Gruntz v1.1 Book Review

I recently got my hands on the printed version of the Gruntz v1.1 rulebook, and would like to put down my thoughts on the product itself. I have reviewed the rules elsewhere - and I have had a dearth of gaming lately, so I haven't been able to even play the game a second time. So for what it's worth, this is my impressions of the physical product.

I already owned the latest version of Gruntz in PDF form, and have it printed out and scribbled all over in red pen like I do to all my self-printed rulesets (I can't help it - I edit things in my sleep, apparently). Still, having an actual bound book is nice because I'm old school, and I find that having something I can flip through is just handy. Besides, even though I am more apt to use PDFs during gaming sessions these days, we had a small hiccup on Saturday night with a PDF not loading correctly during play...and short of a malicious dog or REALLY invasive spill of Mountain Dew, a book doesn't tend to let you down when you need it most.

I also pretended that I hadn't played the rules while flipping through it, to see if that affected my view of it's presentation.

In case you've lived under a rock for the past few years, Gruntz is a 15mm Sci-Fi wargame written by Robin Fitton of the UK. It is described as "Fast play combined arms". Just wanted to make sure you were in the right place...

Their website is http://www.gruntz.biz/.

Initial verdict upon examining the book: The book is nice. It has a good sturdy, glossy cover. The paper inside looks like it came off my printer at work - it is in color but is regular weight. The black spine is uninspiring, and the name on the spine is in tiny print on the bottom of the spine, and is upside down [from my American point of view, I'd expect to walk up to a shelf and put my right ear onto my right shoulder to read spines of books on a shelf]. Not such a big deal, but I do collect rulebooks, and this one will clearly get lost amongst some of the others but for one fact - it is printed in the oversized British standard of A4. I'll nestle it alongside my Firestorm Armada and Dropship Commander rulebooks and it will feel at home.

The Contents looks quite thorough, but one thing stood out to me: it's lack of organization. It is just a three-column exercise in words and page numbers. This is a real shame, because clearly the book is broken into sections: Introduction, Rules, Unit Construction, Scenarios, and Fluff. There is nothing to draw your eye to any one of these categories in the Table of Contents, but this is a minor quibble.

The book immediately tells you what it is for (which, believe it or not, if often skipped in rulebook introductions) and gives you some basics of what you can expect from the game. It then leads you into how a game is played, starting right away with Game Setup, Initiative, and Deployment. I love when a book doesn't waste time and starts you off in the nitty gritty. After all, if you're learning a game and use the book as a reference, like I often do, being able to open to the first few pages and have pertinent info right there is a nice touch.

Robin uses a really nice mix of flow charts, diagrams, and pictures to bright up the book. A friend, who had never seen the book, remarked about the nice layout design as he flipped through it. I agree. There was clearly some time and effort put into the book, and the grammatical and spelling errors I found are to be expected (God knows, I've written enough and proofread my own writing enough that after a very short while, a grammatical error could be brazenly flipping you off from the middle of the page and I could gloss over it).

Despite my initial comment about the Table of Contents, it is actually quite easy to find stuff in book. Massive headers line each page, clearly labeled with what is on the page, and they follow a logical order. I think I would have liked a color change for each major section, maybe, but this is again a minor thing.

One thing that I constantly have to get past when reading the book is the language. I don't mean that silly British habit of putting u's where they don't belong (colour, anyone?), but the very cheeky nature of the terms used in the game. Let me preface: the ruleset is clearly based on a similar game, Warmachine by Privateer Press. This is fine, as the formula clearly works, but it appears that in order to put some separation between other rulesets and Gruntz, the author came up with alternate names for stats.

The Gunnery or Ranged Attack stat is called Shoot. Melee is Assault. The Avoidance stat is "Guard" while the Armor stat is called "Soak". Leadership or Morale is "Mental", and everything else is just called "Skill". A unit that whose morale is broken is under "Condition Brown". Being killed is called "Waxed", or "Smoked" if the unit is a vehicle. Special abilities are called "Perkz", and add-on equipment for vehicles are "Modz". I actually like adding Z's at the end, because it reminds me very much of the Games Workshop Orks-style of language, but the rest of it kind of makes me feel like I should be giggling in the boys bathroom with other 12 year olds over some Mad Magazine comic strip. I can get past it. Others of my friends have clearly stated that they won't. I don't think it should be a deal breaker, as it is just the flavor the ruleset is written in - I applaud the author for being bold and writing how he likes. If I had my own ruleset, I'd likely do the same.

