HOTT: One of our Santas is Missing

Introduction

In the last club night before Christmas, I always bring out my special army for a big game of Hordes of the Things.  This year, Santa and his helpers were under siege from the forces of darkness!  From the west, the massive undead armies of the Cabal of the Black Hand approached his hideaway, intent on destroying this beacon of goodness once and for all.

However, it wouldn't be as easy as the chief necromancer hoped. Santa had friends (?!) to help defend the spirit of Christmas.  From the east came hordes of Oriental workers, reluctant to see a good source of income overthrown.  From the south, a band of mercenaries approached, attracted by the promise of the endless profit to be had from the man in red.

Let the battle commence...

The Game

This was a straightforward big-battle game of Hordes of the Things, with no special rules or scenario (because I couldn't think of anything in time).  There are 3x24AP armies on each side.

The 3 undead armies of the Cabal (on the left of the picture) are lead by magician generals and consist of the usual hordes of skeletons, zombies &c, with a mixture of bats, riders, sneakers and a few other troop types to pad them out.

The other 3 armies are all quite distinct!  To the north, the Kung Fu army is made up of several heroes, some infantry and hordes of peasants.  In the middle, Santa's army has ice bears, elves with guns, snowmen and a toy soldier cannon.  To the south, the mercenaries have a decent block of spears, some crossbowmen, a few knights, a pair of duellist assassins and a strange flying machine.

In the very first turn, the necromancer in the centre tried a speculative spell at the opposing general.  His illusion of a little boy dying from leukaemia drew the kind-hearted old gent into a trap.  Santa was captured and led away in chains before he realised what was happening [the necromancer needed to beat Santa in an opposed dice roll by 3 or more points, which he did...].  Big Man Down!

To the south, the mercenary crossbowmen quickly climbed the hill to their front.  From their, they showered bolts onto the undead forces, causing them considerable disruption.

They were soon joined by the mercenary spearmen, who marched rapidly to block the gap between hill and forest.  This penned in the Cabal's entire southern force very effectively.

Santa's ice bears charged forward and crashed into the huge horde of skeleton warriors in the centre.  It was slow work, but the beasts gradually ground most of the undead warriors into dust.

The Kung Fu army marched forward slowly through the northern woods.  Their general was ambushed by sneakers and lurkers at the same time [I don't think I've ever seen anything quite like this happen before], but Chinese heroes aren't afraid of ghosts and the evil spirits were quickly dispersed.  It took a little longer to deal with the ghouls behind them, though.  The rest of the Kung Fu army had to leave their general behind while their advance continued.

Then, with a jovial "Ho Ho Ho!", Santa broke his bonds and escaped from his captors!  His sleigh flew straight at the Cabal's bat swarms; the first one was easily isolated and pulverised.

In the south, the undead general sent his hero and knights to try to clear a path through the mercenary spearmen.  Because of the confined space, neither had any room to retreat and this turned out to be a fatal mistake.  Both undead mounted units were destroyed by the relentless ranks of pikemen.

Finally there was some good news for the Cabal as the Grave Guard engaged the snowmen.  The elite undead bladesmen quickly destroyed 3 out of the 5 bases, taking brightly-coloured hats and scarves as trophies to add to their war banner.

Santa may have escaped from his imprisonment, but he wasn't clear yet.  The Cabal's flocks of bats swarmed all around him and one particularly huge flyer attacked the reindeer who drew the sleigh.  Even though he was surrounded, Santa still wasn't worried [Aerial Hero General: +6 (though penalised -2 for flank and rear attacks), Flyer: +2 combat factor].  After all, to win the big bat needed to roll 3 better than he did.  This just wasn't Santa's day though: he threw low and the enemy rolled high.  The sleigh and its occupant and contents crashed to the ground and disappeared into the snow.

Simultaneously, one of the 3 stands of ice bears who were trying to break through and rescue their chief was also lost.  Along with the snowmen casualties, this took the central good army perilously close to collapse.

More snowmen were built in a hurry, but this only stemmed the tide briefly as more ice bears were lost.

To the north, the first part of the Kung Fu army finally cleared the forest.  They were immediately attacked by skeleton horsemen and zombies, but the oriental warriors were fighting fit and destroyed all who stood in their way.

