I suppose this first post will be sort of uneventful and aimless, just a "what I've been up to in Europe" for those of you whom I haven't been in as close contact with.
We got a bit ambitious and decided that while we were here, we'd better see as much as we can, so we've been doing a lot of traveling around. Most recently London (this one I'd been planning on, as I've always really wanted to go to Salute, the King-daddy of game shows), and we had a fun but very busy weekend.
We lucked out and caught both the "Life and Death in Pompeii and Herculaneum" and "Ice Age Art: Arrival of the Modern Mind" exhibits at the British Museum, plus I dragged Aubrey to the European galleries to check out Lindow Man and the Lewis Chessmen, so that was a success. Sadly, neither special exhibit allowed photography (which is a shame, since it seems like that was allowed when the Pompeii exhibit visited Denver last winter), but I did snap a few before I was scolded by museum security and caught one of the translation to a mosaic depicting a typical night in a bar, in which two patrons are using some awfully colorful language in an altercation after a board game:
"The two men square up to each other. One, raising his fist says: 'You nasty bit of work! I got a three! It was me who won' (NOXSI A ME TRIA ECO FUI). The other shouts back: 'Now look here you cocksucker, it was me who won!' (OR TE FELLATOR ECO FUI)."
In terms of miniatures, I've been occasionally painting a mixture of Quar, World of Twilight (not vampires/werewolves!), and gladiators. I also picked up a rule set called SAGA, for skirmish gaming in the Viking Age, and a handful of plastic Dark Ages miniatures to go along with it. I'll do a more detailed post about Salute and some pictures of the miniatures in a little bit, but I did want to squeeze in a mention for this kickstarter, which is the first one I've backed (a meager $30 pledge, but with 15mm scale minis that still gets you a decent starting setup):
The setting is definitely heavily inspired by Bladerunner and I, Robot, where rival groups compete for control of "fabricants" (either as hired muscle or for illegal fabricant trade). The rules allow for NPC control of 3rd party characters, which sounds pretty cool, and there's an element of hacking to control the fabricants on the battlefield (some gangs are primarily fabricants, with hackers on the sidelines controlling them). It's only got a little over a day to go, and hasn't quite reached its goal yet, so it may not get funded, but I'm crossing my fingers since it looks like a fun game (and I know the guy that's sculpting the minis).
Alright, well, that's it for a kind of frenetic first post, but more later!
