He Shoots, He Scores!

A couple of weeks ago, my brother Ben came over for a quick game of DreadBall. He took charge of the Corporation team, as always, while I coached the Marauders. The figures are all still WiP, but they're looking better than bare plastic! 

Anywho, I snapped a few pics of the game in progress. I won't give a blow-by-blow account (not least because the memories are a couple of weeks old and I've forgotten most of the details!) but the photos capture some of the action. I managed to scrape out my first Win at 3-0, despite a last-ditch score attempt from Ben. That brings the current tally of games to 2-1 in Ben's favour!

The teams line up for the start of the game

A closer view - the Corporation got the home advantage

The first couple of plays, and the Corp already have a player down...

...and a few more players down! Orx Guards hit hard

The Goblin Jacks make a dash for the 3-point Strike Zone

...but they can't pass the Dreadball very well!

The Corp players manage to get to their feet...

...but it doesn't last long!

It quickly turns into a scramble for the ball!

The Goblins successfully score!

The last play of the game, and the Corp Striker fails the crucial
4-point strike that would have won the game

April Fools! Oh Wait...

Another month has been and gone, again with little to show for it on the modelling front unfortunately. But I have been working on a few things lately.

The flavours of the month recently have been primarily Blood Bowl and Dreadball; my brother and I played our first game of Dreadball last weekend; despite having to take the time to read through the rules as we played, the game didn't take long at all and was fast and furious (naturally, I lost in the end but the game swung both ways right the way up until the final turn). From just this first outing, I can see Dreadball becoming a firm favourite.

So, with Dreadball looking like it will stay on the gaming radar for a while, I need painted teams to play with! Having backed the Kickstarter last year, I've got all four Season 1 teams (Corporation, Orx, Forge Fathers and Veer-myn) already to paint and will be receiving several of the Season 2 teams soon-ish (they're set for an April release date), so I've got plenty to be getting on with. To start with, I've cleaned up the Human and Orx teams ready for painting

The Referee and ball - necessary components for every game!

The complete Orx team - six Goblin Jacks, backed up by four hulking Orx Guards

The Corporation Human team - four Strikers, four Jacks and two Guards

I'm not entirely on what colour scheme (or team name) to use for the Orx but as we were watching TRON: Legacy as we were playing, I can't help but picture the Humans as players on "The Grid", similar to the 'official' colour scheme for the MVP 'Wildcard' pictured on Mantic's website

I'm not sure on the colour yet (blue, yellow or orange); I think the most likely choice will be yellow (because "Wildcard"/Quorra wears blue, and "Number 88"/Rinzler/TRON wears orange). We'll see how it goes when I start painting them. 

Dreadball Redux! Two (and a bit) weeks later!

Well, September 30th has been and gone, and with it the Dreadball Kickstarter I talked about in my last post. If you didn't jump on the bandwagon (why not?!) then you missed out!


In the end, the Dreadball Kickstarter raised a whopping $728,985 (that's £453,456 in real money...). When you consider that the original funding target was just $20,000, that's a massive 3645% of the target.

What did that $728,985 funding do, exactly?

Well, it has not only funded the release of the initial Dreadball game (comprising of two teams, Corporation and Marauders, the game board, dice, rulebook and everything else you need to play) but it has also funded all of this:

~ A grand total of 12! Dreadball teams, each with the full compliment of 16 players and with Prone Markers for each team
~ A huge 22! MVPs/Special Characters, including three Limited Editions only available via the Kickstarter
~ Season 2 Dreadball Expansion, adding rules for league play, extra teams and more MVPs
~ Season 3! Dreadball Ultimate, adding yet more teams, more MVPs, multi-player games and multi-hex mega-players
~ Cheerleaders, Coaches and Keeper figures for each team.
~ Exclusive Kickstarter Dreadball T-Shirts, Dreadball Dice, and Dreadball Bags (courtesy of Battlefoam)

OK, when you list it like that it doesn't look like a lot, but you just have to take a look at the Kickstarter page (here) to see how much it all adds up to. The Kickstarter alone has effectively funded the next two/three years for this game, although I doubt funding will stop there! The amount of models being produced for the game on the basis of the Kickstarter alone is almost enough to equal the entirety of GW's Blood Bowl range, and I doubt that this will be all that Mantic produces for Dreadball.


So what did I get out of all this free advertising?