The minor Kung Fu hero thought he saw an opportunity to kill the assistant magician and charged forward.  However, the easterner was outclassed by the undead wizard and was promptly ensnared by foul spells.

In the south, the Cabal attacked with everything they could in a fruitless attempt to shift the mercenary infantry.  This even resulted in the undead (vampire) sneakers attacking the mercenaries (duellist) sneakers - another first for me in Hordes of the Things.  Inspired by the stout resistance of the other humans, the duellists saw off the vampires, who then fled off the table!

Vampires attack Duellists!

Finally, the last of the ice bears was surrounded and killed; Santa's army collapsed and routed.  This happened just as we reached the end of our slot in the hall.  By this time, the various armies were considerably scattered and had little sense of organisation!

Conclusion

So, who won?  Losing Santa himself and the rest of his army as well was a terrible blow to the forces of Christmas.  However, all was not lost as each of the undead armies was badly damaged [from memory, they had lost 9, 7 and 7 points respectively - out of the 12 needed to demoralise them].  In contrast, the living side may have lost one complete army but the Kung Fu force had only lost 2 peasants and a captured hero: theoretically all of these could return to the fight.  The mercenaries hadn't lost anything at all, despite being heavily engaged.  That being so, I think that this battle was a clear win for the orientals and the mercenaries, though something of a drubbing for the traditional Christmas!

Austrians! Thousands of them!

Introduction

A couple of weeks ago, I received a package in the mail from Heroics and Ros, makers of 6mm figures and vehicles for a wide range of wars.  This was something of a surprise to me as I didn't recall ordering anything from them recently.  The packing slip indicated that they'd been sent by my good friend Steve.  OK, that's nice - but what's going on?

Regular readers will know that I've been unemployed for the last 5 weeks (don't worry - I'm starting a new job soon).  Steve had decided that I needed something to fill my time and cheer me up, so he very kindly ordered this package for me.  Also, he felt that my Napoleonic Austrians had put up a poor showing against his Russians the last time we played Black Powder.  This was at least partly due to my infantry being a bit thin on the ground.

2 large regiments of infantry: the German "10th Mitrowsky" on the left and the Hungarian "2nd Von Hiller" on the right

Black Powder in 6mm

Steve's parcel contained 8 packets of Austrian infantry and 2 of Grenadiers.  That's quite a large number of figures, since each packet has 50 or more figures.  Not thousands maybe, but certainly many hundreds!  Now, my existing Austrian infantry is a mixture of "German" and "Hungarian" bases (the Hungarians have blue trousers but are otherwise pretty much indistinguishable at this scale), with shako or helmet, in march or attack poses.  In other words, quite a varied lot!  This worked well enough for the DBN rules that we used to play where an army only required a few bases.  However it's not so good for Black Powder, where a unit is much larger and for visual effect should have a unified appearance.

So, how do we do this?  Firstly, base sizes are dictated by those from DBN, since I'm not going to rebase all my existing stuff.  That's simple enough: 40mm width with 20/30/40mm depth for infantry/cavalry/artillery.  How many bases make up a unit?  That's less obvious, but by halving the movement and shooting distances from the Black Powder rulebooks and doing some rough calculations on the unit sizes used by other players, I've come up with 6 bases for a large unit, 4 bases for a normal unit, 2 for a small unit and 1 for a tiny unit.  Being Austrians, my army will have a fair number of large units!

I've used the new models to create a large number of plain infantry stands, without command figures.  These can then be used with my existing stands to create either large or normal-sized units as desired.  My older command stands have been altered slightly, so that both flags are on the same stand (!) and so that each has the regiment name printed on a card upright at the back of the base.

Although it is technically possible to deploy a single base forward to depict a unit in "mixed" formation (i.e. with skirmishers deployed to the front), this isn't visually very appealing.  Instead I've decided to experiment with a separate "marker" base with a token number of skirmishers on it; this can be placed ahead of any unit to show that it is in mixed formation.  Note that this is a new idea of mine and I haven't tried this out in a real game yet!

