Friday, December 21, 2018

Galactic Heroes: WW2 Pulp Horror crossover!

Last night I attempted to show the diversity of the Fistful of Lead: Galactic Heroes rules by running a 7 player Weird War 2 Pulp Horror game.
Four Allied players led by Major Victory and the Liberty League had to assault a Nazi research base located in the castle of the mysterious Count Orlock, a noble who had somehow ruled the local area for four centuries.
The Nazi players new the Allies would attack, but not how or where. They had secret reinforcements ready to go in case of just such an attack.
Each player had a Leader with four regular troops. The only special rules were that Leaders had to sustain 3 wounds to be put out of action, even if an out of action result was rolled.
The baddies got a surprise when the Liberty League attacked. I had the allied players stand at the opposite end of the 8' table and throw a cotton ball. Where it landed was where their deployment zone was. This simulated the irregularity of their airbourne drop.
Two groups landed in the castle, two out side.
 Kreigsaffen, Count Orlock and Elsa
 Taking the gate

 The Sentinel and Lucky land and are immediately under fire

 
Major Victory blasts those below
Liberty Belle led one of the outside groups. She was able to use her sonic Liberty Belle ring to knock a hole in the wall (she had the Damaging Aura trait). Sgt. Stone rushed the open drawbridge. Major Victory and the Sentinel of Justice dropped inside, but were quickly attacked from all sides.


In the chaos, Count Orlock opened the door to the underground facility. Out poured undead troops, victims of experiments with the vampires blood.
 Zombies!

 Blood Alley, always one in FfoL.
Totenkopf sees the tide turn.
Each turn, a new horde of zombies lurched threw the open door. They would attack the first living creature they saw, including Germans. Luckily, Count Orlock and robot soldiers weren't alive.

A pile of dead in wounded filled the gatehouse due to Sgt Stone's tommy gun and Major Victory unleashing his "Star-Spangled Vision" from the tower above (he has the Flier trait).

Meanwhile, Count Orlock was able to mesmerize the Sentinel, using him as a puppet to attack his own troops! The Sentinel was able to break the spell, only after killing his own sidekick, Lucky. I can picture the cover to the comic in my head...

After only 2 hours it was clear the Allies had won. Out of the Nazi Leaders, only Count Orlock survived. He was last seen slinking into the caverns beneath the castle.

Great game, and really showed off what I asked it for: robots, zombies, super heroes, vampires...

Mission accomplished!



Friday, December 7, 2018

Battle at the Crossroads II- Fistful of Lead

After last week's play test, last night was a repeat scenario but a different take on armor: Armor as a Ye Olde Save roll.
All other rules remain the same, with the same modifiers. Each player had a Leader rated as d12, wearing chain shirt, helmet and shield. This gave them a save roll of 7+. The rest of each retinue was a mix or armored and unarmored troops. Vikings had bows. Normans had crossbows. Bows could fire every turn, but crossbows took full two actions to reload, but got an armor penetration bonus.
 Wolf the Berserker- They had the Bloodthirsty & Flurry of Blows traits, but no armor.
 Guy de Foiegras, defender of the realm, or at least his bit.
Born Twobears, a giant of a man
The Norman leaders got horses and a nice mounted charge bonus, but the Vikings got an extra miniature to make up for the disparity.
Any hits, whether from shooting or close combat were rolled to Wound as usual. An armored target (even if just a shield) got a save roll. If the save was made, the wound level was reduced one step.
Out of Action becomes wound, wound becomes shock, shock becomes nothing. If a player rolled a natural 10 or higher on the Wound roll, there was no save, they found a weak spot.
Jokers played became reinforcements for whoever played it.
 The Norsemen cometh
 a view from the Fort
 No prisoners!
 Bill, the Big Bellied Berserker makes short work of Norman trooper
 The battle at the crossroads begins...
 ...and quickly escalates.
How'd it play?
The Vikings made a mad rush towards the village in search of loot. A pig was grabbed and a lagging Viking reinforcement entered the field. The norman force coming up the road tried a flanking move, but was soon cut off. The Norman leader was unhorsed and forced to fight on foot (a wound or Out of Action result unhorses the rider and leaves them dismounted Shaken). The Normans from the fort charged out to break up the looting.
A crossbow brought down one Viking, and the Norman Lord rode right into the Viking standard. At the last minute, the standard bearer swooshed the raven banner at the horse, startling it and ruining the charge (i.e. the Norman rolled garbage and the standard didn't).
A huge scrum started in the middle of town. A lone reinforcement charged out of the fort but was dropped by a bowman before he help.
By the end, only the now dismounted Norman Lord remained. He had 4 shock markers on him. He managed to drive off most his opponents and clear his head, only to have a lucky arrow, Harold Godwinson style, drop him.
Victory to the Norsemen!
 Time to go!
To the survivors the spoils! Where'd the pig run off to?
Group consensus was this second way, was much smoother and required less mental math. It played like a movie. Lots of decisions to be made, changes in strategy based on the card deal, and cinematic moments. Another test in in order, but I think it's the way to go.
Back to working on the core book!