Response to the Lower Lab - ATZ Game Pt3

and now part 3. We left Shelldrake's team running away withdrawing to an alternate route.

Shelldrake opened the door and led his team across the corridor and into the room on the other side, which they found to contain glass tanks - each with a human inside, or something that had once been human anyway ...
Last out, Barley used his card to lock the door to the medical lab; down the corridor the monsters  could easily be heard still banging on the other door.

If at first you don't succeed ...

As Barley entered the tank room, Hugh swiped his card locking the door. 
"Eyes on the job, gents!" Shelldrake said as his team gazed at the tanks. "Same as the lab, round the corner and out the other door. Lock the other one as before."

'Secure' in the tank room, Shelldrake focussed his team

Unknown to Shelldrake and his team, the monsters heard the second door close ...

I gave the Zeds a 1 in 6 chance of hearing doors close ... guess what? yup, they heard the second closing

As the lead monster rounded the corner it saw Barley's boot disappear through the door. Within seconds they were trying to get through that door instead ...

if only they could swipe a card and use a keypad ...

Thankful the monsters were still the other side of a reinforced steel door, Shelldrake led his team round to the other exit, making sure the third door was swiped to a secure lock on the way.

second try ...

Opening the door to nothing but the sound of the monsters banging away 'round the corner, Shelldrake's team headed towards the main lab ...

McGrew led the team toward the main lab ...

... while Hugh brought up the rear.

As Shelldrake rounded the corner to the short corridor entering the main lab, he saw another tech's corpse lying there. "Was it bad that Barley and McGrew hadn't even bothered to mention it?" he thought to himself; but his reverie was interrupted by gunshots ...

another of the 'unaccounted' is found ...

McGrew had seen another monster standing by one of the doors to the offices where the staff were apparently trapped. Without hesitation the SMG already at his shoulder barked out a 3 round burst and the monster's head exploded, the contents splattering against the door in front of it.

McGrew deals with another of the 'subjects' ...

The lab looked like an explosion had wrecked it. The body slabs were knocked over, medical tools all over the floor, but then as Barley leapfrogged McGrew's position another burst roared across the lab, as Barley neatly drilled the remaining monster that had been out of McGrew's line of sight by the other door.

Barley dealt the last 'subject' in the room their final hand ...

Hugh, Pew, Barley, McGrew and Shelldrake were all in the main lab now getting ready to open the door to the offices ...

'Let's get these people and then the fuck outta here!"

But, none of the team had thought that the sound of the gunshots might attract the monsters they had left futilely banging on the tank room door ...

'Where are you? we're coming to get you!'

The first any of Shelldrake's team knew about it was the monsters slavering towards him as his guys formed up around the office entrance ...

oh bugger ...

End of part 3 ...

Response to the Lower Lab - ATZ Game Pt2

When we left part 1, Shelldrake had just blasted the corridor with his shotgun as something had appeared around the corner ahead of him.

Pew remembered his training enough to look where the shot had gone instead of where it came from, so he saw the ... 'thing' charging him. Reflexively he raised his SMG and fired off a burst.

Unfortunately, the Zeds rolled better on the activation - Zeds 2 humans 1 - so they charged Pew. He made one pass on his 'Zed or no Zed' test - should they be taken vs Ragers? - and then passed 2 dice on his Being Charged test.

The 3 bullet burst hit home, knocking down the first two 'things' round the corner - but the third was on him!

Pew killed the first Rager, knocked down the second, but the third reached him. You can see the skull counter I used for the dead Rager in the pic below.

Pew meets a rager - he'd rather not have though ...

Pew managed to get his gun up and in the way as he stood back up just in time to meet the on-rushing 'thing'. As it clawed for Pew's eyes, Shelldrake could see it was a person - or had been once. Whatever humanity this thing had once held was long gone. The raking claws, snarling teeth and blood running from their eyes made that a thing of the past ... fascinated horror rooted him to the spot as he watched while Pew fought a desperate losing battle against the monster

Ragers roll 3 dice in melee - normal zeds roll 1 - so are much tougher to beat ... the successes went like this:
1st rnd: Pew 4 Zed 1; 2nd rnd: Pew 2 Zed 1; 3rd rnd: Pew 1 Zed 1; persistent bugger this zed; why won't he die?
4th rnd: Pew 1 Zed 1; oh dear ... 5th rnd: Pew 0 Zed 1; end of Pew ...
Whereas Zeds feast, a Rager 'rages' for d6 turns. I rolled a 5 and put out the marker - a skeleton with a scythe and space for a dice.

