I’m not going to lie. The arrival of Dropzone Commander has
been a strange rollercoaster ride for me and it shows how emotive these funny
little games (please don’t stone me for that) can really be for us.
Back last year when the teasers started appearing I became
suitably excited. I’d go as far to say lubricated! I was seriously intrigued as
the pictures were released and checked every day for the new postings on
Facebook. Great stuff! Great marketing by the guys at Hawk Wargaming. People
were fair dribbling at the point when the website went live and the army sets
were announced.
Then CRASH! HOW MUCH!! I admit I felt disappointed by the
price and it was clear from the interwebs that I wasn’t alone. Cooler more
rational voices (who knew we had any in the GoGs? Go figure!) prevailed and I
soon came to realise that the starter set prices reflected the fact that you
needed more to start the game and that the price shock probably came more from
conditioning in the hobby making me expect a ‘cheap’ starter set rather than it
not being value for money. Pack for pack the prices of the DZC stack pretty
well against those in the industry.
Happier and re-enthused I plumped for the Shaltari starter
with tailored storage foam and case. It cost a goodly amount but I felt, by
that point, that I was getting value. Other GoGs committed and soon it was a
game discussed in terms of painting queues which invariably means it will get
to the gaming table sometime between 3 months and never. Now I’d championed the
game somewhat within the GoGs because sci-fi at this scale has always appealed
and as such I knew that if I wanted to see it reach the table I would have to
drive it forward. So what was the next hurdle? Terrain. We didn’t have a jot of
10mm Sci-Fi between us so we were starting from scratch.
Hawk had this covered. Free downloadable paper terrain! The
more creative members of the DZC community had printed these onto label paper
and stuck it to foamcore for rigid buildings! Brilliant! Inspired! That will be
my approach I thought and I set about gathering the required materials. I
thought that this game would be great when we got it to the table. Still a way
off but I was confident.
Meanwhile rumours started about DZC resin terrain. Scenery
just like they had in the glorious pictures in the book.
Oooooooooh I thought.
Shiny I thought.
So I set to wait for its release before starting the
buildings with the materials I had. In truth I wasn’t holding off working on
them but more involved with other projects for WH40K.
Then CRASH! The resin terrain was released. I saw on a forum
that someone had quipped “I wanted to buy a building but couldn’t afford the
mortgage”. Very true. Lovely buildings but WHOOOOOA! Prices to scare most
wargamers in to apoplexy! It would appear that this is what happened. I too was
baffled by the business choices that led to the release of model buildings at
real estate prices!
Bizarrely this made me feel down and disappointed. Not
meaning to GW bash but I’d thought “oh great another gaming company making
unfathomable business choices”. But I stuck with the game and read bits and
bobs on the forums still with the intention of getting this game to the table
but I admit I had slightly less enthusiasm. However it slowly seemed to appear
that Hawk hadn’t marketed a turkey and I now think this may just have been a
badly timed, poorly explained release.
Now I admit this is my interpretation of second hand info
but it seems to me now that Hawk had the moulds for the buildings already as
they had made them to do those lovely pictures for the books. I think Hawk then
decided to release them, probably because they had the moulds, people wanted
terrain and they probably wanted to maintain release momentum to keep interest
buoyant. Hey….they’d already released free
scenery so the really cool stuff would be there if people wanted it. The
internet nerd RAGE ignored the free scenery at first and I got the impression
that the high cost of the premium quality stuff created quite a bit of
negativity for and towards Hawk Wargames. Not good for a young company. A real
shame because I genuinely believe that Hawk never intended to be a greedy
corporate monster as seemed to be the common interpretation but instead
presented people with an alternative, albeit an expensive one. Why do I think
this? Because of their most recent and significant product since the original
launch; The City in a Box (or Cityscape set to give it the proper name). It is
a product that clearly shows that they are trying to deliver to the community
to enable people to play their game.
The Cityscape is quite simply the best gaming product that I
have seen this year so far. Don’t get me wrong, it isn’t perfect. It is card
terrain which was always a pet hate of mine but I’ve overcome this hatred
because of this product. Easy to put together, cheap, good looking and it is
totally fit for purpose. It also has the added advantage that it means you can
get to playing…..really …really quickly. Everything you need in the box to fill
6x4 in 3D. Perfect. Only £30. PERFECT.
