Tag Archives: Modiphius

“A Good Day to Die!”

I recently got a good deal on some Modiphius Klingons for the Star Trek Adventures game (they just weren’t selling at my FLGS, hence the discount). Having little self-control, I bought them.

Klingons have never been known for a vibrant fashion color palette, so painting these guys was more challenging and less fun than I thought it would be. Mostly dark greys and metallics; not exactly eye-catching. I decided to add some red here and there to give some contrast to an otherwise boring look.

The good news is that I like the poses on these, and I like the overall look of the warband. This female Klingon lieutenant is by far my favorite miniature of them all. I love the bat’leth over the shoulder pose, casually daring you to try your luck.

Continuing with the good news: the rest of the set looks pretty good, and the inclusion of a few female Klingons is certainly nice. There is a nice assortment of weaponry; bat’leths are prominent, and this lieutenant swinging a mek’leth is pretty cool. Almost all miniatures sport at least two weapons (in true Klingon style). Where does it rank up among my Trek miniatures? Well, it’s better by far than the TNG bridge crew, better than the Romulan warband, and not as good as the TOS crew (despite Scotty’s bizarre pose). Just my opinion, of course.

And now the not-so-good news…

In my previous reviews of the Modiphius Trek miniatures I have thus far painted, I stated that they’re made of shitty, brittle plastic and that they absolutely suck to put together, because they’re fiddly and unnecessarily complicated. This remains true. If I didn’t love Trek so much I’d never put up with this level of annoyance, especially at the prices they charge. Put simply: these miniatures could and should be designed better and made out of stronger material. And, despite their obvious digital sculpting, noticeable gaps remain at all the glue points after assembly, making green stuff a necessity.

Also, the 30mm “scenic base” is really just a deck plate, much like the bases in the Romulan set. I actually don’t mind this that much, but calling it “scenic” is kind of a stretch.

Get your shit together, Modiphius, especially since you have the balls to charge over $50 per set. (Not that I paid anywhere near that, because that’s just bullshit.) Thankfully, these scale well with Heroclix (which are a lot cheaper), so you can use them alongside less-expensive options for Trek gaming, should you desire.

A recent visit to the Modiphius website revealed they are conducting a survey on which miniatures gamers would like to see next. I cast my vote for some Cardassians (my favorite alien Trek species), along with the DS9 station crew and a Dominion/Jem’Hadar warband. Some TOS-era Klingons and Romulans would be nice, too; but I can make do with Heroclix until then.

Insanity Pile Progress

Miniatures Purchased: 69

Miniatures Painted: 136

Total: +67

Star Trek Adventures RPG: The Vanished

Throw another of my 2019 Resolutions in the “done” pile. I got my friends together and we played an actual game!

One of my best friends lives on the other side of the country and doesn’t come back here very often. Usually he makes it home for the holidays, which doesn’t leave much time for gaming. But this time he made it back for a vacation. We made a point to set up a game night, and I managed to get three other guys together too! The game: the new Star Trek Adventures by Modiphius.

Being the Game Master, I decided to set the game during the Original Series era, and the players would take o the roles of Kirk and the Enterprise crew. Since we only had a few hours to play and only one copy of the rules, making original characters would have been silly and would have eaten up a huge chunk of our time. With this in mind I also decided on using a published adventure…but rather than use any of Modiphius’s adventures (many of which are quite good), I chose to adapt an old FASA Star Trek module to suit my purposes.

I chose The Vanished, by Guy McLimore and Greg Pohlein (credit where credit is due) which was actually designed with the Enterprise crew in mind. To my knowledge, none of my friends had ever played this adventure (we never played the old Star Trek RPG back when), so they would be unfamiliar with it.

Here’s the plot as originally written: The Enterprise passes by FDR 39, a deep space research station in the midst of a magnetic storm. They hail the station a a courtesy and get a bored response. In the middle of the conversation, communications abruptly cease. But the call isn’t dropped; the person who was speaking just…vanishes! Naturally, the Enterprise goes over to investigate…

What happened? Well, one of the corporations aboard the station was doing some research on a brand new kind of transporter. It just so happens that during a test of the transporter beam, some unknown aliens with an unpronounceable name (let’s just call them space amoebas, because that’s what I did) gained access to the station and caused a power short. This resulted in the transporter beam sweeping through the entire station, disintegrating all the people aboard. Lucky for them, their transporter signatures are still contained in the computer, so they can be restored…if the Enterprise crew can figure that out and deal with the aliens…

