Howdie. Shortly before Fall In I finally managed a small Colonial Horror game at our local gaming spot, the Comic Store West. The rules as written parallel Where Heroes Dare, but with a different emphasis on abilities and characteristics. My first tested scenario, Big Trouble in Little Germantown, was written as a combat and goal game, pretty straightforward, meant to test these skills and traits.
As usual, I forgot my camera, and, as usual, Dieter managed to photograph a few things. The board is set with terrain and mysteries locations (places to search and solve), and is themed in the 1750-60's. There were four adversarial parties, the local militia backed by Scottish Highlanders, an Iroqouis raiding party, a band of witches, and the King of the Pumpkin Patch and his ghoul retinue.
It seems, one Thomas Orhme, a feared necromancer, once ruled this valley until his grisly death at the hands of his neighbors. 60 years later, the valley was resettled.... much to the woe of the settlers! The race is on to reclaim, or, finally destroy, the legacy of Orhme...
Each party was given personal objectives. Dieter chose the colonists, Yabu chose the Indians, Al chose the Pumpkin, and that left me with the witches. The Indians scored additional points for the deaths of the colonists (as they intended to reclaim this territory), the Pumpkin King and Ghouls scored points for killing, well, anyone else, the Witches scored points for casting magic, and the colonists scored points for the death of the Witches. Each party also had an additional, random task to complete. For the Indians, this ended up being collecting harvest items (vegetables, and such)... luckily enough for Dieter, the colonists drew "burn the meeting house down", a task they set to promptly...
The colonists not only managed to burn down the meeting house, but were successful in killing a number of opposing models. My witches, on the other hand, had a heck of a time. They very rarely succeeded in casting magic though the Green Hag did manage to use Arise to summon undead amidst the graveyard (the below picture is of the graveyard, but not of the undead... notice the gnarled hand of the Pumpkin King... and Jay Strongbow collecting harvest goods in the background)...
The Indians quickly searched a cave near the stream, and ransacked the house on the hill.... before finishing off my Green Hag at the site of the lonely grave....
... and for the witches, it was hardly a moment too soon, given their horrid luck. The Puumpkin King remained standing, though his ghouls (who became encumbered by the poltergeist of Orhme early in the game) were cut down with very little effort. The Indians scored some points, and at least had some presence on the table at the end of the game.
The clear victor were the colonists and their Scottish saviors. Not only did they collect the most mysteries, finding the means to dispel Orhme once and for all, they scored big with the wiping out of the witches, and their burning of the meeting house. Sometimes you have to destroy that which you love, in order to save it.... ???
Once again, my thanks for the inspiration provided by the excellent blog Geektactica, and for the players willing to try out my still somewhat rough system. Tastes good, needs more salt :) Once the game play is ironed out, I can move on to the more challenging task of game narrative... but that is a blog for another time...