As the monster knelt over the fallen Pew, Shelldrake could barely contain his revulsion as he watched it start to rip him apart. But then his attention was ripped away from Pew as another monster leapt over the first and  started trying to pull Shellie's guts out - through his mouth ...

So the 2nd melee:  Shelldrake 2 Zed 1; Shelldrake 1 Zed 0

The raging hatred in the monster's blank mindless eyes terrified Shelldrake to his very core, but somehow he managed to get his boot up and intersect with its ribs as it leapt at him, turning it crashing into the wall. Before it could recover, the butt of Shelldrake's shotgun squished its skull against the wall and it slid to the floor unmoving.

Shelldrake kills the second monster

"Fall back to the labe!" yelled Shelldrake. He blasted the standing monster in the hall, blowing it off its feet before he moved back to the dissection lab. Pugh jerked reflexively at his trigger, scattering a burst along the corridor, before following his supervisor's example into the lab - not even registering that he had missed completely.

Pew needed to practice his shooting ...

McGrew was left alone outside the lab now. True to his training, he backed toward the lab covering as much as he could with his SMG. When he saw the monster tearing at his buddy, he put a burst straight at its head. That exploded and the burst went on to travel up and hit the monster behind it knocking it off its feet. He smiled to himself grimly as he entered the lab and Barley locked the door behind him; "Score one for Pugh!" he thought to himself.

All Zeds down; steel security door between them, the
team thought they were safe

Activation roll:  Zeds 2 Humans 4
Shelldrake led his team back through the lab to their original entry point. They could all hear the banging begin on the door they had come through. "Shit," thought Shelldrake, "only 2 hours to the end of the shift and this had to happen!"

Activation roll: Zeds 5 Humans 6
His thoughts were interrupted as Hugh shouted, "What about Pew man?! We gotta get him!"
"Fuck that man!" yelled Barley
"Keep it together guys!" yelled Shelldrake. "Shawn, Pew is down and these 'subjects' - what the fuck?! They're monsters man, not people!"
An unknown voice came over his headset, "Shift Supervisor Shelldrake, have you made contact with the staff yet?"
"We saw a corpse - a tech probably from his coat; no-one else yet," Shelldrake replied.

A respite - so they start arguing ...

Activation roll: double 4 re-roll; Zeds 2 Humans 5
As the Rager raging at Pew was killed before it could finish, I decided that a "Harry, Chill Man!" test needed to be made ... which was failed so, Pew stood up and joined the team. However, as he had not seen the others exit back through the door, he milled about on the spot and didn't join them beating on the door.

Plus one to the Ragers; Ragers 1, Security -1 ... oh dear

"Who is this?" Shelldrake asked.
"That's not important," came the reply, "Mr Siwoc has been relieved from this post and I outrank you. Your orders stand - secure the staff on that level. Re-inforcements are on their way."
"Fuck," said Shelldrake under his breath as he switched back to the team's frequency.
"Right guys," he continued, "Get your shit together, we gotta carry on." He looked each man in the face in turn and was rewarded with varying degrees of resolution. 
"We go back through this door and try the other way around to the offices they called from. Those dumb  things are still banging on that door - we keep quiet and they won't know where we've gone."
He hoped that sounded better to them then it did to him ...
He turned back and opened the door into the corridor ...

"suck it up - the man says carry on!"

End of part 2 ...

Response to the Lower Lab - ATZ Game Pt1

And so on to the first part of the batrep for the game I've set up. Is this a good time to tell you it's not normal Zeds, but Ragers they'll be facing?


Taking a deep breath, Shift Supervisor Shelldrake turned and led his men down the stairs to the Lower Laboratory ...

Super' Shelldrake and team enter the lab ...

