Batman Miniature Game Schoolboy

Been a hectic week had meant to post this last week but never found the time. The wife had a surgery on her leg Monday so have been busy doing all the chores etc the op went well but rest and recovery has been hampered by Mrs Brummie catching the lurgy on top meaning every time she tried to sleep fits of coughing woke her up. On the mend though now so all good.

Anyway on to my post this is my final merc from the Bird and mercenaries booster for the Bane crew. As you can see he is armed with a rocket launcher a weapon only available to 2 or 3 crews now. There is an RPG for Joker crews but they are not quite the same rules wise. 

As per all ranged weapons they have a heavy funding cost weighing in at 33 $500 rep with 2 lots of ammo for his rocket launcher. I'm not sure how much mileage I'd get out of Schoolboy he is not as efficient as an Assault Rifle for damage output but could be useful against swarms with an explosive template and against armoured targets. My main concern is he only gets two shots off and can't move or fire either so if he misses then thats it nothing happens with the shot. I'd struggle to justify his funding in a typical came as you only get $1500 funding and this would be a significant chunk spent.

Interestingly though he has the Soldier of Fortune Trait and is the second with this trait (TNT being the first) If I wish to use more than one character with this trait then I have to include the Sidekick Bird as he is Soldier of Fortune Boss allowing you take more than one. I am hoping we see another one but i'm not sure what they'd be equipped with.

Batman Miniature Game Clover

The third member of the Bird and Mercs set is Clover. Adding a some short range fire power to the Bane crew and being a lot cheaper than the Assault rifle wielding Dallas and TNT. Clover is intereresting as he isn't your normal pistol toting mook. Clover has the trait Rapid fire meaning if h doesn't move his rate of fire (RoF) goes upto a massive 4 with his automatic gun potentially dishing out 4 blood and 4 stun in a barrage of 9mm bullets. Even if he moves he can still has RoF 2 so can catch people of guard. The synergy with Birds Military Tradition is fab using it when my opponent thinks he has blocked his shooting by moving within 5cm the Military Tradition trait allows you to move 5cm and still keep your RoF as if you hadn't moved.

Perhaps one of the harder minis to photo pose wise I am quite please with him. Next up and the final member of the set is Schoolboy.

Batman Miniature Game Cuchillo

Second model from the Bird and Mercenaries set is Cuchillo he seem is armed with a knife and is on a par rep wise with McGregor the machete armed merc from the Bane starter pack. Where this knife guy truly differs is in his traits. Cuchillo has Stealth so models have to be within 20cm to see him and he also has tireless which means he can perform a run by only using a special counter instead of a special and a movement. Making him very fast. Give him the backpack equipment for carrying loot for free and he is the perfect loot grabber for the Bane crew.

To represent his stealth I kept his colours to blacks and greys.

Batman Miniature Game Bane Sidekick Bird.

Reinforcements have finally arrived for beloved Bane crew. There are several Bane Leaders for the crew but sadly no sidekicks have been available since release to take with him. Back in March/April last year when the Flash and Arrow book came out a sidekick release was hinted at in the equipment list as there was a piece available called Venom Factory for Sidekicks or Free Agents to take .  However its taken until Decembers for one to be released by Knight models. I was expecting one to come as a single miniature but a second crew pack has been released coming with 3 more merc filling in some tactical gaps and of course the sidekick known as Bird.

This version of Bird I understand is from the Arkham game and is not in the traditional style of the 3 sidekicks Bane has in the comics was are Bird, Zombie and Trogg.  In the Crew he fulfills a support role for the Bane crew. Equipped with a combat machete doing single blood/stun damage and a smoke bomb. The only odd item he has is a climbing rope which counts as a batcape meaning he can jump of buildings spend a special counter and doesn't suffer any falling damage. Which is fine if you deploy somewhere high but he doesn't have any other way of getting up high.

Know is support role is pretty cool there are some cool combo's you can pull. He has a Special Trait called Military Tradition which when activated allows him to move henchmen within 20cm and who have the veteran trait 5cm for free. Doesn't sound a lot but it allows you to break combat forcing your opponent to move back in wasting there own movement in doing so. Also your henchmen ROF is not affected for this move either.

