Lego is a toy manufacturer. All started as wood bricks, than plastic bricks. The fatal move was to put in this some mini figures, creating a world. After a crisis due to other new hobbies for children as videogames, now Lego is more famous than ever.

Minifigs are the people of Lego’s world. Nowadays they are sold in series and you can find a lot of kinds. But you can’t find strictly military kinds because of a pacifist politic of Lego. However independent (and almost illegal) producers fill the gap with pieces to build historical warriors. And there is someone as this Brick Dictator that use stop motion to create minifilms with minifigs about military battles. Here some examples, on his YouTube canal you can find more.

Among other things I’m a militaria collector too. I focus on WWII Folgore items to act as reenactor for Folgore historical group. There are a lot of militaria shows and this is the bigger and nearer in my area.

Here some items of a friend of mine. Some are materials founded with a metal-detector.

Another view of the fair. Collectors are buyers too. And lots efforts are made to buy something and then sell it for a better or newer thing. You can make a profession of it, but I think the main goal is to reach real pieces of history in your hand. Prices are generally important so every trade is not a simple one. I even found a lot of interesting books, but I applied the formula “or all or none”. So I postpone purchasing to a late time, when I will have more money than now.

Daggers and medals: memories of past killings.

A desert kubelwagon it is always a pleasant view.

And now a couple of customised 1/6 action figures on Folgore theme.

To close, some young models with a standard of a fascist feminine group and helmets from another age. I think that they don’t know what these things were. A photo was took at every stand. They were advertising a power drink and their model school, I suppose. And more beautiful girls with high heels were in the fair. So you had to decide what to watch, or military items or something else. A difficult choice, indeed.

4 against darkness is the first game of a series by Ganesha Games. It is a great success and one of the bestsellers in the history of Ganesha Games. Caves of Kobold Slave-Masters is the first supplement, an adventure for characters of 1 and 2 level. More books will be in this format and new different adventures with this engine will be published. One of them is setting in Arthur world, and maybe another one will be a campaign for gladiators. But before this one I have to publish the second part of Ferrum et Gloria.

It is basically a solo play dungeon exploration. No miniatures are needed. All you need is the book, a pencil, two six sided dice, and grid paper. You choose four character types from the classic classes (warrior, wizard, rogue, halfling, dwarf, barbarian, cleric, elf), equip them, and start adventuring in dungeons created by dice rolls and by your choices. When you enter a room, you generate its content on a series of random tables. You will meet monsters, fight them, hopefully defeat them (or decide that discretion is the better part of valour!), you will manage your resources (healing, spells, life points, equipment), grab treasure, dodge traps, find clues, and even accept quests from the monsters you meet. Your characters can level up and become better at what they do, but it will not be easy. You may use miniatures to remember your characters’ marching order if you wish, but that’s it. It is not a roleplaying game. You may run it as a simple cooperative, GM-less game if you want. It is not a game-book or a choose-your-own-adventure book: there is no prose to read or numbered sections to go to, even if it could be something like that in new supplements.

There is also a small competition valid until May 25th, 2016. You have to write up one or more playthrough reports of the game, and publish them on social media (Facebook, Twitter, G+, etc) or on your gaming-related blog. The more reports you write, the more chances you get to win. Unleash your purple prose and tell us about the glorious victories or the rotten luck of your heroes. Post photos of your completed dungeons on Instagram! Use the #4AgainstDarkness hashtag and always add a link to the product page. Make sure that each report includes a link to the product on www.ganeshagames.net and send an email to andreasfiligoi@gmail.com to let him know of it. On the 25th, the day after his birthday, Andrea will put all names in a hat and draw a winner who will get a lifetime subscription to all 4AD products.

So it is spring and time for another Romics, the comic fair of Rome.

Bigger every time but not so great and big as Lucca Comics & Games. However there were a lot of things to do and watch. 5 enormous pavilions to live. We started at the 10 in the morning and we left at 19 in the evening. And our feet were aching. As our wallets.

Here Andrea caught in the act as victim of a sinister comic seller. That people are terrible chaps…

Gadgets are sometimes more important than comics in comic fairs. Since a couple of years we are flooded by Funk vinyl toys. I watched hundred of them to find a Chrome Blue Flash for a friend of mine.

Romics is a place fulfilled with cosplayers. Sorry, I haven’t photos of young girls with costumes. Too busy with other things. But I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe…

Always in hormones topic, after mousepads with tits, smartphone covers with tits!

As usual, statuettes with big tits and asses. However this time I saw less art pieces as these around.

Another kind of statuette. On the right a Sturmtruppen, comic characters of some time ago by Bonvi.

Lego minifigs are huge numbers now. The collecting market take advantage of pieces from first series so some of them are now sold at 45€ each! But they are very cute.

Some lego bricks together.

This edition was dedicated to Go Nagai that was in Rome for a prize. In these days, in newspaper kiosks you can find new edition of statuettes, dvds and comics by Go Nagai.

Some original animation cells by Grendizer aka Goldrake Atlas Ufo Robot in Italy. This is like a religion for my generation.

