How to build a very simple arena? If you have got some tools for woodworking, you can use them to cut some straight sections made of solid wood and plywood. The result is not pretty elliptical like an arena, but you have got 4 walls, and this could be enough to set your gladiatorial fight. The guy that made it think that these walls can be useful to recreate a fort or a fortified city. Add some paint and some external decoration made of cardboard and you can set various games inside it. It is how to build a cinematography set. To know more go here.

If you think that 1/6 action figures are expensive and that building a scenario for them is something impossible due to space issues, you don’t know the Memento Mori web comic. It is a Roman story made of photos of customised action figures, a lot of them. So you can call it photo story book instead of comic book. It is still in development, even if in the last times I think that new work lacks. However we are speaking of 223 pages at the present. With a cast of 95 figures and lots of extras. Think to the effort, economic and artistic to realise it. Epic!

Read the story of these people made of plastic but with human passions, free on the web on Memento Mori web site.

Ganesha Games releases are at a hectic pace, always more rules are produced that you can lose something. So here some news on the latest productions by GG.

4 Against Darkness is a huge hit with lots of supplements to upgrade your characters. Future books will expand character progression and focus on other types of adventures. All character types in 4AD will progress up to 20th and more level, and there will be more versatile classes. There will be the use of polyhedral dice, one die step per book.

Deeper Dungeons will have rules for expert characters (levels 6 to 9) who will use a D8 for their rolls. Adventures will focus on the exploration of lower level of dungeons, inhabited by more dangerous monsters. Characters are given a list of skills they can gain instead of levelling up.

Four Against the Wild will have rules for veteran characters (levels 10 to 14) who will use a D10 for their rolls. Adventures will focus on outdoor exploration of uncharted wilderness using a hex-based, sandbox terrain and quest generation system. The terrain generation system will work also for lower levels.

Legends of Norindaal will have rules for legendary characters (levels 15 to 20) who will use a D12 for their rolls. Adventures will focus on building strongholds, setting up thieves and wizards’ guilds, gaining political power, waging wars and defending one’s land from invading armies.

Among the Immortals will let characters become immortals and mingle with the many Gods of Norindaal. Characters will use a D20 for their rolls. Level will be reset at 1 but on a whole new tier. In this setting, searching for treasure means collecting bits of divine power that let characters affect reality. The party will explore different dimensions and defend their homeworld from extra dimensional invasions.

And more books are planned with this engine. I’m thinking about one too. In the near future we will have an Arthurian variant, in the less near future we will have a sci-fi variant.

However now we have got two new books: Dark Waters and The Three Rings! Play with them if you want to see more 4AD books.

The first card game by GG is called Fortebraccio. You use your cards to field an army of 12 cards with different kinds of troops on three lines. It was commissioned as a commemorative game for a 600 years ago battle in Perugia. I spoke about it in past posts on the blog when I playtested it:
Cards and comics
Legio Palatina reunion
I suppose that English version will be out before the end of the year.

More on the development of Faustus Furius. My translation is almost ready, so we have to wait only the editing and the illustrator work. The new Ben Hur flick will be out in August. I think that you could race with your chariots at that date.

And keep your money ready for the long announced OGAM supplement in the coming weeks. But this is another story…

Do you remember Ferrum et Gloria? This blog was born as a way to promote this game development. More than 5 years and half ago. In the meantime the blog became a sort of diary of my passions. And in the meantime, with lots of efforts, the first part of the rules was out for Lucca Comics & Games 2014. I’m still involved with the second part. It is not a matter of laziness. I really have got no time to write the rules. It is a long process but it is not impossible. But I’m blocked by work and life. Moreover I bought a new home and the refurbishment is like building a pyramid. It is only 40mq big. Calling it big it is almost a joke, indeed. But the construction work was so full of stress that it absorbed a lot of time, a lot of life. I want to finish what I started. I want to complete my gladiatorial rules. I thought almost all, but I must still playtest something and write on screen the words that explain the rules in a easy and plain way.
Where I am now?