Well, in the end, I caved to temptation and upped my pledge. I won't put the exact value on the slim chance that my other half is reading () but suffice to say that my swag bag is bulging, and my "hobby budget" is emptied. Winging their way to a house in the Midlands will be:

~ Dreadball Season 1 Rulebook (and additional PDF copy), Season 2 PDF Rulebook, Season 3 PDF Rulebook
~ Pitch - Mounted Card Gameboard, Game Cards, Dice, Counters and Limited Edition Kickstarter Counters, Roster Pad
~ Free Ticket to Dreadball event at Mantic HQ
~ 'Creating Dreadball' Digital Book
~ RefBot and 2 Balls
~Trontek 29ers/Corporation team (14 players) and Prone Marker
~ Greenmoon Smackers/Marauders team (14 players) and Prone Marker
~ Midgard Delvers/Forge Fathers team (14 players) and Prone Marker
~ Skittersneak Stealers/Veer-myn team (14 players) and Prone Marker
~ 20 MVPs/Special Character figures (including 3 Limited Edition)
~ Signed Cover Art Print
~ 48 Hex Bases
~ Judwan team (10 players) and Prone Marker
~ Nameless team (10 players)
~ Teratons team (10 players)
~ Asterian team (10 players)
~ 2 Female Corporation figures and Prone Marker, 2 Robot figures and Prone Marker, 2 Z'zor figures and Prone Marker, 2 Zees figures
~ "Nameless Spawn" Multi-hex figure
~ Limited Edition Coach Renton figure

...and I think that's everything! A grand total of 135 figures, plus everything else. The only "downside" is that delivery will be spread over the next 9 months as they produce all the figures, but all the Season 1 stuff (everything I need to play the game, plus the first four full teams) will be here by Christmas!

At least with the deliveries spread out, it gives me a slight chance to paint things before the next batch arrives. In theory anyway!

Right, now I'm off to appease She Who Must Not Be Named and butter her up before the first shipment arrives and the inevitable questions begin...

"MORE FIGURES! HOW MUCH DID THEY COST THIS TIME?!?!?"


*Gulp*

Wish me luck....

DreadBall - The Futuristic Sports Game

Kickstarters seem to be the latest trend to take the internet by storm - there seem to be half a dozen springing up every day. For those who are unfamiliar with the concept, Kickstarter is billed simply as:

"a funding platform for creative projects"

The general idea is that individuals, a bunch of friends and even full-blown companies can start a Kickstarter to "kickstart" funding for a certain project. They pitch the idea to the masses, promise rewards in return for cold hard cash and, if they meet their funding target, they go into production. Kickstarter isn't just for wargaming-related projects, but even so there seem to be tonnes of wargaming projects running Kickstarters in an attempt to raise funds for new miniatures and games. It mostly seems to be the province of indie companies who would otherwise be unable to afford all the production costs, but every so often a big established company jumps on the bandwagon to launch a product of their own. 

I'm pretty sure most people in the wargames hobby will have heard of Mantic Games by now. You might also have heard about this new game they're launching, called DreadBall.

Now, until about a week ago, I'd not really paid much attention to either Kickstarter or Mantic Games. I'd heard plenty about both; I'd seen all the people pushing various Kickstarter projects and I'd seen people using Mantic figures for Warhammer armies and the like, but I'd not really looked into either of them for myself because I didn't see anything that immediately appealed to me.

That was until I saw DreadBall. I saw something that looked like Blood Bowl for sci-fi fans and so, being a big Blood Bowl fan, I thought "that looks cool" and went over to Kickstarter to check it out. What followed was a 48-hour long torment, as I wrestled with my conscience about whether to pledge or not. Alas, being weak-willed as I am, I gave in an signed up at the 'Keeper' ($80) level. That gets me the complete DreadBall game (two full teams, the rulebook, the pitch and all the cards, counters and dice needed) plus the RefBot figure and a signed lithoprint of the cover art. I thought it over and decided this was really the minimum level I could go in at, because I'd need the complete game (i.e. the rules, a pitch and two complete teams) in order to convince anyone to play it with me.

Since then though, I've seen the funding shoot up, I've seen the new Stretch Goals come and seen them achieved, and I've seen all the new goodies that keep getting added to the 'Striker' ($150) level. Four complete teams, ten MVP figures, freebie figures from each of the "Season 2" teams (yes, funding has reached such heights that they can already afford to produce the first DreadBall expansion...), extra accessories for the game including Hex Bases for the figures, extra counters and the like, plus a free ticket to any DreadBall event at Mantic HQ, plus a Buy One Get One Free offer for all of the Season 2 teams at 'Striker' level and above.

All goodies that, at 'Keeper', I'll be missing out on....

So now, I'm going through another wrestling match with my conscience. I probably shouldn't have pledged to just $80 (which is only about £50.....). I'll really be in trouble if I up my pledge to $150 (about £90...).

But I really, really want to!


P.S http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1744629938/dreadball-the-futuristic-sports-game

Go over and pledge some money. It looks like a very cool game, you can get loads of cool stuff for your money, and the more people who pledge, the more figures everyone gets, including me!!