Stargrave Campaign: The Unreal Engine

You'll have read about the creation of my Stargrave crew over the last 6 weeks or so, and it was really great to meet up with a bunch of great friends last weekend to play our Stargrave campaign: Unreal Engine. We were hosted by Underworld Gaming in Dublin, and 10 of us (including: Mr Saturday, Asslessman, Alex from Leadballoony, cheetor, Curis and others) travelled variously from the UK, France, Finland and of course Ireland to play on some great tables, each set up for a specific Stargrave scenario or custom scenario.

Some of the crews that took part

Paying for a Life of Crime - Captive Space Bandit

Every so often you see a fun model that you instantly think of a use for. As soon as I saw the Antediluvian Miniatures captive fugitive, I knew it would be perfect as a game objective. Not to mention all of those scenic pics that need a prisoner or two!

Hunting for Loot & Bounty - A Stargrave Pathfinder

The final member of my Cold Trader's Stargrave crew is a Pathfinder. I'm a big fan of ranger-types in any warband - there's something about the kind of character that wears a long coat or cloak and carries a bow or long rifle that really appeals to me. I'm not sure how effective a Pathfinder will be in Stargrave, but I couldn't resist including the archetype.

Stargrave Q-Bots (AKA Skullz Servitors)

Everybody knows that robot characters are cool, and that if you have opportunity, you should include them in a starship crew. I wasn't quite sure how best to include some robots in my Cold Trader Stargrave crew, as nothing really seemed to fit the bill stylistically. I happened on the Q-Bot soldier type from the Quarantine 37 supplement and decided that 40k servitors would be a fun way to represent them. I dug out a couple of the early 2000s servitors, but it was nagging me that they didn't have any detail that could be easily passed off as the one-shot flamer or grenade launcher. And then I remembered my Skullz servitors...

Alien Treasures & Secret Data - Stargrave Loot Tokens

As mentioned in my previous post, I'm currently prepping a crew for Stargrave. Most of the scenarios in the game are loot-grabs, so every game needs a selection of suitable loot counters. Loot comes in two different types: physical (crates, ammo, valuable items etc) and data (floppy discs and memory sticks).

For my data loot tokens I bought a bunch of little doodads from a bits reseller. I think they might be some kind of mine from a Space Marine kit, but I figured they'd do as little data caches.

Cold Trader Void Troopers

I've been steadily working away at a project that I've wanted to do for some time - creating a crew to accompany my Necromunda Cold Trader. I always wanted to create more than a 4-strong group. Not only is this now possible in the Necromunda rules, but they're the perfect premise for a Stargrave crew. Happily, I have a weekend of Stargrave gaming coming up next month, so that was the perfect motivation to work on some new figures to accompany my Cold Trader.

I wanted the additional figures for the crew to give the feel of professional no-nonsense criminals. These aren't gutter scum or lawless pirates. This is an efficient and meticulously-planned smuggling operation that requires a skilled workforce. The first group of figures are exactly that - disciplined and well-trained, if perhaps a little morally suspect!

Staring into the Void - Navigator

I wanted something relatively quick and easy to paint up as my first figure of 2023, so I decided to pick something from my boxes that was long overdue. I'm a firm believer in salvaging all of the off-cut components from my conversion projects as they nearly always get recycled into new projects. This figure is a good example of that, using the torso of the Imperial assassin who donated her legs to a chaos cultist in November 2018, and the body of a fantasy cleric whose head is now sported by a renegade Inquisitor.

The new Navigator flanked by a junior member of the house and her personal servant.