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Friday, 5 July 2019

Death Race 2019

Yesterday we played our first Gaslands death-race of 2019. Since we had a bit of a time-limit, Caesar suggested that we limited our teams to 30 cans apiece. This seemed like a good idea at the time.

This was the course. It looks complicated ...


... but wasn't. It did. however, ensure that any car getting too far ahead would have to make a run for the finish through the pack.


We had six players. Three went for a single vehicle apiece. Two went for two vehicles. I went for three - cheap explosive prison cars. Unfortunately this meant that despite the lower points we still had a lot of individual vehicles in play, and that slows things down.


The start was orderly ...


... but things quickly got messy. That Caesar's mini in the middle, being rammed by one of John's prison cars. Kannika in the yellow sports-car, Jason, in the police-car and Ed in the hot-rod pulled ahead. I spread my three ticking time-bombs through the pack, hoping to deter any attacks by the treat of apocalyptic explosions.


The first vehicles reached Gate One, and their weapons became hot.


John dropped a pile of glue in the gate, limiting access to it. Things got tight. Kannika rose to the occasion.


Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of what happened next. There was a collision. This led to a wreck. and another collision. And another wreck. and some explosions. And wrecks. And explosions. Lots of vehicles were destroyed. Cars spun out. It was a disaster.


The survivors kept racing. Caesar managed to plonk his mini in the glue.


Jason and Ed were out in front, making the turn for the long run to Gate Two. However I'd sent one of my prison cars to intercept them. More collision. More explosions.


Kannika was now closing up on the leaders as well, in her sporty yellow number.


In fact she took a commanding lead.


Jason and Ed were in hot pursuit though.


By this stage we were running out of time, and I'd mostly stopped taking pictures. Kannika was still in front, but the others were able to take her under fire, and whilst she got through Gate Three ready to head for the finish Ed finished her off just after. This left him in prime position to win had we been able to continue.


So, we learned that low points games aren't strictly the answer; you need to limit the number of vehicles as well. But it was a fun and chaotic evening. And I found the explosive prison cars good fun to use.

4 comments:

  1. The Rule of Carnage was certainly in effect in that race! Thanks for the AAR.

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  2. I liked the layout of the race course with plenty of interesting turns and tight spots. Thanks John for dumping that glue at Gate 1! The cunning plan to limit points didn't make for a much shorter game unfortunately and I think you're right that limiting vehicles to one per team would have worked better. Maybe no respawns past a certain point in the race too?

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    Replies
    1. Maybe after a certain point, but I'm not sure when. perhaps any vehicle that's passed Gate 2 can't respawn?

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    2. The problem is that a Death race isn't about survival (that's the Arena of death scenario). It's about winning a race. Remember that each scenario has a particular focus on how it's won.

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