Warlords of Erehwon: the Aftermath

Guest Post: My friend Albert wrote a great little short story recounting the aftermath of our first game of Warlords of Erehwon, which I posted about a couple weeks ago: Warlords of Erehwon: First Game  Sadly, it involves yet more travails for the long-suffering wizard Aethelstan...

Aftermath:

Lord Adelstead stands over the rows of dead, his dead, being given their last rites as the peasants bury his men into the earth. Now the low-born clansmen armed with spear and bow, the King’s own chosen soldiers, the Ogres and the Lord’s own cousin are now equal. Adelstead’s father called death “the great leveler” before he passed on and left his land to his son.

Adelstead looks up and sees the vultures and various carrion-eaters descend upon the bodies of the beast-men. They care nothing for their dead. Just another reminder of what the Men of the West must defend their homes from.

The King’s Champion, Konor, a veteran of over 50 battles and man who has fought for coin, kings and survival since Lord Adelstead was just a dream in his father’s eye, looks over the scene. Nothing. He feels nothing. We lived. That’s all that matters.

Konor heads over to the Adelstead… Adelstead doesn’t look up. “Is this the part where you tell me that we won a glorious victory and I should be happy?” A silent monk throws dirt on the face of Adelstead’s cousin, who died by his Lord’s side in the battle.

“Victory? We bought time. Nothing more. Do you see the Beast-Lord’s head set on a pike, his Minotaur spawn being paraded around the streets like trained bears?” The old mercenary tosses his dented helmet into the grave. “He’ll run back to his headstone and spin tales about how the man-things defended a land of great treasure with blood. He’ll be back with more.”

“It sounds like you’ve had this happen before.” Adelstead responded, still not looking at Konor. “I don’t know if you noticed, but we have a lack of fighting men to stop this further threat… So, unless you have something constructive to say, leave me to my penance.”

Konor smiled. Adelstead did not like Konor’s smile. That man had seen too many battles, his blood-lust was something that belonged to the wild men of the Black Forest across the Great River. “Aye. they have a headstone, we have glory. You tell people about how we beat back the beast-men, alone, men will come from all over to devour your glory… Do that and we’ll have enough men when the Beast-Lord returns.”

“Who will ask the King for forgiveness for his lost men and ask for more? Who will grovel and beg the assorted knights and seasoned men-at arms to come here? Who will empty the quays and bars, looking for mercenaries to fill our ranks?” Adelstead asked. “Who? Who can we make abject themselves to such a degree?”

Konor points at the hills… Towards the bloodied wizard Aethelstan, the survivor of the Dread Desert, dragging the corpse of his assistant back towards the camp. For the first time Adelstead smiled… for who indeed shall abject himself if not the outcast wizard. Konor smiles again “After he’s done scraping the ground and apologizing for the dead, he’ll wish he was resting in a harpy’s belly.”

"Agreed…. Get the paper and ink ready. It’s time to call the forces…” Adelstead states to his servants…

What A Tanker - first games

Earlier this week the Austin Historical Gamers of Dragon’s Lair tried out “What a Tanker,” Too Fat Lardies’ WWII tank skirmish game.  It is a single-tank to platoon level game, the same as GF9’s “Tanks” game, but with very different mechanics.

Each turn, you roll a hand of six order dice for each tank. Each number of pips corrresponds to a different order or action by the tank’s crew: drive, acquire target, aim, fire, and re-load.  A six is wild, and so very useful. 

We played two games in a single evening, both times matching up three T-34/76s against a pair of PZ IV-Hs and a STuG III-G. 

The rules are really simple, and fast.  My eight-year old really enjoyed it and remained engaged through both games.

Ouch, in the second game, Jake’s T-34 snuck around behind me, brewing up my PZ IV.  He went on to single-handedly take out the other Panzer IV and the STuG.

Warlords of Erehwon - first game

Albert and I tried out Warlords of Erehwon today.  This is Warlord’s new fantasy warband skirmish rules, written by Rick Priestly, and clearly a close cousin to his Gates of Antares sci-fi rules.  Like Antares, WoE uses the “order dice” system from Bolt Action.

We played the “Pillage the Village” scenario, with 1000 points per side.  That is a mid-sized game, the rules recommend using 500 to 2000 points.

I once again pressed my SAGA Anglo-Danes into service, using the “Knights” army list in the rule book.  This list covers generic fantasy humans pretty well, and would allow you to field your old Warhammer Empire or Brettonnians.  I added my rules-traveling wizard Aethelstan, and rounded out my force with a couple mercenary ogres.

Albert brought Warhammer Beastmen, intent on pillaging said village!

