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Author Topic: Taking Back My Star Wars  (Read 2973 times)

Offline punkrabbitt

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Taking Back My Star Wars
« on: June 13, 2018, 03:27:16 AM »
Star Wars. The first movie was released in 1977 and it changed my life. The prequels were released, and they weren't as good, but at least they were special.

And for the last four or five years, with the lead up to The Force Awakens, I see friggin' Star Wars every single day. There is at least one licensed product commercial on every episode of every tv show. Every store has Star Wars products literally everywhere. I am so burnt out on all the commercialization of Star Wars that there are now THREE friggin' Star Wars movies I haven't even seen, including Carrie Fisher's last movie EVER, because of all of the over-exposure. I won't even wear my Star Wars tee-shirts any more. Disney has RUINED my favorite franchise ever. They stole a piece of my heart.

How does this tie into gaming? Because I found my long-lost big box o' WOTC Star Wars pre-paints a friend gave that I have been looking for FOREVER while I was cleaning the garage last week. I instantly made a whole bunch of skirmish game ideas. And then I put the box back on the shelf. Because friggin' Star Wars.

And then I decided that was a giant load of BS. I'm taking back MY Star Wars. On MY terms. And thus, Gangs Of Tatooine was born.

I am using my favorite multi-genre skirmish rules, FiveCore, with the science fiction suppository Five Parsecs From Home (the first edition.) I dutifully rolled up a five-member gang, two characters and three goons.

Kruha Lachu is the leader of the Gamos Krayt Dragons, a yarkorian armed with a pistol and sword and wearing combat armor. Naarm is a wookie armed with a shock rifle and some surprising stealth skills. There are also a dug and an ithorian armed with pistols, and a rodian with an rifle.

For their first outing, I rolled the "Heated Words" scenario as an enemy encounter. The enemy gang was four members with a variety of armaments. I just grabbed a couple handfuls of rocks from outside the front door and put them on my gaming table for scenery. Kruha Lachu and the enemy gang leader faced off 6" apart and so began the showdown...



The game was quick and brutal. Despite some random guy with a rifle showing up and joining the enemy, the Gamos Krayt Crew swept them off the table. Kruha killed both the enemy leader and another gang member in melee, the others were driven off table in the final turn.


^ that's Kruha Lachu in the middle, watching the other gang run for it.

After the game, campaign events resulted in Naarm leaving for the next three campsign turns(!) and the acquisition of a concealed blade and a patron. Because Naarm's departure brought the gang down to four people, two goons with pistols were added to the roster.

Now I need to generate the details for the next scenario. But I have a Manchukuo game to play first, just FULL of papercrafted scenery...
Hi! I'm Harry. I am a hobby addict; I game sci-fi, fantasy, and historical (including Ancients, Dark Ages, Renaissance, and World War II Manchukuo.)

Please visit my OSR products for sale at www.drivethrurpg.com/browse/pub/17194/Punkrabbitt-Publishing

Online Daeothar

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #1 on: June 13, 2018, 06:47:03 AM »
Excellent; that's exactly the way we old schoolers need to handle the current overload of SW: we take what we like and ignore the rest.

I'm of a mind to do the same and concentrate myself on the Rebellion era, and maybe the prequel era, but act as if my own SW universe never left Legends. I might even sell off my X-Wing First Order and Resistance ships in the process.

Of course I will dutifully go see all the movies, but only from a completist point of view, although I really liked Solo and absolutely loved Rogue One (must be because they're set in 'my' SW period).

I've bought into Star Wars Legion to finally use my WotC miniatures in actual battle, (I have loads of them, and I am using those instead of the new, overly large Legion minis, however lovely they are) but as soon as they start bringing out exotic or sequel units, I will not be getting them (although I will probably be getting the cards ::) ).

So I'm with you on this; many kudo's for turning your burning out on SW into your own take on the universe. Your train of thought is probably shared by many other old gits (me included) here on LAF, and I hope it will inspire many to develop their own selective tunnel vision, to concentrate on those things they like instead of having to accept everything Disney's commercial department is force-feeding (sic) us.

Your battle looks like fun. I take it it was a single player game? Goes to show how easy a Tattooine table can be; even with just a couple of domestic rocks, the pictures look convincingly Tattooinish, and the WotC prepaints always look the part from a distance (I am slowly repainting mine though, as the sculpts often deserve it).

