Hi all

[Quetzalcoatl]

Hi all,

First post here Few words to introduce myself :

I’m a French 40 years old wargamer (historical 15mm ancient
and Renaissance ) as well as an occasional RPGer
( call of Cthulhu, Shadowrun D&D, …).

15mm has been  my scale of choice as it was cheaper and
my buddies had mainly 15mm armies anyway.
But after a recent eye accident (don’t use electric metalic brush
without glasses,  it hurts…) i found myself  quite unable to paint
15mm figs any longer, so had to turn myself to 25mm.

I was wondering what was going to be  my gate to this scale
until i stumbled  across some  pulp threads on The Miniatures  Page
relating « .45 adventure » reports.
Man was i happy !! All of a sudden scenarios after scenarios were
taking shape in my head, with infinite possibilities of playing with
figures i could have never used in a standard army across weird and
various worlds !! that was it !! instantly hooked !!

Now i would need your help :

I’ve bought most of the.45 adventure rules and supplements and love
 them .
What you veteran pulp players would recommend as a starting theme/
style ?

What are the themes that

1-offer the most replayablity (is that a word ?^^) with the same figures before you feel the need  to play other pulp themes ?.
Or
2- offer the largest scope for expension (without having to buy completly
new figures) ?

Pirates ? gangsters ? Darkest Africa /Lost worlds/ ?
All this to avoid buying hundreds of figures (which is going to happen anayway^^) to play various pulp themes right from the begining…
but rather using some already used for previous theme and buying few others to start a new but not completely unrelated theme.

My personal favorite themes are, Call of Cthulhu, Anything related to Ancient Egypt (momies and such), Pirates, Zombies, Maya/Aztec ,
weird WW2  and to a lesser extend Gangsters,  Back of Beyond
(those two i don’t know much about), others…

Well that's it for now, thanks for your patience^^.

didier.

[Operator5]

Welcome to the Madness.  :mrgreen:

Here is a quick list off the top of my head of figures that will always have some use.

1.) WWII German soldiers. Always the villains and you can have them show up anywhere.

2.) Chinese Gangsters/Bandits. Another group that can show up anywhere. They can also be good guys if you set it up that way.

3.) Mummies/Skeletons/Undead. As a scenario hook, these can also be used anywhere in the world. Often the dead were claimed to guard some tomb/holy site/etc.

4.) Heroes. Picking and choosing a half dozen hero types from Artizan, Brigade, Copplestone, Pulp (or even some from my line). Just find the models you like best and grab them.

5.) Unspeakable Horrors. Since you like Cthulhu, the creatures from that Mythos can show up anywhere. And since many of his creatures were indescribable, they can look like whatever you want. Maybe check out RAFMs line of Cthulhu creatures and pick up 3-4 of them.

6.) Hooded Minions. Another group that can have many uses. Pulp Figures and Artizan have groups of them and we have The Jade Hood coming out in January and Bud and Lou (his minions) already out.

That's my short list. After that I would add Artizan's Sky Pirates just because they're cool, Brigade and Copplestone gangsters, almost anything from the Pulp Figures line.

[JollyBob]

Hello! Nice to meet you.

If you're looking for a nice intro to Pulp games, why not build a "serial" around your figures, so you can use the same ones every time?

Like the old saturday morning serials, you have a plucky band of adventurers that are the same every week, and a scheming villain and his minions (who always manages to escape, thereby setting up next week's installment.  :: )

Think about the old stuff and you can have any background you like, from Flash Gordon to Tarzan, Zorro or The Untouchables.

You can then have a rolling story that uses self contained "Chapters", with varying goals, and not necessarily even linked to a larger narrative.

Given your preferences, I'd go for a group of Investigators versus a Ctulhu cult, and make the Magister/Cult Leader the recurring baddie. And you can set it wherever you like too, making use of whatever scenery is at hand.

"Well, Sparks, we stopped the Red Hand here in Arkham, but De Montaigne slipped away in the confusion. Looks like he took the sceptre with him too..."

