Matakishi's Tea House

The Plan

Originally, back in 2007, I was very taken with the Wire and decided I wanted to do a self contained game about drug dealers. I started work on some buildings and made eight of the proposed twenty before I was laid low with illness for a few weeks and it all fizzled out.

I still want to do a game in the same run down Baltimore setting but I've decided to make it just another location for modern Crossfire. This time the criminal gangs and drug dealers will fight the forces of law and order.

Over the course of this project I hope to paint a whole range of figures I originally stockpiled for my zombies setting; gangs, bikers, police, innocent bystanders, criminals, terrorists and assorted personalities. I want to revisit the original Baltimore buildings I started and revamp them and, of course, add more to the set.

In the end I hope to have an interesting, tactically challenging and somewhat different crossfire game to play.

Here are some bases of SWAT for some heavy firepower on the streets. Figures are from Britannia Miniatures, vehicles are from Pardulon. The lettering is done with Letraset rub down letters and the police lights are from a chap on e-Bay.

The vehicles will act as secure transport and armed back up units. The figures are based as two fire teams and a door-breaking team with 4 dice and 3 dice respectively in Crossfire terms.

Since I was asked, here's a diagram of how I painted the visors:

The colours used were all from the Foundry range of paints but any range of blues will do.
1,2 and 3 are 21 Sky Blue A.B and C. 4 and 5 are 23 Vivid Blue B and C.
As a final touch I gloss varnished them for added shine.

For some added firepower I combined two eM-4 sentry guns and some Warlord WWII German Goliaths to make a pair of remote controlled guns.

Here's one with some figures to show the scale.

A couple of sniper pairs from Westwind Productions.

I'm basing my Police in pairs on 50mm bases and giving them 2 shooting dice so they can pin and suppress but can't kill on a single fire action. Any suppressed criminal base contacted by a Police base will be automatically arrested.

They will find it hard to winkle bad guys out of cover but that's what SWAT's for. Obviously all this may change before the final version of the rules.

Here are some Patrolmen, Detectives and Highway Patrolmen. Currently having a little difficulty finding Police vehicles in a suitable scale. I've decided that 1:43 vehicles are way too big (I'm so fickle) so I'm looking for 1:56 or 1:60 but may drop to 1:64 just for the convenience.

Figures are from Westwind Productions.

I have plenty of Gangstas thanks to their recent popularity with figure manufacturers. I've started by re-basing my Thugz onto 60mm bases in threes. They will have 3 shooting dice since they're heavily armed.

click on the image for a bigger version.

Working around civilians is a constant worry for the Police and other Law Enforcement troops. Groups of bystanders can block fire, become hostages or be put in danger in a number of ways. Constant news coverage and roaming camera crews mean each incident is captured for posterity and it always seems to be the fault of the Police not the criminals.

I have several civilian figures to paint up, to begin with I have re-based my Mini Homies in pairs on 40mm bases which are used to indicate if an area of terrain is occupied by civilians. Civilian and bystander bases also block fire for Police units but not for criminals.

The Batman in Crossfire.

The Batman has a vast arsenal of weapons and tactics with which to overcome his adversaries. Detailing each of them would require too much work for a fast moving Crossfire game so I have abstracted everything into general Crossfire terms for ease of use. If you want to add specific rules for a favourite gadget you are, of course, free to do so; none of this is in anyway official or endorsed by either Crossfire or DC Warner etc.

Trying to shoot the Batman
Because of his costume, athleticism, frightening aspect, speed and so on the Batman is always considered to be 'in cover' from both direct and indirect fire so any enemy shooting at him loses a firing die even if the Batman model is standing in the open right next to them (he's even scarier close up).

The Batman invokes fear in his enemies so any enemy stand that wishes to shoot at him must make a rally roll as if they were pinned, nearby leaders etc may help with this as normal. An enemy stand that is actually pinned and passes this roll doesn't lose its pinned status, it just gains the ability to shoot at the Batman for that action.