Background: There is a trend (again) recently to bring rulesets back to the generic, so that they work with anything and anyone. I completely applaud this direction because I stopped buying game-specific rules and models years ago. Now I buy what catches my eye, and I'd love to put them all on the table at once...and these types of rulesets allow that. With that in mind, Fluff (e.g. background story, the setting's history, etc) is a controversial item. Some, like myself, could care less about the fluff because we're going to making our own as we go, or even just ignore it in our rush to get models killed on the battlefield. Others feel that without fluff, there is no immersion, and without immersion, one might as well be throwing dice on an empty tabletop. Gruntz acknowledged both of these schools of thought and did something brilliant - he put it in the back. The last 32 pages of the book are Background, so they're out of the way if you don't need or care about it, but, well, if you do, it's there. Kudos. No, I haven't read the fluff, and no, I don't intend to.

However, I feel that in this case, the fluff gets in the way of what could be a truly excellent product, but for 3 things missing: a QRS (Quick Reference Sheet), an Index, and 2 or 3 premade factions with example units.

The love of a Build-your-Own system is that you can buy, model, and convert to your heart's content, and you can likely find rules for putting it on the tabletop. The downside to said system is that often, you have to do the Gruntzwork yourself (I'm feeling quite clever there - leave me alone in my smugness!). In order to get about to throwing dice in anger, you need units, and this book has none. Well, ok, there are a few tiny examples in the Unit Buider section, but that's not what I'm talking about. I'd like two faction's worth of infantry, a few support units, a few vehicles, and let me try it out.

I own the unit builder for Gruntz, but I've never used it because I don't have a printer at home. I know there are plenty of examples on the really cool website http://www.gruntz.biz/, but is immaterial to me. Sometimes I like unplugging, sitting down with an army book, and doodling over a paper with a calculator. I like sitting with friends pre-game, especially if I am introducing a game to them, and picking out forces together. Am I alone in this? 4 pages of pre-mades to get me started, to whet my appetite to build my own, is all I'd want. I think this is one large error from a rulebook point of view.

[The opposite of this is PMC2640, which doesn't allow you to custom design anything, but has so many prebuilt options that you'd have to be incredibly anal or nitpicky to not be able to field the force you want].

Personal Issues: I have a few other minor points to point out. Doing so might be slightly unfair, because I said I wasn't going to go into the rules. I cannot help myself, however, as I have played it once, and these things are niggling at the back of my head, and might be semi-influential in why the game hasnt hit the table a second time for me.

The first is the method of combat resolution. Roll some dice, add a stat, compare to a target stat = nothing new here, especially considering it is WarmaHordes rewrtten. My issue is that you roll 2d6 per model firing. If you have a standard infantry unit of 8 men (2 with Squad Weapons), you're rolling 16d6. Each pair of dice is unique, however, so you're rolling 8 pairs of different colored dice. Oh GOD yes, I can do this (my dice collection is stupid-huge), but this is a bit of an inconvenience when it comes to speed of play. This is shared by the friends I have shown...and it shouldn't be, but its the biggest roadblock to me wanting to play Gruntz again.

By the way, I completely agree with and understand the allure of the 2d6 bell curve. I grew up playing Battletech (Phantom Blue Assault Company, FASA fan chapter #2 for any really old timers out there), and my favorite roleplaying game is HERO, which uses 3d6...so this leads me to my second quibble.

In v1.0, the price to buy more Shoot mechanic was 1 point per stat, so a Shoot of 4 costs 4, and a Shoot of 6 costs 6. The problem here is that a +1 or a -1 to the 2d6 bell curve is HUGE. I'm not a mathematician here (1 plus 1 IS 2, right? Just making sure...), but give me a -2 to a 7-or-better roll and I'll love you, but give me a +2 and make it a 9+? Ugh...so why make this all-important stat so damn cheap?

