- This topic has 14 replies, 7 voices, and was last updated 7 months, 3 weeks ago by
.
-
I painted my first 28mm figures in almost two decades this week, in preparation for Relicblade. The game has been around for 9 or 10 years and steadily expanding. It is a very low figure count skirmish game played on a 2×2 table. In between games characters can gain skills and magic items (including the powerful Relics). It is fairly well balanced for a skirmish campaign game, and has great play aids integrated into the game. I’ve been playing in 15mm (easy to find proxies) for a couple years and enjoyed it enough to upgrade to the hardcopy rulebook and campaign book as well as some of the official miniature line. The whole game is a one man effort – sculpting, rules, writing, illustration, sales etc. He even does custom sketches for every order.
Its been fun and I’m hoping that the simple rules and comic book styling will hook my daughters in another year or two as they get old enough to play. With only 4 or 5 models per side needed, I am also hoping the if I demo it at the FLGS I might be able to convince some others to play. Here is my first couple of 28’s for the Advocate faction of the game:
A Rogue:
And a Questing Knight:
I’m not a great painter – but it was very fun to paint these larger figures at years of only 6, 10 and 15mm.
Thanks all – If they look good, it’s because the figures are really nicely detailed.
Wouter – Relicblade is one of my two favorite skirmish games – the other is Twilight which I started playing in 15mm after seeing your photos here on TWW -thanks for the inspiration on that one. I’d love to see some of the 15s that you are using for Relicblade.
Andrew – while all of the game rules/minis/cards etc are all tied together with a really tight artistic theme, the game isn’t really tied to the miniatures – it clearly states in the beginning of the rule book that the characters are archetypes or classes not specific individuals. There are monster creation rules that let you use anything from your collection, too.
That being said, I have found a lot of great 15mm figures that I feel line up well with the character illustrations in the game. Almost all of my 15mm Relicblade figures are from Splintered Light Miniatures. I’ve built all of the Battle Pigs from SLMs pig-faced orcs, all of the Iguana Men from SLM’s Dragonmen, all of the Temple of Justice Figures and the Lone-guard from various packs. You only need five or six figures per side max so in 15 I started with two complete forces for about $25. Some of the later factions (Bone Constructs, Shrimpmen) might be a little harder to find figures that match the art – but the force building rules are very open so it isn’t a big deal if you can’t find something you feel represents one.
Here are my 15mm Lone Guard – standing in for the Swordsmen, Ranger, Captain, a Relic Marker:
And a Sabertooth, an Infiltrator, and a Rogue. You’d probably only use five of the six figures in a standard size game.
I finished four characters for the Adversary faction this week, 3 Iguans (lizardmen) and their pet Basilisk:
Any good name suggestions for him? At the moment, I’m leaning towards Nibbles.
With 8 painted minis, that makes two complete warbands for the game ready to play. I’m thinking that I’ll eventually add a few more minis for each side to have some additional options, but that is down the line a ways. First, I’m working on some scratch-built terrain, and then the plan is to focus on some objective markers. One of the really cool details that I like in the rulebooks are the author’s (Sean Sutter) sketches of terrain boards for the game. There are 8 different environments at the moment for matches to take place in, and his little boards are great inspiration.
I have a few more pictures of the other painted figures on my old blog if anyone is interested in following the progress on this project in more detail.
https://beneaththecurve.blogspot.com/2024/02/relicblade-adversaries.html
Mike – I like Fluffy!
Andrew – that is an excellent idea. I think I’ll do that.
Thomaston – It is a small figure count (3-8 figures per side) and small table (24 inches x 24 inches). It plays very quick (less than an hour per game), and use cards to aid play. There are three overall choices for your army – Adovcates (Good guys), Neutral, and Adversary (Bad Guys). You can mix and match any characters from within one of those categories as well as use any Neutral character when building a party. The cards for the game are either Character Cards, Upgrades (potions, small magic items, extra skills, gear etc) and powerful Relics. These cards come with the models or can be purchased separately (including as pdfs). To build a party you simple pick from your character cards and maybe add a few upgrades. The cards do a great job of explaining all of the special rules that will be used in each game.
Players take turns alternate activating one character at a time. Each character has a pool of Action Dice that they can use to Move, Dodge (improve defense for the turn), and Focus (improve the chance of success for a different ability for the turn). Actions have target numbers, and you roll to try and perform them. Some, like Move, have a target of zero, you can always move over flat ground. Others like Climb require rolling above the target number. Each character also has three special abilities – for example the Questing Knight has a basic attack (Longsword), and powerful attack (Vicious Strike that takes two actions) and an utility action (Command) – he can give an action to an ally.
The characters tend to follow this pattern with one or two the abilities being common to other similar characters (i.e most knights have similar attacks) and one or two being unique. Fighter types tend to have two different attacks, higher armor, few actions. Rogues tend to have more utility abilities and more actions. Spellcasters usually have two different spells or magical abilities.
Different types of characters a grouped by keyword – for example the Iron Tyrant and the Questing Knight are both “knights” and have nearly the same profile with the exception of one of their abilities. There are knights, rangers, rogues, scouts, clerics, wizards, druids, witches, monsters etc. Some upgrades can only be used by certain keywords – for example extra spells.
Attacks are based on a target number, and damage is an opposed role. Figures have hit points tracked on the cards, and if badly injured they lose actions.
Most scenarios include placing objectives: interactive terrain, perils like wandering monsters, treasure (in the form of items etc from Upgrade cards) or Relics.
Relics are powerful and weird magic items. Many scenarios revolve around searching for one of these – they are immediately usable in games if found. In campaign play, each side is allowed to bring a single Relic that they have found in previous games if they want. Relics can be lost and claimed by opponents on the battlefield. I think that in the cards I have, there are about a dozen Relics that I could use, ranging from “The Sword of Ruin” to “The Sludge Encrusted Eyeball”.
The basic rulebook (Seeker’s Handbook) has 9 scenarios, four environments with unique encounters/terrain/relics that can be used if desired and a Mordhiem/Frostgrave style campaign system.
Anyways – there is a free demo if you are interested, including print and play paper models, on the main Relicblade website.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