While this gives the landing party some clear objectives (investigate the station, deal with the amoebas, restore the transporter patterns), there’s not really much for the crew aboard the ship to do. At least not as the adventure was originally written. So I decided to add some of my own touches. First, the magnetic storm increases, making transport and communication between the ship and the landing party impossible for part of the adventure. This happens right around the time the landing party first discovers the aliens. (Too bad they can’t warn the Enterprise…)

To make matters worse, another ship arrives, filled with Orion pirates disguised as corporate employees. They’re here to steal the transporter tech with the help of an inside man, but they weren’t expecting to find their man disintegrated and the Enterprise in orbit around FDR 39. Still, they try to bluff the Enterprise while sending their own team to the station to retrieve the tech.

Once aboard the station, the landing party and the Orions have to deal with the aliens. But the Orions only want the tech, and seize the first chance they can to steal it and get away. Without it, the transporter patterns of all the people aboard the station can’t be restored, so the characters need that tech too…

Meanwhile, in orbit, a couple more of the aliens gain access to the Enterprise. Since the crew aboard have no idea about the aliens, they’re in the dark about how to deal with them. While the ship’s crew tries to repel the space amoebas, the Orions on the station either get control of the transporter tech and make a run for it (cue starship combat), or fail to get the tech, but still try to make a run for it (cue starship combat).

So how did it turn out? Obviously, I’m not going to blog a seven hour rpg session, that would just be dumb. But I will share some highlights…

The landing party was made up of Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty and two uncontrolled supporting characters, Lt. Suvek and Crewman Ramirez, both security officers (redshirts). This left Sulu in command of the Enterprise, along with Uhura, Chekov and Nurse Chapel, as well as several supporting characters, most notably Chief Specialist J’Zhara, an Andorian female engineer.

As you might expect, the security officers met with misfortune. Lt. Suvek wandered off to investigate a noise and fell prey to one of the space amoebas early. This prompted the crew to investigate, and in so doing they discovered the aliens for themselves. While fighting off a bunch of them, one of the amoebas was about to engulf Spock, when Crewman Ramirez somehow got in the way…

Of course, Kirk and the Orion pirate leader (disguised as corporate employee) had a romantic flirtation pretty much throughout the entire evening, which annoyed Bones and made Spock’s player delight in ruining the moment by constantly interjecting his scientific observations and theories at inopportune times. (I suppose I should clarify that the Orion pirate leader was female, but not an Orion. Still, she led a bunch of Orions.) Fun stuff.

The most surprising moment of the night was when the Orion ship finally fired on the Enterprise and made a run for it, Kirk and the landing party was still aboard the station and Sulu was dealing with the aliens in the Enterprise shuttle bay. This left Lt. Uhura in command of the Enterprise, as she was the ranking officer on the bridge! She wasted no time in pursuing the Orions and locked a tractor beam on them, preventing their escape! Considering she never did anything remotely as interesting on the TV series, this was pretty awesome!

Speaking of the shuttle bay, Sulu and company were having a hard time with one of the space amoebas. They opened fire on it and failed to do any damage at all. Then Nurse Chapel, of all people, stepped up and vaporized the alien without any problem whatsoever.

Finally, as any GM knows, your players will throw a wrench into any plans you are foolish enough to make. In this case, you would expect the story to unfold something like: board the station; discover the transporter accident; deal with the aliens; deal with the pirates; fix the broken power relay; save the station personnel by restoring their transporter signatures; capture the Orion vessel. The end.

Instead, it was: board the station, encounter the aliens, flirt with the Orion pirate captain, fix the power relay, inadvertently help the Orions steal the transporter tech from right under your nose, discover the transporter malfunction, chase the pirates, capture the Orion vessel, get the transporter tech back, and (eventually) save the station personnel by restoring their transporter signatures. The end.

I like Star Trek: Adventures, although I will say there’s a lot to keep track of. Seeing how it was my first time running the system, I’m pretty sure I didn’t do everything right. It was a fun time, and it was great to see some of my old friends around the gaming table again. (One of our players hadn’t played a game in over twenty years!) I’m hoping we get to play more often, possibly with original TNG-era characters. Fingers crossed!

“Kirk to Enterprise…”

I finally finished my three sets of Modiphius Star Trek miniatures with The Original Series (TOS) bridge crew. This is my favorite set, hands-down. Good sculpts, all (even Scotty, questionable “run-for-zee-hills” pose aside).

