State of the Nation - laying out 2015

State of the Nation

Presidents and prime ministers around the globe give state of the nation speeches at the beginning of the year. Here at Skirmish Sangin we thought we would borrow the concept and look back briefly over the last 12 months and to let all our loyal players know what’s happening in the next 12 months.

So the last 12 months have seen a great deal of growth in the Skirmish Sangin market. The year was book marked by the release of Sangin Despatches 2 and 3 and one of the key highlights was our trip to SALUTE which was a great deal of fun. Our Insurgents/Taliban figures were released.

Phalanx Consortium came on board as our US distributor  and that is a relationship that's gone from strength to strength.

Unfortunately we lost a great good person along the way. Stuart Griffin of Griffin Moulds (Sangin's Figure Manufacturer) and we would like to take this opportunity to pass on our deepest condolences to his family and colleagues.

So what will 2015 have to offer? 

Now we can’t reveal all as we have signed a number of non-disclosure agreements with companies but there is a core of projects that we can reveal, some of what is going on.

Now before I go in to detail can we just say a little about timelines. All of the team have full time, high-pressure jobs and while we indicate deadlines and do our best to work towards them, we are always deliberately vague simply to avoid disappointment.

Our projects tend to take a while to create and sometimes can be held up by even the most innocuous of things. 2014 had a few among them the birth of beautiful baby James to Chris and Rachel. Pneumonia and a serious knee operations for Colin and a PHD for Craig, all of these thing vied for our time.

We hope there are less this year but you never know. Anyway enough waffle what's happening.

First quarter 2015

The first of our Battle Books will be Maalintii Rangers (Day of the Rangers (Mog) - to those of us that don’t speak Somali). This book will concentrate on the battle made famous by the book and film Black Hawk Down. It will have additional rules, background info and ORBATS for everything from Street mobs and Somali gun man to the D-Boys and Rangers. A set of entertaining scenarios that focuses on various stages of the battle and ideas of how to model and paint the participants.

 IMAGE ABOVE - Rough Scamp of the cover

To support this we will also be releasing our first set of 28mm Americans, initially an 8 man Rangers squad, that’s ideal for Mog and more than usable for Iraq 1 and 2 and early Afghanistan as well as some more goodies we have in the pipeline. See the Ranger renders below.

We are also planning a running a Kickstarter to help us expand this figure line but we’ll let you know more about that nearer the time.

Also in this quarter you will see the release of the final 28mm Insurgent/Taliban so there will be more than enough to build a sizeable force.

ABOVE:  Some of the new Insurgent/Taliban figures

Second/third quarter 2015

This will see the release of our first fantasy game, currently called Outbreak – This is a zombie horror skirmish game. This will be launched at GENCON and a number of us are making the trip to Indianapolis to be part of the fun. So do come along and see us.

ABOVE: The almost final cover for Outbreak

We will also be at Historicon with plenty of Skirmish Sangin goodness (as part of our month long trip to the USA) so that will be another opportunity to chat if any of you are heading that way. We hope to have more than a few new goodies available at both events.

Third/fourth quarter 2015

Sangin Despatches no.3, yes number 3, we have so much useful stuff left over from SD2 that we plan to bring you another book to conclude Afghanistan.

Now anybody that has played Skirmish Sangin know the system can work for any conflict from ww2 onwards and this year we plan to use the system to venture further a field and expand both globally conflict wise and back through the ages to help our players use the system to play there favourite genres.

So that’s all the big picture stuff we can talk about and as you can see we haven't been lazing a round but also we are going to do our best to use this blog to bring you some great Skirmish Sangin Goodness.

It’s our plan that each month we will release you a free scenario for the remaining 11 months of 2015. We will also increase the number of articles and After Action Reports (AARs) to as many as possible. This will allow players to see the flexibility of the system and get some great new ideas for their gaming. We are kicking off our first free scenario in February with a look at the Australians and what they got up to in Afghanistan.

Obviously this is not all but its all for now. Do let us know what you would like to see in terms of ORBATS etc. and any game ideas and we’ll do our absolute best to bring them to you.

cheers

Colin

We are back, and a new project!

