That’s The Joke?
It’s official. This book is tedious. For those who don’t know, the Harry Flashman series of novels follows a member of the British light dragoons/hussars through various Napoleonic era adventures. Harry is the villain of the piece and…that’s the joke? In the first few chapters he plows his father’s...
Secret Headquarters: Qualified Recommendation
Watchable kids movies are pretty rare these days, and most of that fare consists of weird rubberface CGI cartoons. Which is why, if you have a kid in that 10-15 demographic, you should give Secret Headquarters a look. To get a few of the usual objections out of the way...
Moving Beyond 1990s Film Assumptions
Now that we have the whole streaming services thing mastered, it’s high time we got past the 1990s assumption that films need to be at least 87 minutes long to deserve a release. This was inspired by Brian and Charles, one of those quirky low-budget high-concept British films. It’s...
Nefarious: A Spoiler Free Review
This is not a perfect film, and a few blunders prevent it from even reaching the level of “great”, but it is a film worth watching. The wife saw a recommendation for this on one of the alternate social media sites and dragged me, kicking and screaming, into a...
Rebels and Patriots: Mixed Emotions
It’s fine. I’ve only got a couple of fights under my belt, so it may be too early to tell, but it hasn’t really grabbed me. This is another sibling in the Rampant Family of Rules, and unlike its older brethren, a tabletop general get one attempt to activate...
Flight of the Eisenstein
They keep sucking me back in! I still have no interest in playing Warhammer 40k. Every time I dip my toes back in to the scene the corporate drones remind me of why I prefer the small-house hobby side of what passes for the wargame industry. From a distance...
Initial Thoughts on ‘Rangers of Shadowdeep’
Why did I wait so long? Joseph McCullough’s masterpiece, Rangers of Shadowdeep has everything a man could ask for in a solo skirmish fantasy wargame. Everything except hope, but maybe that comes later. The basic mechanics are simple. Skill checks consist of a basic d20+skill versus a toughness number. Combat...
Brainstorming Paranoia
There’s a new edition of the classic RPG coming and hoo boy are the schoolmarms out in force. For those that don’t know, the Paranoia RPG was a dystopian sci-fi game with pretty thin rules designed to provide just enough game framework for a dark comedy RPG that satirized...
More Rank and Flank Thoughts
Army building. We meet again, old frenemy. As a reminder, we are talking about the popular collection of rules known as One Page Rules. In my particular case, the fantasy regiment game called, appropriately enough, Regiments. Let’s take a look and what you need to get started, and I’m just talking about...
Coming Soon: Modern Rank and Flank
It’s been a while since I’ve thrown a game of rank-and-flank fantasy down on the table. Dragon Rampant is more of a large warband skirmish game, and it lacks the nuance and subtlety of proper blocks of troops maneuvering about the green fields of battle. Demonstrating the charms of Chainmail...