So; keep it up, because I for one find it inspiring... :)

PS: am I the only one who finds the melon looming over the table like some sort of Vegan Death Star hilarious? lol
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Offline Mako

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #2 on: June 13, 2018, 07:57:37 AM »
Good for you!

Can't blame you one bit, since I'm of the same mind.

Loved Rogue One - Rate it almost as good as the original, SW movie, ANH, and Empire.  Perhaps a little better than Empire, in some respects, but with a similar, more adult-themed storyline, as opposed to teddy bear armies defeating "Elite Imperial Stormtroopers", and their armored vehicles with rocks and sticks.

Saw "The Force Awakens" on TV - utter dreck.  How many times can they redo the same story, with a few slight twists, over and over, and over again.  Seems as if ALL their good writers have died, and/or, certainly their directors/business managers/executives controlling the utter drivel they put out for storylines.

Haven't seen Solo yet, but hope to this weekend.  Apparently, from reviews, it could have been better, but is reasonably entertaining.  We'll have to see.

Sounds like fun with the minis.

Want to do that myself some day, and need to get with it, since I'm not getting any younger.  Have some figs, and some vehicles, and hope to do some gaming in/around Mos Eisley, as well as perhaps some other spaceports, and worlds from that era.

Need to scratch-build some structures/buildings to go with them, and some of the other terrain items I've acquired over time.

Need to make a few space vehicles to play in/around as well, including at least one spaceship interior, just for grins. 

Looks like some of the old SW Action Fleet vehicles match up reasonably well with the figs, so that's a plus too.

I do like your desert table, and the rocks do look very convincing for local terrain.

Will have to follow your progress, as time permits.

Enjoy!

Offline punkrabbitt

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #3 on: June 13, 2018, 08:01:42 AM »
Thank you, Daeothar and Mako. I was 13 when I saw Return Of The Jedi; by that time I had figured out that the Empire really was a scary organization and Stormtroopers were only bad shots when they were trying to shoot at the Light Side (Luke and friends, for the first three.) But I also noticed that on Tatooine and Cloud City that there were a lot of people not involved in the "big war" stuff and just wanted to get by. This was reinforced ten or so years later with the "Tales From The Cantina" anthology, which was kind of a snapshot of several intersecting lives in Mos Eisley.

The Force gets all the press, but I want to know the lives of the little guys :)

Offline vodkafan

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #4 on: June 13, 2018, 08:41:43 AM »
They were all just films to me, I never understood all the hoo-ha. But some of the spaceship designs were cool, with the Millenium Falcon being the coolest.
I am going to build a wargames army, a big beautiful wargames army, and Mexico is going to pay for it.

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Offline Ultravanillasmurf

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #5 on: June 13, 2018, 10:50:33 AM »
The film reviewer Mark Kermode said he never understood the appeal of the Star Wars films until he was a parent and watched children creating new stories with the toys. It was not the stories in the films that were important, it was that they gave children the tools to create stories in their heads.

That might be why the prequel stories received such bad responses, they did not match up to the stories in our heads.

The current films are (directly or indirectly) made by people who have already made Star Wars stories (for good or bad) in their heads.

I like the new films (and was not impressed with the prequels series) and remember the original versions of the first three fondly (the CGI "improvements" make me wince).

Somewhere I have a battered box of Palitoy figures, and three metal official Storm Troopers (cannot remember who made them).

I plan to run a game using Anvil figures and the Sarissa Landing pad using the 7TV rules.

Offline zemjw

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #6 on: June 13, 2018, 01:12:25 PM »
I've always liked the Star Wars universe as it seems big enough for anything to happen.

I hadn't paid a huge amount of attention to it after the original movies and completely missed the comics stuff. It was really the Clone Wars cartoons that brought me back into the fold as they really show a working, messy universe.

Most importantly to me there are civilians aplenty, something missing from other, grimmer settings ::)

I've settled on the Imperial Assault figures for now and I'm busy converting the duplicates. I have some buildings, but nothing painted and some vehicles (not yet built, never mind painted)

I have some of the FFG RPG books, mainly the source books. They look promising for background material if nothing else and the pictures in them are very much eye candy :-*

Plenty of material to feed into your own stories and more than enough "history" to play in :)

Offline Ultravanillasmurf

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #7 on: June 15, 2018, 07:38:56 PM »

Offline Hobby Services

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #8 on: June 15, 2018, 09:42:25 PM »
Quote
with the science fiction suppository Five Parsecs From Home

I have no idea what you were trying to say there, but that word does NOT mean what you think it means.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suppository

Also, you should take a look at Scott Pyle's Blasters & Bulkheads rules as another alternative for Star Wars gaming.
« Last Edit: June 15, 2018, 09:43:57 PM by Hobby Services »

Offline Tauntaun Scout

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #9 on: June 15, 2018, 11:21:35 PM »
I am diving back into WEG D6 Star Wars for similar reasons.