Aaaaaaaand we are back!

So, with the holidays out of the way, the team is back to work, as well as back to progressing with Skirmish Sangin. Fear not, our time away was productive, we were able to do a lot of writing, so you won't have to wait until the end of the year for our next release- promise!

But we will update you more on that in the coming weeks, along with our plans for the blog for the year.

As for what I am working on, I have started a new project. Now, I really like gaming in 28mm. I have lots (possibly too many according to some) of 28mm figures, and it is the rule set for which the Skirmish Sangin rules were primarily written for (not that you have to use 28s, I know we have more than a few 20mm fans out there!).

So while I like my 28s, I have a real problem of table space.

This is my kitchen table, also known as my gaming table:

It does a stirling job as a table, doesn't wobble, great to use to serve roast dinners on and for me to get crushed by my wife at board games on. But it's just a bit small to be my ideal Skirmish Sangin table. It works well for smaller scale games, or close in city/compound fighting with a small number of troops each side. It would work for bigger games too, but I really like having space to maneuver.

With that in mind, I have started my new project to assist with that. If the table can't get bigger, then I will just make what I put on it smaller! There is an NZ company, Flytrap Factory which I knew had a small range of 15mm Moderns, suitable for Afghanistan. I was a very big Flames of War (another NZ company!) for a very long time, so 15mm was a bit of a homecoming for me.

So I have bought a few packs of the Flytrap Factory miniatures, enough to keep me out of trouble for a while!

So after some time spent assembling/priming/painting, I have managed to complete my first US Marine:

Apologies for the dark photos, my lighting source (the sun) didn't want to play ball for the photo!

So there it is, the start of my new project. More about it in the coming weeks!

Pooch

Happy holidays from the Skirmish Sangin team

Just a quick little note, to wish all of you a happy, safe and enjoyable holidays. I had written this message a week or two ago, but neglected to send it. So for all those wondering where your semi-regular Sangin updates have gone, Colin and I are taking a break for a couple of weeks, heading back to our respective families and recharging our batteries.

It has been a big year for us, Despatches II has been released, our range of Taliban, we attended Salute, have shared our game with people all over the world and have had an absolute blast while doing it!

Next year promises to be even bigger. The ground work has been made for our next wave of book releases, we have talked before about Mogadishu, about Despatches III and have mentioned that we have other, secret projects in the works. While the time is not quite right to share those with you all yet, please do not think that we have been idle.

Personally, I have really enjoyed the feedback that we have received about Despatches II, it is so encouraging to hear that you are having a go with what we have created, and are enjoying the developing game that is Skirmish Sangin. There is more to come, we promise!

Since regular communications won't be back online until the new year, I will leave you with a blog shared with me recently, from a chap called Neal. He is using Skirmish Sangin to play a series of games of an insurgency in Amsterdam.

The blog is here. There are some interesting things here, I for one am going to be keeping an eye on it.

In the new year, I will try to coax Colin into letting me share some of our plans, but until then, we hope you have a good break.

Pooch

Dish Dash Taliban- Packs 1 to 3

We have finally received some copies of our 28mm Taliban miniatures (some of you got them before we did!). Naturally we thought we would paint up a set, to show off how good they look. As Craig and I are more than a bit busy at the moment, we passed over a set of 15 to our good buddy Ray (you have seen his French up here before).

He dutifully painted them up, and made an absolutely cracker job of it! In fact, I am confident I couldn't have done any better!

So here they are, our first three packs of Taliban

The whole group!

Taliban pack 1

Taliban pack 2

Taliban pack 3

And now for some close ups....

So the first two packs are available now, with the third pack on it's way soon. And I know that there are yet more on their way- so more than enough to create a great Taliban force. Especially using the Taliban ORBAT from Despatches II (also available now!)- I look forward to hearing some feedback on what people think!

Pooch

Posts from the Sangin Community- Matt's Marines

Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming!