"Hey Bulldog, look at this map! Why do you suppose there's a big cross in the middle of the Gobi Desert?"

TUNE IN NEXT WEEK!

[Lowtardog]

Welcome aboard Quetzalcotl, this forum is a wealth of information and will lead you on many paths of gaming and inspriation from the great lead god.

I think Operator 5 (and Jollybob who snuck in a post while I was typing ) sums up the best approach, you can have your band of heroes and morph them into any genre you like.

I would be interested in your Aztec/Maya gaming, that is one of my favourite periods and a continuing saga for gaming and miniture collections

[TadPortly]

Welcome to the Madness.  :mrgreen:

Here is a quick list off the top of my head of figures that will always have some use.

1.) WWII German soldiers. Always the villains and you can have them show up anywhere.

2.) Chinese Gangsters/Bandits. Another group that can show up anywhere. They can also be good guys if you set it up that way.

3.) Mummies/Skeletons/Undead. As a scenario hook, these can also be used anywhere in the world. Often the dead were claimed to guard some tomb/holy site/etc.

4.) Heroes. Picking and choosing a half dozen hero types from Artizan, Brigade, Copplestone, Pulp (or even some from my line). Just find the models you like best and grab them.

5.) Unspeakable Horrors. Since you like Cthulhu, the creatures from that Mythos can show up anywhere. And since many of his creatures were indescribable, they can look like whatever you want. Maybe check out RAFMs line of Cthulhu creatures and pick up 3-4 of them.

6.) Hooded Minions. Another group that can have many uses. Pulp Figures and Artizan have groups of them and we have The Jade Hood coming out in January and Bud and Lou (his minions) already out.

That's my short list. After that I would add Artizan's Sky Pirates just because they're cool, Brigade and Copplestone gangsters, almost anything from the Pulp Figures line.

I would add some British infantry as the British Empire covered a large part of the globe, plus some egyptian/arab figures (good bad guys).  Plus how about some Foreign Legion? Artizan do a very good range of the latter.

[Wraith]

Hello!
I'm still new myself, but welcome.

I am just a few years into pulps, but the above ideas are good ones.

My gaming buddies are usually really lean on miniatures, and I am lucky if they provide their own hero miniature! So I get to supply all the minis and paint-jobs.(Though one fellow bought a load of Copplestones at Gen Con for me to paint up, thereby starting the Whole pulps genre minis craze)

Anyways, I just started with a dozen hero types, let my buddies roll up their characters and we leap those same characters from senario to senario.
I have taken them all over the world!

Then, before I run a new senario, I buy about a dozen more minis to support that senario, and paint them up! it wont cost much at the time, and the painting wont get overwhelming.

Soon your pulps mini collection will grow if you play frequently.

So this is how mine grew in the last year:

1: A dozen or so hero types
2: Chinese hatchet guys
3: British troops
4: Archeologist types
5: Nazis
6: Wierd WWII types
7: Volcano denizens
8: Deep sea suited fellows
9: Rocketeers

To see them all on the table seems like a lot, but they came along gradually.

[twrchtrwyth]

Hello. You'll find this a great place for inspiration and everyone is exceptionally friendly.

I don't think you could go wrong with one or two robots either. The mad scientist could hide anywhere and use any type of figures as mercenaries to guard his inventions.

[Quetzalcoatl]

Thanks for the warm welcomes all I already feel at home amongst
 you^^.
 I've put a little bit more thoughts into what could be a reasonable
 first flexible theme, and came to the conclusion that i should
 take into account what  my buddies would be familiar with/interested
 in...

 A dozen generic heroes might be a solid start though. Now, i still
 have to decide whether they are going to be urban style

 http://www.copplestonecastings.co.uk/images/gn2.jpg

 those ones could probably face gangsters, weird ww2, cultists,
 even cthulhu themes) whereas the other heroe style

 http://www.copplestonecastings.co.uk/images/af22.jpg
 http://www.copplestonecastings.co.uk/images/bc1.jpg
 would be fitting for Darkest Africa, Lost worlds ( pygmies,
 masai...) dino hunts, Egyptian/archeological adventures themes.

