Crouching Duckling-Hidden Fat Guy

  Well I am back a little sooner than expected, but wanted to share a pic of the prototype for the new billboard model.  I hope to run some production of these next week and get them available.

One thing I would like to do is gather a few images together and put them on a file downloading site so if you need a quick graphic to add to your billboard just download and print. If there are any folks out there with an imagination and a bit of skill with photo-shop send me some images and I will try to make them available to the world.   One source that I found amusing was from the movie "Idiocrasy"

Many others from that movie would make neat billboards but would be R-rated.



  And I was thinking quite a little bit about gaming in general and thought it might be a good time to rant.

  There seems to have been a steady shift in gaming over the years and I used to think it was just me getting older. Back in the beginning we played lots of cool games and I looked like this.

  You know you were having a good time when someone casually states,  " Hey guys it is daylight outside."  And to you it felt like maybe 9 or so.  Used to be D and D and maybe some board games. I liked Magic the Gathering immensely and become very interested in miniatures gaming. It seemed the perfect pastime- I love building models and playing games. It was like a Reese's peanut butter cup- 2 great tastes that go great together.  But something has evolved. Magic became more competitive and people started building killer decks, and we started also building killer armies. Power gaming became the new norm. I did this a bit when I played old Warhammer, equipping my orc general with a vampiric frostblade and deploying him behind some goblin skirmishers. I used his leadership bonus to FAIL the animosity test and then he killed a bunch of the goblin adding a pump to a stat with each blow. Then I used his leadership bonus so the goblins did not rout and stayed for more abuse. By the time the enemy approached the general was a monstrosity and could wipe out anything in the universe.  Legal, yes. Absurd? of course.

  I was a lot younger and not aware how stupid it was, but it was the path that games were destined to follow. There is even a company that makes a game called Warmachine. I have never played it but it essentially states in the rules to power game to prove your manhood. Egads.
  So what happens?  Most times when I play now I look like this instead.

  Which is why I am 99.9% model builder and collector and not really a gamer anymore.

  Someday I am going to write some generic rules to play around with, but everything takes time.

  OK, enough ranting and on to the important stuff.

  The ducklings had a stern test as some "Canadians" launched an invasion.

Outnumbered and facing some super-heavy enemies, they fell back to the barn calling for support. This is where my lifelong regimen of donut eating finally paid off, as I was an even MORE super heavy than the invaders and was able to repel them with a bamboo stick.  It was a tense standoff for a few minutes but they retreated and peace was restored.

  And that is the word for the day.

 Have a great weekend.