Hippodrome

I ran another Faustus Furius race, but thus time used a more formal course. This game was done on a  bit of a whim, which is why I marked out the course with random bits of card and river sections that were on my table. It was done according to the minimum size for a circuit given in the rules - 30cm wide by 60cm long. 

I used six chariots again, but ran a mix of types. Red and Yellow were fast, Green and Blue were Agile, Grey was Scythed and White was Standard.

Blue and Yellow got off to a terrible start when Grey, the scythed chariot, attacked one of them, went out of control and spun around, wrecking them both. They would have to right themselves and make a slow start.

In fact, with their fast trait, Yellow more than made up the lost ground, and got into second place behind Red, the other Fast chariot. But fast chariots aren't so good on the corners.

Red and White made the corner. I'm not sure what happened to Yellow at this stage. The Agile chariots, Green and Blue, got into a mess with Grey, in which Grey was wrecked and Green spun to a halt.

White took the lead, as Red, whilst fast, had had to take the corner a lot wider. 

Ah - here's Yellow, coming up in third place, having taken the corner really wide. White held onto the lead as the chariots entered the second turn.

Again, White's better handling told over Red and Yellow's superior speed, and White continued to maintain its lead as they entered the second lap. Green and Blue were coming up fast as well, and would make light work of the turn too.

White was now well out in front.

Red and Yellow sped down the straight, but Green and Yellow were in the running now as well. Although Green had spun out again.

The benefits of a fast chariot can be seen here. Although White took the corner well, they seemed to slow on the back straight and Yellow, despite its slow cornering, was catching up. Grey was about to be lapped - cautiously, because those scythes are dangerous and Grey has nothing to lose.

Yellow and White went into the final corner together. 

And they both fluffed it. White crashed, and Yellow took it too wide and spun to a halt.

But they had a good lead and were back in the race before the other chariots, led by Red, could overtake them.

Yellow surged ahead, and had to fend off an attack by Grey. Amazingly it survived.

In the approach to the final corner Blue, Red and Green got into a mess and there was a bit of a disaster again.

Meanwhile White had put on a burst of speed, and managed to cross the finish ahead of White.

There was no way Yellow couldn't take second place - the compulsory movement would do it even without them rolling dice.

Red and Blue had lost out on the final corner, but Green deftly avoided the worst of the disaster, and picked up a late third place.

So the fast chariot was beaten by a standard model, but only just - the balance is kind of right with a standard chariot performing better on the turns, but losing ground on the straights. In previous games I've felt that Agile chariots have an overall edge because their cornering is just so good. In this race though they kept getting delayed by poor positioning and the side-effects of attacks. Even so, they made up the lost ground well.