Masters of the Universe - Battleground, a review.

Master of the Universe.

As per my last post, I picked up this starter set on an impulse at Colours wargame show. I had seen it online when released and the reasonable price per kilo (Seriously you get a lot of heavy plastic in there) plus the freebie added He-man and Battlecat mini, was enough to convince me.

The box contains a cardboard hexed board, a lot of plastic scenery and ten minis, five each of heroes of Eternia and villains. Even if the rules were rubbish, the plastic components were definitely worthwhile. The terrain pieces are generic enough to be used for other games and the minis are great quality too.

The set is produced by Archon Studio who also make the Dungeons and Lazers range of plastics including their great range of dragons, one of which I own:

Like the dragon, the plastic pieces fit together so perfectly, there has been a lot of thought put in how these kits are made. I would say though, that to produce the dynamic poses they have, each model is comprised of around seven to ten pieces, meaning there is a lot of craft knife work to be done on their contact points to the sprue. (Not a project for a first timer.) It's took me a couple of evenings to glue them all together, but they look great.

I have yet to play the game, but a quick read through of the rules seemed to make sense. Each player has a deck of cards that they use to 'bid' for priority then use the same cards to assign mana and action points to their models. Mana is used to cast spells or re-roll dice, action points for moving, shooting etc. The cost of an action increasing if attempted multiple times in the same go. Resolving attacks is pretty simple, roll a number of dice equal to the relevant stat, succeeding on a 4+ and then the defending player cancels out successful rolls with their own test.

There are lots of exceptions to the rules on character cards and item buffs to keep the game interesting. For example, the sword of power can use mana to increase its attack. Characters can also spend a turn focusing to improve their odds the following turn.

A well set out and clear rulebook, an additional book of different missions and some high quality plastic parts make this a great starter set. There are two 'Wave one' add ons available now with a third 'Wave two' coming in October with extra characters and cards. Fingers crossed eventually we might even get She-Ra and Swift Wind! 

Review of the day, Colours 2022

This weekend I went to Colours 2022 at the Newbury Racecourse, hosted by Newbury and Reading Wargames Society. Regular readers will know I love this show and due to reasons we all know about, last year the show didn't go ahead. This year was a welcome return for the show.

The whole day flew by at such a pace, I had such a great day I was too busy to even take any photos! I started the day with a peruse of the always wonderful Bring and Buy then Brother in Law and myself had a demo game of Achroma, a new card game. Similar in vein to Magic the Gathering or Pokemon, there were some interesting ideas like the use of a mobile app to keep track of your life and as you are linked to your Opponents apps, you can steal their life directly from their phone too. 

There was of course the obligatory meet up with Illustrious Opponent and other friends, then for the afternoon my youngest boy joined me thanks to the Father in Law bringing him down. Keen to get some gaming in, my boy was a little disappointed with the less than normal number of games at the show, but we did get to sit down with the chaps from Liverpool Wargames. We had an excellent game of Saga using balanced Samurai forces and I have to say myself and the other chap I was partnered with took an absolute trouncing from the Enthusiastic Opponent. My son has the best luck with dice and a keen tactical mind. We were very grateful for the chaps coming down from Liverpool with such an excellent game. I've not played Saga before and I have to say, I would again.

For the rest of the show we got some great shopping in, even Pokemon cards, although Space Marines were thin on the ground around the show, so EO didn't get to add that wanted Dreadnought to his Ultramarines force. He did however choose some scenery of his own.

The scouts are his own too.

I had a lovely chat to the owner of Tangent miniatures who kindly gave EO a freebie miniature that has a distinct Buckeroo Banzai feel to it. As we watched Ready Player One this week, I am instructed to paint the model up as Parzival for him. (Watch the film, it will make sense.)

The shopping haul wasn't massive, but there was one heavy item.

I have to say, the set is so heavy my plastic bag split before I got home and snipping the sprues for the scenery was a workout in itself. We are looking forward to getting a game in. Today has been all about X Wing though, mainly because there wasn't any painting involved, we cracked on straight away learning the rules when we got home.

All in a fun day, can't wait till next year.