Turn one: a general advance by both sides.  My archers and wizard all sprinted to reach the top of the big hill.  My plan was to spend a couple rounds fighting a delaying action with spells and archery, and then fall back off the hill.


“Sprinting” lets you move triple your normal movement, but at the risk of picking up a pin marker.  All my sprinters picked up pins...


Aethelstan got the party started with a fireball spell that toasted no less than five Ungor archers! One survived, with only a pin marker to remind him of his lost friends.


Round 2: I really hoped I would draw the first order die... but Albert got it.  A unit of mounted chaos marauders pretending to be centaurs used their amazing speed and the Sprint rule to gallop right up the hill, charging my archers.


But amazingly, the archers held!  Between the defensive shots they were able to take, and some lucky rolls in melee, they wiped out the centaurs, losing three men in turn.


However, over the next couple rounds, the beastmen cleared the hill, wiping out one unit of archers, the ogres, and defeating my wizard.  A rolling melee between the hill and the small wood saw heavy losses to both sides.  It was looking bad for the humans.


However, the battered defensers held on, forming a new defensive line right outside the village.  Wave after wave of braying beastmen charged down the hill, but each was thrown back in turn.  At this point, we had completed six rounds, which meant the scenario was over.  Since the village was intact, it was technically a victory for the handful of surviving men.

We really enjoyed these rules and agreed we actually like them better than Dragon Rampant (which is a lot of fun too).  We are already planning a sequel, when the beastmen (who are convinced the humans must have some really valuable loot in the village since they fought so hard for it) come back with more friends to have another go.

Bungle in the Jungle: A disastrous game of CONGO

Another great game of CONGO.  Well, great for the players, more of a bloody debacle for our intrepid adventurers.  Pete, Albert, and Jake joined me for this game, with Pete and Albert bringing their German and Russian-themed explorers' expeditions, Jake borrowing my Forest Tribes, and me fielding my peaceful Zanzibari traders.

We adapted the "Encounters in Hostile Lands" adventure from the Throne of Thunder expansion.  This scenario is written for two players, who start in opposite corners, separated by a band of jungle running diagonally across the board.  I re-arranged the layout to make sense with four players, replacing the single long diagonal with a cross-shaped arrangement of terrain.  The primary goal is to get your lead character off of the opposite corner of the board.  Secondary objectives are picking up valuable artifacts in the jungle, and defeating enemy characters.  

Complicating matters, every time a unit enters the dense terrain, a fearsome tribe of cannibals launches a barrage of poison darts at that unit, and every other unit with Short distance.  This proved devastating, and the Cannibals eliminated more figures than everyone else combined.

Early in the game.  Jake's Forest Tribesmen are top-left.  Tippu Tib's Zanzibaris are at the bottom.  Hauptman Atackkopf's shamefully still unpainted Germans are to the right.  The Mad Russian adventurer Sazinov is somewhere beyond the central mass of jungle.

Even the raucous Ruga Ruga are silent as the make their way into the daunting depths of the jungle.

The scenario naturally drew all four players to the center of the table.  Tippu Tib faces off with Russian-employed askaris, while the Forest Tribe picks up green loot counter, which represents some of the valuable artifacts.  Tippu Tib never made it past this point, and his group was slowly picked off by the poison darts, before he and a last bodyguard were overwhelmed by Forest Tribe spearmen.

In fact, not a single character survived...and most were killed by the cannibals!

An Elephant showed up midway through the game, but was content to linger outside the jungle.  (We forgot to roll for its random movement after the first round.)

The last act. A pair of Russian Askaris somehow made it out of the jungle with two loot tokens they had picked up by vanquishing Germans and Forest Tribesmen.  But even as they were about to make good their escape, they were cut down by a hail of poison darts.  The last surviving Zanzibaris, a trio of Baluchi matchlock men, swooped in and picked up the artifacts.  They were charged by a unit of spearmen, but amazing defeated the spears, despite their poor melee skills.  The spearmen dropped a third treasure before retreating (they can be seen ignominiously cowering near the great jungle bole).

Incredibly, it appeared I was going to net 12 victory points due to this bit of luck.  But then, Jake insanely charged the Baluchis with a single tribal musketman.  Neither side scored any hits, but in CONGO, the defender retreats after a tie, leaving any loot behind...And so the Baluchis shamefully fled, leaving the triumphant Bunduki holding three treasure tokens!  This was another example of the surprise endings that CONGO so often serves up.

Jake won with 24 points (16 from holding all four treasure tokens, and another 8 from having slain Tippu Tib and Pete's Kirangozi guide).  I can't remember if Albert or Pete had any points, but I know I had zilch!  

The real winners were definitely the cannibals...