Passing the roll lets the stand shoot, failing means it goes to 'no fire' if it was attempting a reaction shot. If a stand belonging to the phasing player fails then the initiative swaps as usual.

Indirect fire weapons may fire as normal at the batman so long as he is not in their direct LOS. If the operating crew can see the Batman they must pass the rally roll before they can fire. Forward Observers may call down fire as normal.

The Batman ignores 'pinned' results and these count as a miss for purposes of determining 'no fire'.

The Batman's weapons
All Bat vehicles are armoured and therefore immune to small arms fire (except possibly a Batbike but I don't have one of them). The actual armour values and firepower of any Bat vehicles I leave up to you. Here are the one I use, feel free to disregard them:

21st century Batmobile:
Armour: 3 but may deploy shields if unmoving for armour 5
Weapons: Linked chain guns: 4 dice against infantry forward firing only. Guided missiles ACC +2 PEN +2. (limited ammo for these, usually only 2 per game).

21st Century Batwing:
Armour: 2
Same weapons as the Batmobile but with 4-6 missiles depending on the scenario.

WWII Battank
Armour: 4
30cal MG forward firing only.
50cal HMG in turret.

The Batman himself has 4 dice for ranged combat and may effectively engage armoured vehicles at range if he needs to. I allow suitably armed infantry to shoot vehicles the same way they shoot at infantry with corresponding pins, suppresses and kills for 1, 2 or 3 successful hits. If you need to work out ACC and PEN values for the Batman be my guest.

In Close Combat the Batman receives +4 to his roll. He is never surprised. Enemies wishing to actually fight the Batman must rally as if they were pinned in order to join in once they are in base contact with him; as with shooting, leaders present may help with this.

Enemies who fail this roll will be ineffective in the following combat so will not roll dice or add to dice rolls in any way but will still count as being present at the end. They will, therefore, be counted as casualties and be removed if the Batman wins or be restored to full effectiveness if their comrades defeat him (unlikely).

Other abilities:
Moving:
The Batman may scale a vertical surface as a separate move action. He may cross gaps and obstacles such as barbed wire, security fences or spaces between building roofs with ease and never becomes hung up on wire or entangled.

Bats
Each initiative the Batman may attempt to summon bats to aid him. Each stand of bats may be placed anywhere in his LOS and acts as smoke, dissipating at the beginning of his next initiative.
Failing to summon bats does not lose the Batman the initiative.

Bat summoning roll:

D6 Roll	Result
1	Fail, no bats
2,3	1 stand of bats
4,5	2 stands of bats
6	3 stands of bats

Inspector 'Dirty' Harry Callahan

This lineup of famous detectives is from Obelisk Miniatures

Harry Calahan invokes fear, any stand that wants to shoot at him must first make a willpower roll (this is the same as rallying from pinned). Passing the roll lets the stand shoot, failing means it goes to 'no fire' if it was attempting a reaction shot. If a stand belonging to the phasing player fails then the initiative swaps as usual.

Harry is immune to fear effects from others.

He gets 4 shooting dice because he uses a .44 magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world and, even through a wall, it will take your head clean off.

Harry ignores 'pin' results like all heroes.

Harry acts as a +2 PC for any law enforcement stands rallying within a large base depth of him (60mm). He adds +2 in Close Combat in addition to other leader bonuses that may be applicable from others present. Harry may not organise or contribute to crossfires (he works alone).

Harry requires a roll of 3+ to recover from being suppressed and receives no bonuses from any other stand or leader for rally rolls.

Crime Lords and Gangsters

The seedy underside of any city is home to a variety of unpleasant types, among these, the members of the local crime family rank as perhaps the most dangerous.
The first of my orgaised criminals is Marsellus Wallace.

Marsellus is a Clix Kingpin figure, his men are KGB and Gangsters from Copplestone Castings. Jules and Vincent are his elite hit men, a cut above the regular heavies.

The Buildings