Desert Race

I set up a solo game of Gaslands yesterday afternoon, to see how it played on a smaller table, but also to see how a race played out with less complexity in the vehicles. I know we did this in our first couple of games, but since then we've generally used the full rules for sponsors/perks and so on.

So for this race I put together five cars at 20 cans each. I didn't use sponsors, but did give some of the cars perks, limiting each one to a single class though. I used Audience Votes, but with no sponsors you could only generate them because of other vehicles passing through gates, or by being wrecked.

These were the vehicles:

Rear Row (L to R)
Red Barchetta - Performance Car with Hot Start and a Shotgun
Back In Back - Car with Front Minigun and Handbrake Artist

Centre
Perfect Day - Performance Car with Delicate Touch and Rear-Drive

Front (L to R)
Natural Born Killer - Car with Tank Tracks and Front Ram
Bad Blood - Car with Front MG, Rear MG and Headshot

And this is the track I used. It was about 30" square. The 'hills' are dunes; not impassable, but they count as treacherous terrain, and cover if a line of fire passes over them.

The vehicles on the starting grid.

And the start. Back in Black nosed ahead thanks to a spin and slide. The bulldozer, Natural Born Killer also managed a slide-based lead. The racing car Perfect day was forced to hang back rather than collide with Natural Born Killer.

On the approch to the first gate Natural Born Killer was able to bring its ram to bear on Back in Black, which took damage and wiped out.

And so we reached this position - Perfect Day had made a poor start and got left behind. Bad Blood had spun into some dunes and was stuck trying to extricate itself. Back in Black had wiped out and was motionless across the gate. Red Barchetta had passed through it all and was ready to run on to the second gate. And Natural Born Killer ...

... piled into Back In Black again, causing it to wreck and explode, then hit Red Barchetta as well. The red sports-car evaded the worst of the damage and sped away, risking the dunes as it did so.

A new turn enabled Back in Black to respawn almost immediately. It moved off, used its minigun to shoot at Natural Born Killer, and then got rammed again.

Red Barchetta was well ahead now, Perfect Day was moving off and poor Bad Blood was still in all sorts of trouble.

Red Barchetta was now at Gate 3. But it had got there by fast, reckless driving that not even the higher handling of a performance car could sustain for long. It flipped and crashed into the gate. Audience Votes would bring it back, but the other vehicles now had a few moves in which to catch up.

Back in Black wrecked again, whilst Natural Born Killer and Perfect Day built up some speed.

Gaslands is fun, but not what one would call realistic. Ever seen a bulldozer do this? It was fun though. The pool of water was treacherous terrain, but tracks allow a vehicle to ignore that. The slide took Natural Born Killer past the wreck of Back in Black.

Bad Blood was still blundering around. In trying to stay on top of its hazards from the dunes it wasn't getting a chance to go up in gears, so kept getting left behind on each new turn. Perfect Day and Natural Born Killer negotiated the second gate.

Red Barchetta got back into play as Natural Born Killer reached the third gate. The race looked like it would be between the fast sports-car and ponderous bulldozer. But with a very tight turn ahead Red Barchetta couldn't rev up to full speed just yet. Both vehicles exchanged fire, but evaded each other's shots.

Perfect Day was also making good running.

On the tight turn to the finish Natural Born Killer went up over the dunes, but was T-boned by Red Barchetta. Both vehicles chose to evade the collision, which just meant hazards, but hazards were not good in this position.

Back in Back and Perfect day were also closing up fast; a dramatic finish was on the cards.

Natural Born Killer misjudged its line, and sideswiped a shipping container, wiping out. It now looked like Red Barchetta had the race sewn up.

Perfect Day and Back in Black blundered on the final turn, and pretty much put themselves out of the running. But what's that? Natural Born Killer out in front? Yes. It had wiped out near the end of a turn, so got to act at the start of a new turn. And rolled really well; with a straight line to the finish it could afford to put all of the shifts it rolled into acceleration, with no regard for hazards, and roared ahead in a cloud of dust.

Red Barchetta was also going at high speed, but the only way it was going to finish ahead of the bulldozer was to throw in every risky manuever it could. Like this.

Natural Born Killer crossed the line in first place.

The rest of the field were nowhere to be seen. Bad Blood did finally make it past the first gate though.

This was surprisingly good fun, concentrating on simply racing rather than the technicalities of all of the different perks and abilities sponsors dole out. I possibly should have made some of the track less cluttered, and use of that many dunes somewhat favoured the bulldozer's tracks, but overall I didn't think the small space really hindered the game too much.