The Formations

So how does this look in practice?  Using most of the new infantry and some of my existing bases (refurbished somewhat!), I now have 4 large units of line infantry plus enough extras to make up at least 1 or 2 normal-sized units as well.  Alternatively, I could choose to deploy them as 6 normal units instead of 4 large ones.  Here are some examples:

10th Mitrowsky in "mixed" formation

2nd Von Hiller (Hungarian) in "mixed" formation

Large regiment in attack column

Large regiment in line

Regiment in march column

Large regiment in square

Skirmisher marker base

As well as bulking up my regular infantry, I used some of the excess command figures to make a bunch more brigade commanders.  These are mounted on 20mm washers and have a standard to aid with identification:

A bunch of brigadiers!

So look out, Steve: we're ready for you!  We'll be back!

TRWNN: The Old Hangin' Tree

Introduction

It's not often that I'm completely torn between 2 alternate titles for one of my battle reports.  However, yesterday's club game is one such, where the action went completely against my predictions and left me wondering how to write it up.

Originally I was going to call this battle "A Game of Two Halves", alluding to the infamous soccer cliché, for an obvious reason.  The setup is this: the small New Mexico town of San Fidel is divided between 2 rival, ruthless families and their employees.  To the north of the main road, the Delgados have control, whilst south of the road is under the sway of the Maxwells.  This is an unstable situation anyway, but the recent arrival of a Mysterious Stranger in town has upset the delicate balance.  People are on edge; even the most trivial incident could lead to a conflagration...

Scenario

This is a game for 3 players.  Each of the 3 forces is potentially hostile to both the others, though there are reasons why they might forge temporary alliances.

 Forces:

• Delgados, Maxwells: Each family has 6 models with a range of capabilities from Legend down to Citizen.  4 of these start the game in play; the other 2 are potential reinforcements.
• Mysterious Stranger: 1 Legend.  My version also had the Fast Draw and Luck skills.

Setup: 

Dice to see which family sets up first.  The loser places 1 model anywhere they like as long as it's within their half of the town.  The families alternate in placing the remaining figures, again within their own territory.  Once all of the families' models have been positioned, the Mysterious Stranger player then places his/her figure anywhere desired.

Reinforcements

Each family has 2 reinforcement figures.  One of these will come into play when/if one of the figures already in play is lost.  When that happens, choose a reinforcement model at random and shuffle the appropriate action card into the deck.  On their next activation, the reinforcement may be placed at the front door of any desired building within their own family's territory.  The second reinforcement is placed in a similar manner when the family takes a second loss.  After that, you're on your own!

Victory

Each of the families scores points for members of the other family who are dead, captured or have lost their nerve by the end of the game as follows.  Note that it doesn't matter which force incapacitates their enemies, just that the hated rivals are cut down to size!  In order to claim a victory, a family must score at least 4 points more than the other family:

• Legend: +4 victory points
• Shootist: +3 victory points
• Gunman: +2 victory points
• Citizen: +1 victory point
• Mysterious Stranger: -4 victory points!

(Yes, that's right.  If either family KOs the Mysterious Stranger then they lose points.  It might still be worth their while, though...)

The Mysterious Stranger is trying to play one side off against the other.  He/she wins if the scores of both families are less than 4 points different.  In other words, the stranger wins if neither family can claim an outright victory!

Our Game

A number of lesser gunmen had already been placed hiding well within their own territories, when the Delgados put the rifleman Emilio provocatively behind the old hangin' tree.  The other family responded by placing Black Bart immediately on the other size of the trunk.  Tit-for-tat led to Tuco supporting Emilio and Jebediah behind a nearby cactus.  It would be interesting to see who drew the first action card from this lot!

Even as Juan, the rookie, ran up to support his boss, Black Bart's action card was turned over.  He snarled at Tuco: "You yellow-bellied skunk!  I saw you eyeing up my sister yesterday.  If you know what's good for you then you'll leave town immediately!"
Tuco went for his gun, but Black Bart was faster: his shot caused a flesh wound and forced the Mexican to duck back out of sight.  Jebediah joined in from behind his cactus and emptied his pistol firing at Juan, but only managed to graze his target.

This was about as good as things got for the Maxwells, though.  Tuco recovered from the shock and popped round the tree stump.

He shot Black Bart, twice.