I’ve been binge-watching TOS lately, and I’ve noticed a couple of things. First, Captain Kirk is damn rude. He rarely lets anyone finish a sentence without interrupting them, even if they’re answering a question he just asked them. Kind of a dick move.

Second, when I was a kid, I couldn’t stand Dr. McCoy. I really don’t know why. Now he’s unquestionably my favorite character on TOS. Maybe because he’s crabby most of the time and not shy about telling Kirk to piss off when Kirk gets too lippy.

Onto the miniatures. First, the big three: Kirk, Spock and McCoy. Good-looking miniatures, worthy of the main characters.

Next: the guys driving and fixing the ship: Lt. Sulu, Ensign Chekov, and Chief Engineer Scott. Looking at this picture, I think I need to clean up the eyes a bit on Chekov and Sulu…

Finally, the ladies: Lt. Uhura and Nurse Chapel. I love Uhura’s miniature. I would have preferred Yeoman Rand was included rather than Nurse Chapel, but no one at Modiphius asked me for my opinion before casting the set. Here’s hoping for some individual releases from Modiphius in the future, much like Fantasy Flight does for Imperial Assault.

I posed the ladies with a power cell from Tiny Terrain, available at Miniature Market. At $1 apiece, I bought six. They’re cool-looking generic sci-fi set pieces that can be used for a lot of things, even in different scales. That being said, as 3D printed terrain, they require a lot of cleanup and they aren’t exactly perfectly formed; but for a buck each they’re not bad.

Once again, I broke these miniatures up according to uniform color and painted them in groups. For Kirk, Sulu and Chekov, I based them in Citadel Tausept Ochre, then highlighted with Iyanden Darksun, then washed with Agrax Earthshade, then highlighted up again to P3 Cygnar Yellow. Then I went a little overboard on the yellow by washing it in Citadel Yellow Wash. A little too bright, but whatever. For Spock, McCoy and Chapel, I based in Coat D’arms Fester Blue, then washed in Citadel Blue Wash, then highlighted up with a 50/50 Fester Blue/Reaper Ice Blue mix, and finally a highlight of Reaper Ice Blue. Scotty and Uhura were based in Citadel Mechrite Red, then washed in Citadel Baal Red, highlighted with Reaper Fresh Blood and finally, Reaper Brilliant Red.

Dr. McCoy was my favorite miniature to paint, but I think Uhura came out best. Scotty was my least favorite miniature to paint. and also my least favorite miniature in the set. Both Modiphius and I could have done a better job with him, IMO.

I’m looking forward to gaming with these miniatures, and I already have some ideas of how to use my Hydra Retro Raygun and Rattrap Fantastic Worlds miniatures. I bought them a long time ago for a retro sci-fi project that never really went anywhere, but they fit right in as TOS aliens.

I’ve managed to meet one of my painting goals for the year: paint my Modiphius Star Trek miniatures. Now, onto my big project: getting my Old West scenery and terrain built and painted.

Insanity Pile Progress

Miniatures Purchased: 46

Miniatures Painted: 98

Total: +52

“Make it so.”

I finally finished my Star Trek: TNG bridge crew. I wish I could say it was fun, but…it wasn’t.

Try as I might, even with as much love as I have for these characters, I really hate the miniatures. It’s just such a waste of a good set compared with ANY other Modiphius Trek set, especially the TOS bridge crew. The dumb poses (LaForge and Yar) and questionable equipment choices (Troi’s tricorder, Data’s phaser rifle) are a real bummer, not to mention the brittle plastic (Worf).

To get this set completed, I painted these in groups according to uniform color. Getting the “classic” next-gen uniform pattern was a bit more challenging than you’d expect; it seems these uniforms are sculpted so they can be painted in a variety of styles, either from the movies or the TV episodes. The classic look requires a bit of free-handing. The black on all the uniforms was simple Reaper Black, highlighted with a faint drybrush of Citadel Celestra Grey, then washed with Citadel Nuln Oil. After the miniature was sealed in Dullcote, Vallejo Gloss Varnish was then added to the boots.

First up, Picard and Riker, or as I like to call them, the second and third-best miniatures in the set. I painted the uniforms with Vallejo Red Brown, then highlighted with Citadel Scab Red, Reaper’s Fresh Blood, and Citadel Blood Red and Red Wash.

Next, the Ops, Engineering and Security officers: Data, Yar, Worf and LaForge. I based their uniform in Citadel Tausept Ochre, washed it in Citadel Agrax Earthshade, and highlighted with Citadel Iyanden Darksun.

