? Anything outside of historicals I missed, but should look at? MERCS (minis not the board game)?

Who's got the line on what's out there now?

I haven't kept up and moved away from the more open battlefield games and towards the games based on a board. But here's what I know.

Flames of War has branched into WW1, Vietnam and Arab Israeli Wars. I dabbled when they were just WW2 and starting and thought it was solid so I'd imagine those theaters would be every bit as well done.

Infinity is a neat Cyberpunk world and again, one I looked into but at that time I was moving from miniatures and into boardgames so I bought the base rule book and it looked promising but never played.

Warmachine did have a rules reboot a year or a few back and moved away from the large scale armies and made it more Jack-centric. But I hadn't looked into that one for years. I don't know when you last looked at the game but if it was pre MkII rules they might be something to look back into. What's nice about Warmachine is that opponents are easy to find.

All Quiet on the Martian Front is an alternate history WW2 War of the World looking game. I know nothing about it outside of seeing the miniatures which aren't great, but average. I like the setting though.

It really depends on what you are looking for in a system. No way to keep up with all of them, but its pretty easy to find dedicated rule set and a dedicated group discussing said rules no matter what you are looking to game.

A long time ago I moved away from 28 mm due to less space requirement and great figures that can be found in 15 mm. It seemed from the other thread you wanted a dedicated system with miniature support from that company, which I no longer know anything about. However, this is especially true in the 15mm miniature market, there are ton of rule sets that will support minis from a large range of companies or are built for mix-and-match collections. I enjoy the freedom of picking and choosing from lots of different ranges.

I currently am really enjoying Fistful of Kung Fu for skirmish gaming. It is billed as Hong Kong action movie type combat, but really can work for any skirmish stuff you imagine. Its based on Song of Blades and Heroes system which if you want somewhat light rules with fun list building is a great option. There are specific rule sets for all of various genres. Of Gods and Mortals is a lot like Fistful of King Fu and those two are the ones I recommend the most due to the Reaction system the author has introduced. Unfortunately not a lot of campaign depth with those rules, but the fun with minis is that you get to mod that like you would RPGs. I currently am running what really is a combination of Gangbusters RPG from the 80s with a blade runner-esque minis game called The Department for the campaign; then fight the battles using the Fisful of Kung Fu rules.

Sci fi rule set I would look at is 5 Parsecs from Home. Which is based on that author's 5 Core system. It does Firefly-esque and world building really well. Again it is a much lighter system, which is what I gravitate to these days.

I've heard Pulp Alley is a really good rule set as well and Strange Aeons is supposedly pretty great, but I think Pete can speak more on that.

Basically there are so many choices you just pick a genre or time period and how heavy the rule set you want is, and what number of models you are looking to field. Should have a lot of options.

All that being said, based on what you wrote in the other thread. If you enjoy playing the old GW minis games, I would honestly just play those. Plenty of ways to spice them up and there is still of plenty of game there.

Da Bid Dabid wrote: All that being said, based on what you wrote in the other thread. If you enjoy playing the old GW minis games, I would honestly just play those. Plenty of ways to spice them up and there is still of plenty of game there.

That's a very good point. Really, in print or not, there's only a handful of readily available miniature games that you'll have good success in finding an opponent. Might as well pick what you like since you'll likely need to groom your opponent's and supply them with what you need.

One other I forgot, no idea if the game is any good or not, but the concept alone had me very close to picking up a copy: Pig Tickler.

You're lancers in pith helmets riding unicycles trying to stab a mechanical pig.

Da Bid Dabid wrote: All that being said, based on what you wrote in the other thread. If you enjoy playing the old GW minis games, I would honestly just play those. Plenty of ways to spice them up and there is still of plenty of game there.

Yeah, this really is the best advice...especially since I've already got opponents for these games.

You can download the Mordheim (GW fantasy) and Necromunda (gw 40K) skirmish handbooks from the GW website under the specialist games.



But If you feel like historical, I'd say go for Dux Brittaniarum by Too Fat Lardies for Arthurian Britain. Really excellent campaign system, where you are a Saxon leader of a warband raiding into Romano-British territory in the 5th and 6th centuries, or the Romano-British duke defending his province. There's a few stats that immediately bring your main characters to life. There's some card hand management. There's tactics and some strategic background. There's beautiful miniatures available and you need 30-40 to make it work.

Look at a game I played a few months back .

I would go with Deadzone. It's not a pure miniatures games with rules and all, because it uses grids. But LoS is miniatures, and placement of miniatures allows freedom by having 3" grids.

I think as far as skirmish miniatures games go, it combines the best of both worlds.

The boxed game also comes with mat and just enough terrain.

I wish to know more about deadzone. What's the campaign like? Workable for any faction or only the two in the box?

Also, tell me more of this grid based movement and no need for rulers.

I wouldn't get Deadzone due to its campaign. You may want to check quirkworthy.com. It's the designer's website.

The grid based movement is as it sounds. You move on 3" grid. Since models are on 1" base, you can choose where to place your model. LoS are traced using true LoS. Generally a model can either be in cover (in a space marked as "cover", your choice), normal, or in clear sight. In clear sight is if the target model is completely unobstructed. There is no %. Just unobstructed or not. The rule goes a little stupid that even if the base of miniature covered by the terrain small clips (1mm high), they're not in clear sight, but easily fixed.

The 3" grid is 3D, means you're actually using 3" cubes. This is used for grenades throwing you off ledges, etc. Also, climbing is very easy. If a higher level terrain has a wall on your side, you can always climb it. Otherwise, only units with jump pack can do it.

IIRC it uses card-based activation.

You can check some quick start rules here.

www.manticgames.com/free-rules.html

You know what the biggest thing stopping me from getting into these things is? People. I hope you have good luck finding people to play something besides GW games or maybe even Malifaux. I have not and it depresses me.

No campaign rules in the quick start pdf.

Can you give me a brief outline of it? It looks like the unit stats are on cards, so how are advancements handled? Is there a classic pencil and paper roster to use as well?

Puppet Wars Unstitched is really good for a 2-3p hex-based skirmish game. The style is great, the rules are solid, and the gameplay is fun. It plays quickly too.

If I recall correctly there are three downsides:
- No real cmapaign system.
- Need to get an extra pack of cards for a 3rd player
- Terrain in the set is just little plastic hex pieces

I picked up an extra card set and I pimped out my copy by making terrain pieces out of thimbles, thread, spools, yarn, and such.

Armor Grid Mech Attack is really good for a tape measure skirmish game. Really easy to get into and it feels like a mech battle. Only downsides are no real campaign system and you have to either papercraft (included) or provide your own minis.


Between those two I've never found myself looking for another skirmish game. For campaign play I prefer games like Mice & Mystics or Level 7 Omega Protocol.

Dreadzone sounds kind of interesting, but for me most minis rule sets just aren't that interesting without a campaign system. So for me it's Necromunda or Mordheim. There are two fan-made GW-based skirmish/campaign games: Inquisimunda and Kill Team.

Jeff, let's make Necromunda on tiles happen!

I don't like steampunk at all, but it's an easy prejudice for me to overcome to play Malifaux 2nd ed. I don't have the time to play army-scale games anymore and for me this is the best of the skirmish games. I outline my reasons in more detail in this review on BGG if you're curious:

boardgamegeek.com/thread/1059580/malifaux-excellent

Edit: Forgot to mention that the next book for Malifaux will add a full campaign system.

metalface13 wrote: Jeff, let's make Necromunda on tiles happen!

If I understand Deadzone correctly, that's what it is.