This game has grown in
the waiting. I was planning a series of games, using different
rules, ending in a large game.
Life got in the way. After our
Battlesworn game of February 2016, “One of our dinosaurs stolen by
vampires” we moved shop and I came up with this as an “emergency”
game playable in the new shop.
Scenery. I
wanted to recreate the cramped feel you get in old town that has
grown organically. There are several around here and we had gone on
the best of the Jack the ripper tours. Amazing what has survived
both Hitler and the 60's planners. A modern trip down Brick Lane on
a winters night is not a comfortable experience. To then dive into a
poorly lit sidestreet-. Although this scenery was aimed at a
different place, I think it did us good here. I'd picked up a bag of
plastic Britains fencing a few years ago. Cut down, mounted on
stirrers, sandwiched between cork tiles with more no-more-nails than
plastic.
The board was made of
layered tiles on an A3 foamcore sheet. This made everything
removable and provided texture to be used as terrain, slowing the
figures down whilst giving a more realistic play.
I think Tony's
monochrome aftershots gives the idea, but it's difficult to simulate
poor streetlighting without giving yourself eyestrain!
The Story. You
may like to acquaint yourselves with the events of “One of our
dinosaurs stolen by vampires” of February 2016. The lorry is
tracked to Gravesend (a port below London that handles coastal trade)
and Shrerlock Holmes and a police squad race in pursuit. The game is
afoot!
The lorry is spotted in
a backstreets yard. As they arrive they are accosted by a frantic
gaggle of local, um, ladies who are “fed up with being food for the
undead”. It seems that the problem with Gravesend is too many
vampires. The trap has been sprung.
The figures
Whilst I stated in my last article that “Old
Glory will provide the great detective, more vampires and Victorian
civvies”. The 2 former are featured here, the latter have yet to be
painted, as they were a back order. These packs are a wealth of
ready made forces. I don't think we've ever done a game so easy to
replicate. There's a Tarzan pack and Africans with figure 8 shields
that would do for Trojan War- I must watch the new Tarzan film.
The sides.
Don't be put off by Battlesworn's apparent simplicity.
The Villainous Vampires of Madame Synn
8 vampire fighters
(those with arms outspred)
Brute Leader Madam Synn
herself
Brute, top 'at 'n cane,
a propa swell
Tank, the old one 7ft
of Nosferatu
Law and Order
Holmes fighter/leader
Watson, Inspectors
Whatt and Why, shooters
5 police constables,
fighters of the legal law
4 ladies of the night
(rabble, killed on first hit)
Playing. As the
defender, I had to be careful to “play the game” and react to
what I could see rather than what I knew. There was (from Holmes
point of view) a gaggle of street women policed and some sort of
altercation at the main gate well in the capabilities of the
constabulary.
Tony played the
vampires. And a blinding game too. He based the bulk of his forces
in the road to my right, feeding in vampires (fighters) in a steady
flow. This pulled my constables and inspectors to the gate. Two
constables would lay to a vampire while the inspectors used their
service revolvers to good use.
What's this! A vampire
has broken through and attacked a poor young lady! The sergeant
steps up and he is no more. There is always a cusp, and this was it.
From the dark menacing
figures are moving. Down the back passage towards the back gate a
silent shape approaches. Mere cast iron is no defense and the back
passage is broached! The crack! Of Watson's pistol warns the party
of his approach.
A constable is the first to feel its icy touch. Meanstwhile the sergeant and a young lady tackle the Gent (brute) who underestimates the effects of a brick filled handbag & truncheon and goes down redeaded!
Watson, realising that
there's still a threat to their flack from the survivors of the main
gate heads for the young lady.
Meanstwhile Holmes
grapples with the old one who dispatches him! That leaves the
sergeant, Watson and the young lady to get away in a conveniently
parked tourer. The papers say that the great detective has retired to
Sussex for his health. But we know better, alas. There is a rumour
amonst they who do say that his last words were “Clever girl”.
