Well your weird retro thread for today.

Kryomek is this SF miniatures wargame that I first saw advertised in Dragon (ads appeared in at least #173 and #177 that I know of). At the time I was quite taken with the line in the ad:

'It is said that Man is created in the image of God and since this God created the Universe, man feels confident that it has a right to rule it. But there are other Gods, dark Gods, Gods in whose terrible image other creatures are made - and they too might believe that they are destined to rule..."

Searching the net lately and I found the rulebook available as a free .pdf (scotiagrendel.com) and have been having a look through. Just wondering if anyone has ever by any chance played it or what have you...

I remember when it came out.  It didn't last long, no one seemed to really support it in the FLGS's and beyond it having some really cool 'Alien' looking miniatures that about all I can really remember.    But then it was competing against 40k when 40k was actually affordable for most people.

I've got the book.  That quote is pure awesome, the rest of the game is good but that's a damn fine quote.

The game itself is okay but it suffers from being a scenario based game with no scenarios in the book.  There are no points totals.  It certainly uses the widest and most amusing range of weapons templates in the history of wargames.  They use the old Thud Gun template concept for around three different weapons in three different ways.

Don't get me wrong, the rules are neat but not very complete.  Many of my figures come from the starter sets they did later on and those came with scenarios.  I've always liked the Kryomek football scenario where two groups of Hellions are trying to link up with a Warmaster.

I've got a few squads of Nexus SWATS and a few marines and a number of Kryomek Hellions and Warriors.

The Kryomek Warmasters and Warriors are some of the nastiest bug aliens ever to be produced.  They are pure nasty beyond anything GW's Tyranids could imagine.

Talos units are awsome.  The hellcats and the walkers are lame.

The tanks are a bit small but a very neat modular concept.

The scenery is pretty decent.  Back in the day it wound up on lots of 40k tables.

The Nexus Swats are really nice powered armor figures.  Stylish and sleek but still cool.

The Hellions and Marines are just plain poor figures.  The Hellions are flat and the marines are lumpish and ill proportioned.

The Nexus Cyclos are pretty nice figures.

Did I ever mention that I got into every attempt to compete with GW before I finally broke down and did Warhammer?

You guys get serious geek cred for replying I wasn't sure I'd get any replies...

Quote from: kryyst;440198I remember when it came out.  It didn't last long, no one seemed to really support it in the FLGS's and beyond it having some really cool 'Alien' looking miniatures that about all I can really remember.    But then it was competing against 40k when 40k was actually affordable for most people.

Yes that'd be why. And yes its very 'Alien'. The bugs even have acid for blood...(which powers some of their weapons like the 'corroder lance' that Warmasters use, etc.)

Quote from: David Johansen;440226I've got the book.  That quote is pure awesome, the rest of the game is good but that's a damn fine quote.

The game itself is okay but it suffers from being a scenario based game with no scenarios in the book.  There are no points totals.  It certainly uses the widest and most amusing range of weapons templates in the history of wargames.  They use the old Thud Gun template concept for around three different weapons in three different ways.

Don't get me wrong, the rules are neat but not very complete.  Many of my figures come from the starter sets they did later on and those came with scenarios.  I've always liked the Kryomek football scenario where two groups of Hellions are trying to link up with a Warmaster.

I've got a few squads of Nexus SWATS and a few marines and a number of Kryomek Hellions and Warriors.

The Kryomek Warmasters and Warriors are some of the nastiest bug aliens ever to be produced.  They are pure nasty beyond anything GW's Tyranids could imagine.

Talos units are awesome.  The hellcats and the walkers are lame.

The tanks are a bit small but a very neat modular concept.

The scenery is pretty decent.  Back in the day it wound up on lots of 40k tables.

The Nexus Swats are really nice powered armor figures.  Stylish and sleek but still cool.

The Hellions and Marines are just plain poor figures.  The Hellions are flat and the marines are lumpish and ill proportioned.

The Nexus Cyclos are pretty nice figures.

Did I ever mention that I got into every attempt to compete with GW before I finally broke down and did Warhammer?

Cool...thanks! I couldn't find a point system but I thought that was just because I hadn't looked thoroughly enough...there was the big fiction piece at the start about the war to close of the local hyperspace access diman thingy which seemed to suggest a scenario or two, maybe they had to cut them to fit it in...

Just having the rulebook and not the actual minis, what you said helps make sense of it...from what you said on the tanks I'm guessing the Talos are modular too since the rulebook mentions they get take some sort of weapon attachments in place of one of the hands.

Thanks again.
Um...also this may be be a stupid question but what's a Thud Gun?

How's the setting for conversion to an RPG?

Well its fairly Warhammer 40K-esque so potentially useable with a Dark Heresy type game - or Bughunters or  3:16 or the LEG Aliens Adventure Game, [dark alien] god help you....