Finally, the Medical crew: Dr. Crusher and Counselor Troi. I think Crusher is the best miniature in the set, but YMMV. I was going to paint Troi in her classic purple/grey spandex, but she was unmistakably sculpted in her Season 6-7 science uniform, so that’s what I went with.  I based both uniforms with Vallejo Prussian Blue, then washed with Citadel Blue Wash, then highlighted with Coat D’Arms Fester Blue. I based Crusher’s lab coat in Fester Blue, washed with Citadel’s Nuln Oil, then highlighted with Reaper Ice Blue and Army Painter Troglodyte Blue. (The medical table is from Tiny Terrain, a 3D-printed line of terrain available at Miniature Market. At $2.50 each, I bought three. Maybe someday I’ll have a skirmish in sickbay!)

Yar was the most fun to paint; Troi was by far the least. I don’t think I did a very good job on Data’s face, either…for some reason I just can’t seem to paint Soong-type androids very well.

I’m not sad to be done with this set. It took me longer to complete than I anticipated, mainly because I was so indifferent to the miniatures.

Coming soon: the Original Series bridge crew.

This post also marks the return of the painting queue, which somehow got lost along the way this year. By my tally, I bought 33 miniatures since the last time I kept track (mostly the Modiphius Star Trek sets, which account for 26 of them), but I painted 27, so that’s not too bad. Which brings my current tally to:

Insanity Pile Progress

Miniatures Purchased: 46

Miniatures Painted Thus Far: 90

Total: +44 

Star Trek Adventures: Ruthless Romulans!

It’s Martin Luther King Day here in the USA, so I have the day off. I woke up this morning to a balmy 7 degrees Farenheit (that’s 13 below for any of my readers who use the Celsius scale). Definitely a day to stay indoors and paint some miniatures. My first batch of Modiphius Star Trek miniatures has been completed, and I decided to go quick and easy with the Romulan set. Since they’re essentially all painted the same, it was a small matter to get the entire set painted in short order.

This is a good thing, because they were not much fun to paint. Romulans aren’t known for their daring fashion sense. The limited grayscale palette wasn’t exciting, and they all have the same metal deck base. Yawn.

The exception was the Romulan commander, who I painted as Sela, the alternate-timeline daughter of Tasha Yar. Since Modiphius made the Romulan commander miniature female, I have to assume they expected other people would do this, too.

Once they were sealed, I added some gloss coat to their boots, belts and hair. Not sure I like the glossy hair, but at this point I may be too lazy to change it. All things considered, it’s a good set with some nice miniatures. Once I get the bridge crews done, I should be ready to try out a skirmish or two.

Modiphius Star Trek Miniatures: A Review

For Christmas, I gifted myself two sets of Modiphius miniatures for their Star Trek Adventures roleplaying game: the Next Generation Bridge Crew and the Romulan Strike Team. Then, after Christmas, I got the Original Series bridge crew at a staggering discount (see below). Here’s my review of all three sets. Spoiler: it’s not a universally great review. Some sets are much better than others, and the same problems are common to all.

Price: There seems to be a great deal of variation in the price of these sets. Modiphius sells them for $50.99 each, which is fucking insane even for licensed properties like this. Luckily, you can easily find these much cheaper simply by shopping around. I paid $24.56 with free shipping for the TNG bridge crew, and $16.88 for the Romulans, both from Amazon vendors. Then, I managed to find the Original Series bridge crew for only $8.00 plus shipping, which is a truly incredible savings that I still can’t believe! YMMV, but I find full retail price for these to be ridiculous and not at all worth it.

Sculpting: They’re obviously digitally sculpted, and I’m not really a fan of computer sculpting. (That’s my personal preference, of course.) The likenesses are pretty good overall, although I question many of the poses of the TNG crew and the decision to make so many of them and the TOS crew multipart castings. More on this later.

Composition: The miniatures are plastic. Not good, strong plastic; rather shitty, fragile plastic. Be very careful removing them from the sprue. I was, and I still had an annoying mishap (see below). I don’t understand how miniatures today get made out of flimsy materials like this. GW, Victrix, Wargames Factory and Wyrd can make miniatures out of strong plastic, so it’s not like it’s impossible. Even Reaper Bones, with their tendency to bend, are way better than these. Not a fan.

Assembly: Each miniature comes on its own sprue, which  includes a circular base with holes to accommodate pegs on the model’s feet. Most of the bases are sculpted to look like metal decking, but some of the TNG and TOS bridge crew miniatures have “scenic” bases. I found using the peg holes to be somewhat aggravating, as they are positioned in such a way that the models are often off-center, which looks weird. To make matters worse, these miniatures are fiddly as fuck, making assembly a huge chore. This is further complicated because many are multipart castings (and they really don’t need to be…see below).

