Blood Red Skies

By Troy Hill

For the first time in almost a decade, North East Indiana in the USA seeing the return of a weekend-long gaming convention in November. With the demise of PentaCon earlier this century, the pre-Thanksgiving game con slot has been empty in this part of Indiana.

True, Ft. Wayne Indiana is still home to the Winter Fantasy role-playing convention every winter (WF now run by Baldman Games), but, in my humble opinion, the Fort needs a late fall convention focussed on tabletop miniatures.

And the Death or Glory (DoG) club is hosting just such an event in the same time slot, and at the same location as the now-defunct PentaCon. They’re hosting Rumble on the Rivers at the Grand Wayne Center in downtown Fort Wayne November 10-12, 2023.

DoG has hosted three successful Motor City Mayhem tournaments so far in the greater Detroit area. Their first was in 2021 at the height of the pandemic. Rolling with the state of the world then, they instituted social distancing among tables, and performed temperature checks by on-site medical personnel.

No Dice No Glory is happy to be a part of the event and is sponsoring two of the historical tournaments. What tourneys are going to be hosted?

By Troy Hill

Well, Warlord did it again.

They released a new game. That uses rules from their other games. For an entirely new game. Or something like that.

Combined Arms is both a stand-alone board game, and a campaign set for Warlord’s suite of World War II games, Bolt Action, Blood Red Skies, Cruel Seas, and Victory at Sea.

And my gaming group in Indiana has been salivating for a campaign system we can use. Warlord timed the release of the game well, right as gaming is ramping up across the globe after two years mostly in pandemic lockdowns.

By Mike Rafferty

This past March, Adepticon returned after a two-year hiatus (caused by “nothing in particular).

The convention once again returned to Schaumburg, IL. This was a different convention from years past, and not just because of the wait between conventions.

While Keyforge was held offsite in 2019, this year historical games were at the Hyatt giving Adepticon its first true offsite venue.

I volunteered to run this offsite venue and historicals to ensure that historical players, of which I am one, received a great convention experience. My long-term goal is that we can use this space to grow historicals at Adepticon and establish our own identity to stand along with the Games Workshop and Star Wars players at Adepticon.

By Kreighton Long

This past weekend the hosted CYBËR WÅRS 2020 giving attendees a virtual convention experience that will hopefully help alleviate some of the pent up pressure to geek out after months of closed shops and social distancing.

Throughout the CYBËR WÅRS weekend over a dozen panels took place over Zoom with interviews of movers and shakers in the wargaming community. During one such panel representatives from came together for a 2-hour conversation including some sneak peeks at upcoming releases and works-in-progress over at Warlord HQ.

By Troy A. Hill

As I write this, the world, including the gaming world, has screeched to a halt. Covid-19 has crippled activities the world over. Gamers, like all others not in essential industries, are being told the shelter in place, and avoid social contact to stop the pandemic.

For gamers, from this tragic time, arises a golden opportunity. The pile of lead, resin and plastic shame in our hobby dens can finally be addressed. I’ve begun a small dent in my own pile of shame, finishing up some DAK and Italy campaign Germans for Bolt Action. I’ve also got most of my Demo-Kit for (BRS) in various shades of paint awaiting decals and final matte spray.

Fortunately, my copy of Air Strike! appeared in my post box before the order for social distancing came into effect. Now that I’ve had a chance to flip through it and give it a good read, I want to take the opportunity to address the idea of whether the book is a good entry point into the game for a new player.

By Troy A. Hill

Southern California (SoCal) isn’t a location that often sees representatives of table-to gaming companies unless they’re homegrown. With major conventions like KublaCon in San Francisco and the Las Vegas Open (LVO) seven and five-hour drives away from the Los Angeles basin, SoCal often misses out on major hobby events.

That changed this week when the co-author of , and Warlord Games North American Demo Team grand-poobah Jon Russell paid SoCal a visit to launch the new Korean supplement and line of miniatures for Bolt Action.

Hosted by the (Pacific South West chapter), Russell visited three stores in the greater Los Angeles area Friday and Saturday, followed by a visit to San Diego in the extreme southern end of California.

Recently my best friend Jon Russel from told me about a new addition to the game . Warlord’s WWII aerial combat game introduces well-known historical aces. In a shift, they are about to release a new ace in the line-up. The ace?

Johnny Red, a fictitious character from the comic series of the same name. Not only do I want to tell you about this new release and the Johnny Red Series I also want to talk to comics in wargaming.

Once again we have Jon Russell from Warlord Games on the show. We talk about what is coming out for all of our favorites games in 2019. You do not want to miss this one!

Some of the topics we covered

Cruel Seas

Blood Red Skies

Bolt Action

Bolt Action Korea (due out in August)

New Tournament System for Warlord’s games in 2019

… And so much more.

Folks, sometimes we get lucky. Jon Russell wanted to get out the word about all the great news coming from Warlord games, so we quickly put together a podcast to get it to you. Tom and Mitch talk about Cruel Seas, Blood Red Skies, Fall of France, and the upcoming Korea book.

Some of you may have heard our interviews with Jon Russel from . In our July 2017 interview he announced that a new air combat game would be hitting the market. That game, Blood Red Skies (BRS), has arrived.

I do recall asking him if Warlord would be able to put out an air combat game when the market has a lot titles to choose from, and no single game system as really been deemed as the benchmark. I have played Wings of Glory and Check Your Six in the past and I have a huge collection of bi-plane models.

I cannot say either game has really hooked me. Maybe it is the fact that I have been an “Airman” my entire adult life that leads me to be harder on air themed games. I believe that to be good, a game focused on air warfare either needs to be very detailed (which bogs it down) or super easy like an arcade game (rock, paper, scissors) and neither option is fun for me. At least not until BRS hit my gaming table.