Game Review – Blood Red Skies

October 5, 2021 Peter Holland Leave a comment

Type:	World War 2/Aviation
Scale:	1/200th
Players:	2+
Age:	12+
Game Length:	30-60 Minutes
Starter Box Cost:	£45
Designer(s):	Andy Chambers
Publisher:	Warlord Games
Complexity:	2.6/5.0
Board Game Geek Rating:	7.4 (166 Ratings)

Blood Red Skies is the new World War II mass air combat game from Warlord Games, written by renowned game developer Andy Chambers.

Packed with everything you need to play this fast paced air combat game, the Blood Red Skies starter set does what it says on the tin. Plus once started you’ll have the extra rules to introduce the play cards that really bring your fighter aircraft to life, allowing you to fly them just as they would have been by the Aces of WW2!
Description from Warlord Games

First of all, right off the bat, this isn’t a simulation game. If simulation of World War 2 dogfights is what you’re looking for then this isn’t the game for you.

However that being said, there has been a lot of work that has gone into the rules to give them an authentic ‘feel’ of the period.

The Blood Red Skies: Battle of Britain starter set contains everything you will need to carry out air battles over the British Isles in World War 2. With six Spitfires, six Messerschmitt BF-109s and a number of scenarios through which the players can jump straight in.

The games core mechanic revolves around aircraft being Advantaged, Neutral and Disadvantaged. Disadvantaged aircraft cannot shoot aircraft that are Advantaged or Neutral and Neutral aircraft cannot shoot Advantaged aircraft. However, you can choose to make your aircraft disadvantaged to gain manoeuvrability and enabling you to try and get on the tale of enemy aircraft.

Scoring is done by using boom chits, where any shots that hit the enemy cause a chit regardless of whether it causes damage. Once a player has more chits against them than they have aircraft then their squadron are forced to break contact with the enemy and head for home. This can mean that games are over without a single aircraft being shot down, which is true to the real life dogfights that would be carried our in the skies during World War 2.

Gameplay is quick with a loop of Shoot-Move-Action that is enhanced by the use of the action deck, with extra abilities and events. These cards can be selected based on the planes in use and the period of the war the combat is taking place.

Downsides of the game are that the pilot discs are easy to damage when inserting or removing them from the plane bases. Measuring can also be tricky with arcs being difficult to set on the circular bases.

That said, this game is fantastic and is ideal for a quick pick up and play game during a lunch break or a spare 30 minutes with friends in between other games.

Games Workshop, Warhammer 40k, Warlord Games

Andy Chambers – A Life in Wargames

October 4, 2021 Peter Holland 1 Comment

Chambers is best known for his work for Games Workshop, where he worked from March 1990 to March 2004. He worked extensively on various Warhammer 40,000 rulebooks and sourcebooks, and also authored multiple fiction novels set in the same universe. Chambers was the lead designer on a number of Warhammer 40,000 spin-off games, such as Necromunda (1995) and Battlefleet Gothic (1999), produced by Specialist Games. These games were released at a time of major growth for Games Workshop and were designed with expansions and more miniatures sales in mind.

In 2003, Chambers joined Mongoose Publishing as the lead designer of the company’s development team for the Starship Troopers tabletop miniatures game. Starship Troopers won “Best New Game” in the 2005 Origins Awards.

Chambers was also made the lead story writer for Blizzard Entertainment’s StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty for which he is given much of the credit for completing the project by other members of the company such as Megan Farokhmanesh.

Andy Chambers has also been involved in numerous other projects over the years such as Dust Warfare (2012) releases by Fantasy Flight Games, Dropfleet Commander (2017) by Hawk Wargames and Blood Red Skies (2017) publisher by Warlord Games.

Like Jervis Johnson and Alessio Cavatore, Andy Chambers has been involved in the designing of over 100 rules and accompanying supplements for many publishers including Games Workshop, Warlord Games, Hawk Wargames and Fantasy Flight Games to name but a few.