Remember Tomorrow's War? I tried my ASS off to make a spreadsheet that assigned points to units, because I'm just not cool like other people who can balance lists off the top of their head. As I consulted the forums, one thing came up constantly: Troop Quality (the stat used in ranged combat) IS ALL. It is the most important thing. It might even be the only thing. Same as with Gruntz (as an aside - I was so desperate to like Tomorrow's War, but I think I need someone who knows, really knows, the rules to walk me through it. Are you near San Jose, CA? Holler at me!).

I helped do rules testing and editing for Unbridled Fury, which was a really promising product, and his combat stat was almost exponential in cost. I urged Robin to the do the same...So Gruntz v1.1 came out, and I was relieved to find that he had at least increased the cost per stat, but only by 1 point each...I think it is too cheap to get a high skill, but it is better than it was.

Summary:
So let me sum all of this up. The rules are what they are, so no rulings here.

Book Presentation: A-
The book is well done. It organizes itself fairly well, although I have not had to delve for info i the middle of a game for ages, so I cannot comment to that. An Index would have been HUGE, as would have a more organized Table of Content.

I liked the layout and how things were presented. I liked the order that everything was presented in. I missed the prebuilt unit lists that are on the website, and a QRS would have been jolly good (jolly goodz?). I will buy other Gruntz products if they are produced, and most likely in book form if they come out in this medium again. I am even aiming at playing this again, but my gaming group suffers from the same affliction that I do - gamebookcollectingitis. Yea - we all collect rulesets, and we all want to play said rulesets at least once, which means on any given game day, we're likely trying out a new set of rules. The upside? Lots of cool rulesets come across our desks. The downside? It's like that hot brunette that catches your eye as she passes in a crowded mall - by the time you realize she really was as hot as you initially thought, and turn to get a second look, she is gone, swallowed up by the crowd, and getting back to her is harder than it should be (poor choice of words? "More difficult", maybe?)...PMC2640 is my number one right now, but Victory Decision looms on the horizon, as does the WW2 ruleset Chain of Command by Two Fat Lardies (which I have already played once but not reviewed).

Thanks for reading.

Gruntz in 15mm gets its first trial run

Tonight, Aron and I put aside Tomorrow's War after two play tests of the rules and gave Gruntz a shot. As I reviewed for the game, I felt much more at ease with the mechanics of the game, although the writing and organization of the rules left a little to be desired. Still, I know Robin of Gruntz is working his tail off on a revision, so I had no qualms with putting together what I knew of the rules and giving it a shot.

Gruntz is a Company-sized game, and focuses on Build-your-Own units with a mechanic very similar to Warmachine or Hordes: each squad that activates gets two actions (unless buffed by the Commander of your forces, or penalized by being Suppressed by enemy fire, ie taking casualties), which are used to move and fire, more or less, in different combinations.

I had already drawn up what I wanted my forces to look like when I bought the game months ago, but instead of using my own creations, I borrowed from Comstar on the Gruntz forums and used his FSE and NSL forces from GZG.

I ended up taking the NSL and had 5 8-man squads (each with 2 Squad Attachments) and 1 "Halftrack" and a Commander. My opponent fielded 2 APCs, 2 squads of 6 troopers, and a 6-man team of Powered Armor, plus his Commander. Our points came out to 150 per side, and we played a Meet-and-Greet on a 3'x3' board.  It should be noted that we played with Alternating Activations, not the Rules-as-Written IGOUGO format.

I set up my forces after winning Initiative, keeping 2 squads in my APC and the rest in a long line.

Instead of taking copious notes, I decided to journal the event through pictures at the end of each turn, and make comments and whatnot at the end.

In Turn 1 we discovered the true nature of Gruntz: Range Matters. With most of our squad weapons statted out for 8" range, with 16" being Long Range (and a -4 to hit), almost nothing was done the opening turn. His vehicles were sporting Mortars, and his Powered Armor troops had moved to a position where they could see one of my units. The scatter roll deviated the shots onto a nearby unit, and 2 of my boyz fell. His Commander then ordered his PA units back into cover. My own APC raced forward and delivered its passengers into a nearby ruined farmhouse.

