Machinas At The Mad Max 2 Museum. Almost.

One of the things I wanted to do on holiday was play a game of Machinas at the Mad Max 2 Museum. I packed some cars, the rules and some dice of course. But then I always take games on holiday if I can.

As it turmed out playing at or in the museum itself wasn't very practical, as there isn't the space (or a cafe) inside, and it was far too hot outside. But after our visit it was lunchtime, and there was a cafe next door. So we went in there and I set up the game whilst we ate.

This was our view. That's looking west towards South Australia, but also towards the roads I wrote about in my previous post. You can also see the bank of cloud which heralded a massive thunderstorm during the game.

Catherine, John and Claudia wanted to pay, so I kept he game simple, with minimal car features and signatures and the most basic of equipment on the vehicles. I ran Max in his Interceptor, being pursued by three vehicles, one for each player. They could choose to cooperate or not.

Claudia chose the big ram-car, Jon the rocket-armed buggy and Catherine the classic blue Miss Murder.

The first game lasted less than a turn. Jon tried to pass and shoot with his buggy, but I held him off. I decided to bash him in response, and rolled badly. He didn't. I crashed. Game over.

We started again, with the same vehicles. After walking the roads I had decided to adapt the game to what I'd seen, so the road surface itself was now only two lanes. The other lanes were considered off-road (shoulder driving in the rules), and I added an entry to the random events table to make driving on such a surface a little riskier. Here you can see Max escaping down the road, with Catherine following him and Jon and Claudia running along the inside shoulder.

I evaded the chasing cars for a few turns this time, but my luck ran out when Claudia brought the massive ram on her car into play.

Everyone seemed to enjoy the game, and were just about picking up the rules by the end.

We then went back to our campsite, which had been leveled by the storm I wrote about earlier. As we put everything back up another two storms came through. We had a busy time that night.

The next day dawned bright and mostly sunny. We spent it exploring Broken Hill (including the hotel with the murals featured in 'The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert'), but in the evening, it being a Thursday, I set up another game of Machinas at our camp. This was my view:

The green tent was Catherine and my home for a fortnight. One day we're going to get a tent you can stand up in.

I ran Miss Murder, and selected six potential pursuing vehicles from the ones I'd brought.

I started with one pursuer in my rear-view mirror - an armoured car with ramming spikes.

It quickly moved to deploy the spikes, but I held it off, despite some scratched paintwork.

However my swerving also caused my spiky friend to edge ahead of me. Actually no bad thing ...

... except that I was now joined by a trike with a big gun on the back

At this point I was joined by a spectator, but they flew off when I invited them to join the game.

With the trike now in the chase the spiky car decided to quit.

However a gun-car now also joined in. Things were not looking good.

The trike lost no time in raking me with gunfire, causing some damage.

Again I swerved, and the trike moved ahead ...

... which now put me in the sights of the gun-car.

More damage was inflicted, and my car was beginning to suffer. The gun-car came in again, off-road, and on-target.

A bike now joined the chase.

As the gun-car cut in for another shot I swung the wheel over and attempted to run it off the road. All I did was force it to swerve back though.

The trike had failed to drop back for a clear shot, so it too gave up the chase.

The new bike came in, its rider brandishing a heavy pistol. Another shot or two saw more damage on my car. One more hit would see me crash out.

The bike came in for another pass.

I dropped back in response, hoping I could hold off the gun-car.

I didn't need to - the gun-car gave up the chase too.

Now it was just me and the bike, although other reinforcements were possible.

The bike swung out to try and drop back, hoping to line up a shot afterwards.

As I pulled alongside I moved in for the kill ...

... but its rider was high on savvy, and evaded my attempts, accelerating ahead of me.

I must have rattled him, however, as he gave up the chase as well.

My car was battered and on its last legs (or wheels), but I had survived.

It was inevitable that any holiday I go on includes games if possible. here we are playing Fluxx in the Silverton Hotel.

Catherine and I also played Street-Soccer, this time in the camp kitchen at our campsite in Dubbo. There was a thunderstorm raging outside, and a few of us took shelter there. The funny colours are due to the yellow strip-lighting they use in such places; great for not attracting insects, but rubbish for taking photos under.

Catherine beat me 3-0.

The next evening we had more storms, so Catherine and I played W1815. The French lost three of the four games.

So that was the bits of my holiday relevant to gaming. We did do a few national parks, went down two mines (opal and silver) and covered a few museums as well. We also sat in the sunshine and read books and enjoyed the wonderful wildlife with which this country is blessed. It was a good holiday; our first in 20 years without the children. The question is ... where to go next year?