Back in the fall, Bruce hosted a couple of games of Fistful of Lead using his Swashbuckler adaptation of the gladiator game (Arena of Death?). First up was Zorro.
Zorro and his (wo)men had to rescue their compatriot who was being hanged in the town square. If the hanged man got into the crowd and Zorro excited the left side of the board, Zorro would win! Zorro set up hidden and, until one of his hidden units was spotted neither the four guards at the gallows nor the four lancers at the stables could move.
As soon as Zorro was spotted, the lancers moved out, trying to thin out Zorro's henchman and also set up a blocking position to prevent his escape. They could dismount, but there was an advantage in combat to being mounted so they did not.
Zorro and broom guy beat one of the guards silly with others rush the gallows. The lovely Maria was one of the most effective agents of rebellion.
Meanwhile, behind the stone house, the lancers catch Zorro and tie him up.
The doomed man makes his escape but more lancers keep piling in on Zorro. He fights valiantly, thinking the ranks, but cannot sustain this level of wounds forever.
Finally, he succumbs to the pressure and draws his last breath. Or does?
A few weeks later, Bruce hosted another horror game. The villagers must pass through town and destroy Dracula's castle. Dracula has lots of critters to help him defend and delay the townsfolk.
Bats assail the shooty group of villagers.
And now rats assail the stabby group of villagers. Improbably discipline among the villagers (plus some pretty lucky rolling) allowed them to brush aside these annoyances one-by-one. Some additional time pressure would have made the game more challenging for them. The fast-moving fliers could also have used their faster movement to isolate and dog-pile some villagers to try and thin out the peasantry.
The forces of evil moved as blinds until spotted.
Here, Frau Blucher and some random find themselves alone against a large number of rats.
Fortunatey, good dice trump bad tactics every time and the villagers rush towards the castle.
In the end, Blucher and some guy with a mug of beer ran head-first into Dracula and, but the boots to him (yay, box-cars!).
Overall, a very slick system for skirmish Bruce is working up a few more flavoured rules so more powerful characters can do more movie-like moves.
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