Initially nothing seemed out of place; the team saw and heard nothing ...

and see a whole load of nuthin ...

At the bottom of the stairs, Shelldrake indicated the first door on the right - a good a place as any to begin their sweep. Barley and McGrew moved up to flank the door, quickly followed by Hugh and Pew bursting through it. As Shelldrake looked through the door he could see it was a medical room of some sort just as he could hear Pew holding back a retch ...

Hugh and Pew could not believe what they were seeing ...

From the corridor the rest of the team heard Pew losing his lunch just as Hugh began retching

From the corridor the retching seemed to echo endlessly ...

The rest of the team entered the lab and were horrified to see three bodies in various stages of dissection. "Don't look," growled Shelldrake, "Keep it together and move on." A few seconds pulling themselves together and the team moved on through the lab. "Lock that door Hugh," Shelldrake said. Hugh swiped his security card in front of the sensor as he passed - now only another security card could open it.

The team move through the dissection lab

Reaching the other exit from the lab, the team formed up and executed another great dispersal on the other side.

Shelldrake was proud of the way his team dispersed through the door

And rapidly found the first of the 'unaccounted' staff ...

'Euwww ' said Pew

Pew knelt beside the body and reached to check for life - "Jees, boss," he began, "This guy's been ripped apart." 

But Shelldrake wasn't paying attention; someone - or was it something?! - had come around the corner ahead of Pew. Whatever it was, screamed and shouted, reaching toward him and Pew. 

"What the hell?!?"

Without hesitation, Shelldrake readied his shotgun and pulled the trigger.

Pew failed his In Sight; but Shelldrake passed 1d6. Unfortunately, his Snap Fire missed. Ooops ...

Part 2 follows soon ...

Response to the Lower Lab - ATZ Game Pt0

Shift Supervisor Shelldrake looked up from his paper as the alarm suddenly sounded. Another slow day in charge of the 5 man security response team had changed.

Shelldrake and the members of his team looked at each other dumbfounded as they waited for the second tone to kick in to indicate yet another drill. Slowly it dawned on them that it wasn't a drill ...

It was as if a tornado had hit the room as they jumped up and pulled their gear together. Into this maelstrom of action, the administrator's voice came over the PA - "Security lockdown enacted in the lower laboratory. Response team to security door 1 now!" None of the team commented on the edge of panic creeping into in the admin's voice ...

"Clear a hole!" shouted Shelldrake as he led his team at a jog into the corridor and towards the staircase - unneccessarily he found as the corridor was deserted. "Shit," he thought as he led his men pounding down the staircase. "It had to be the lower lab..." There was no camera feed available to him from there due to 'security' - even though he was the shift super! They did know the floorplan at least ...

"What's the story Shawn?!" Shelldrake barked into his comms headset
"Unknown," came the administrator's shaky reply. "The alarm was tripped from the main lower lab. Been trying to contact them but - wait"
Shelldrake held his hand up to stop his team as they reached 'security door 1' - a steel shutter that had sealed the top of the stairs down from the main lab floor to the lower lab.
Shawn's voice came back through his headset, "Spoken to Doctor Brummie," he began, "There were 12 staff on the floor; 8 of them are in the offices at the far end of the main lab, 4 unaccounted for. The containment on an experiment in group dynamics on their 'subjects' broke down. All 8 of them are uncontained and he described them as 'very violent'."
"Oh wonderful!" Shelldrake responded to this news. "What the hell does 'subjects' mean?" he demanded of Shawn.
"He wouldn't tell me anything else - said I wasn't cleared for it," replied Shawn. "Shellie ... he instructed extreme containment though - shoot-on-sight ..." Shawn's voice trailed off.
"Oh my god ..." was all Shelldrake could say ... after a moment's pause he continued, "Open security door 1 on my mark and close on my second mark - understood?"
"Got it," Shawn replied

Shelldrake outlined the situation to his team, looking each in the eye in turn as he did, finishing with, "Extreme  Containment authorised - we all know what that means. 'Very Violent' is an unknown. You all know what to do though. Identify your targets - there are 4 unaccounted for friendlies in there. Keep calm; remember your training and we will all come through this.  Now, time to earn your pay."