The other cool ability he has is 'One of the boys' which lets him use the 'Lets Go' ability counting as a henchmen for this purpose which if successful (you have to roll 4+) means you can activate your models without letting you opponent getting to activate. Being a sidekick your models within 20cm can also reroll lets go rolls if the fail. So you can see there can be a lot of flexibility given.

I had a game the other night using him against the Watchmen and I found Bird quite useful though I kept forgetting to put counters in special for my henchmen to make full use of the lets go trait. I had planned to deploy him on a building use a sewer to get to another building in my opponents deployment zone using his rope to jump off. Only I forgot this plan during deployment.....and deployed him on the ground with all the sewer access points being positioned on top of buildings....whoops lol.

 

The three other henchmen who come in the crew pack are being worked on. Two more are done which i'll get posted up this week and the third is not far from being completed either.

League of Shadows Bane Crew BMG

Well some new leadership is in order for my Mercenaries for the Batman miniature game. I have a new version of Bane to lead them this time the Dark Knight Rises or DKR(movie version) he has slightly different skills but is still great at knocking the crap out of people and KO'ing them but converting all that stun to blood damage is a struggle with all versions of Bane. So as an experiment I have decided to switch my crews affiliation (I lose the Venom Soldier as he is Bane only) to League of Shadows I get more options for Sidekicks, free agent and henchmen wise but can only take DKR version of Bane. There is one character in particular as to why I have switched affiliation.

First up of the new leadership is the main man (in my eyes anyway) DKR Bane. I really love the iconic pose of this model. The only annoyance and real a shame was the casting quality of it. It was so plastered in mold lines and had a terrible one down the right side of his face meaning I had to more or less file the eye socket and eyeball into shape. Paint scheme wise I pretty much copied the colour scheme from the movie (which surprised me how much dark blue was in there rather than black). Positive thing was that he was a single piece model.

Downside to this Bane doesn't count as large so can be knocked down by other normal size characters, does not move as fast, loses the lethal blow attack and finally the master fighter trait (+1 to hit). The trade off he has combo unarmed which means for every 2 unarmed attacks he dishes out he gets a 3rd free so can dish out a lot of attacks, strategist gives the crew 1 more strategy point so can take extra strategies or better ones, Desensitized means regardless of damage his will power doesn't get reduced so he can still perform to the max until he goes down. Bane also has true love Talia which means if she becomes a casualty he gets +1 willpower and +1 attack until the end of the game. Taking of Talia.........

Here she is! Talia Al Ghul will be his sidekick (replaces the venom soldier bodyguard points wise) she is not as monstrous in combat but has a katana which does double blood damage per hit and she is quite quick and agile with acrobat Talia can't romp about on her own as she is likely to get mobbed but paired up with someone they can be a nuisance together. I had Talia used against me in the tournament and she chopped up Mohawk quite ably. Colour scheme wise I didn't want to go all in black like Knight models did and went for brown leather and cream riding jodhpurs. (Much to Kieron's amusement with his love of Jilly Cooper novels!) I think she fits in with the mercs in this colour scheme more.

I think If I was to go the ninja side of the LoS I would probably use other characters instead of Talia (Unless I get hold of Talia's alt card)

Finally a different Free Agent this time Deadshot gets replaced with DKR Scarecrow. Now this guy at a glance doesn't seem to do a lot. Not great in combat his drug spray is short ranged though potentially useful against a clump of henchmen. But the reason why I'm taking him is for one special trait 'Death or Exile' This character can target one ko'ed miniature within 20cm from him, the targeted miniature becomes removed from the game as a casualty. This is an awesome trait similar to arrest but with a range of 20cm! Meaning he can hang around behind Bane and remove the characters Bane puts down. Well thats the plan anyway. This guy was easy to assemble just comes in two pieces body and the out reached left forearm/hand.

As you can see its still fluffy with Bane, Scarecrow and Talia (though there is no movie Talia so  far) all starring in the The Dark Knight Rises movie.