Offline Mako

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #10 on: June 16, 2018, 01:43:46 AM »
Not sure what rules I will use, but thinking of a mix of home-brew, FUBAR, Traveller, and Mythic - the latter to keep the storylines going.

I think some stuff from Traveller would work well on Tatooine, and other places in the SW universe.

B&B, and some of the others do sound interesting too.

Will probably do SW in 32mm, with the olde WotC minis.

Want to also do some larger games, and/or games with more terrain to explore, using 15mm - 18mm Sci-Fi minis too.

Offline Tauntaun Scout

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #11 on: June 16, 2018, 12:29:35 PM »
Here's why a lot of fans rejected the prequels, I think. The prequels weren't just different that what we imagined. As standalone films, they lacked a lot of the core elements that made the first movies popular.

Lucas intentionally created mystique in the old trilogy, and that was a big part of what grabbed people's imaginations. It was really silly to go and trash the mystique. We ought never have seen when Obi-Wan fought Darth Vader, or when Han met Chewbacca. The mystique was mostly gone.

Lucas' personal nostalgia for the 50's and 60's is everywhere in the old trilogy. No similar underlying consistent, sincere, artistic sentiment can be found in the other trilogies. The sincerity is gone so things feel a little more hollow.

A lot of revisiting of film history went into the old movies, that was subconscious pleasing to people, that's gone. Now instead of revisiting great films of the last 70 years, they just revisit the Star Wars franchise, so it gets inbred.

People really liked the lived-in look of the universe. CGI robbed the sets and costumes of some of that.

Lucas went from very subtly using mythology to very heavy handed use of mythological themes.

Rogue One was the exception in my book. It's the only DVD I'd bother to own besides the old stuff. Course it also came out shortly after I had my first daughter so all the "Stardust" stuff hit me too. Also as I age I'm becoming horrified by man's inhumanity to man, and Rogue One certainly did not depict war as a fun romp like other SW movies...

Offline area23

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #12 on: June 16, 2018, 09:29:31 PM »
Excellent analysis Tauntaun Scout.

The magic of starwars was my own interpretation with the action figures I had. Yak Face was really important and big friends with the ewoks in the forest diorama I built on my table. All the Skiff Guards were major protagonists. Endless afternoons of amazing stories.
Later on I merged the SW universe with Action Force figures and I built an incredibly cool sewer system (based on the Beauty and the Beast TV show with Ron Perlman) using old Playmobil buildings and sigar boxes.
Now with my toy soldiers it's the same thing really, painting wtih winks and homages to SW but doing my own thing.

The prequels were too much for me. I remember yoda flying, fighting Saruman. After that I collapsed. A black void, I don't remember anything. the third prequel I never watched, even if people say it's actually the best one.
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Offline AWu

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #13 on: June 16, 2018, 09:41:14 PM »
Threads like that make me regret buying only Gungans* when those models were dirt cheap.

I wanted to convert them for silly purposes and never get to it and I am stuck with 6 gungans somewhere :P

Offline punkrabbitt

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Re: Taking Back My Star Wars
« Reply #14 on: June 16, 2018, 09:58:34 PM »
Haha, a lot of call outs for my use of "suppository" instead of "supplement." But really, I get frustrated with book after book of extra rules, and new editions. So, I basically think that a supplement sticks it to me where the suppository is supposed to go.

I really appreciate all of the thoughtful analyses of the Star Wars franchise. I was okay with  the prequels, but thought Revenge Of The Sith went too far. Skip the scenes where Palpatine gives the Darth Vader title to Anakin, and then just show Kenobi and Amidala escaping. No show of cyber-Abakin, no birthing scene, just the opening of A New Hope with the ominous, never before seen Darth Vader, which keeps the reveal of "No, I am your father" every bit as relevant as it was back when Empire Strikes Back was first released.

FWIW, I should Episodes 1-6 in that order to my kids, and they always saw Darth Vader as Anakin just going through a rough patch.