Turning to face the door, he engaged his microphone and said curtly "Mark." The steel shutter rolled up and to his right, with a quiet swish, revealing the stairs. Quickly Shelldrake led his team through, and said, "Mark," again, even more curtly if possible. Again the swish noise and the shutter closed. "Good seal," Shelldrake told Shawn, "switching to team net, will log in every 5. Shelldrake out."
Taking a deep breath, Shift Supervisor Shelldrake turned and led his men down the stairs to the Lower Laboratory ...


The above is the backstory to an ATZ game I've set up to play today, which has come about for a couple of reasons. The first thing was a thread over on the board of living lead where I posted some photos of the resin dungeon stuff I've accumulated over the years - mainly from Ainsty Castings. The second was a comment I made on a post on Mathyoo's blog - campaign-set-up-theory-1 - where I recommended that he play a game rather than wait until he had everything ready ... hmmm ... pot, kettle? So I decided to actually play a game myself - especially when I checked back and found my last zombie game was over a year ago!

So, I've set this game up. The layout of the 'Lower Lab' is shown in the pic below. As you can see from it, my stuff is definitely dungeonesque so I've used crates and barrels to stand in for 'assorted science stuff'

 To give an idea of the size, the small square rooms at the bottom right are 6cm x 6cm. This layout uses damn near all my dungeon tiles and all the walls I've got. As you can see I don't have many walls as they just got in the way when I used the tiles for rpgs. As I'm going to be doing more solo-gaming now, I think I'll get some more.

And here is the response team led by Shift Super' Shelldrake. The minis are from eM4 Miniatures' Para-Military range and were fun to paint (if you've looked at that page, yes I do have some sentry guns, but unfortunately Shelldrake doesn't!)

Hopefully I'll post a batrep later today sometime ...

My Lead Men - Elfball Teams

I can't remember for the life of me how I stumbled across Elfball originally, but I must have somehow ... anyway, when I did and found that the rules were free to download (see link on name), I printed and read a copy.  They seemed pretty damn good to me, so I ordered a copy of the game - to get the board - and then bought a couple of 28mm teams at Salute 2011. Or maybe it was 2010 ...

So far, so good. But then, after painting one team, I just lost the enthusiasm for the other. The Black Scorpion team (BS from here) which I'd bought (in metal, they only seem to do it in resin now) was far too ... 'fancy' with too many decorative bits for my tastes, so this particular project joined the countless others in my roundtuit* pile.

But then earlier this month, having finished my Iron Stars ships - new-toys-from-salute-2012-pt-3 - I was wondering what to do next, and decided to look back at this post - what-to-do-in-2012

In the list were the Elfball teams. I hadn't completely forgotten that they existed at all ... honest guv'nor ... how could you think that?!?

So, in a burst of resolve that left me quite light-headed, I dug them out and have now finished them, even repainting those I'd already finished so that I could magic dip them.

Here are the finished miniatures. First up is the Shadowforge Miniatures Female Gridiron team. I've used Oriental Flesh paint as the skin colour and black hair, the idea being they are the 'Wu-Sheng' Dragons, an oriental ladies elfball team, who (at some point!) will have a half-dragon owner (from Hasslefree)

I am really pleased with how well they've come out (there are actually 11 figures in the team, but 1 was hiding when I took the pics). This next pic shows the 'extras' - i.e. non-players - figures I've got. They are (from left to right): a metal ball, a goblin referee, the Dragons' coach and 3 Dragons' cheerleaders. The bottom part shows the Fenris Games 5-man skirmish movement tray (now trimmed to 4) which I'm using to ease movement of the coach and cheerleaders.

Again, I'm very pleased with these. Next is the BS team. These have been extensively chopped about and are in - IIRC - their 4th or maybe 5th colour scheme. Anyway, to show what they were purchased like, here is a pic I've copied from the BS website

Comparing that to the finished team below, you can see that there was plenty of work for my metal snippers!