At the moment the new list is as follows

DKR Bane
Talia Al Ghul
DKR Scarecrow

Smash with Loyalty Tattoos (gains bodyguard trait)

Mohawk with Climbing Claws
McGregor
Dallas with Ammo + NVGs
(cheesy some will say but really my only range threat)

Titan Tournament Bane Crew

Been a MEH week this week, Both kids in and out of school being ill, burst water pipe in the kitchen MEH! Despite not getting much hobby stuff done I Did get a great game of Batman in Monday night at Pulp Citizen's .Getting a bit more familiar with my Bane Crew i'm taking to the Tournament this Saturday. We forgot a few things still so have made a sheet of all my characters abilities so I can just take a glance during play and hopefully use them a bit more to there full potential

Crew composition is currently looking at being the following 

Origin Bane 93 rep

Deadshot 76 rep $300

Venom Soldier 57 rep

Dallas 35 rep $600 + Ammo $200

Ted Hunter 31 rep $250

Mohawk  30 rep + Titan Dose $100

McGregor 27 rep

For a total of 349 rep and $1450

L-R Deadshot, McGregor, Mohawk, Bane, Venom Soldier, Dallas, Ted Hunter

I tried Night visions goggles on Dallas on Monday's game and though nice I still spent two turns legging it to an ammo objective to get a final shot at the end of the game. So going to try in the game tomorrow night extra ammo just to see if  I can live without the NVG's are really needed plus some strategies can give me extra lamposts so another thing to consider.

Bane was much better and knocked down a couple of henchmen. I need to pair him with some one who can do blood damage though and finish off those he puts down. Venom Soldier was pretty good as well need to pair him with Bane more still and remember some of his abilities like Hardened (turns first blood each round into a stun).

Deadshot was great and simple to use, Mohawk did pretty well against Strix with his Ice Axe combined with a Titan Dose boosting his attacks upto 6 doing 1 blood each managing to mortally wound Strix allowing Deadshot to gun her down after she sliced down Mohawk. Ted was nice missing his first few shots but shooting down Cobb in the back and KOing him in the final turn managed to leg it into the enemies deployment zone and jumping onto an ammo counter snagging some much needed extra VPS.

Another possibility may be to drop Ted and take Smash instead. This would do two things give some one to follow Bane and Venom finishing off those they KO and would also free up $300 funding allowing cash for NVG's or a batclaw.

Lots to think about still!

Playing against a Poison Ivy crew which will have some guns in and plays different with there static plants. I'll also be facing Hush and Deadshot so should be a different game style to play against tomorrow night.

As promised a shot of the lamposts from the TT Combat City Scenics Street Accessories set. Sadly not had time to work on the 6 barricades that come with set but maybe I can get them done this week. At the moment i've started the League of Shadows mainly priming and the flesh has been done. Not sure how I want the ninjas to look yet whether to go for a blueish hue or maybe even greenish tone to the black.

Talking of Green very tempted to start working on my Green Arrow crew as well. I spent last night basing Green Arrow and Arsenal and filled in a some gaps on them both as wellas Black Canary and they are ready for painting.

Sewers, Skips and Mercs

Its been another busy weekend I'd hoped to put up a post on Sunday but before I knew its now Wednesday! Its not been without any hobby time far from it! My package arrived Saturday afternoon with my order from thr Troll Trader. Comprising of two MDF kits and a booster for my Bane Crew the mercenaries Mohawk and Ted Hunter. So work began at a fast pace and on them all.


First up the Sewer markers these are a requirement for the batman game you randomly generate D3 per game with some abilities or special rules allowing you to increase the number.

These are part of the TT Combat range by the Troll Trader you 4 sewer covers, 4 Lamp Posts 4 Construction barriers and 2 large barriers or for the princely some of £3.95 posted! Bargain! They kits punch out really easy and I only had to use the scalpel on a few bits at I felt might get damaged if I just popped them out. The Second kit is the security hut but I will build that once all the prep for the tournament is over.

Sewer marker simply painted in a metallic colour washed with various brown, black and green inks and then drybrushed with the metallic colour with a bit of brown added. Nice and simple

The Lamp posts also a requirement are still wip but they are almost base coated so progressing nicely.

Finally the two Mercs first up my favourite of the two is Ted Hunter armed with a nice medium ranged shotgun he is handy to run and gun as it is ROF 1.  Ted comes in two pieces body and left arm with shotgun. A little bit of filling was required to smooth the arm join.

 Mohawk the second merc in the set armed with a pair of ice axes. This guy comes in four pieces head, body/left arm, right arm and legs. The head was a pain in the ass to put on it had no obvious way of connecting and appeared to be cut at an angle. I fitted it as best as I could and used a bit of putty to smooth out the join. 

 The duo together.

