Gruntz

Please go to this thread in the Barracks beta forum and log in with your beta access password, there you will find links to the 0.21 beta release of Barracks.

Please go to this thread in the Barracks beta forum and log in with your beta access password, there you will find links to the 0.19 alpha release of Barracks.

Please go to this thread in the Barracks beta forum and log in with your beta access password, there you will find links to the 0.16 alpha release of Barracks.

The Barracks Indiegogo crowdfunder is now over, having raised $3,981 compared to the original $2,222 goal. :-)

However most of this was raised through book pledges rather than software pledges so the actual amount raised after costs is only 40% or so more than we were originally aiming for. :-(

So what's next?

Phase One - Writing

Over the next couple of weeks I will be taking the prototype/alpha version of the software and:

Last Summer at Salute I came across the Gruntz rules for 15mm SF wargaming. I was immediately taken by the unit creation system that Robin had designed. As generic rules for the genre there are no army lists but instead you make up unit cards for your existing figure collection/whatever you buy and convert to fit 15mm scale.

At the end of my Salute 2012 purchases blog post, you may have seen that I started assembling a 'spare' Infinity Remote (A Yu Jing Yaokong) so that it can be used for both Infinity and as a 15mm walker/large Tachikoma.

As there is little scale-specific detail on the model itself, the main way of giving it scale seemd to be the base - by using a 1.5mm ply disc instead of the usual 3-4mm high plastic base it sits lower to the ground and looks more convincing next to a 15mm figure, plus I came up with the neat idea of adding a magnetised 15mm trooper taking cover behind one of the front leg plates.

The base will be getting a sandy texture so a couple of small indentations for the trooper's legs shouldn't be too intrusive when used for 28mm gaming. Painting-wise the model will probably get a sandy and green camo pattern as this will fit both my existing 15mm forces for Gruntz (and the club's desert terrain) and my 28mm Haqqislam force for Infinity. Technically Haqqislam have their own chicken-style robots but I prefer the looks of the Yaokong.

This year I spent a smallish amount of money on models at Salute, pretty well all 15mm SF stuff to add to my small 15mm collection for Gruntz.

Here's the overview, with one of my Alternative Armies Firefight Marines:

First up, one of Antenociti's new Kabardin APCs, although I'm not sure if the autocannon on the turret would take it into IFV territory or not.

After a bit of a gaming break I've been having another look at Robin Fitton's Gruntz system and unit creation rules and letting my imagination run riot with shoehorning other scale minis in to make up for a lack of 15mm models on my part.

I didn't manage to get a test game of Gruntz on Tuesday at the local club due to a mix of falling attendance as the summer break approaches and people already being spread out between a lot of systems. However I did manage to take a few photos of the forces so far on our desert plateau Infinity table.

The 30mm polystyrene plateaus work well for both 28mm and 15mm figures, for 15mm they are even tall enough to hide vehicles in the ravines.

28mm has long been the most popular scale for science fiction wargaming although over the decades it's seen spurts in growth from 25mm to 28mm to 32mm! 28mm gives you a decent size model with room for detail and big enough to paint but in contrast the individual models can be expensive and a 4x4' or 6x4' board only represents a tiny area of ground given the weapon ranges involved in most SF universes.