I must apologise to all of those people who have been sending me images and blog links over the past few weeks. I have been more than a bit snowed under with my actual work (which sadly is not Sangin!). However, I will endeavor to get all of your hard work up here on the blog, and I am sorry this has taken so long.

Anyway, here we have another post from the community, showing off some of the excellent Empress US Marines and the Empress MRAP, painted up by Matt. He did them all in a single sitting, which is just making me feel far too easily distracted when I paint. Probably doesn't help that I am always painting 2 or 3 things at once....

Anyway, on to the pictures!

Keep sending through the cool things you have been working on, send them to chris@skirmishsangin.com.

Pooch

Skirmish Sangin at the Movies! Part One: Iron Man Mk 1

Following on from yesterday's introduction, here is the first part of At the Movies!.

Presenting what was I think my favourite Marvel comic character when I was growing up, Iron Man!


The Ironman Mk1 Suit!

Please note, Iron Man is entirely the property of Marvel Studios. Radio Dish Dash Publishing respects their rights as owners of the Iron Man character and design.

From the Iron Man wiki

The Mark I (1), was the first Iron Man suit built and created by Tony Stark.

It was featured in the movie Iron Man, and first appeared when Tony and Ho Yinsen were held captive by the terrorist group known as the Ten Rings. While they were held captive, Tony and Yinsen devised a plan. In the cave, they created blueprints for the Mark I.

The suit was very crude, due to the limited tools and resources that were available.Its successor was the Mark II, built inside the Stark Mansion.

The suit has several notable functionalities and weapons. It is equipped with a Manually Deployed Rocket Launcher, a Flamethrower mounted on right arm, Jet Boots equipped in its soles, an exposed Internal System attached to its back, and the very first Miniature Arc Reactor. The reactor powers the entire suit. Later, Tony created an upgraded version that would power almost every other suit to date.


Using Iron Man in Skirmish Sangin:

The Iron Man Mk 1 operates like a normal character in Skirmish Sangin, and has the following statistics.

The Iron Man Mk I suit

Massive Bulk- Due to the large weight, mechanical strengthening and by its very design, the Iron Man suit cannot go prone, either by choice or because of being knocked down by the enemy.

The Iron Man Mk 1 may not run.

The Iron Man suit is simply too large to fit into standard doorways without the chance of damaging itself. Entering a doorway takes 1AP for Iron Man and has a 25% chance to do so without damaging itself. If Iron Man fails this test, roll on the Iron Man morale table to see the effect getting caught in the door has had.

Due to the Iron Man’s size, an enemy model attempting to SPOT or SHOOT the Iron Man has a +20% modifier.

Armour- Iron Man has a value of 3d10+10 for body armour, and gives Stark a BODY rating of 1d6+10.

Limited visibility- The Iron Man helmet is designed for protection, not for visibility. Iron Man only has a 90 degree line of sight, not a 180 degree arc. It will cost Iron Man 1AP to turn in place.

Iron Man in Hand-to-Hand Combat

The Iron Man suit may not make any special combat attacks in hand-to- hand combat. The Iron Man suit causes 4D10 damage when it hits in close combat. The attacks from Iron Man may not be parried, unless by a superpowered or armoured suit wearing opponent.

Hitting the Iron Man Mk I in close combat is at +20%, and reduces Iron Man’s armour value by 1d10 when rolling to save in close combat. This variant simply has too many weak spots!

Iron Man may not parry any close combat attacks.

Weaponry

Iron Man isn’t here to make friends. This suit’s entire purpose is to get Tony out of the caves and get to freedom. To assist with this, it is equipped with a variety of weapons.

Missile
The Iron Man suit is equipped with two external missile launchers. Lacking in a suitable firing mechanism, the missiles take 2AP to fire. Unfortunately, the Mark 1 suit has no reloading ability, and so may only fire 2 rockets per game.

The Missile uses the stats for an RPG.

Flamethrower
The Iron Man suit has two flamethrowers, one mounted under each arm. These nozzles are connected to high pressure hoses, allowing Iron Man to spray fire for a short time from both arms.