You'll notice in the background a pair of skips I've had these along time lurking on the table and I did a quick and dirty job on these last week in order to get them ready to use in Tuesday's batman game. They are by Ainsty Castings and paint up a treat. They fit in well with the slightly larger 35mm batman figures and so will also be perfect for 28mm gaming.

 Tried to use a lot of extra inks as if its been standing empty for a long time and water has begun to stagnate in the bottom of it.

The Entire Bane Crew ready to rumble. I am pleased to say my step is also a bit more accessible so providing the weather stays dry pics on it shall resume :)

Batman Game Bane Crew.

This past week has been really busy hobby wise. I have decided to goto the Titan Games Batman tournament after being asked a few times by Pulp Citizen I have decided to have a crack. My last batman game with my Penguin Crew things finally began to twig with the rules.

I have enjoyed learning the game with my Penguin Crew and they are far from finished but I fancied something different for the tournament and besides the large numbers make them quite unwieldy to manage. I plan to get more free agents such as Deadshot, Catman and perhaps Copperhead (I still like the model Pulp Citizen :P )

Anyway my new crew I have settled on is a Bane one. The main reason I really like the military/mercenary look to the warband. Bane is a nice imposing model and I can choose 3 flavours of Bane to lead the crew. Also with the DKR Bane I can dip in my toes with the League of Shadows.

Now someone happened to be selling a Bane starter and Merc set 2 (unpainted and unassembled) on one of the facebook groups and this was to good an offer to refuse! The crew was rapidly started :). They arrived last Wednesday afternoon and in a blur of activity I managed to get them all assembled, based and painted in 3 days finishing Bane Saturday evening. (I have been on  leave).  I still have more to add to it to bring it up to the full 350 rep $1500 required for the tournament which is on March 19th. I have another merc set on there way (hopefully arriving tomorrow). I want to add a free agent but can't decide again neet make my mind up by end of week in order to get the model painted in time.


I have had my first run out with the Crew (Borrowed Deadshot and proxied some gaps) They played quite well a lot easier and with some of their traits (Veteran on most henchmen) more forgiving when planning actions for the turn.

The main man himself I lost him in my first game I let him get pounced on by the Court of Owls Butcher and one of the O'Malley Henchmen he was knocked on his ass then stabbed repeatedly by the smaller henchmen removing him from play before I could rescue him. (Bad deployment on my part didn't help) Though the game ended with Bane 36vps to the Courts 32vps (Counts as a draw tournament wise) I was quite pleased I had managed to catch up with PC's early lead in the first few turns and started to take over towards the end I nearly could of pipped a few more VP's in the last turn but the dice gods were against me with Dallas rolling triple 1s when I really need to finish off Branden O'Malley in the final turn.

Here is the main man himself. This version comes in the starter set and is known as Origin Bane. Nice thing about this guy is that he is all one piece :)

Next up is Dallas equipped with an Assault rifle he is the ranged firepower of the group. Undecided on any extra gear for him at the moment certainly Night Vision goggles (Unlimited vision) and either extra ammo or Grapnel gun(bat claw). Dallas was probably the fiddliest to put together right arm with rifle, left arm, body and head. The arms were annoying to line up but I got him together in the end.

Next in the gang is one of my favourite miniatures out the set McGregor. This one comes in three pieces legs, body and right fore arm with machete on.

Another Melee fighter named perfectly is Smash wasn't so much fiddly to assemble bit had some awkward gaps to fill where his arms attached to hammer join his shoulders/waist.

The Starter crew completed :)

The additional blister I got was the Bane Thug Set 1 (These can only be used in a pure Bane Crew no LoS crossover)

First up is the Venom Soldier another tough melee fighter he has the bodyguard trait meaning if I keep close to Bane (which I didn't do in my first game) he can soak some of the damage from his leader. This guy is three pieces legs body and the backpack with pipes quite simple to put together really.

The second thug in the set is TNT (He is a bit special in the fact he has Elite 'Soldier of Fortune' trait which hints at least one more character like him and a special boss in order to take more  than one in of his kind in a crew) I really like this mini as well really intimidating. Sadly I can't fit him and Dallas in the same Crew they eat up all the cash leaving very little for gear or other characters. I may one day take pure Bane mercs in a friendly game and see how things work out :)

The Elite Duo

The whole crew so far.