 

Meanwhile, Emilio used his rifle to prevent help from reaching the embattled Black Bart.  With an improbable series of action card draws, Emilio aimed and fired repeatedly at anyone who approached.

Between them, Tuco and Juan finally incapacitated Black Bart...

...while Emilio gunned down anyone else who approached.

A Saviour?

The Maxwells were pretty despondent by now.  They'd lost 2 of their better men for not much gain and hadn't received any reinforcements yet.  Then we drew an "Old Friend" bystander card.

Cole had just ridden into town and was unwittingly behind the Delgado lines.  Perhaps this would even things up a little?

Nope, not a chance.  Tuco spun round and gunned the newcomer down.

Mysterious Stranger Decides to Act

So far, Blondie had just been sauntering up the street.  He was now dealt a whole fistful of action cards at once and decided to join in before matters got too far out of hand.  The loner ran towards the tree, firing as he came.  Emilio took a flesh wound, but that was all.  Juan, his gun empty, decided to charge the tall stranger in desperation, but Blondie had saved an action card especially for such a situation.  He blazed away at the Mexican, hoping to use his luck to negate any possible ill effects.  This plan went horribly wrong, as he threw 3 '1's out of 8 dice and promptly realised his gun was empty.  Oops!

The citizen Juan did well to hold his own against the legend Blondie, until Emilio joined in the melee.  Even then, the outcome should have been anything but certain, but Emilio gave the mysterious stranger an incredibly solid punch that knocked him out cold.  Blondie still hadn't recovered by the end of the game!

Maxwell reinforcements were beginning to arrive, but Tuco wasn't going to wait for that.  He turned his gun on the citizen Jebediah, who had been taking pot shots from behind his cactus all game.

Tuco's shot may not have been the most accurate, but the bullet went straight through the cactus and struck his target in the belly.  Although Jebediah wasn't seriously hurt, he decided to cower in the dust and wait for help, rather than continuing to fight.

Whilst the Delgado family was clustering around the tree, Injun Joe ran up onto the gallows and opened fire.  Despite the large number of bullets, he narrowly missed all his targets [this is the first time in playing "The Rules with No Name" that I've felt it worthwhile to look up the page on "stray shots".  The Mexicans were clustered very tightly together!]

Injun Joe wouldn't get another chance, for Emilio raised his rifle and fired.

In true Hollywood fashion, the injured Injun Joe then fell backwards, through the trapdoor in the gallows, and ended up unconscious in the dirt below.

In an act of brutal revenge, Tuco then approached the badly injured Black Bart and executed him [this was only possible because of his evil attribute].

This act had no consequence on game-play, other than to cause horror in those who saw the deed. The rest of the Delgados felt somewhat uneasy, but said nothing.  The last remaining Maxwell (Emmett) was appalled at the despicable act; he approached with the intention of gunning Tuco down - though the bad guy had other ideas!

Conclusion

At this point, we ran out of time and had to pack the game away.  However it's hard to see how playing on would have altered the result in any significant way.  So, final scores:

• Delgados: +11 VPs.  Incapacitated 2 shootists, 2 gunmen and 1 citizen.  Also +2 VPs extra if the "Old Friend" is counted - I hadn't made a ruling on this.
• Maxwells: 0 VPs.  Some of the Mexicans had flesh wounds, but nothing serious.

I was debating whether to penalise the Delgados for incapacitating the Mysterious Stranger as well, though technically Blondie was only unconscious and could have recovered.  The odds of this happening and him then being able to take effective action seemed extremely slim, though.  He'd better hope that there's a friendly innkeeper and/or coffin-maker to hide him while he recovers and plots his revenge, I think!

As it stands, it's completely academic whether the Delgados have this penalty or not.  Their score is so high that they have clearly won a very major victory with or without the -4 VPs!

I cannot think of another game I've played, of any genre, where an arbitrary piece of terrain has played so prominent a role as in this one.  I'm not counting the only bridge over a river, the one pillbox that is holding up an advance or a similar "designed" focal point.  Rather, when I set the town out, I imagined that the old hangin' tree was just 1 terrain feature of many, yet as far as the game play was concerned it might as well have been the only thing on the board!