The real name for Ferrum et Gloria 2 is Ferrum et Honor. I defined rules for shooters, dwarves, females, left-handed people, weather, terrain. Now I’m playtesting some things for horsemen, chariots, beasts. Then there will be some other issues but the core of the book is full developed. I wrote half of it too. Only a matter of time. Then the editing phase and next year the effort to produce the English edition. So I wish to release the 2nd Italian book for Lucca C&G 2016 (October), but I expect that it will be realistically realised for Hellana 2017 (March).

In the meantime I’m contributing to the development of a new game, Faustus Furius by Nicholas Wright. It is about chariot races and you can read it in English for late June or July. My Italian edition will be available around September. They are not gladiators but something similar. I hope you will enjoy it. It is only a matter of free time.

I was so late with the reports that I forgot to speak about one article of mine on Dadi & Piombo magazine. You can find it here https://dadiepiombo.it/dp59.html but it is only in Italian language. It features a review on available miniatures to play in gladiator games in all scales, 15mm to 300mm. However if you want to see a review by images, you can look at this page on my dedicated website about my rules: https://www.massimomoscarelli.it/ferrumetgloria/?page_id=21
Following here scans of the article. I don’t think you can read it, small types indeed. It is better to buy the magazine to do it…

I found that Sergio Franchi, the miniature painter that works a lot on Andrea Sfiligoi miniature collection, realised a couple of arenas for Ferrum et Gloria. He sells them and accepts commissions to build other arenas. You can find him here: https://www.facebook.com/sergio.franchi.33

After the Miniature Island review, the Ganesha Games one.

This was the Fungi year and Advanced Song Blades and Heroes rules were played in the convention.

During a pause Andrea drew a sketch of Norindaal world.

A couple of rules explanation and demonstration moments.

The Friday table of Heel Creek, the Ganesha Games spaghetti western rules. Now only in Italian. The first pressing was sold out. When Andrea will find the time, you can have the English version. If you are still waiting Ferrum et Gloria in English you can understand schedule priority…

This man is the author and he could kill Andrea in the following months. In a western time style indeed.

This couple is Crazy Factory, a miniature company that is realising a custom version of Andrea future science fiction rules. You can find a beta version on their website.

An official photo of our hero in Lucca outfit.

Animal rules are practically ready, only some tweaks are needed. I need more tests but now I’m involved in a new project due for the end of the year. More news in a next time.

And here while I’m was testing some food available at the canteen: beans and tomato, together with fried potatoes.

After a general coverage of the convention (but more things were around), now the part dedicated to Ganesha Games presence: two gaming tables and one large table as vendors.

Mushrooms at large. Miniatures were cast and now Andrea can demonstrate the Advanced version of Song of Blade and Heroes with them. An enormous house was built by Miraz, the author of the new western rules, SBH based. Dwarves are arriving from casters.

The first convention day was with an OGAM scenario run by Diego based on new OGAM supplement on Celt mythology.

Andrea as entertainer for mothers and children.

Your hero together with a mother and her child. Note my new Gojira t-shirt. Sometime the demo work is useful to attract new people to wargame, sometime is simple entertainment for children.

During inaction time we playtested some new rules for venationes. A very useful session.

This is our group photo. A beautiful holiday among miniatures. My regret is scarce possibility to visit places where we play because all the time we remain involved in gaming. Only dinner time is free. All restaurants in town were sold out so we winded up in a pizzeria where the owner sang old tunes together with orders. Chisena sang following the owner. Weird and fun. However pizza was not the best, pity. But lunch was worse: internal canteen was not cheap and not good. After the dinner, the concierge delighted us with descriptions about his artistic ceramic personal collection. We heard it with dreamy interest. Because we were falling asleep. Our friends of wargaming clan ate in another place. A great and genuine meal based on meat plates. We declined because of vegetarianism. And even because we know that was a meal that lasted more time. So when they returned later than us, the impact with the concierge was far worse. The Sunday morning they were destroyed by scarce sleep.

We are completing the back events schedule. No coverage of Tiferno Comics (too near to Empoli, only Andrea went) and Maker Faire Rome (too many people and chaos to pick an interesting photo). So it is time for Lucca.