Life, Work, The Universe...... White Stuff

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2" of snow and the country descends into chaos. Every year it's a shock - "My god! White stuff!" Of course it's not as simple as that. But the point is, why can't we as a nation plan to mitigate it where possible and accept that for a couple of days, life might not be as normal. Couple of days I said - that doesn't mean panic buying at the Co-op! It's all about a sense of proportion and preparedness.

 

This is our winter wonderland on Saturday

 Saturday Evening!

 Sunday Evening!

Tuesday! Hills, what hills?

Haven't seen them since Sunday lunchtime

Why didn't I collect Star Wars action figures? Right now, that snow in the garden could make a great Hoth battlefield!

Time to raid Forbidden Planet in Aberdeen!

4" of snow fell in an hour on Saturday evening and we now have about a foot outside with drifts up to three feet. Heather has been away on business in Oxford and caught up in the resulting travel chaos. She finally walked through the door at 2am this morning - making the last plane to Aberdeen, which touched down bang on midnight. My thanks go to the anonymous ex-Bootneck taxi driver who braved blizzard and an icy but deserted dual carriageway to bring her home. I cleared the Freelander around 1am, in case I had to meet them half way, but thanks to her driver, Heather only had to walk the final hundred yards to return home safe.

Cheers

Mark

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All Gone A Bit Hadley's Hope

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We were in town on Saturday where I picked up a very reasonably priced copy of Aliens vs Predator for the XBOX 360.

I started the 'Marine' campaign set on Hadley's Hope and have to say, had a real blast! Dark corridors, bleeping motion trackers, Xenomorphs by the interstellar bus load and a very nice female Latino Marine called Tequila guiding my half arsed, half panicked attempts to survive. The game really got the blood pumping and inspired me to recreate the action on the tabletop!

I want to make an important point here. Computer and console games don't replace the miniatures game for me and the same is true of Master Chef. They inspire us to recapture the console action once again on the tabletop with miniatures.

My Googlefu failed to find a decent pic of Tequila on the net, to captivate budding 15mm Colonial Marine sculptors out there - but Natassia Malthe makes a gratuitous but very attractive proxy for this foxy Marine.

By way of  'research' just had to watch Aliens (1986) this afternoon, which left me all fired up for a Bug Hunt! The day job is going to be tough up till Christmas, so this will be a nice lightweight and fun diversion, switching between media and back as I like.


Unfortunately, to my mind, there are no decent Colonial Marine proxies in 15mm that appeal to me. RAFM's classic ex-Traveller Mid-Tech troopers are the nearest to my tastes but lack poses, weapon variation and character for any kind of  'heroic' movie'esque skirmish game. GZG's 15mm NAC? Yes, but they are still NAC. Denizen's 25mm Mid-Tech troopers are really tempting but I already own some of RH Model's excellent 20mm Colonial Marines!

RH Models 20mm Sci Fi

Colonial Marines

"State of the bad-ass art"

I will have a go at sculpting a female head onto the slimmest of the marines and share with you my success or failure. Khurasan's Space Demons will be perfect for the 'aliens', especially the big daddy Space Demon King. And, I'll start painting the Marines this week. So there we have it, on the ready line! Lock n load and wake up Hicks - because they're gonna need everything they've got to survive the colony on a terra-formed planet that swarms with bad-ass xenomorphs.

Cheers

Mark

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Pre Christmas Special Offer from 15mm.co.uk

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15mm.co.uk are offering a  free pack of HOF57 Starfighter Crew worth £3.50 with any order containing a science fiction item from their ranges.

HOF57 Starfighter Crew

These miniatures are great as any kind of Sci Fi support, maintenance and repair personnel. A couple of the figs could even make downed Grav Tank or Dropship crewmen.

To get a free pack of HOF57 all you need to do is order ANY item from the following 15mm.co.uk  ranges:

• Laserburn 15mm Science Fiction
• HOF 15mm Science Fiction
• SHM Range
• 6mm Sci-fi Range
• UM001 USE ME 15mm Science Fiction book
• Laserburn Books

One pack of HOF57 will automatically be added to every order placed for one or more items from the above list of range and products upon dispatch.

We will accept any number of orders from a customer but only one free pack per placed order will be honoured.

Offer ends Monday 6th December, 2010

Cheers

Mark

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Additional Optional Rules for USE ME available now

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From Alex Scott at 15mm.co.uk......

"Many thanks to all of you who have decided to play USE ME for your 15mm sci-fi games.  Thanks for your support!

I am happy to be able to announce that feedback and requests in the last month from players has resulted in another page of free optional advanced rules for the game.

You do not need this document to play USE ME, you can pick and choose the optional rules you want to use based on your own setting and troops from your 15mm sci-fi gaming collection.

The subject of the free page is Cyborg Enslavers, their aims, their motives, their special rules and force compostion examples.

You can get this page for free from the Barking Irons Blog .

You can learn all about this mighty little system for only £3.50 and about the Cyborg Enslavers as pictured are in our SHM Range from £0.35 each on our website (www.15mm.co.uk)"

Thanks

Alexander Scott

Cheers Alex

Mark

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Gonna Have Me Some Fun Tonight!

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It's no secret that Heather and I are big aficianados of the classic 1987 PREDATOR movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jesse Ventura and Sonny Landham.

So, to celebrate the imminent release of a 15mm "slackjawed" Special Forces team (SF01-SF07) from The Scene, Dropship Horizon is proud to sponsor a PREDATOR inspired give away!

To have a chance to win the first set of these new minis from The Scene, all you have to do to demonstrate your Predator Mojo is leave a message below, that:

1) identifies SIX animals mentioned by the characters in the film.

2) correctly identifies the order in which they are mentioned.

You get more brownie points for answering in the true spirit of this competition!

Without doubt, Blain played by Jesse Ventura gets the best lines and in our minds is the most enduring character in the movie. To win the second set of these Special Forces miniatures all you have to do is create:

3) a quote in the style of a typical "Blainism", eg "They're shooting straighter than a Saratoga snake".

 The "Blainism" Heather judges the best, wins.

The competition is open until Mike puts the figures up on the webshop. Entries made anonymously without a name included in the entry are disqualified for obvious practical reasons, "I'm Brian, and so's my wife!". We're looking forward to seeing your entries - Have fun & best of luck!

Cheers

Mark

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Critical Mass Games goes critical!

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This week's blog entries for Critical Mass Games amassed a staggering 1,608 views on Thursday alone! You can catch Critical Mass Games at WARFARE 2010 in Reading this saturday and sunday 20/21st November.

Cheers

Mark

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