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Author Topic: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis  (Read 5567 times)

Offline Agis

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Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« on: February 18, 2018, 08:47:12 AM »
OK, time for another blast from the past.
Back in 1997/ 1998 and years later I was a big Aeon Trinity and Trinity Battleground  fan.

Some info:
Trinity is the first published game in the Trinity Universe trilogy, and the final entry in the trilogy chronologically. Trinity is a science fiction game set in the early 22nd century, a time referred to as both the Trinity Era and the Unity Age. Psions are the protagonists and player characters of the game.

Trinity (and the larger Trinity Universe) was created on a very short timeline, conceived and created a mere 10 months before publication. It was designed as a replacement for the Exile game spearheaded by Mark Rein•Hagen, who took the game with him when he left active involvement at White Wolf in 1996. Trinity was the first Trinity Universe game published, and originally was called ÆON (so all the Trinity Universe games began with an A). It was renamed Trinity to avoid legal problems with MTV's Aeon Flux. Early editions of Trinity with the ÆON title are rarities.

In 2012, Onyx Path Publishing purchased the full rights to the Trinity Universe, and are planning their own new edition, to be titled the Trinity Continuum: Æon.

The game gets a BIG relaunch at the moment, a Kickstarter is running to revive the game line! As long time fan I immediately jumped at the opportunity and backed the game.
See: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/200664283/trinity-continuum-aeon-rpg?ref=user_menu

While the Kickstarter is purely about the RPG, Trinity was more, back in 1997/ 1998 it was also a miniature game - Trinity: Battleground. It's notable for being White Wolf's first — and to date, only — foray into miniatures gaming. The rules were straightforward, and based of the Storyteller System. Converting characters between systems wasn't very difficult.


Strike Team Psion from the boxed game - Somers, Jameson, Dr. Sager (Blister packed metal mini), Bayta, Williams


Strike Team from blisters packed metal minis - Sage, Lu Chen, Jon Holt, Juanos Palmero, Montrose

Unfortunately, Trinity suffered from lower sales than its World of Darkness counterparts.

IMO the release date timing  was not well chosen, the game was release more or less at the same time as GWs 40K 3rd edition and Warzone 2nd edition.

So despite its ease of playability, detailed setting and and how fun it was, a miniatures game based on Trinity turned out to be a financial failure. A mere six months after its initial 1998 release, it went out of print.

A real shame as far as I am concerned since the game was in many aspects ahead of it's time, alternate unit activation opposed dice rolls etc.

Battleground's default setting presented characters as members of the Legions or as Aberrants fighting for control of Khantze Lu Ge. While very similar to Trinity, the settings were not identical. For example, Trinity's Strike Team Psion was a popular animated series distributed on the OpNet. In Battleground, it's an actual Strike Team.


Aberrants - Krikquill , Caul Fein and Fhata Khan- from the core box

Some Background information

Assuming Battleground would have continued, several supplements were planned. The first was to be called Trinity: Battleground - LoneStar, and would further open up character options. Characters would be either members of Orgotek or from the Federated States Military, fighting in the Tex-Mex District.

The next supplement was to have been called Trinity: Battleground - ChromePrime, featuring the invasion of Chrome Prime as seen in Alien Encounter 1: Invasion. It would open up character options to include members of the Æsculapian Order, the Ministry and ISRA, as well as Chromatics.

The final supplement mentioned was one involving the Norça and the Qin. The name and setting are unknown. It's possible that two more supplements would have followed, the first involving the Upeo wa Macho and the Coalition, and the second involving the Chitra Bhanu and the Doyen.

All miniatures well sculpted by veteran Bob Naismith. 20 years ago the miniatures were on par with contemporary releases, for today’s standards (2018), they suffer from the usual, Big feet, hands and head syndrome.


I am very tempted to pick up my old minis again and get some dice rolling.
More pics on my site as always: http://www.adpublishing.de/html/aeon_trinity.html
cheers and keep on gaming, Agis - http://www.adpublishing.de

Offline Schogun

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #1 on: February 18, 2018, 02:42:01 PM »
I enjoyed this minis game, too. There were some rules that had to be fixed, but overall a good system. I was excited to see Trinity return until I realized it was RPG only. Maybe some day...

