Birthday Beasties

Just the other day my little chap turned a big 6. He's always been a big fan of monsters and the like (a good 90 percent of the drawings he does contain beasts of some sort), so I made sure (among the usual new pants, shirts, pens, pencils and drawing blocks) there were a few dangerous critters.

He'd already begun to accrue a small collection, starting with a few Warehouse dinosaurs; then last Christmas I tracked down a few choicer items on Amazon ~ some mythical beasts by Papo and Safari Ltd. For this Birthday I again visited Amazon ... and found more beasties, as well as a wizard and a Spartan warrior to throw in the mix.

Areion, the immortal talking horse from Greek mythology

...a bit like a black Mr. Ed

Cerberus, the friendly 3-headed hound (ok ...not so friendly)

A Griffon ...you're not going to have a rodent problem with this guy on the case

I must admit, the gifting of these marvellous monsters was all part of a cunning plan. A plan to introduce him to and (hopefully) get him enthused  in the realm of tabletop (war)gaming. You can't start too young :)

Following Christmas I had pointed up two small warbands for the game "Song of Blades and Heroes" by Andrea Sfiligoi. Only 3 six-sided dice and 3 small sticks (for measuring) are required to play. I gave the lad a quick run-down of the way things worked, stacked some boxes between the bands as terrain ...and we were away. As I had hoped for, he found it rather intriguing ;)

I was delighted at how quickly he grasped it - his ease of remembering the skills his various band members had ...even reminding me. "Hey, doesn't Joan of Arc always get a six!" (being a Hero ...and a dinosaur mounted one at that).

"You can take this team" he said "I want Medusa!"

We have had many games since. With him always wanting to add new objectives and special terrain; just the other week he got me to construct a haunted house which he declared you had to make a quality roll to see if you were brave enough to approach ~ if you were, the ghost gave you a special gift, if you weren't, you were scared to death!

Suffice to say, this Birthday he was well pleased to acquire 4 fresh conscripts to add to his creature pool.

Medusa and Zip-Zanny the Wizard...

...followed up by Joan on a Diplodocus and her entourage

The Chimera catches Medusa's bale glance and is turned to stone

Flying beasties lurk above

More action than you can shake a 7" stick at!

Here he is, dressed to kill ...and also as something starting with the letter W for a school "letter of the alphabet" day. He was a Wyvern!

I whipped up the costume in an hour, with a stuffed green stocking tail and wings cut and stitched on, made from a sacrificial red t-shirt.

He was going to have his face painted too ...but decided against it as he finds the paint can get a little itchy - and it would have been on for the whole day.

And just a quick mention ...that I have managed to make a few further additions to my Robinson Crusoe: AotCI boardgame. Now adding a Volcano tile as well as a handful of ash pile tokens.

You could warm yourself by that on a cold winter night

...plus a few more life-spinners, requested on the 'Geek, for the fan-made characters available.

Circles of life :)

Fire in the Sky

The nearby volcano has been more active of late. Frequent tremors have convinced the band of treasure hunters it's time to strap together a raft and flee the impending doom. But rumours of riches beyond their wildest dreams tucked away in various locations on the island have them torn. Is there time to collect the treasures before the fire begins to rain down?!

I've sculpted a further 4 tokens, depicting the locations our brave adventurers can visit in the Robinson Crusoe: AotCI scenario "Volcano Island".
The Cave, Small Temple, Underground Temple and Ruined Village.

There's gold to be found in them thar hills!

More pics of my RC:AotCI pimping can be found here ;)

The Path of Least Resistance

After finishing sculpting a bunch more crate cubes and rock markers for Robinson Crusoe: AotCI, I looked at the clock ...it was 2am. I still though felt enthused to make something else. I find the ever handy short cut seems to make it's way onto the board in many of my games - time to give it's token a makeover.

It'll cut the trip in half

A handful more pics can be found on the pimped RC:AotCI page.

Now though ...time for a nap.

:)

Deadman's Island

The fog is rolling in and the dead are rising. A group of courageous god-fearing folk must brave the haunted island and exorcise the evil within.

Consecrate the earth and banish the spirits

I've now created cross and fog markers for use in the 'Cursed Island' scenario of the Robinson Crusoe: AotCI boardgame.

I haven't attempted it yet ...so far I have just been sticking to the Castaways scenario ~ a great challenge; but I'll see if I can summon the courage and attempt to turn these vile undead.

