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One of the disadvantages of playing a 1500pt game on a small table…
…is that it gets rather crowded.
Played Take and Hold and it was very close, but in the end my Orks just managed to win.
Highlights of the game: a Medusa taking out a unit of Burnaboyz in just one shot; the battery of Big Gunz actually hitting something (they have been practicing).
Why do the Klingons look so different now then they did in the 1960’s?
look they just did…. or is there now a reason…
People often point out that the Klingons from the original series look different to the ones seen in the movies, the Next Generation, Deep Space Nine and now Enterprise.
One explanation was ascribed to varying ‘races’ within the Klingon culture. The raised cranial ridges finally winning control of the empire and taking a prominent role in the public face of Klingon.
Originally there was no “explanation” in terms of Star Trek, it was just that budgets and technology of the 1960s couldn’t do anything more dramatic than a Mongol look. It was the first Star Trek movie which changed the way Klingons looked…
…but now there is!
In the latest episode of Enterprises the reasons why the Klingons of the Kirk era Star Trek look different to the Klingons of the movies, the new Star Trek is finally explained.
***SPOILER***
It would seem that the Klingon have been playing with Human DNA and as a result and accidently created a virus which “dissolves” the cranial ridges and makes the Klingons look like the ones see in classic episodes such as The Trouble with Tribbles. You can now understand why Worf indicated that Klingons don’t like to talk about it….
Secret Army, just as good as I remembered…
Back in 1977, the BBC broadcast a series, called Secret Army about a group of Belgians who helped downed aircrew escape from occupied Europe. At the time I thought it was excellent and extremely well made.
Today I often think I won’t watch that old programme as the memory of it will be ruined by seeing it again. Having said that I borrowed the first season of Secret Army from my father-in-law who had purchased it on DVD.
I did wonder if it would be as good as I remembered and thinking nearly thirty years has passed since this was first on, and time can play tricks on you. I knew that it would be a combination of film and video (as was virtually any drama made in the 1970s) and that maybe the plots and acting would be a disappointment.
Boy was I wrong.
It was excellent and though I having only watched the first two episodes it was certainly as good as I remember (if not a little better). It was very powerful stuff and well made.
I have now seen a few more episodes and it certainly is gripping stuff and well made television which has stood the test of time.
Certainly recommended.
I have just started to read the Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
Having seen the Tony Robinson debunk of some of the *facts* on Channel 4 recently and as my wife thought highly of it, I decided that I would give it a go and see what it’s like.
I have quite enjoyed it so far, but some way to go…
Robert Langdon, Harvard Professor of symbology, receives an urgent late-night call while in Paris: the curator of the Louvre has been murdered. Alongside the body is a series of baffling ciphers. Langdon and a gifted French cryptologist, Sophie Neveu, are stunned to find a trail that leads to the works of Da Vinci – and further. The curator, part of a secret society named the Priory of Sion, may have sacrificed his life to keep secret the location of a vastly important religious relic hidden for centuries. It appears that the clandestine Vatican-sanctioned Catholic sect Opus Dei has now made its move. Unless Landon and Neveu can decipher the labyrinthine code and quickly assemble the pieces of the puzzle, the Priory’s secret – and a stunning historical truth – will be lost forever.
Amazon.co.uk Review
With The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown masterfully concocts an intelligent and lucid thriller that marries the gusto of an international murder mystery with a collection of fascinating esoterica culled from 2,000 years of Western history. A murder in the silent after-hours halls of the Louvre museum reveals a sinister plot to uncover a secret that has been protected by a clandestine society since the days of Christ. The victim is a high-ranking agent of this ancient society who, in the moments before his death, manages to leave gruesome clues at the scene that only his granddaughter, noted cryptographer Sophie Neveu, and Robert Langdon, a famed symbologist, can untangle.
The duo become both suspects and detectives searching not only for Neveu’s grandfather’s murderer, but also the stunning secret of the ages he was charged to protect. Mere steps ahead of the authorities and the deadly competition, the mystery leads Neveu and Langdon on a breathless flight through France, England and history itself. Brown has created a page-turning thriller that also provides an amazing interpretation of Western history. Brown’s hero and heroine embark on a lofty and intriguing exploration of some of Western culture’s greatest mysteries–from the nature of the Mona Lisa’s smile to the secret of the Holy Grail. Though some will quibble with the veracity of Brown’s conjectures, therein lies the fun. The Da Vinci Code is an enthralling read that provides rich food for thought.
I have now finished Homeward Bound.
I really enjoyed it, a very good read. One reason I think I enjoyed it, was that Turtledove focussed on much fewer characters than he does in his other books. One characteristic of most Turtledove novels is the preponderance of characters, this was more like Guns of the South, in that there are few characters. My only thought was that in order to use characters from previous novels and the fact it is set in 2031 means that Harry has had to use a plot device of cold sleep to keep the characters young enough to be in the new book.
It certainly has its twists and turns and it is well worth reading, though to appreciate it you do need to have really read the rest of the series.
Review from Amazon:
Alternate-history maestro Turtledove’s conclusion to his Worldwar and Colonization sagas, about how lizard-like aliens known as the Race invaded Earth during WWII and were fought to a stalemate by the major Allied and Axis combatants, lacks the vividly described battle scenes of its predecessors, but more than compensates by closely examining the Race’s culture and society.
While the Race have colonized much of Earth, they’re amazed by the human ability to adapt to change. (The aliens’ probe some 600 years earlier led them to expect they’d be facing armored knights.) When an American starship makes the trip to Home, the Race’s planet of origin, the lizards fear the loss of their technological dominance and decide to annihilate Earth, their colony included—until another Earth spaceship arrives, this one with the faster-than-light drive the Race never developed.
The question of how much common ground exists between the lizards and humans wouldn’t have been out of place in old issues of Astounding. The author dramatizes the old “nature versus nurture” argument through the moving stories of a human woman raised from birth by the lizards and of two aliens raised as humans. Fans will be pleased that room remains for a sequel.
Order the book from Amazon.
Here is a flight of Deth Koptas from a recent game.
They performed well, though my opponent was somewhat confused over what they were. Were they vehicles or were they infantry.
Bikes can be confusing even more so when they are akin to Jetbikes like the Deth Koptas.
No real solution, but I may be tempted to use them as Wartrakks rather then Warbikes.
I have been adding to my Ork Boyz.
Using the same technique as outlined on my website.
It is relatively quick and quite a few boyz can be painted in a short time.
This is the progress I have made with my Ork Standard Bearer.
As with most of my Feral Orks he uses components from the WHFB Orc sprue.
As for the eventual banner design it has to be this…
As you can see from the photo:
I have painted various components of the Skorcha and some of the driver.
The main body will be a brown/orange colour with the metal parts in a dirty rusty metal colour.
I have also virtually finished the Grot who sits on the trailer.