I use Gorilla Glue gel to assemble all my miniatures. Metal, plastic, resin…it doesn’t matter. I find it to give a strong, quick bond, and the gel gives a little substance for fiddly parts to grip onto. Gorilla Glue gel failed me here. For whatever reason, it did not want to bond this shitty plastic. I had to hold pieces together for much longer than usual to get these miniatures assembled.

Now, onto the miniatures themselves…

I’ll get the Romulans out of the way first, because I have the least to say about them. In short, it’s a pretty good set, and you get 10 miniatures instead of 8. These include a commander, 4 centurions, and 5 uhlans. The Romulan commander and three of the uhlans are female; the rest are male figures. Sadly, you get repeats of some of the same figures as opposed to 10 different sculpts, but they’re still much better looking overall than the TNG bridge crew, and far less fiddly to assemble. All of the miniatures are single-piece castings with the exception the two centurions armed with disruptor rifles; they need to have their arms attached.

Onto the TNG bridge crew. I’ll take these miniatures individually, because there’s a lot not to like about them. I’ve already stated my problems with assembly, so just assume unless otherwise stated that they were all a pain in the ass to put together.

First, what I consider to be the best miniatures in the lot. Dr. Crusher looks pretty good, carrying a medical kit in one hand and a medical tricorder in the other, just as she should be. In my opinion, she’s the best miniature among the crew, but YMMV. Next, Captain Picard is the only one-piece casting in the set. He’s not too bad, but I would have preferred he look more “Picard-ish” and not be brandishing a phaser. Lastly, there’s Commander Riker, who looks pretty good dramatically standing with his characteristic “leg-up” pose. His beard is not very well-defined, which could be because Modiphius wanted to give us the option of having a beardless, Season One Riker. (That’s no Riker of mine, but again, YMMV.)

Next, the rest, in no particular order of disappointment. Lieutenant Yar looks good except for her ridiculous karate pose. (They couldn’t give her a phaser? She was Chief of Security. If anyone should be brandishing a phaser, it should be her.) Lieutenant Commander LaForge would be a lot better if he was looking at his tricorder, not looking like someone poured ice water down the back of his uniform. Deanna Troi is ok, I guess…but why give her a tricorder? When did Troi ever use a fucking tricorder?

Lieutenant Commander Data looks just as out-of-place holding a Type III phaser rifle. Again, why? Maybe Modiphius wanted to give some variety, but I can’t recall a single instance of Data using a phaser rifle in the entire series. Even if he did, it’s not like it was a common enough occurrence that he deserves to be sculpted with one. Lieutenant Worf is wielding his iconic bat’leth, because of course he is. I would have preferred him with something like a Type III phaser rifle instead. I can’t recall him ever using one of those either, but it seems to fit his style better than Data’s. Sigh. I can’t decide whether Data or LaForge is my least favorite miniature in the set. They’re both pretty bad.

On to The Original Series miniatures, by far my favorite set of the three, and not because I paid the least for it. You get eight miniatures in the set. Again, I’ll start with the three best miniatures (IMHO, of course); the big three: Kirk, Spock and McCoy.

My favorite miniature hands-down, Kirk just looks AWESOME, talking into a communicator and brandishing a phaser. (He just needs a green Orion female to drape herself around him Frazetta-style and it’s a 100% match.) Spock is looking appropriately science-y, and McCoy looks great with his iconic old-school tape recorder/microphone style medical tricorder. A+ on this trio, Modiphius!

Next, Sulu, Chekov and Uhura. Sulu and Chekov both look great, although Sulu is a tad more dynamic (Bravo on not casting him shirtless with a fencing rapier, Modiphius!). Uhura is also a terrific sculpt (I like her almost as much as Spock and McCoy); although she was rarely on away missions, she looks perfect with her ubiquitous earpiece and a phaser, to boot.

Finally, Mr. Scott and Nurse Chapel. Although he’s still better than most of the TNG miniatures, Scotty is my least favorite miniature in this set. What is he running away from? A warp core breach? (If so, it’s doubtful he will get far enough away on foot…you know, in space…) Nurse Chapel looks fine holding Dr. McCoy’s space clipboard for him, but I question her inclusion in the set. I guess they needed an eighth miniature. I guess they didn’t want to include Yeoman Rand, considering she only lasted 8 episodes…

My biggest quibble with all these miniatures is the quality of the plastic. Worf broke when I was cutting him off the sprue, and my cutters didn’t even touch him. His foot snapped in half when I cut the sprue next to it! Annoying for sure…but it would be downright infuriating if I had paid full retail for this set. I tried my best to fix it, but the problems I experienced with the glue made it set wrong. I have read similar complaints about the fragility of other sets.