The encroaching fog bank will make things difficult

Hallowed ground

Feel free to check out the rest of my pimped RC:AotCI.

Next on the list I'm thinking may be some busts for the character pawns. Hmmm ;)

Circle of Life

I was finding the life tracks on the bottom of the player cards in Robinson Crusoe: AotCI a touch fiddly, so I decide I'd whip up some Life Spinners. Now I don't have to fret about knocking those little markers off the cards ...and can focus on gathering kippers for tea ;)

The life of a castaway

Yes, I am aware the morale arrows are in fact pointing the wrong way ... oops ;p

I'll be fixing that small error though, then submitting it to the RC:AotCI files area on the Board Game Geek shortly ~ so those who'd like to spin their castaway's lives away can print them out and do so.

Edit: These Spinners are now available for download on the 'Geek ;)

Bonus and fan-made character Spinners can be found here.

Polish language versions are available too,

as well as German language versions (kindly translated by 'Geek user plissk3n)

:)

Goblinson Crusoe

I'm happy to say it's been a productive few days here ...in creating and gaming.
With nary a minute to spare, the goblins have been completed. Well, they still need a lick of varnish ...but hey. With very little help from myself (I just did a few tidies and the basing) my young lassie has now wrapped up her first commission. I must say she looks rather relieved the task is complete; those goblins, though they look quick and easy can actually be fiddly little blighters.

Focussed on the task at hand.

The usual suspects.

Lets hope they last at least one round on the battlefield.

A little further progress has been made on pimping my copy of Robinson Crusoe: AotCI.

It came to me that a great token tray addition would be one of those 'multi dish snack platters' made from wood. I trotted down to the local Briscoes, as I had a feeling I had seen something similar there.

I was in luck; they had some sweet 3-dish trays, and whattaya know ...they were on sale. I grabbed 4 of them for a meagre $14 dollars total! They are all pretty much hand-made so each is a little different giving them a good desert island vibe. And I must say, those nice smooth curved dish sides make retrieving the tokens very pleasant ;)

Whittle me a dish Friday.

I've also had a request from another 'Crusoe player for some custom tokens. So I've been busy hunting, catching fish and baking some goodies. I still have to gather some bananas and coconuts ... a bit of fresh fruit in the diet's always a good thing.

I'm currently making 4 sets worth of the custom playing pieces (food/wood/hides/markers). One has dibs on it already, but the other three will be available for purchase once complete.

Prices have not been set as of yet and the items are currently under construction ... but if you are interested feel free to leave a comment or pm me.

Mmmmmmmm... tasty.

Speaking of RC:AotCI, my wife and I had a fabulous game last night (actually it's been on the table for a couple of evenings). It was more like "Robinson Crusoe: Adventures at the Luxury Resort".

We were playing the first mission, "Castaways", and just couldn't believe how well it went. We managed to get the short cut and hatchet very early on, wove a basket and discovered new flock. Even with a couple of dubious events that rolled in later in the game we still managed a win in round 10! Our blazing bonfire signalling the passing ship the second it came into view. It was unheard of.

It was a stark comparison to the game we had had previously; where we had been plagued by non stop torrential rain, bug bites and infected wounds, and the loss of nearly all our items ~ on top of that, we all died in the final round in separate incidents ...I (the Explorer) slipped down a bank and fell to my death while exploring, Friday (also exploring) had an unfortunate adventure, and being on one life at the time, also came to a sticky end, then finally my wife (the Cook) succumbed to the elements as a final vicious storm tore through the camp.

Ahh .. I just love the way you never know what this game's going to throw at you ;)

A tropical resort indeed!

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

Luckily we have a good mix of both here.

:)

The Storyteller and the Goblins

With the encroaching arrival of the Teller of Tales, my daughter is having to pull finger and get to it. Partially my fault ..ok, mostly my fault, for not trimming them up with the knife & needle file and undercoating them ...sooner.

Eek ...The goblins are coming!

Anyway, a troop of devious Goblin Archers is now under way.
To keep her composed and the task progressing I touched up the odd drawing-outside-the-lines.
I also couldn't resist the goblin's charms and found I had to paint one myself ;)
And in a handful of hours over a couple of days 4 of 10 are complete ...sans basing.

It's the pointy bits that hurt the most

Pincushin' 'em boys!

She's pretty happy with herself :) ...so more green-skins on the horizon.