Earlier this year, while I was in the middle of a buy-and-paint-all-the-things phase, I stumbled across Guerilla Miniature Games' RelicBlade video. Ash made the following statement in the very beginning:

This game is super kid friendly.

I was sold.

A dream is to get my son and daughter to play miniature games with me. Seriously. One of the main reasons I am trying to get better at painting is so that when they can play, the miniatures I paint with be exciting and inviting to them and their friends. Yeah, borderline Michael Scott pathetic. I know.

All shiny and chrome. Path of the Advocate on the left, and the Adversary on the right.

It is one of those terrible projections I have onto my kids. Some dads want their kids to be star athletes. I want them to be uber-nerds.

The crazy thing is, Ash from GMG wasn't wrong.

RelicBlade is spectacular for kids.

The rules are simple and clean. The cards document most of the experience. Games are quick, which is often overlooked when most kids cannot stay focused past 45 minutes.

Initial base coats on the RelicBlade miniatures.

Another one of my favorite rules decisions is the 2'x2' playing area. This may seem counter-intuitive, but hang with me like a klingon to a butt hair.

The most surprising perk of the smaller play area is that it is achievable. In fact, you can knock out a thematic 2'x2' chunk of terrain in days instead of weeks of work. With a small amount of foresight, the smaller 2'x2' can be used as centerpieces in larger tables when playing other systems. It's okay of you do, RelicBlade will wait for your return like a faithful puppy made of white metal.

There are plenty of other reasons 2'x2' is great for a skirmish game. It helps games go faster. Ranged attacks become more balanced. Storage is easier. In short, don't be turned off by the fact that you don't really want to use your 6'x4' game mat for a melee-focused skirmish game.

The first two RelicBlade Pigmen. They were exceptionally easy to paint.

I am only going to spend a paragraph on the sculpts, but the summary is that they are great. They are cast in a standard white metal, closer to the Reaper metal quality than Corvus Belli. This means that there is no lead in the alloy and they are a little more brittle but can't quite get the same level of detail as the CB. The detailing is still great, and these figures lend themselves well to both basic and advanced painting techniques.

I tried a few new things on these guys, including basic wet blending, airbrushing the entire skin tone, and using ultra-controlled washes to shade them.

Okay, enough gushing. If this appeals to you, which it should if you like skirmish games, check out the RelicBlade website. And currently, through mid November, there is a second Kickstarter ongoing for RelicBlade. The first Kickstarter was incredible, and delivered on time. I cannot recommend the Kickstarter highly enough.