 While writting i'm considering another angle that might make
 decision faster that is my ability to construct the scenery (trees,
 buildings...) as i've never built any...

 So i might have to select those heroes according to the scenery
 i'm going to be able to produce. I "think" jungles, lost worlds
 landscape, egyptian style sceneries, might be easier to build
 than urban ones ( houses made of bricks etc...).

 Unless you advise me against i ( scenery more difficult to build than
 i anticipate for exemple ) think i'm going to go the non-urban
 style first as i could use cheap but nice dino figs for hunting games
 and find egyptian building/ darket African lands easier to produce
 than Chicago buildings and urban ones^^.

 Did i miss anything?

[Operator5]

Jungles and ruins are some of the quickest terrain pieces to put together. Of course, the more time you spend on it, the better your terrain will look.

I think that's a good way to start. And, if you start that way, you can always add some middle eastern buildings and when you add gangsters have them show up in Cairo.

Good luck and I hope you'll keep us up tot date on everything you work on and the games you run.

[Argonor]

Welcome aboard Quetzalcotl, this forum is a wealth of information and will lead you on many paths of gaming and inspriation from the great lead god.

AKA make you buy minis and rulesets you'd never imagined existed  ::

Welcome to this mansion of lead-induced madness, indeed. Enter freely and of your own will... (this really should be the Prof. speaking, but I could not resist this pun, sorry  :wink: )

[Hammers]

As Alex, that is Professor Witchhemer, has proven: you simply cannot have to many African tribal warriors/villagers. The same probably gooes for Baluchi (tribal warriors of various ethnicities in arabized fineries) which can be uses for many epochs and areas of conflicts.

Myself, I swear by merchant sailors and Englishmen in tweed. Very versatile, both.

[warrenpeace]

My personal favorite themes are, Call of Cthulhu, Anything related to Ancient Egypt (momies and such), Pirates, Zombies, Maya/Aztec ,
weird WW2  and to a lesser extend Gangsters,  Back of Beyond
(those two i don’t know much about), others…

If you like Maya/Aztec stuff, have you seen the temples done by Stonehouse Miniatures in Portland, Oregon?

http://www.stonehouseminiatures.com/buildingsruins/

One of the most expensive things about the hobby, in terms of storage space and time, not just money, is the terrain.  You might consider picking two or three types of terrain to concentrate on, and then getting a few figures from different time periods that could be used on the same terrain.

[Quetzalcoatl]

Great !! Thanks for tips guys i've been through some more threads
 and thanks to all the contributions i should be able to have an idea
 on how to start my sceneries ^^.
 The difficult part is going to avoid comparing what i've seen and
 what i'm going to build and paint.....
 
 @ Argonor, i'm sure here of my free will, and don't really plan to escape
     getting my fair share of pile of lead, just it doesn't grow out of hand
     right from the begining .

 @ Hammershield, good point with the sailors, i sure could send them
     them all over the world and it brings a nice Corto Maltese touch.

 @ Warrenbruhn, my god !! no, i wasn't aware of those handsome
     Meso-American constructions, gorgeous!! As you might gather
     from my what i've already said and my username, i'm a BIG
     fan of this period and, even though i'm probably
     not going to start with this theme at my club, i'm definitly going
     to start a 25mm  Mayan, Aztec or Inca project as early as i can.

 Trying my best to keep some sort of sanity in front of all those
 infinite possibilities that are calling me so loudly !!

[Troll]

Welcome to the list. I can't add much to what has already been said, but I am a Cthulhu fan as well and am looking forward to the rumored .45 Adventure horror supplement that is due out next year.

Cheers,
Troll

[Argonor]

Welcome to the list. I can't add much to what has already been said, but I am a Cthulhu fan as well and am looking forward to the rumored .45 Adventure horror supplement that is due out next year.

Cheers,
Troll

Hear, hear!! (rattling his chains, and shuffling his feet...)