Earlier this year I got the itch (no, not that itch!) to paint up some larger miniatures and ended up going in with some 40mm scale Vikings and Saxons. I always like seeing larger models on the tabletop at gaming conventions and thought I needed some of my own. Yesterday (Saturday) most of the Space Cadets +1 put these on the table for their first battles.
I decided early on that Nightwatch would be a nice set of rules to use for these models, focusing on a small group of very capable fighters against a large number of lower-quality opponents. Nightwatch scenarios have strong, clear objectives, meaning obvious winning conditions for a convention-type group of random players.
The players in attendance were some of the usuals - David, Ziggy and Mark and we were joined by Mark's 12-year old nephew Luke, who is just starting his miniatures gaming journey. Numerically this was perfect - one Viking per player and I would GM the Saxons per the standard automatic behavior rules.
That's Mark and Luke there... The first scenario required the Viking to burn the large house and make a break for it.
The Vikings made it to the target easily and the first waves of Saxons arrived in manageable locations.
The end of the game, turns 6 and 7 were a bit tense, with useful arrivals but the Vikings had no trouble completing their objective.
The second mission was to find a steal sheep from the Saxons! This was essentially a find and rescue mission.
We rearranged the tabletop and marked four possible locations that needed to be searched by the Vikings while they searched for the sheep. The locations were the three buildings and the livestock pen. The Vikings enter the tabletop between those hedges. The Saxon entry points were also placed in more useful locations - two were totally useless in the previous game as it was coming to a close.
Ziggy's spearman locates the herd. Now, to get out of there - activate SHEPHERD MODE!
Things quickly turned to shite for the Vikes as the Saxons immediately began appearing at the most useful spawn points and my Defense rolls were absolutely magnificent.
YESSS. The impartial GM loves the chaos as the Vikings completely fall apart. They all try to free Ziggy's spearman so he can get away with the sheep. My dice were hot, making it a tall order for sure.
Turn 7. The shepherd gets SO so close to the goal, a two-inch strip at the edge of the board. A Saxon slinger and an archer are in hot pursuit! A rare Saxon victory! In all fairness, my dice were on fire and the players' dice were hot trash for that game.
There are David and Ziggy!
Next game... this time the Vikings would have to protect their flock from dem teevin' Saxons. A quick re-arrange of the scenery and voila!
The livestock pen was the Saxon objective. They had to break it up to let the sheep loose. The Vikings had to protect it. The Vikings selected two archers for this scenario figuring it would be more useful in a defensive situation.
Not many photos of this game. The dice gods corrected the lines of fate and the Vikings had a tremendous amount of success this time, easily dealing with the early arrivals and being able to stay tight for the impending rush. The last couple of turns were tense but easily managed. I did get a few villagers into contact with the pen but didn't have time to tear it down. Ah well, better that the players win anyway.
What a blast! A very worth playtest before I take these guys up to Southern Front next month. I'll make some adjustments to spawn locations in the first scenario but otherwise things worked very nicely. The guys were happy with how things worked which is all that really matters.