Turn 2 was a little more bloody, as guns started to find their range. My APC, cargo delivered, came around from cover, its plasma cannon firing wildly, killing a FSE trooper and suppressing its unit, but return fire was vicious and the APC was completely eliminated. More shots were traded between the Power Armor unit and my Gruntz on my right, with soldiers in both units falling. My team in the farm yard advanced into firing positions from the house, and their supporting teams dashed ahead, threatening the enemy APC on our left.

Turn 3 would be the final round, as the contestants were growing weary from long work days, but it turns out that the game was naturally headed that way on its own.

His Commander, piloting one of the FSE APCs, had the gumption to charge my Commander (who, while doling out Command points to remove Suppression from his own troopers, hadnt had the movement to QUITE reach cover). My Fearless Leader dove out of the way quite easily (he needed a 5+ on 2d6) much to the chagrin of Aron. We figured this should have been some sort of opposed roll...

My most advance unit on my left swung around the house they had taken refuge behind and popped the backline APC with a few well-placed shots from the Plasma SAW and LAW rocket. Combined fire from my two teams on my right finished off the Power Armor, and one of his central Gruntz units was in Condition Brown and backing away from a nasty round of fire from the farm yard-entrenched NSL soldiers.

 

We decided that his units would have fled in as orderly a fashion as was reasonable, and called it a night.

Tomorrow's War had some really great things going for it, once we figured it out, but I must admit, I was really enjoying Gruntz. It felt semi-40k-ish to me, in 15mm. Range was likely too big of a factor (-4 on 2d6 is a gigantic modifier), and we never really just picked up gobs of d6's and rolled them (I had successfully located 8 pairs of matched 12mm d6's), but for me, this wasnt a problem.

Aron wasnt so happy with the "Firing is compared to Defense, but nearly every soldier in the unit had a different modifier because of weapon or range, and then weapon damage is compared to armor", but it didnt really bother me much at all. I knew it was similar to Warmachine, but it just worked for me.

It definitely was a swing away from the TW "brain fry" crunch, and a refreshing change at that, and I am really looking forward to drawing my own units up and seeing how Aron runs his. I will play this again in a heartbeat, and will likely start dabbling with more options in-game, and actually run a published scenario or two. A larger 4'x4' board might have been better, but with our time crunch (and the fact that my craft room is so full of junk that its a miracle the 3'x3' board was accessible!) it worked out well.

Other rule sets in the queue? Alien Squad Leader, Stargrunt II, maybe OP4S in 15mm...and I just bought the whole kit and kaboodle of Strike Legion for 6mm off Wargame Vault (www.wargamevault.com) so that will have to come out soon too.  Man, wish I wasnt moving in a few months. My gaming stuff is so hard to reach! :)

15mm Khurasan forces are COMPLETE!

How long ago did I begin this project? Too long ago, for sure.

BUT...after some mishaps with experimentation, let me present to you:

First, let me tell you about my experience with the Secret Weapon weathering pigments. I must say, after watching Robin of Gruntz make it look so easy on his videos, I bought a few and eagerly awaited the chance to use them. This meant that I purposefully left out my customary drybrushing, and after the paint and wash had dried, I coated them and moved on to the pigments.

Problem: Details matter. Did you know?  Like, GLOSS COAT is not MATTE VARNISH. Using Gloss, like I normally do for protection, does NOT give the pigments any traction!  I was quite dismayed as I began dusting on the pigments and see no noticeable effects, except for where they gathered simply by resting on a flat surface. After a quick reconsulting of the Secret Weapon tutorials and a post to their Facebook page, I realized my idiocy...and rushed out and purchased Krylon Matte Finish varnish from my local Ace Hardware. It was a whopping $5...and not too late.