And, as before, I'm pleased with these as well. That said, I think the 'strong tone' dip I used was a bit too dark for the Moldy Ochre and Linen colours that I used on them

 * - i.e. I'll finish it when I get around to it : roundtuit

Dave Graffam Models 5 - Low Ruins

Another post on my Dave Graffam Models (DGM) builds. This time 2 builds I've put together from the 'Low Ruins' product. I did wonder whether to post on these builds or not, as Vampifan the Great (VtG) had already made a post on his build (here: daves-games-low-ruins-and-crosspiece ), but I decided to in the end, to show the great versatility of DGM, through their use of layers in pdf files.

Just a couple of points on my DGM builds:

1. All my DGM builds are printed from the file onto A4 paper by a colour laser printer, which is then cut down to the size of the prints
2. The prints are then glued - for the first couple of builds with PVA glue, but latterly using a glue stick - onto Rymans' stationers Oil and Acrylic Board (which is 2mm thick)
3. The board is then cut to the paper's dimensions with a craft knife.

Anyway, as with my previous DGM posts, Van Fampi - the interior design consultant of legend - has once more consented to be present to give a scale indication in the pics. This first pic shows the side elevation of the first build, which is a 6" x 6" model. The interior wall for this build is made from the Low Ruins file - VtG used components of the Crosspiece Ruins set for his - and was added for support and a bit more cover. Having seen VtG's build, I'm thinking of adding some more interior walls.

"What a surprise - no see-through windows or opening doors!"

This next pic shows the same build at another angle. You can more clearly see the rubble layer that can be shown on the floor (if desired), mainly in the corners. At some point I'm going to use some model railway ballast/gravel to build this up.

" ... hmmm, I'm liking therest of the interior, though."

For this next 'Low Ruin' I chose the 6" x 4" footprint and the brown brick exterior (the first had red brick). Again this build has the rubbled floor.  This pic clearly shows that I have used black marker pen to colour in the cut edge of the paper and board. It doesn't - IMHO - look particularly fantastic. My idea is that it represents soot - or something like that anyway - to give the suggestion of fire damage. I might try painting the edges a more appropriate colour at some point. (I think VtG painted his grey.)

"Once more - disappointing .... "

I've just checked and there are 9 different layers that can be used for the walls of this build (or 10 if you include 'no layer') and 8 different floor layers (again 1 extra if no layer is counted) making this an incredibly versatile model, that I'm very pleased I bought.  This last pic is another elevation of the 2nd build.

"Not bad, I s'pose - apart from the usual of course ..."

The only slightly negative point is that it can be a pain to make sure you are lining up the doors and windows correctly when you print! Against that, of course, is the incredible versatility of the model and the fact you can use the floor piece as flooring in different models - as I did with my DGM Village Chapel here: dave-graffam-models-2-village-chapel and DGM Pub here: dave-graffam-models-1-pub

Dave Graffam Models 4 - Split Ruin

Another of the extensive range of Dave Graffam Models in this post. This time it is the Split Ruin, again using Van Fampi as an indicator of size. Although it may seem quite basic, this build was the hardest I've done to date because of the differing shapes and many, many cuts needed.  At their most basic, the other builds could be described as boxes, with more or less square/rectangular sides, so cutting them with a steel rule and knife is - compared to this model anyway! - fairly easy.

When you look at the jagged edges of the 3 floors, 3 walls and roof of this build, I hope you can imagine just what a pain it was to do. Having said all that, it is a nice model and I'm glad that I have it! So here is the first pic, showing the 'inside' of the ruin:

"Well this looks promising ... fully detailed interior, trapdoors cut out - good start!"

As you can see there is a lot of 'internal' detail for this build, and with the layers used by DGM, an wide variety of possible combinations.

This next pic shows an end elevation of the build and that, as before, the doors aren't cut out ...

"What's this?! A non-opening door! after such a promising start ...."

This final pic shows the roof - or what's left of it! - of the build. For me this is the 'disappointing' part of the build ... the printed roof tiles just aren't convincing.  That is being quite picky though, and I am happy with it. Anyway, back in this post - shopping-wmms-part-2 - I showed a photo of roof tiles that I'd got from Warbases and I intend to use those to give a better look to the roof.

"P'fah! Solid windows AGAIN! I despair, I really do ..."