There is fiction in there with world background that gives you enough to understand the history of the game universe - its not Earth, instead Nexus humanity arose separately on three different planets in the same system that united after a madman called the Flayer caused an interplanetary war.

As far as monsters go, there's humans and there's Kryomek (the humans have assiduously been prejudicially terraforming alien planets they encounter with other sentient life) but there's enough info on Kryomek that the GM can understand them, a few cool pictures to show them, and there's some details on how hives are constructed and enough for the GM to understand how to play them, I think.

The fiction pieces are interesting and flavourful and give a reasonable insight into how convict troops in particular - called 'cyclos' due to an third eye type device thats actually an implanted neuroregulator - are treated. Overall the rulebook itself is quite pretty art-wise and might be good for ideas. It is free anyway, though you do have to create an ID on their website to get it.

A Thud Gun was an early Warhammer 40000 artillery piece.  It had four barrels and a specialized template with four linked circles that you had to build yourself.  You'd roll and rotate the circles around to simulate the shells falling close to but never on top of each other.

The resin vehicles have three chassis options, tracked, wheeled and hover and a variety of weapon configurations, missiles, turreted gun, and armored personal carrier IRRC.  They were cast in open moulds so the tops just swap out with the bottoms to great all the varients.  Simple, easy to model and not bad looking.

The Talos units are generally cast with the weapons.  You'd never expect them to look so good from the art in the book.

If I was cribbing a setting for an aliensesque rpg I'd get TSR's Amazing Engine Bug Hunters instead.  But if I was looking for alien monstrosity miniatures or slightly skeletal combat robots Kryomek is the only way to go.

Thank you!

Thanks again to everyone that's replied!

Definitely nice minis by the sound of it.

On bughunters...I do have it somewhere (though I haven't played it) - setting wise thats definitely more flexible in that there are more aliens out there to choose from mission to mission. More familiar to players since its a future Earth, which could be a plus or a minus.

Kryomek seemed more evocative to read than Bughunters but I'd have to admit trying to turn a wargame setting into an RPG setting might involve a fair bit of work, whereas Bughunters its at least done for you.

IIRC the Kryomek rules are based on the original Stargrunt system from Ground Zero Games... Stargrunt II is now a free download on their site (it's a great 'firm' scifi wargame with a Traveller/Striker feel to it).
Our LGS had lots of the Kryomek stuff back in the day... I managed to amass a good sized force of the aliens and both of the game books but most all of it ended up getting used in Rogue Trader instead... adopting the Kryomek setting as an backwater area of Imperial space... Kryomeks as variant Tyranids.

The Cyclos and Talos are nice sculpts, they fit well with the old Rogue Trader minis as well (IG Penal Legions).
I liked the walkers and Hellcats. The Hellcats were reminiscent of the Ed 209 from Robocop.
IIRC there was at least one other alien race that was sculpted up... a kind of grotty looking fungusmen.

hmmm...I've played Stargrunt and Kryomek and didn't see much similarity.  Mek is a d20 opposed matrix with lots of templates and Grunt is more of a die type as effect level thing.

Quote from: David Johansen;440445hmmm...I've played Stargrunt and Kryomek and didn't see much similarity.  Mek is a d20 opposed matrix with lots of templates and Grunt is more of a die type as effect level thing.

Well, like I said, it's based on the 'original' version of Stargrunt... Stargrunt I... which I've never seen so I can't speak to how different they are or how different the first version of SG is from the second. I've only ever played the second version and Kryomek only got onto our table using Rogue Trader's rules.

[additional geekness points also awarded to Simlasa... ]

I did see mention of Stargrunt in the front of the rulebook. Kryomek come out in 1991, with Stargrunt II apparently out in 1996 (according to someone on their forums...if someone on the internet says it, it must be true right..).

Hmm, seems like interconverting it to Rogue Trader is somewhat discussed there too.

When I look at Kryomek I see many of the classic blunders that hamper new games.

There's the limited number of factions.  Yes it's hinted that humans fight humans and meks fight meks but at a glance the game is too narrow.  The great advantage of sf and fantasy over history is the broader scope.

There's the bad sculpts.  Really, the human marines based on the marines from Aliens got the worst sculpts?  Who thought that was a good idea?  Were they dating the sculptor or something?  Yes, I know, there's only so many sculptors who will work for the zero budget start - up but there are some damn sexy Kryomek sculpts, including the very nice human Cyclos.  The marines look like I did them 15 years ago.

There's the attempt to do too much.  Too few factions, too many troop types.  Really, the customer's only going to buy a fixed number of packs.  It's better to provide a wider variety within one troop type than a wide range of troop types from the start.  Take a look at GW's initial Rogue Trader blister sleeve release.  Each force has a good two dozen very characterful individual figures.  There's only one troop type per faction (6 initially) but the figures are varried and interesting.

This page (at the bottom) also shows the Shrikeen and Cryean... other alien forces that didn't get much development. Nothing amazing but I've always liked the Cryean sculpts... there's something creepy about them.