5 on Friday 17/03/23

It’s Friday, and here on No Rerolls that means it’s time for an all-new 5 on Friday. We’re going to start with 5 exciting releases for this week before moving on to our usual digest of some of our favourite articles from the past week. Of course, we’re slow readers, so don’t be surprised if there are some articles that are a little older – these are just some of the great articles we happen to have actually read in the past week.

Releases & Previews

Every week there are many games and miniatures released. This will probably be a mix of previews, preorders, and releases, and with release dates being the way they are in this industry, it’s always pretty approximate. Excuses out of the way, here are 5 of the releases that caught our attention this week:

Games Workshop releases Wrath of the Soul Forge King – Games Workshop put out a lot of these two-player army sets, and with the volume and variety the produce, they must do pretty well. I heard it discussed a while back that, generally, boxed sets sell particularly well in the UK, whilst the US market tends to be more willing to buy individual units. I wonder if that’s still the case.

This latest set features an interesting range of miniatures of different ages. You’ve got some older Deathwing Terminators, coupled with some Primaris Space Marines and a brand new and updared Azazel miniature. On the Chaos side, you’ve got lots of models from a previous 2 player set, accompanied by the titular Soul Forge King, himself. The new models look fantastic. The box seems an okay start to an army, but I’m never a fan of a Chaos Space Marines box with no Chaos Space Marines. The new stuff is right bonny, though.

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Element Games

Free League launches Kickstarter campaign for their upcoming The Walking Dead RPG – This game has been the topic of much discussion in some of the Discord servers that I frequent, as well as in the wider community. The focus seems to largely be on the fact that Free League, like Modiphius, seems to be taking on a lot of licenses and pumping out a large number of games. This is something that makes me anxious as a fan, with an eye to how that ended up going for companies like Spartan Games. Hint: there’s no longer a Spartan Games.

The game itself will, I’m sure, be good. It’s Free League. I’m always delighted by their output. The theme of this one doesn’t entirely appeal to me, so it’s not one that I’m tempted to pick up, but I expect that it will be wildly popular. Certainly, the Kickstarter seems to be meeting success. As I write this, it’s already about $100,000 higher than when I first looked the other day. The game is also based on the same rules as Mutant: Year Zero. That’s a big plus, as it’s a proven, flexible system.

Foxcraft releases The Terran Rocket League STLs – Retro-futurist STLs, ahoy! There’s something charming about the Buck Rogers-esque, vintage sci-fi aesthetic, isn’t there? These miniatures capture that really well:

Have a look at the preview images on the Wargame Vault page. Based on a successful Kickstarter, there’s a lot of content in here, and they’ve look very much at home in games like Rogue Stars and Stargrave.

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Wargame Vault

Penny Arcade launches a Kickstarter camapign for a new series of Acquisitions Incorporated – Oh, I love Penny Arcade. I’ve been a fan of the comic, their video productions, podcasts, and everything else for a long time. I also really loved Acquisitions Incorporated, their series that pioneered the current craze for performative roleplaying games. And hey, there’s more coming:

I’ve actually written a lot more about AI and this campaign in my post from this Wednesday.

R. Talsorian Games releases volume 2 of Interface RED, a compilation of content for Cyberpunk RED – I had my first game of Cyberpunk RED a couple of weeks ago. We had a lot of fun with it and I’m finding myself pretty keen on exploring it further. R. Talsorian games are likewise exploring and expanding upon their game with the release of volume 2 of their Interface RED series:

The content is largely stuff that’s been previously released on their website for free, collated for convenience and with some new content mixed in. If you like everything being together, then this will be a solid purchase, but if you’ve been keeping up with the free content, it may feel a wee bit overpriced. The print on demand option is handy, though.

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DriveThruRPG

Blog Posts & Articles

The meat of 5 on Friday, the articles are listed in no particular order, so let’s get into some recommendations:

Chaos Dwarfs come to Warhammer: Total War @ Scent of a Gamer – I don’t follow much in the way of video game news these days, but it’s nice when an interesting tidbit makes its way to me. I’m quite excited for this expansion to Total War. The game is really fantastic and I’ve always loved the Chaos Dorfs!

Eclipse Phase Remixes the Future @ Verisimilitude in Tabletop Roleplaying – This is a new blog by the author of the Unpossible Journey blog. Eclipse Phase is not a game I know at all. Erik’s posts are always thoughtful and fascinating. This one really inspires me to want to check out Eclipse Phase for myself.

Deeper Dungeons @ Gameroom Ramblings – There’s not a huge amount to say on this one. The image caught my attention and I’m delighted for the author. He gets to try out a really fantastic expansion for the first time Enjoy!

Top Three AoS Lists for the Brewdog AoS GT @ Woehammer – Scottish AoS is best AoS. We know this. It is known. This article is particularly good because it has comments from everyone involved. Really good people; really good read.

We’ve Launched On Patreon & Discord! @ Sprues & Brews – Sprues & Brews are a great blog and podcast, that I have already heartily endorsed. I’m going to join their Discord. Might see you there!

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Since my last 5 on Friday, here’s what’s appeared on NoRerolls: