The Tsar's Dragon

It is a little known fact that at the start of the 18th century, Peter The Great of Russia kept a pet dragon on a secluded estate just outside of Moscow. This creature was almost certainly one that had been captured after wandering from a certain lost valley in the Ukraine.

The dragon was carefully watched over by a select guard.

Charles XII heard of this creature, and sent a flying column of his finest troops to kill it and bring back his head. After all, what a propaganda coup that would be.

As they marched towards where the creature was chewing on some sheep and a few rather unlucky condemned criminals, a well-dress but wild-eyed gentleman shouted curses down upon them. One group of Swedish soldiers was discomfited by this, but soon shook it off.

The Swedes formed up and advanced cautiously towards the beast.

The musketeers moved to the centre, loaded and fired, wounding it. The pikemen worked around one side to cover them in case it charged, whilst the cavalry moved round to the creature's left.

The shouting of the wild-eyed gentleman had attracted some Russian cavalry, which hovered around the Swedish force, but seemed reluctant to close.

Indeed even the guards seemed rather disinclined to rush to the aid of their charge.

The Swedes kept up a steady and surprisingly accurate fire on the dragon which alternated between backing away and roaring. It did make one rush at the Swedes, but didn't seriously threaten them.

The cavalry charged in, and slashed it with their swords. The beast was now looking weak.

A volley rang out ...

... and another. The dragon fell - dead.

The Swedes formed a cordon,  cut off its head, and then marched away in good order, unopposed.

Even the wild-eyed gentleman had run out of good curses.

OK, so as I said I bought 'Palaeo Diet - Pulp' over the weekend, and this was my first time using some of the things in it. Rather than individual characters, I used the four-figure stands of my Great Northern War troops. The Swedes had two that counted as Rifle-armed, one that counted as a hunter with a spear and the cavalry were classed as a club-armed hunter. The scenario was 'To Kill A King', but I replaced the raptors with a group of three goons, and the giant herbivore with a witch-doctor (the wild-eyed gentleman) who could summon cavalry reinforcements (more goons).

What actually happened was that goons turned out to be surprisingly unaggressive if you don't go too close to them (and the Swedes didn't). The witch-doctor could have been useful; he got in a curse on one Swedish stand, and summoned more goons, but the latter were as reluctant to close as the others. This really left the dragon - a king carnivore - as the only real threat on the table. And it is quite imposing on paper. But its reaction rolls were ... pathetic. Most of the time it chose either to back away from the Swedes, or simply roar at them, so they were able to pretty much sit tight and shoot at it.

So, a great idea for a scenario (even if I do say so myself), but the design wasn't quite there, and the dice failed to deliver in the bits I had got right. I'll give it another go with a different setup, I think.