NuCoal ready for action! UNSPACY on the way?

Well, the Christmas sales are long over and I've spent the month working on getting my NuCoal tank regiment painted up.  I've finished the two hovertank squads as well as the two sections of GREL hoverbikers in the paint scheme I borrowed from my first 40k army.  I was going for some sharp differences in the colors and I accomplished that but I'd be lying if I said I was completely happy with the results.  On top of that, the overcoat seems to have gone on unevenly on the tanks (less so on the bikes) likely due to the unseasonably cold weather delaying the drying (and allowing more of it to drip).  I didn't use any thicker coats or longer sprays than previously so I suspect the ambient temperature where I spray (60F roughly) had something to do with it.  In the end, it's not exactly what I hoped but it also isn't bad enough that I'd consider stripping it and starting over like I had to do with my southern army after a primer cake-on mishap.

The finished force

Primed

Some initial paint coats

The black on the primed picture definitely came out very washed out in the picture but not on the model; the primer coat you see in that picture is the same black in the initial paint coat picture (although I did cover up mistakes with a second brush coat of black on the finished models).

For NuCoal, I've still got a GP/Strike squad of Chasseur MKIIs to work on.  I'm debating whether I should start prepping some northern models in anticipation of the pdf release later this month or finish of the NuCoal.  I'll likely go with the later just to get the force completed (like my southerners) and leave myself with only one paint scheme and army to worry about.  

While the paint was drying on the NuCoal models, I also put together my broken 1/200 Battletech/Macross models you see in the background of the finished pic.  The Robotech minis kickstarter delivery date has unfortunately started backsliding (a month passes and the delivery date is pushed back MORE than a month) so I'll have to get my Robotech fix via other methods.  I dug up my Battletech Unseen minis and put together a preliminary force idea of how to use them in Heavy Gear.  Basically, I plan to use the Veritechs as Fusilier hovertanks with a ground mode added to them and the destroids as striders (Mammoths seem to be the best fit statwise with all the recent buffs to strider defense stats and the unloved expansion of gearstriders).  The hovertank mode gives the transforming fighters the mobility they should have along with relatively appropriate weapons (lasers, missiles, autocannon) and they just need a walker mode to finish off the "counts as".   I initially thought the gearstriders would be a good match for the destroids but the idea of the veritechs having the same maneuverability seemed odd so I'll be looking instead at the Mammoth variants... more armor but easier to hit feels right for that counts as.  

NuEdition, NuCoal, and NuSales?

Yeah, I know.. the last part of the title is a stretch but I had to try!

Hey guys and gals... not too much has happened here on the blog rules front over the past couple of weeks.  After letting the combat groups 2.0 rules percolate for a while, I've decided to add them into the rules and replaced the combat groups section under of the table of contents with the newer simpler rules.

For those who don't follow the DP9 website and forums, a new edition of Heavy Gear was announced a week ago.  The open playtesting will begin next month when the rules are posted but so far the only public info we have is that they're "significantly different" according to the Dave over at DP9 when asked if current books will be compatible.

On a more personal note, I've finally started assembling my NuCoal minis after I got a two more during the recent Miniature Market Black Friday sale.  I've also finally assembled (or more accurately based) my hoverbike GRELs as well.  To round out the zoom-zoom-zoom NuCoal force, I've got a GP squad of Chassuer MKIIs as well that I've had for a while still to be assembled.  That gives me about 1300-1500TV of NuCoal depending on how much I spam the upgrades (BOTB, extra sturdies, etc).

Paradoxically, the hoverbikes are bigger than I thought and the Fusiliers (for a size 10 vehicle) are smaller than I expected when put next to gears.  I have to say though that I like the sculpting on both tanks and especially the new Hetairois.  The casting was also top notch with only some tiny tiny bubbles on the tops of the Fusilier engine plates occasionally and a few other areas that were covered with other bits when assembled.  Apparently at some point they switched from all resin to resin/metal hybrids with the Fusiliers as I got one hybrid and 3 pure resin.  The Heterois though are a newer kit and to my knowledge have always been resin/metal hybrids.