Gadgets from 35 year ago. Among them, evaporators for heaters!

Other gadgets: sweets box and processed cheese. At that age I eat chupa chups and cream chocolate only to have gadgets with anime characters.

So, we have an interesting long weekend, an holiday at home. More Ganesha Games duties will be next. For another Romics we will wait Autumn.

Here the report of a long weekend with Andrea in Rome at my new, and still almost empty, house. We rallied a lot of things and events in 4 days. To begin, we held some playtests about next Ganesha games. This one is about mutant apes.

And this one is about that old project that we are developing through these last years. Maybe this one is the final effort. However we are speaking about 2017.

Other things were tested and other ideas were submitted. Diego join us for a couple of half days and this is a moment of relax in a patisserie.

We passed the Friday night at a game shop in the opposite part of Rome. Andrea presented his kind of games with a demo of Advanced Song of Blade and Heroes.

Here the Mjolnir shop and an exposition of Ganesha Games books. They are too much to show, indeed. Free apple pie for everyone. However chatting went from Friday to the first hours of Saturday…

Saturday afternoon was the time for the class on game design. In this photo Andrea seems a priest on a pulpit.

After the lesson, a direct check to the game projects of the people. There are very different ideas and kinds of games, with Andrea and the organisers that are trying to address them to their realisation.

And the Sunday was the time for Romics. But that is another post…

After the overall part in the previous post, here the focus is on wargame relate part of Modena Play.

We stayed two days, the first as visitors and to speak with people. This is true even because we are preparing a new game for Lucca Comics & Games together with another editor here present. The second day we were guests in the space of roleplay editors, so Andrea could run some demos of Advanced Song of Blade and Heroes.

Wargame part is not so historical hardcore oriented as other convention where we go usually. Here there was a WH40K tournament: masses of mega tanks that shoot each other at 10cm distance…

Following, another tournament, with Flames of War: masses of historical tanks that shoot each other at 10cm distance…

Inside the tensile structure there was the two-dimensional wargame section. A place where cardboard pieces are positioned with tweezers.

Wings of War games. The author flew around the tables.

Lego imitators do what Lego have to do: historic Lego sets as Romans or WWII.

At this point Gundam kits is a modelling genre in and of itself.

There were some dioramas with German WWII theme full of details and with mixed settings. Really beautiful things!

More wargames were around. As more boargames and interesting things. This is only a partial report of what you can find in Modena Play. I hope to return here before another 5 years.

After 5 years I’m in Modena Play again. A lot of things changed in my life but some are always the same.

Here I’m with an anthology of adventures for roleplay game Kata Kumbas on Savage Worlds game engine. I’m one of the 8 authors. Out just for Modena Play. Read and play in an medieval Italy where Brancaleone da Norcia rode.

Modena Play is the annual appointment for boardgames and roleplays in Italy. Furthermore you can find card games, 2D wargames, 3D wargames, videogames, reenactment and cosplay. Players illustrate games so you can play with it freely after few minutes. And in these two days you could play even 20 games if you are an hardcore player.

While I was walking around I was approached by two chaps who were playing around. It is so simple to find mates to play here. So we formed a temporary player group of 3 people to play with what we could find around. This was a game about the management of Roman provinces.

Another game that we played was about the training to be a knight.

Sometimes there is someone that do it bigger.

Card games can be designed for adolescents with hormone storms. Like this one with an ass as advert. More sexy poses inside…

The ritual auction for games. Gems and garbage mixed in a crowded and fun moment.

I met Paolo in the fair! Now he is full involved with videogames as profession. Here he was in a play-by-play together with a mate of his. Good luck! ; )

A more traditional game than games on videos: a foosball table, but a very small one.

A more traditional game than foosball: wooden tops. Bigger ones were made on request with a lathe. Cool!

A more traditional game than top: war!!!

I found this book in the reenactment part of the fair on fighting with armour in ‘500. He is the curator of the modern edition of an ancient work. I bought Fluxx Cthulhu, MDF terraces for a new gladiatorial arena and 35 vallejo colours too.

After 5 years I could eat tigelle again, a kind of soft bread made with lard filled with a mix of lard and parmesan cheese. Available only in Modena. A long wait…

Here can view people who eat and the corridor between the two main pavilions. Moreover there were the upper storey, another pavilion and a tensile structure.

Unexpectedly you could find a lot of cosplayers around. A stage was setted for them. Every opportunity is good to show your costume. Even during the play of games.

And now some of the best cosplays that I picked from an unofficial photographic report of the event:

Next time Modena Play and wargaming!

The end is nigh! The third Ganesha Games’ kickstarter is almost to its end. I remember you the new edition of MUTANTS AND DEATH RAY GUNS together with the add-on PROJECT SIMIAN ULTRA X. And the 14 new miniatures about mutants for this radioactive age, mostly humanoid apes mixed with flying squirrels.

With $30 you can obtain these 5 miniatures. But if you pledge $60 you can pick up your choice of 15 miniatures on ALL miniatures, EVEN UNLOCKED miniatures!

This one instead is free.

Quick, you have only 20 hours…