The flamethrowers fire together, and have a range of 15” and blast diameter of a KZ 5” (4d10) DZ15” (2d10)

Being hit by a flamethrower causes a morale test at -50%. If the morale test is successful, the model may attempt to put themselves out, otherwise they will simply run from the battlefield and are treated as killed.

Any model part inside the DZ of a flamethrower is treated as being on fire. This will cause 1d10 damage at the end of each activation for that model, unless they can put the fire out. Putting the fire out costs 3AP, and has a 75% chance of success.

The Iron Man Mk 1 has a limited fuel supply. After each time the flamethrower is fired, Iron Man must roll a 1d10, on a 1-5 it has run out of fuel. The chance increases by 1 for each time it is fired (1-6 on the second shot, 1-7 on the third etc)

Iron Man Morale

The Iron Man Suit may be exceptionally well armoured, but at the end of the day there is still a man inside the can. The Iron Man can be forced to take a morale test like any other model. If this is the case, the Iron Man rolls on the following table.

1-5 Stunned- Iron Man suit may only operate for 2 AP in the next phase
6-8 Shaken- Iron man suit may only operate for 1 AP in the next phase
9-10 Suit Damage- Lose 1d10 from suits armour and may only operate for 1 AP in the next phase

Iron Man Mk 1 in 28mm
I managed to pick up the Heroclix Iron Man Mk 1 very cheap from the internets, gave it a repaint and voila, Iron Man!

So there you have it, the Iron Man Mk 1! I think I might have to write up a scenario to use it, so bear with me on that. Big question is- what do you want to see next as part of At the Movies?

Pooch

Skirmish Sangin at the Movies! Part One: Introduction

The team here at Radio Dish Dash have a lot of ideas. Lots and lots actually. And although most of the time, we are able to put horse blinkers on ourselves and focus on specific projects, sometimes we allow ourselves to go off track and see where we end up!

Over the past years of working on Skirmish Sangin, we have had more than a few random ideas. Some of them will become books in the future, some were "Afghan-ised" to become part of Despatches books and others were released here on the blog. But there are some ideas which just didn't fit anywhere else, either because they were things we could never release, things which we didn't think were a whole book or things which were only really going to be fun to play as an individual game once or twice, not over and over again.

As a team, we decided that the best thing to do would be to not hoard all our (potentially genius) ideas, and so the idea of Skirmish Sangin at the Movies! was born.

So what is it?
So what is it? Well, Skirmish Sangin at the Movies will be a collection of odd rules, special characters and other things which we have created that we want to share with you, our community. They are things which are not really balanced, but that are going to make for really fun one off games!

When will they be posted?
There isn't a schedule, these are random ideas remember! Between Colin, Craig, me and our other contributors, we think we have already got rules for maybe two or three movies fully written. But that isn't all we have, those are just the ones which we have finished! So every time you see Skirmish Sangin at the Movies! it will let you know that it is a Movies post, and although it uses many of the same rules for Skirmish Sangin, there will be a few things which are so odd as to need their own rules too!

But Pooch, I want to see (insert movie here) as a set of rules?
Now, that is the cool part. What we want is for you to comment on our posts, or drop us an email to tell us what movies you want to see as part of Skirmish Sangin at the Movies. We have lots of ideas, and lets be honest, these haven't been fully tested. They are designed for fun, not necessarily to be a balanced game! We want you to share your experiences with the rules, your ideas for changes and movies you want to see in the rules.

But will this be the only place we see these rules?
Now that all depends on you. We are enthusiastic people, if you want to see more, we can make more! So although what will be posted on the blog as a starting point, there will be lots of different places we can go with the rules for the movies. Our initial release may be small, but we will need your thoughts to make the rules, bigger, better and badder.

But, remember that some things we could never release as a paid product, simply because we can't afford the licensing. But other things, we may look closely at turning into a book if we get enough material. And perhaps, perhaps, there may even be a Skirmish Sangin at the Movies! book one day in the future. Others may just become a PDF download on the website.

The first article for Skirmish Sangin at the Movies! will be posted up tomorrow, so be sure to tune in!


Pooch