Now onto the NuSales part of the title...  Is it just me or does it seem like stores are dropping alot of HG on clearance?  Miniature Market would be a good example as they basically put all their HG stuff on clearance and haven't restocked the stuff that sold out during the Black Friday sale.  HG bags at Battlefoam were 50% off as well.  Finally, a friend also mentioned that another online store (have to confirm with him which one before adding it to this post) was doing the same.  While the huge sales are great for fans in the short term, I have to wonder if they'll be bad in the long term if the stores are just divesting themselves of their HG stock.  If you know of any other stores that are doing the same or other big name online retailers that are instead adding HG to their lineup, feel free to let me know in the comments.

Combat Group Construction v2.0

 I've gotten some feedback in the past that conversion to the FLASH! smaller style combat groups was a bit difficult to figure out.  Over the weekend, I played a game of blitz and was chatting afterwards with my opponent and had some ideas about how to make the construction simpler as well as reducing the overabundance of "veteran" units in blitz (every one of both our models were vets with Att/Def3 making the upgrade somewhat useless as it was the new standard).  

For army construction, I've decided to try out the following.

For vehicle and gear combat groups in Blitz, construct your Blitz combat group as normal initially and then use the following conversion to fireteams.
1-2 model CG in Blitz: 1 model (CGL) combat group in FLASH!

3-4 model CG in Blitz: 2 model combat group (CGL plus one of your choice)  in FLASH!

5-6 model CG in Blitz: 3 model combat group (CGL plus two of your choice) in FLASH!

7+ model CG in Blitz: 4 model combat group (CGL plus three of your choice) in FLASH!

 You may choose any models you have in your full blitz squad keeping in mind that models using veteran upgrades must spend a veteran slot to do so per the rules below. Combat groups containing combined models (like infantry) are unchanged from Blitz. Before taking another Fire Team of the same type, you must take a second combat sub-group with your remaining models (if any) from the first Blitz combat group.  For example, selecting a Blitz two tank squadron gives you a single model in FLASH! (the CGL).  If in Blitz you upgraded the tank squadron to 3 models by adding an extra tank, the FLASH! version would be 2 models instead (CGL and one of your choice).  If you wanted to add a second tank squadron of the same type, you'd have to first take a second combat group consisting of the remaining tank you didn't take above in both examples.

My original intent was to make the fire teams half size mirrors of the full blitz versions but that seems to have lead to some confusion unfortunately.  I've rarely seen bog standard models in games unless those bog standard models were quite special to begin with (like my opponent's Fer de Lances this past game) so why fight the inevitable.  The above instead lets you just cherry pick whatever you want from blitz instead of being a half size version with the caveat that you must "complete" the original blitz squad

As for veteran slots, I've decided to try changing the veteran slot effect to applying only to a single model instead of the whole squad.  With the ability to cherry pick the models, this seems like killing two birds with one stone.  It limits the overpowered possiblities inherent to cherry picking upgraded models somewhat and also grounds the game a bit more at att/def2 without everyone fielding extra sturdy boxes.

Veteran Slots: You get a number of veteran slots equal to your army PL in Flash!. Each slot may be used to upgrade a single model to veteran status and unlock veteran options for it. (i.e. a single gear or a single squad of infantry is upgraded for each vet slot spent).   You may buy extra veteran slots at the cost of 2 SP per veteran slot.  

You can still take a fair number of veteran upgrades (PL4 gives you 7 in a 1000TV game which is the upper limit roughly for my skirmish houserules) but you're giving up all your SP to get to that point.  Honestly, I think att/def3 and extra sturdy boxes should be more expensive but changing TV is going beyond what I'd like to do with my blog and would prefer to leave that to DP9 themselves.

As usual, let me know if you try any of the above or whether you think it's an improvement.  I'm leaving the original army construction rules in the table of contents to the right for the time being to aid in comparison but hope to eventually change the chapter once I get some feedback.