FYI -- there was an unpublished Player's Guide after game release that could have been the first supplement. It revised some rules and added new troop types and abilities...along with a lot of new background story and history. It may still be out there somewhere.
« Last Edit: February 18, 2018, 02:44:59 PM by Schogun »

Offline stone-cold-lead

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #2 on: February 18, 2018, 03:43:33 PM »
Never heard of the game before. Great work on the models.

Offline mrgrigson

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #3 on: February 18, 2018, 06:51:11 PM »
Excellent! I had a copy of this as well, before it disappeared due to my own stupidity.

The mechanic that I loved, that I later enjoyed seeing in SuperSystem, was how they handled the henchmen units, with each model representing a wound. Allowed for great representation of mooks with superhumans.

Offline Agis

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #4 on: February 18, 2018, 06:53:40 PM »
Thanks folks!
FYI -- there was an unpublished Player's Guide after game release that could have been the first supplement. It revised some rules and added new troop types and abilities...along with a lot of new background story and history. It may still be out there somewhere.

Indeed, you can get it free here:
http://www.wargamevault.com/product/122127/Trinity-Battleground-Players-Guide

And yes, Battleground had many rules included that were later picked up by other games!

Offline Malebolgia

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #5 on: February 19, 2018, 08:16:47 AM »
Awesome blast from the past man. Terrific paintjobs on these.
I remember getting this game on eBay back in 1999 for $20 including shipping lol. It was the time I actually sent all the money as cash in an envelope to the seller in the US. Ah, golden times.

We played the game once and loved it. It was really good! The scenery was also very good. Still bummed I binned all the cardboard scenery.
“What use was time to those who'd soon achieve Digital Immortality?”

Offline Hobby Services

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #6 on: February 20, 2018, 10:28:37 PM »
Fantastic work there, Agis, and a great retrospective of the game's history - which is pretty obscure if you didn't happen to play it during its brief window of availability.  I've always regretted that WW didn't get more into minis games - they had a Werewolf the Apocalypse skirmish game on the planning board as well but nothing ever came of it that I know of.

Offline James Holloway

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #7 on: February 22, 2018, 03:10:41 PM »
Lovely figures. I had a few of the Aberrants back in the day, which made good utility monsters. Nice figures but quite delicate! I may even still have a few somewhere in my Cthulhu models case. Your paint jobs really make them stand out.

Offline Wachaza

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #8 on: February 22, 2018, 03:35:52 PM »


Strike Team from blisters packed metal minis - Sage, Lu Chen, Jon Holt, Juanos Palmero, Montrose

Those Naismith sculpts have a real Rogue Trader vibe. I think I only ever saw the boxed set in a UK shop. Had no idea that anything else ever appeared.

Offline Agis

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #9 on: February 22, 2018, 04:31:18 PM »

Offline The_Beast

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #10 on: February 22, 2018, 08:05:50 PM »
Have the old Battleground box in the basement, though never played. Did you ever do any of the terrain features?

Actually, I've been seeking some of the old books if I can find at not great price, as I picked up some artwork from a fellow that did a bit for Star Wars D10, but said one was actually Aeon.

Stuff is fun, but huge bonus if actually original game art. I'm a sucker for that... ;D

Doug

Gabbi

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #11 on: February 22, 2018, 09:59:36 PM »
I should still have a box somewhere that I got mainly for the terrain (at the time I mostly played Necromunda with included terrain). Minis should be untouched.

Offline Agis

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #12 on: February 23, 2018, 11:39:59 AM »
Did you ever do any of the terrain features?

Honestly - NO! Even back in the days I found the paper buildings too flimsy and the hills too ugly...
;)

Offline Warboss Nick

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #13 on: February 25, 2018, 10:58:48 AM »
Wow, now that‘s news from the past! We played the RPG back then, and my friends gave me battleground as a birthday present. With no tabletop experience whatsoever we utterly failed, but the seed was sown and it got. me into 40k which led to warmaster which led to WHFB and finally historics...

I still have the box and some extra Minis somewhere in case you‘re interested.

Offline Agis

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Re: Agis Aeon Trinity Battleground minis
« Reply #14 on: February 25, 2018, 12:13:32 PM »
Thanks warboss!
What do you got? I am interested!

BTW - The new - slightly modified - background revealed during the KS is just great!
Last KS days...

 

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