"The Rubberway Arena" at Milleniumcon

One of our local gaming conventions just came and went. I ran another Car Wars event which turned out quite well. I made a miniature version of the Akron Ohio "Rubberway" arena. I like the theme I have created the last two years, both years I have done 3D versions of actual arenas listed in official Car Wars books. I keep thinking about doing the Armadillo, but it seems daunting, maybe next year.

Lots of Car Wars Gaming

Arthur made it to Austin and he and Phillipe and I got together a couple of days and managed to get in 5 games of Car Wars. We did four arena events and one raid on a big rig.

Three people playing Car Wars is a good number. I've never controlled more than one car at a time, but since we were all fairly experienced players we controlled two or three in all games. I like the feel of this as you are always in the action.

This ended up being an all time favorite weekend of Car Wars gaming for me. I got to try a highway scenario, had my first event in the Double Drum, saw how cycles work, and Arthur gave me a few maps that he created. I will post on the maps coming up, these things are incredible.

Below is a link to the Arthur's writeup of our Double Drum arena event.
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/584113/lothariochimaera-team-event-at-double-drum

Here's a shot if the Double Drum:

Dungeons & Dragons Battlesystem

These pictures were taken about 8 years ago and this was my first project after a long hiatus from gaming. In the 80's in Maine at a local convention someone use to run massive fantasy battles using mostly Ral Partha figures. His games were probably three or four times the size of the one in the pictures below. Fielding my own game like this had always been a dream of mine, and when I started to get back into gaming the first thing I did was hit Ebay and buy quite a few old Ral Partha figures. I began collected them for years and these pictures show probably half my of what I have collected. I have to salute Ral Patha for what they did for gaming. They had some excellent sculptures and to this day I think their 80's fantasy line captures my picture of a fantasy world filled with goblins and orcs better than much of what is out today.

This battle was held when I was living in San Franciso. The game took place at Jon and Warwick's apartment named Game Central. I had been painting these troops for a few years and this was the second time the majority of them hit the table. They haven't been used since and have been in storage for about 7 years.

The game rules we used were TSR's Dungeons & Dragons Battlesystem. I have no idea why these rules didn't manage to capture gamers attention longer. The second edition rules streamlined the combat. The morale and movement and much else just worked with no suprises and I think you got out of them what you would expect.

First Austin Monthly Car Wars Meeting

We had the first of what I hope will be an ongoing monthly meeting of Car Wars here in Austin.

The event was held in the Ohio Rubberway arena.

The car used was the "Swagger"

20F, 20L/R, 22B, 6T, 12B, HD tires, Super Power Plant, 10 acl, 3 HC, RR Front with extra mag, med rocket L/R, paint discharger L/R, Spear 1000 md Back.

This was a pretty good match. The Rubberway's ramps make choke points for tailing and the severity of the md 1000 made tailing attempts difficult. Two early tails were thwarted by the driver laying mines coming off a ramp.

The map I made out of contruction paper and tape. I then had it laminated. I'm not all that happy with the results. It kind of looks nice, but I don't like the glare when taking pictures and counters slide a little more than just the paper. But it is more stable than the paper maps and it will be hard to damage it due to the lamination. I'm still thinking that mounting the counters on metal bases and using sheet magnet is the way to go.

Here is the write up:

At the start of the game all 5 contestants converged on the west raised bunker from three different ramps and across the pass. The first pass saw a lot of action as the contestents exchange rockets and recoiless rifle fire. On the first pass four of the autoduelists dropped spear 1000 mines with one duelist setting it to auto. Two of the drivers lost control and skidded toward the edge of the roof, Dolf gained his control back just in time, but Elvis trying to miss a mine trail wasn't as quick at the wheel and skidded over the edge of the roof ending his match.
The duelist then paired off with Dolf giving chase after John, and Dennis pursuing Steel. Both the chasing cars were soon thrown off their tail by defensively laid mine strips.
All drivers then disengaged trying to recover from the climatic pass and then began to look for an opening on another driver. John and Steel picked up speed and circled around the buildings while Dolf and Dennis slowed down waiting for a shot and tailing opportunities. Steel and John met while circling and exchanged accurate RR file on each others front. Just after the exchange Dennis took pop shots at the speeding Steel while Dolf managed to get a tail position on John. Frantically John tried to shake Dolf but could not, Dolfs withering fire soon blasted through killing Johns back armor killing the driver and sending the car into a wall at 50mph destroying the car.
Steel took a long loop to get back into the action while Dennis and Dolf met up for some rocket and RR fire exchange. After the first pass both attempted a boot legger for a finishing shot. Dolf pulled out the manuaver while Dennis ended up rolling his car taking him out of the action.
As soon as the dust had seem to settle the speeding Steel made a pass at Dolf. Both did extreme damage to each others front armor on the pass and they set up to do it again. Another pass at each other yeilded the same result with both cars starting to show holes in the front armor. Neither car could take another hit and both decided that it was suicide to take another pass and retired from the event to prove their skills another day.