Currently, Modiphius offers three additional sets: TNG-era Klingons, Borg, and generic Starfleet officers, many of them alien races included as character options in the rpg. They all look pretty good, but I haven’t been able to find the sets for a reasonable price (less than $30). I would love to see some Cardassians (my favorite bad guys), the DS9 station crew, and some original series Klingons, but we’ll have to see what, if anything, Modiphius releases next.

I’ll be working on painting these Trek miniatures throughout January, so hopefully I’ll have them done soon. Until then, peace and long life!

What I Got for Christmas

Another holiday season has come and gone, and it’s time to tally up the loot under the tree. I won’t bore anyone with detailed descriptions of my new socks and aftershave…after all, no one who reads this blog is the least bit interested in that. Instead, what gaming goodies did Santa Claus leave at chez Piper?

Well, Santa himself didn’t leave much, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t get some cool stuff.

First, Tanks, from Gale Force Nine. Three plastic tanks, some cardboard terrain and everything else you need to play a quick miniatures tank battle game right out of the box. If I like it, I can buy some expansions, much like X-Wing. A pretty darn good value for the $20 I hear Santa paid for it.

Next, Santa brought me Ronin, from Osprey Games, which is something I asked for. Why did I ask for Ronin. when almost all of the samurai miniatures I own are from Clan War, and are unpainted? I don’t know the answer to that. I really don’t. But ask for it I did, and it was under the tree on Christmas morning.

And that’s all the gaming stuff Santa brought me this year. Of course, every year, while shopping for friends and loved ones, I become my own Santa. So…

A close up of the Arid Land mat.

Cigar Box Battle Mats had a pretty cool Christmas sale…buy 3 mats, get 20% off. And I almost went for it, until I saw how much I was spending, and how much the shipping wipes out of the savings. That being said, I love Cigar Box, so I started my self-Santa-ing by buying myself a mat for both Old West and Post-Apocalyptic games. I chose their Arid Land mat.

Looks like it works well for Gaslands

And for whatever Old West skirmish set I decide to use.

I’ve just discovered a podcast called Mission Log, which apparently has been around for years now, in which two guys watch every episode of Star Trek from every Trek series, ever, and dissect the show; providing trivia, commentary and thoughts on morals, meanings and messages contained therein. They’re somewhere in season two or three of Deep Space Nine right now, but they’ve already made it through the Original Series, the Animated Series, and The Next Generation, not to mention all the TOS movies (up to Generations). A few years ago I binge-watched every episode of DS9, which may be my favorite Trek series. (I say may be because it’s kind of a tie with TNG. Both these series came out when I was in high school/college, so they were “my’ Trek era.) Every Trek series is currently available on Netflix (including Discovery, over in Europe), so it makes re-watching them pretty easy, should you be so inclined.

Several months back I became aware of Modiphius’s new Star Trek miniatures from an issue of Miniature Wargames magazine. While shopping on Amazon this year, I stumbled across these sets at somewhat irresistible prices, so a couple of clicks later, the cart was empty. What are irresistible prices, you ask? Well, these sets retail for about $50 each, which makes them quite resistable, as that’s just insane even for foreign-manufactured, licensed character miniatures like these. BUT, on Amazon I found the TNG bridge crew (8 miniatures) for around $25 including shipping, and 10 Romulans for $16! That’s less than 2 bucks per Romulan! Sold!

Of course, then I discovered there was a game to go with these miniatures…

So I bought this bundle, which includes the “new” (about 2 years old now)Star Trek: Adventures roleplaying game, a book of 8 ready-to-play adventures, a combat screen and reference sheets, a map of the alpha and beta quadrants, and this spiffy spaceship pin.

The first thing I did was cast aside the pin with complete disinterest. (I mean, really…if you’re going to include a useless pin in a bundle of gaming stuff, couldn’t you make it a TNG communicator or something cool? ) Then I looked though the core rulebook, and I fell in love.

I’ll probably do a review of the game and the miniatures soon, but for now I have some lingering projects to finish before the new year. Then I have to give some serious thought to what I’m going to do in January…

Happy New Year, everyone!