So this week I found myself at the point where we had fully
painted figures, fully prepared scenery (I’d braced the corners and weighted it
because….well I’m just like that) and two GoGs wanting to finally get to play
the game. Maybe the internet amplifies some of the negative things as much as
it inspires from the positive but the arrival of DZC on the table seemed to me
to be ridiculously emotive. Am I the only one who gets hooked on these ideas
and emotionally committed? Judging by the nerdrage I don’t think I am.
So were the ups and downs worth it?
Only a game was going to tell us.
Marge (The Silverback’s preferred moniker now she is
post-Op) and I squared off on Wednesday night over the newly laid out
Cityscape.
How cool is this?
I used my Shaltari……..
….whilst Marge deployed her lovely PHR. The awesome scaled
effect makes these look really cool. I’ll take this opportunity to say that
Marge also looked lovely (Little compliments like this help at the moment as
her hormone levels are still settling down after “The Change” and she gets a
bit weepy).
We plumped for the first mission and promptly got stuck in.
We both knew that we would get things wrong or just plain miss things but as
always, you’ve got to start somewhere. I got first initiative and my gateships
started to glide into the city……..
….and the PHR surged forward to meet us.
The first round ended quickly as both of us had just flown
onto the board and very little had been disembarked troop wise. This changed on
the second turn as we both started to get our troops into buildings and
commence the search for Objectives. I do like the fact that there are actually
rules for finding the objectives rather than just landing and grabbing them. It
just feels a bit more realistic as it conjures images of troopers sweeping
derelict buildings with scanners as they advance in squads. The second turn
ended with some rather painful but well spotted AA fire from the PHR that
downed a gateship that was moving forward to teleport some Shaltari AA tank
onto the city streets. The dropship bit tarmac but thankfully, as the shaltari
don’t actually ride in their dropships, the AA Tanks were safe in their orbital
transports…..for now.
At the start of the third turn Marge’s troops found their
objective first but my short-sighted Braves failed to discover anything in the
disused tower block that they’d moved into. The PHR’s walkers and the Shaltari
Tanks started to tangle with both sides losing vehicles as they traded shots.
The Shaltari gaining success from their high energy weapons whilst the PHR’s
numerous shots pierced the Grav Tanks energy shielding. The fire fight
continued into the next round until the weight of PHR proved to heavy to bear
and the Shaltari tanks were knocked out. Personally I think that moving forward
wreaks should stay on the field with smoke plumes to add to the feel of the
scenery.
The Shaltari did mange to strike back by downing a PHR
dropship but then, buoyed by this success, the AA tanks tried to take out some
PHR Walkers. N’er. No can do. After lots of ricochets the walkers were
completely unharmed and began to twist their torsos round to acquire a lock on
the (extremely) foolish Shaltari light armour. With their heavier guns gone the
Shaltari were forced further and further back as the PHR began to bracket their
position. The only recourse left to the Shaltari was to collect the one
objective that the braves had finally tripped over and get the flock out of
Dodge.
The freedom of the city meant a win to Marge and the tough
and nasty PHR.
Now we know we have plenty to read and correct before the
next game but the all important question.
Did we like it?
Oh Yes! The strange switching emotional attitudes (Mine not
Marge’s) encountered surely must have come from the fact that I was so looking
forward to a game that promised lots of movement and cinematic visuals. I was
not left disappointed neither was Marge.
At this level (starter sets) it is obvious that this game is
probably meant to be played with either more troops and less armour or
preferably just with larger forces. Hence the fact that Marge already has the
new PHR she ordered and mine are currently under the influence of the post
(shakes fist skyward in defiance of Kevin the god of postal workers).
Next game we’ll be trying to add the command cards and
probably giving the next scenario a crack. I’m confident that we’ve missed some
points about embarking etc but we can build on what we done next time.
All in all a good game with lots of potential and, as my
monumental error in attacking armour assault walkers with AA tanks showed, a
game with lots of points to learn.
Nice work Hawk. For the GoGs it is going to be a keeper.