The snippet from our FB discussion:

Me: SO, the steps should have been: 1. Paint 2. Matte coat 3. Weathering pigments 4. Matte coat?
SW: Yes, you've got it now. Although I'll add that it also depends on what else you're doing. For instance it might be:

Paint
Gloss
Decals
Gloss
Washes
Matte
Oils
Matte
Pigments

So...after I coated the minis in the Matte Varnish, I COULD have gone back again and reapplied the pigments, and then recoated in Matte to finish them off again, but I was just DONE with them. They are good enough for tabletop gaming, and while I will be annoyed at myself till the end of time for doing this incorrectly, I'll know for the future.

Without further ado:

Blue Squad deploys in front of the town, enjoying the warm early morning sun:

Blue Squad revels in their Walker escort:

Green Squad checks the end of an alley for insurgents:

The Squad of Power Armor spots suspicious activity at the outskirts of town, and investigate...taking the short route:

Two Heavy Machine Gun crews cover the town from across the way:

The Main Battle Tank cruises along slowly, escorted by its canine team and handler:

Yellow Squad jumps out of their APC, eager for action:

A mass of Company Support Assets, ready for assignment, cluster in the staging area:

Company Commanders huddle in conference, comparing notes and weighing options (note the US Nickel base, setting them apart):

Representatives of the different squads gather for discussion (L to R: Purple squad, Senior Company leader, Company leader, Yellow Squad leader, Green Squad junior leader/Medic, Orange Squad medic, Company asset (unassigned) Light Support, Company asset Medium Support, Blue Squad Medium Support, Company asset HMG Heavy Support team):

Details of the Support Weapon markings:

Leadership markings (note, the Junior Squad Leader on the left is also a Medic, and only the Squad level leaders have squad colorings. The others are "Unassigned" grey, meaning they can fit where ever they need to be):

Lastly, just a quick shot of two "guys". Purple squad is a regular trooper, and the Orange Squad is a Medic (see his right shoulder):

The overall group shot again, as they patrol the quiet border town in the early winter sun:

Our playtest of Tomorrow's War is on this coming Tuesday. I cannot wait!

And now, for a quick gratuitous mention of Battlefield 3:

I play a TON of Call of Duty on my Playstation, but recently got REALLY into flying helicopters on BF3. I want to show you my favorite video on Youtube, AND the free download of that AMAZING song by Emancipator that I cant get enough of:

And to get Maps for free:
http://emancipator.bandcamp.com/album/free-downloads 

Have fun, and thanks for reading! 

Card-making tutorial for Unit cards

With the latest 15mm rulesets out there, a lot of them beg for custom unit creation, and THAT begs for custom unit templates.

This video is a quick guide to doing just that in Word. I copied it and had my own cards up in no time!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YyMSWeeZYU&feature=related

Mammoth is camo'd up, lined, and has a new, shiny cockpit

I got the lining done on the Mammoth this evening. Being a larger model, I felt that this sucker could lure me in with its wiles and trap me all night, so I went for a more minimalist approach than on the APCs by Khurasan. Still, it took me a bit and I was pleased with its results.

.That cockpit scared the tar out of me. I have never actually done one, but I always try to do my research and so came up with this.  Of course, it made me realize that the sensor sticking out of the cockpit needs to be lined (tomorrow!) and I realize that the searchlights on the torsos just dont look quite right, but hey, Im like 99% happy. I need to splash some red on the missiles in the launcher on the left arm, add my battle damage to the vehicles as a lot, seal it, then add the weathering pigments from Secret Weapon, seal it again, and then maybe base it. 60mm base, anyone?

Outlining on the 15mm vehicles

After getting the camo mostly done, I wanted to do some outlining with Devlan Mud like I saw on one of Robin's videos on his Gruntz feed on Youtube.  It went on nicely, I think, and gives a reasonably subtle hint of 3D when used only along creases and corners.  Here are some quick shots of it.

