RIVETS BOPPERs

Offering for sale NOW:

Reproductions of the Martian Metals BOPPERs for Metagaming's Microgame #5: RIVETS

The tragic fire in Martian Metals destroyed all the original molds and the company did not return after the fire.

Metagaming originator Howard Thompson had abandoned the intellectual property in 1983.

From these moves, now 30 years later, I have taken up the torch of exposing more game players to the great game title, RIVETS.

To that end I have some castings of the BOPPERs for sale.  Each set is priced at $8.00 U.S. funds.
Shipping is in a new box, at a flat rate of $22.00 U.S. funds to anywhere in North America.
Shipping to other world destinations, please contact: viperbbb@gmail.com for a quote.

The BOPPER Control and Production Complex is where the BOPPERs are built & programmed

Heavy artillery firepower is the feature of the Big BOPPER

Air Power from the Dive BOPPER (you will need your own pin for the flight base)

Famed for its battle cry of "POP-A-TOP"  the JB is a favorite

Light BOPPERs are speedy and deadly in swarms

A bit of a rough knuckle dragger the Rocket BOPPER gives fire support

Tiny (pronounced 'teeny') BOPPERs are the brains of the operation

SCRUD Cossack skirmish

The Campaign of Nations called for a skirmish series to determine which side would win out in the on-going patrolling battle in the no-mans-land between the two contesting armies in Brandenberg.

I settled on using SCRUD for this contest as my tabletop area is still finishing renovations (new flooring!) and would take some time to set up the table, plus I had no opponent for the day as he was having to do family stuff.

The first two battles went pretty simply, first for the French, the second for the Russians.  Both of them were more or less attrition battles.

The rubber match, was a different story.

In round 1 the French lost one die, similar to the first game they won.

Round 2 was a draw, almost equal dice rolls across the board.

In round 3 the dice fell like this:

the Russian dice are in the 'oval' at the lower center of the image

Not so much an attrition battle this time, as the French almost wiped the Russians out in one roll!

The next round, told the full tale:

Gone in two throws of the dice, the Cossacks just cannot seem to win the patrolling battle when it counts

So the Campaign of Nations resumes, with the French continuing to dominate the critical patrolling war.

On a different note, my middle son requested measuring sticks and dice to do some LEGO fun.

nope, no influence from the gamer dad at all ...

Garden Wars - ARMY MEN

Having gone away for a camp out trip with my family, on the way home we stopped at a toy store.  My youngest decided to spend his fun money on a bucket of tan and green soldiers that had some vehicles in it also.

He was most pleased with his purchase and has been seen around the house playing games with them.

On Tuesday night he suddenly declared, "Hey Dad I can do Garden Wars with these men!  Will you play with me tomorrow?"

How could I resist?

My only request was that he count the men and mark on the troops what number they were so that we could make sure not to loose any in the tall grass ... known as forest in the game.

The real win came later, when my young son decided to write out some rules ... this is the 'cover'

the beige troops were under my control, they have a jet

and a tan, along with 28 men, a mix of officers, radio men, grenadier, flamethrowers, riflemen and a metal-detector soldier

the green were under his control, they have helicopter, tank and similar men, with mortars instead of bazooka

here is the commander laying out his forces

action started (there were no rules written) so I just followed along with what was decided and tried to keep it all in my head.  I did show the boy all about men riding on the back of a tank.

then my jet went into action - not quite shooting down his helicopter after my bazookas had killed his tank

the not quite dead helicopter then killed my jet and went on to destroy my tank

Luck for the green helicopter was the tipping point as the GREEN TEAM won the day!

Pulp Action

Encounter at El-Birbir.

Some fun with Jeff and his multifarious minis.

Pulp Action rules with some flair using sentries as 'mobile' perils...

Capo's Gangsters which I ran

The Dark Fire ...cool name for a bunch of red shirts, organized by Peter

Winchesters, Jeff's crew

The red shirts ran into trouble with perils, though they did have two of the items at one point

perils everywhere (the white dressed guys in fezzes) and the red shirts still could not hit them ...

Peter taking a turn at the storytelling microphone, all our skills need honing in that area

lucky discovery, stop a good shooter with a pugilist

Jeff has many other shots of the action on his blog

in the end it was a cool storytelling moment when the Dark fire #1 and Capo's leader met within inches of the final objective.  In the end the red shirt dropped his item leaving only the Capo's with anything of value.

English Civil War Horse Progress IV AND Royalist foote sneak peek

The second layers of colour are on all the horse now.

animal colors are all done

The shabraques and some rider details are all that remain, then gloss coating and flocking.

I went over to Jeff's the other day and did some detail painting support for him so that the Royalist forces would be completed around the same time as my Parliament ones are.

Here are some sneak peeks at the Royalist drill ongoing ...

a red coat Royalist foote unit, that I did some stockings and belts for

the great mass remaining that is still going to need detail works

If all things go as planned, Jeff and I ought to have troops on the tabletop in the late Autumn or Winter, just as the weather turns nasty.

English Civil War Parliamentary Force - a review

Entire force seen in overhead view deployed in lines

I took the opportunity to get out the English Civil War forces that I have been building over this past winter and spring and paraded them for the camera.

Jeff and I have been discussing flag sizes, so I decided to flag all the units and use this as a comparison opportunity also.

looking down the lines from the left flank

one of two 'commanded shotte' units, this one in black, the other in green

a selection of command figures, with the Cromwell pennon in the rear

view down the lines from the right flank

liens now switched to columns, with the horse leading

The foote flags are all two inches square (on the pole, the sticker is 2"x4" folded over the flagpole), while the horse are all one and one-half inches square (again on the pole).

the three blew foote regiments flags

the two red and one gray foote regiments flags

the three horse regiment flags

a closer comparison of the size of horse and foote flags

ECW Horse progress III

color undercoat on bottom image, just inked on the top image

The color undercoat and inking are pictured here, now all completed.

Next stages are flesh (for the riders), manes, tails and blazes for the horse and finally the riders 'colors' - in this case mostly shades of browns and yellows.