This weekend was originally supposed to be the “Second Annual HOTT Campaign Weekend”, but for a variety of reasons I decided at the last minute to drop the campaign idea and just host a series of one-off games over the weekend.
Friday night we kicked off with the traditional homemade Pizza dinner, followed by a Hordes of the Things MEGA-BATTLE!
Saturday was SUPER SAVAGE SATURDAY! I hosted THREE separate Savage Worlds games! I originally planned to write up detailed reports for each game – including stats and loads of photos showing all of the action… but I just don’t have the time…
Instead here’s a brief rundown of the savage shenanigans that ensued with a few pictures…
SATURDAY MORNING
Saturday morning I set up and ran a Pulp Adventure game. The general scenario was that there was rumours floating around Cairo that a sandstorm had shifted some dunes to reveal a lost city out in the middle of the desert. The city is thought to be The Lost City of Maraha – the supposed resting lace of the Eye of Sett. The Eye of Sett is an enormous jewel set in a headband of gold that supposedly gave the wearer the ability to command the dead to rise and attack the wearers foes!
The players were a band of heroic adventurers that set out to recover the rare and precious (and potentially powerful!) artifact.
Unfortunately there was a group of Evil Nazi Occultists that also had their designs on the Eye of Sett that arrived at the lost city around the same time they did. The Evil Nazis were played by myself.
There were a number of “searchable locations” through out the city – mostly one in each small building and a couple in the rooms of the larger buildings – unfortunately in each searchable location there was the potential for an encounter. Whenever entering a searchable location the player entering it drew a chit out of a box that had either “nothing” or the name of something nasty written on it… if there was nothing or the foe was defeated the players (or the Nazis) could search the area by spending an entire turn within the location and passing a notice roll. If successful they got to draw a chit out of the “treasure box” – all but one had “nothing” written on them, the other had “treasure”…
If that weren’t bad enough, there was an approaching sandstorm that would likely bury the city again so time was limited. At turn ten I would start rolling a d10, if the turn number plus the die result totaled 20 or greater the sandstorm had arrived and the game was over.
There were five players for this adventure. CVT played Harshit Gopal; a Gurkha. Rick played Timtim, Youthful Investigative Reporter (as well as his trusty canine companion, Snowball). Jackson played Freddy “Flash” Burton, Ace Pilot. Terry played Captain Hadrock, Salty Sea Captain. Cory played an explorer and big game hunter whose name escapes me at this moment. And someone also played a crew of diggers…
(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)
The Germans enter the Lost City of Maraha.
Timtim and Snowball lead the way! Harshit Gopal and the diggers (and the namesless big game hunter) trail behind.
Freddy “FlashL Burton and Captain Hadrock make their way to another gateway.
Captain hadrock had a special ability (well… hindrance…); Alcoholic – before the game Capaitn Hadrock had to check and see if his been at the whiskey, requiring a spirit check. Success meant he had shown some willpower and stayed sober. Failure meant he was three sheets to the wind and thus -2 at all Agility and Smarts based trait and skill rolls – but +2 on all Spirit-based trait and skill rolls (yes, he actually got better at intimidating; “Billions of Blistering Blue Barnacles! Thundering Thypoons! You Sea Gerkhin! Poltroon! Bashi Bazouks! ECTOPLASYM!”)
He failed...
The Germans had a bad time of it – the first building they entered had the Royal Mummy!
Hans was shot up by Harshit Gopal.
The next building the Germans entered had four Minions of Sett!?
It’s been a while since I ran a game where we got to wears hats!! This is Terry (who played Captain Hadrock) in his sailors hat and Jackson (who played “Flash” Burton; Ace Pilot) wearing my flight helmet!
Günter ran into some Bedouin. He shot up one before the rest blew him apart.
The Royal Mummy made a mess of the Nazis…
Timtim had a run-in with some lesser mummies.
The diggers ran in to his aid and Timtim slipped out to search elsewhere… ("When danger reared it's ugly head, Timtim turned his tail and fled....")
The beautiful but deadly Heidi von Ravenhoff had a run-in with a rather large lot of zombies and was torn to pieces…!?
Timtim’s clever canine companion, Snowball, discovered the treasure and brought his master to it!
The heroes escaped with the good while the Nazis got beaten down by the denizens of the lost city…
Went a little quicker than I expected. But fun and laughs were had by all…
SATURDAY AFTERNOON
In the afternoon I ran a World War Two skirmish game set in the streets of Stalingrad. The scenario was pretty simple – who ever controlled the most buildings at the end of the game won. Rick, Jackson, and Terry played the Germans. Cory, CVT, and Gary played the Russians.
The Russians had a slight numerical advantage, but the Germans were a bit “better”.
Germans advance through the ruined streets and rubble-filled avenues.
The Russians prepare to take back the neighborhood.
The first long range shots are exchanged.
Russians and Germans blazing away at each other from hard cover with little effect.
The Russian Scouts leading the way around the flank.
Cautious Germans taking cover.
CVT’s Russians mixing it up in a close-assault! (they had their asses handed to them eventually!)
Russians moving up to try and take the next building.
Last minute mayhem!
In the end the Russians won. Though we didn’t end it with a roll – we had to call it on time as it was getting on and we had reservations at Amigos the traditional supper locale for Tim’s Wargames Weekends…
SATURDAY EVENING
After supper we returned to the War Room for one final Savage Skirmish… and we had a staggering ELEVEN PLAYERS!?!?
From Right to Left: Christian, Darrin, Amanda, Gary, Mistah Millah, Jackson, CVT, Patrick, Rick, Terry, and Dave!
I thought I’d just carry on with our regular Savage Saturday campaign… with a couple of “guest stars”. As I had essentially four guest stars I just gave each a Mercenary Commando fire team member (who are normally fielded as a group of extras) and upgraded them to wildcard status.
Considering the number of people the scenario had to be pretty simple and straightforward to keep things moving. So I pulled out a scenario I was originally planning to use in a couple weeks. It’s based on a mercenary commando ticket the old Traveller Book 4: Mercenary.
Short version: Players have to sieze and hold a small mining camp deep in the jungle of some backwater world.
Here is the mining camp… it is defended by a platoon of other off-world mercenaries and a section of battle droids.
Turn one Jackson’s character got deal a Joker and was feeling cocky so he charged out into the open and started blazing away at the defenders in the trenches….
Cpl. Bullseye in the open versus 10 guys in trenches… how do you figure THAT worked out. Thank goodness for the +6 armour of infantry battlesuits!!
There was a lot of blazing away at each other in cover with not much effect until Terry’s chracter decided he’d had enough and charged in!
He dove into the trench blasted another defending merc and the remaining three surrendered to him.
After that a few others dashed for the cover of the trench and proceeded to blaze away at each other slowly picking away at each other.
All the while Mistah Millah’s character, “Nitro” was runnig around the edge of the table to attack the compound from the rear. He kept referring to himself in the third person which had me laughing all night.
Anton Wilson dashing from one trench to the next in the background there.
How things looked when the shooting stopped, the dust settled and the remaining defenders surrendered…
THE END
I think we wrapped up around 12:30…. We had started around 9AM! It was a long but (mostly) fun day. Thanks to everyone that came out! (but I hope I never have to run a Savage Worlds game with eleven players again!?)
Sci-fi Shenanigans resume next Saturday!!
