Gibbering Madness

Monday, 15 June 2020

Rangers of Shadow Deep - Temple of Madness - Part IV

TEMPLE OF MADNESS is a four part mission for level 5 - 15 Rangers for the RANGERS OF SHADOW DEEP co-operative tabletop skirmish game. This is the fourth part of that mission - "The Mirror Enduring"...

Our current lineup of Heroes:

Alfie's Team:

Arthur - Ranger (level 11)

Malvolio - Conjuror

Fern - Guardswoman

Odis - Rogue (New recruit for this mission)

My Team:

Jennifer - Ranger (level 11)

Archibald - Archer

Seb - (a character from the Bloodmoon mission who is now a companion)

After making it through the Pit of Ghouls in the third part of the mission... our heroes recuperated a bit and descended a long winding tunnel...eventually they entered a chamber... at the far end was a huge mirror.. in front of the mirror were an old man, and a huge horned man-beast!
As the Rangers and their companions came through the doorway, the old sorcerer raised his hands - and instantly two things happened... a huge net of chains rose up from the floor in front of the raised dias that the evil magic user was standing on, and a wall of fire appeared in front of our guys...

Trekatis the evil sorcerer stands in front of his magic mirror, guarded by Greviks his faithful man-beast

To make it through the wall of fire, our team all had to make a Will test, or end up taking burn damage and being stuck behind the wall. Everyone made it through apart from Jennifer and Seb..

Three Temple guardians who were hanging about in the middle of the room started shooting at our teams. Trekatis raised his hands... Odis was suddenly being mind-controlled by the evil wizard... He was already in base contact with Archibald, so he started to attack his friend!

Odis - his mind controlled by Trekatis, turns on his fellow heroes!

Whilst Odis continues to try and fight Archibald, the other heroes move towards the curtain of chains...

There was a possibility that Odis would be able to fight off the mind control, so we didn't want to knock him out unnecessarily. We left Archibald on his own, in the hope that they wouldn't do too much damage to each other... Two of the Temple guardians were taken out easily... Trekatis raised his hands again... he tried to blast Malvolio with some kind of magical blast... luckily he missed!

Trekatis casts spells as the heroes approach...

Our two rangers shot at the fixings holding up the net of chains... Arthur had an incredibly lucky shot, and Jennifer used her one-off "Steady Aim" ability... the metal Net crashed to the floor!!

Trekatis summoned two skeletons.. they appeared in the center of the room not far from where Archibald was struggling with Odis (who was showing no sign of shaking off the mind control!).. Jennifer and Seb turned and moved to intercept them...

Alfie's three other heroes - Arthur, Fern and Malvolio got into a position where they could all rush at Greviks together... Malvolio blasted Greviks with a magic bolt... rolling high, he reduced the creature to half its health!

Two skeletons appear!

Odis has knocked out Archibald!.. he moves to help the skeletons attacking Jennifer and Seb...

Whilst Jennifer and Seb took on the skeletons, Odis took out Archibald!! - The skeletons were bashed to bits by Sebs warhammer... Seb had had enough of Odis - it was clear that he was too weak minded to fight off the power of the evil sorcerer. Seb knocked him out.

Meanwhile Alfie's team did a group movement and took on Greviks together... it wasn't long before he fell at their hands.. Trekatis was looking worried... he tried to cast another spell... failing this time..

Alfie's team take on the man-beast mob-handed...

A Bloodbat swoops down into the center of the room...

Malvolio strikes the final blow... Trekatis is defeated!

Jennifer and Seb took out the last temple guardian and started to move up to help with Trekatis...

Trekatis was fighting off Alfie's guys. He kept pushing them back... He pushed Fern back so hard she scooted back across the floor 6 inches!.. He summoned a Blood-Bat, which flew down in the center of the room... but it was too late... Malvolio ran at him - and with a mighty blow knocked the Evil magic-user to the ground...

The blood-bat flew off... and our heroes were victorious. Odis and Archibald were both ok.The heroes searched the room on their way out, finding a magic Spellbook. Arthur smashed the mirror so that it could no longer be used by the ShadowDeep... now all they had to do was get back home.....

...

I created all the floorplans for this mission using the fantastic free resources available from

2 minute tabletop.

Saturday, 13 June 2020

Crane Model - Sarissa Precision

This is the Small Treadwheel Crane - a really nice, good value mdf model kit from Sarissa Precision in the UK. It was easy to build... and it works!!

I made the platform part myself from some thin scrap wood from a vegetable crate from work. It's initial use will be for an up-coming Rangers of Shadowdeep scenario, where a lift platform that descends into a large pit is required... but it's a great scenery piece.. so I'm sure it will find a lot of use in up-coming Frostgrave and other skirmish games...

Monday, 1 June 2020

Drawing wIth Karl Kopinski

My son and I found a great arty activity to do together whilst his school is closed due to the pandemic. Karl Kopinsky (excellent illustrator / artist) has been doing some fun drawing sessions aimed at kids on his his youtube channel (click HERE for link)...

Here are some of our attempts:

Sunday, 31 May 2020

Rangers of Shadow Deep - Temple of Madness - Part III

TEMPLE OF MADNESS is a four part mission for level 5 - 15 Rangers for the RANGERS OF SHADOW DEEP co-operative tabletop skirmish game.

Our heroes managed to open the incantation lock in the last scenario, but it was tough going - four of our team were only on 8 health. The minions of the evil ShadowDeep Mage were now aware of the presence of our characters in their underground lair...