Here you can see elements of the tank, such as the headlights, that I tried to throw in for detail. The are highlighted with 2 colors, but its really hard to tell from this angle and at this scale:

An overhead shot:

So at this point, Ive finished with the camo, the tired and treads, the head and tail lights, and the outlining. Well, the Mammoth hasnt been outlined yet, but I can only take so much cramping to my neck, back and hands in one sitting :)  After I get the Mammoth highlighted, I will try some weathering pigments from Secret Weapon instead of my normal drybrushing. This is, after all, my project of experiments (new scale, new painting, new outlining, new weathering techniques...cool!)!

Balls to the wall...

Enough talk, I thought, and swiftly proceeded to set up the airbrush and grow a pair. You cant learn if you dont try, right?

First I used Blue-Tac (poster-tac, same thing) to wrap a few of my vehicles. It was kind of fun but definitely tedious and tricky. I found it an interesting exercise in thinking in reverse, in that the spaces I wanted to be tan, I had to cover, and the places that were to be green needed to be exposed. But of course, looking at it, I saw white (to be tan) and tan (to be green). Interesting to say the least:

Then I discovered that the airbrush I had came with no instructions. Awww man!  Well, I powered through it, and was about to give it the college try:

I didnt mix enough paint and had it sputter on me very quickly. Turns out I used half of the bottle. Yikes. Anyway, I had some scary moments figuring out air pressure, etc, and had some sputtering and spitting while I did my test sprays, but in the end, well...I got the models covered :)

At this point I was a wreck. I couldnt tell if I had done a decent job, or if I had completely blown it. I was as nervous as a soon-to-be dad waiting outside of the delivery room! But eventually I came in after the paint was dry and slowly peeled it away...

...I felt like the Joker unwrapping his bandages for the first time...

Well HEY, not half bad, eh?

Still, there was WAY too much green for my taste (I used Vallejo's Model Color Medium Olive), and so I set about hand painting the other two vehicles to compare and contrast.  Here are two APCs side by side. The darker green on the right is the airbrushed version, and the one in the foreground has been brushed:

Take a wild guess which I like better?

The APC weapon mounts havent been done as of this pic, obviously, and the washes, pigments, details, etc are still to be done, but overall I am really happy with this. The darker green versions arent my favorite, but will allow me to skirmish against myself (or a friend, lol) with 2 different forces using the same models, so that is cool.

The plus side of the airbrush was that my back didnt start killing me right away. I hunch when I paint, and as I type this I am squirming like a mother :(  However, the brush was just too reliable and easy (more time, but big deal). Painting the resin was interesting, as it was porous enough that the paint sank right into it, but it made for easy blending.

Anyone want to buy an airbrush? :)

15mm first layers of desert camo applied

I'm one of those guys who doesnt like doing things that he doesnt know how to do. In this case, Im stuck on using my airbrush. See, my wife bought me a cheapie years and years ago upon my request...and I've been too chicken to use it ever since.  However, after watching Robin's video on airbrushing I decided to brave it.

LOL...so I havent done it YET!  However, I have taken the bold move of preparing the models to be airbrushed. Brave, see?

I decided on a simple, possibly even boring, US 3-color desert scheme for my test run. I started out with the Army Painter Skeleton Bone primer. After each model was primed, I used a drop of PVA glue to stick each member of a squad onto large craft sticks for ease of handling.  These are my Khurasan 15mm Federal Marines models for use with Tomorrow's War and Gruntz.

Here is the lot ready to go:

Next I added some Vallejo Game Color "Earth" to the models in large swaths, with an artistic free-flowing motion. The intent is to replicate what Robin did in his video (and I had seen elsewhere) with the poster-tac. I will overlay the poster-tac along the brown lines, intending to blend the green into it with the airbrush.  We'll see how well that works :)

This is more of a close-up of my 6-year-old daughter's humorous "threatening" note to me to go get the pumpkins...lol...but it also shows the recipe for Gunk that I use as an additive when painting (I got it from the awesome article over at Reaper's forums:

I did manage to get brown onto one squad of 6 marines, but discovered as I started to do the second squad that some of the underparts of the infantry hadnt caught the primer. And since the primer is going to be, well, the primary color for the army, I ran them out and gave them another dusting of the Skeleton Bone. I will admit that with the craft sticks attached, it let me lay them on their sides and get a better angle. I should have done this first, I think.