Hi everyone,
In these tough economic times it's hard to pick and choose it's not 2007 anymore and we can longer justify purchasing pretty much everything and anything, going from being paid $4,000 a month to $2,800 a month doesn't help either, so what I'm going to do here is help you ,the reader, by directing you in the best way to spend your hobby dollar.
First things first you've got to be open minded this isn't Games Workshop there are loads of other games out there and you no longer have to drop $18 for 100g of sand (totally true) instead of debating alternatives here we're going to look at what you can get for $200NZD in each different system. We will assume you brought the rules a few months back and already have all your modelling supplies so now it's toy soldier time!
http://www.flamesofwar.com
Flames of War 1:100 World War II Miniatures game with a focus on Africa, The Mediterranean and Europe with an Early War 1939-41, Mid War 1942-43 and Late War option 1944-45. Lets select a 1500 point Mid War list and consult our budget.
Ok here we have a bog standard German Grenadier Infantry list
Company HQ $17.00
Grenadier Platoon $34.00
Grenadier Platoon $34.00
HMG Platoon
$17.00
3x Panzer IIIN Tanks $51.00
2x StuG F/8 Assault Guns $34.00
Priority Stukas JU-87G $25.00
Total $212, $12 over budget however planes don't always need to be represented. Flames of War is the third most popular gaming system in the World after Warhammer 40K and Warhammer Fantasy it shouldn't be too hard to find a player near you.
http://wyrd-games.net/
Malifaux is a 32mm Heroic Scale Steampunk, Victorian, Horror Skirmish game meaning it's cheap to get into another strange thing about it is that it uses a card based fate deck to twist or even cheat fate. The different factions in this operate in Crews the points of a game are measured in Soulstones so lets go build a 25 point Soul Stone List.
For this I'm going to go with my list that I took to Battlecry
Witch hunters
Sonia Criid
Purifiying Flame 2 points
3 x Witchling Stalkers 12 points
Samael Hopkins 8 Points
This leaves me with 3 extra Soulstones in my cache to help me cheat fate etc as for price well each faction has a starter box
This works out to about $40NZD at current exchange rates and the Purifiying Flame is about $9NZD so you and 3 other friends could easily get started for that $200 budget or you could have 4 Starter sets. Good looking miniatures and and easy to follow ruleset also help out alot.
http://privateerpress.com/
Warmachine is a very fast growing 28mm scale steampunk/magic miniautres game and one of the very few American wargames that's actually working. It combines infantry and Steam and magic powered robots (known as Jacks) and Beasts for the Hordes part of it both fighting to kill the opposing teams caster like Chess once your caster's dead that's game.
It works similar to most dice games walk forward, murder people however the Jacks and Beasts need orders so you have Focus and Fury both work very differently. Jacks get allocated Focus by your Warcaster and Beasts generate Fury by doing things I've heard it discribed as risk management versus resource management anyways lets build a 25 point starter list that seems to be a good start
Lets go with Khador they're red and they seem grumpy
The Butcher of Khardov $22.05
Decimator $45.40
Destroyer $45.40
War dog $13.00
Man-o-war Demolition Corps (Leader and 2
Grunts) $58.40 (this is a box of 5)
Winter Guard Rifle Corps (Leader and 9
Grunts) $65.00
Total $249.25 ok so that's well over budget so you might want to purchase it in parts I'm going to pop over to Wayland games and just do a comparison $223.81 not a bad saving their link is at the top on this blog.
http://www.spartangames.co.uk/
I lumped Dystopian Wars & Firestorm Armarda togerther as they're both played in a very similar fashion albeit one is a futuristic Sci-Fi Space ship game and Dystopian Wars is a Victorian Steam-punk Air, land and sea game. The miniatures are made of high quality resin and the game play is an I go you go system with an exploding dice component, roll 6's, it's good fun once you've figured it all out.
Ok lets see what we can get for our budget I'm not sure how points should work but I've been told one box contains everything you need to get started.
So $65.27nzd not a bad outlay for so much stuff and when was the last time you got 9 of anything for that price so at this price I could get the above and still have coin enough to get this
At $73.85nzd it's a bit more expensive however the ships are even bigger than Battlefleet Gothics ships and the Space battleship is twice as long as the Dystopian counterpart. So far that's $139.12 that leaves us $60 to spend on enhancing our fleets with carriers, submarines and other assorted toys. I always go with what looks cool rather than what is good according to the masses.
http://infinitythegame.com/
I copied this from their website.
"Infinity is a game with 28mm high metal miniatures that simulates combat and special operations in a science fiction environment with Manga aesthetics. Infinity miniatures are characterized by the high quality and detail of their modeling, the dynamism of their postures and their futuristic aesthetic"
I tell you what their minis are real nice however some of them have that Manga look and well I personally can't stand it. The game itself is a reactionary D20 game it has a very steep learning curve but once you're onto it the game plays smoothly when I played it I took a few heavily armoured troops and thought I was unstoppable unfortunately unfortunately snipers can still kill you no matter what you wear. One other thing I neglected to mention is this game relies on terrain and lots of it almost a Necromunda amount which helps with cover and consealment but the better player will always overcome this. Lets price it out anyways so once again I've gone for a box set due to it being a skirmish game it shouldn't set you back too much.
The above is a nice looking set of toys that'll cost you about $54.00 which is very cheap for such high quality minis when you compare it to 5 Space Marines for $48.00 from Games Workshop it comes up tumphs. You can start adding things to this like snipers, heavy weapons and ummm well what look like warewolves for these guys everyone else just has big robots.
So there you have it these are what I think about these selected games and I'll write more reviews in future if you want to send me something to be reviewed please contact me via email or leave a message in the comments below.
Thanks for reading
-Daniel