After running down a long sloping tunnel, our roughed up heroes entered a room finding themselves on a ledge overlooking a large pit. On the opposite side of the room was another ledge, with a large metal door in the center. A huge chandelier was hanging over the pit... four ropes came off it and were tied up on the ledge with the heroes. There were four large wheels on the opposite ledge... a ladder led down into the pit, and there was another ladder going up on he other side of the room. In the middle of the pit were three statues. In the corners of the pit were four trapdoors.

As our team took in their surroundings, the four wheels on the opposite wall started to turn... the four trapdoors creaked open, and simultaneously they heard a grinding of gears and a loud metallic clang from the door across the room. Four ghouls climbed up out of the trapdoors... and more ghouls crept out of the shadowy far corners of the ledges....

Our current lineup of Heroes:

Alfie's Team:

Arthur - Ranger (level 10)

Malvolio - Conjuror

Fern - Guardswoman

Odis - Rogue (New recruit for this mission)

My Team:

Jennifer - Ranger (level 10)

Archibald - Archer

Seb - (a character from the Bloodmoon mission who is now a companion)

The setup at the start of the game...
The deer's heads represent where the ropes from the chandelier are tied up.

Standing on the ledge...

It was risky, but possible, to use the ropes to swing from one ledge to the other... but the result of failure could be disastrous for some of our guys who were already on low health. We decided that Jennifer and Archibald would attempt it as their health was ok. The rest of the guys would try and run across the pit as a group and take on any ghouls as they went...

Jennifer and Archibald took pot shots at ghouls in the first round, taking out one and wounding another...

At the end of every round we had to roll on a special random table. Another ghoul, ghoul rotter or ghoul fiend would appear out of one of the trapdoors.

Jennifer and Archibald shoot at ghouls from the ledge, whilst everyone else tries to get across the pit...

Another ghoul comes out of a trapdoor...

It wasn't long before a big fight kicked off between the adventurers and a gang of ghouls in the middle of the pit... most of the ghouls were knocked out - but unfortunately so was Odis!

It's all kicking off in the center of the pit!

Odis is knocked out...

Jennifer and Archibald were still on the ledge - they took out both ghouls there, and then luckily they both succeeded in their rope swing attempts! - They swooped diagonally across the room to the other ledge... the ghouls that had been up there had climbed down into the pit by this time - so they were unhindered in trying to turn the wheels that they had landed next to. Archibald was having trouble getting his to move - but Jennifer had no problem with hers... there was a click from the door, and then one of the trapdoors on the pit floor slammed shut... now there were only three left for baddies to emerge from... just then one of the statues in the center of the room seemed to animate and sing a mysterious song... what could it mean? Arthur who was nearest the statue felt suddenly empowered (he would have a bonus in combat for the rest of the game!)...

Jennifer and Archibald have swung across the room... another ghoul enters the pit.

The guys on the floor made it up the ladder to the ledge on the other side... all the guys apart from Seb that is, who was grabbed by two ghouls at the bottom of the ladder.. he tried his best, and managed to deal damage to one of them - but was knocked out by the other...

Jennifer takes on the ghoul that knocked out Seb...

As Arthur and Fern went to turn some wheels, Malvolio went to help Archibald who was still struggling with his.. Jennifer shot one ghoul through the head - and ran at the other ghoul at the top of the ladder...

The final wheel is turned, unlocking the door...

At last all the wheels were turned - Malvolio helped Jennifer finish off the final fiendish ghoul... the door swung open.. and our heroes exited the room...

...we're out!!

Odis and Seb were knocked out - but both were ok... between us we killed 10 ghouls and a ghoul fiend... we got XP for hearing the mysterious song, for turning the wheels, and for getting people out of the door... We had some good dice rolls in this scenario - things could have gone a lot worse - we could easily have been overwhelmed by ghouls on the floor of the pit.

We really liked the rope swinging mechanic - very fun!

Next time - the final confrontation with the evil mage in "The Mirror Enduring"...

...

I created all the floorplans for this mission using the fantastic free resources available from

2 minute tabletop.

Skeleton Ogres

Here are a couple of "skeleton ogres" that I got for some up-coming Rangers of ShadowDeep scenarios... They are chunky oldschool metal miniatures from Ral Partha (see links below)...

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http://www.ralparthaeurope.co.uk/shop/dsa-the-dark-eye-28mm-fantasy-c-30/armalion-c-30_36/19305-undead-ogre-with-club-p-1190.html

http://www.ralparthaeurope.co.uk/shop/dsa-the-dark-eye-28mm-fantasy-c-30/armalion-c-30_36/19304-undead-ogre-with-axe-p-1189.html

Dropzone Commander - UCM forces

I bought the two player starter set of DROPZONE COMMANDER a couple of years ago - it contained small starter forces for two factions - the UCM (Humans) and the SCOURGE (bio-mechanical aliens)...It is a 10mm scale sci-fi tabletop battle game set in the far future. I have been steadily collecting and building on my original starter set over time.

Recently the game IP was sold by HAWK wargames to TTCombat - the game has been re-booted with more streamlined rules - downloadable for free from their website. They are in the process of recasting the models, and making available the ones that have gone out of print (still not all available yet at the time of writing)...

I have finally finished painting my UCM faction.

I went for a grey camo pattern for the ground forces (Army painter Wolf Grey / Ash Grey) - and a plain (Wolf Grey) scheme for the Dropships/Air support.. I'm pleased with the final result - but these were really a bit of a slog to get through towards the end with all that camouflage!

I'm waiting for the final few Scourge models to come back into print before I start painting them... I want to paint them all at the same time for continuity with the colour scheme.