Games Workshop

Orruk Warclans – Brutes

October 3, 2021 Declan and Eeyore 6 Comments

Are the Brutes back again

Welcome to Woehammer – have you noticed the lovely feeling of no adverts (ads), no pop-ups and no auto-playing videos? Well, that’s the norm here at Woehammer.

But this is only possible because of our wonderful Patreons. So, some articles over 1 year old will now display our Patreon request at the top of the article… like this one! Don’t worry, we are not adding ads – but if you can afford to donate to the site, we would definitely appreciate it. Membership is available from just £1/month (plus taxes!!)

When Ironjawz were released as one of the first new armies in Age of Sigmar the Brutes, Gore Gruntas and Maw Krusha were lovely models which went straight into my collection.

Unfortunately the rules always meant that my Big Waaagh and Ironjawz army kept coming back to Ardboyz, with minimal Brutes. I loved the models, but only had 10 painted, and the rules didn’t encourage me to buy any more.

However, that’s all changed and the new rules have prompted me to have a 50% increase on Brutes for Mancunian Carnage 2021.

5 Brutes with Jagged Gore-Hackas for Bloodfists!

What has made me change my mind… well the warscroll has said an upgrade, points are similar and Ardboyz have now become support / objective holders. Also, Big Waaagh! doesn’t care about number of troops anymore. In case you’ve missed the warscroll – especially as they’ve disappeared from GW website (!) here it is:

My Brutes all have Jagged Gore-Hackas, which is fortunate given the above. They have 2″ reach so can deploy in two ‘ranks’ on the table and still hit the enemy, and the additional pip of rend over and above the Brute Choppas more than makes up for the slight reduction in attacks. Especially as we’re hitting big things on a 2+ without a command point – Smashing!

Finally, they also have a great new special rule You Messin’ which means that models with a wounds characteristic of 1 can’t contest objectives. Sure, most things with 1 wounds within 3″ of this unit should be dead, but if a few Skeletons or Zombies survive this rule gives the Brutes the edge. Kunnin!

Sure they are slow on paper, but we’ve got lots of Mighty Destroyers available (free movement), and most scenarios start much closer to each other now. I’m taking my 15 to Carnage, and have 10 more on order for War in the Heartlands later in the month.

I’ll let you know how I get on, and how I find using the new & improved Brutes and their successes. Bashin’

— Declan

Age of Sigmar, Fantasy, Games Workshop, Warhammer 40k

Woehammer Painting Competition

October 3, 2021 Peter Holland Leave a comment

As well as our painting competition which is open to the public where you can win a Start Collecting or Combat Patrol box of your choice, the guys at Woehammer and our generous sponsors SCN Hobby World are holding their own internal painting competition.

A few have already chosen which models they’re going to paint as well…..

Sarah

Sarah has been collecting Orks for some time now but has chosen to do something a little different for the competition.

Howling Griffon Space Marine. With the marine already purchased and undercoated Sarah is well on her way ahead of the 30th November deadline.

Sarah’s painting back catalogue is full of amazing looking Orks.

Ray

As far as I’m aware this will be Rays first miniature, and he’s chosen the new Ork Beastsnagga Warboss. I’m really looking forward to seeing what he comes.up with this for the competition. There’s already been smack talk between himself and Ben as well!

Rhys

Anyone who followed our Tale of Painters on YouTube will know that Rhys has only been painting for about a year and a half now. In that time his abilities have gone from strength to strength…..

Ed

Ed loves Nurgle and Lumineth, but this time round he’s attempting a new model and style completely with a comic book look. Here’s some of Ed’s work….

Ben

After smack talking with Ray, Ben decided to paint a Space Marine captain which he’ll paint in Imperial Fist colours and donate to Dave’s army that he’s creating. Ben is another talented painter with quite the back catalogue…….

Peter (Me!)

For this challenge I’ve chosen to do something a bit different to what I normally would paint. I’m painting Calas Typhon the forgeworld model. This is actually Dave’s model which I’m painting for him (Dave is kindly painting Mephiston for me).

Some of my earlier works….