Roo Hunting

With some new roos painted, it seemed fitting to get them on the table and hunt a few of them. I set up a hunt with a group of six of them being stalked by four hunters. The hunters had to bring down two of them.

An added complication was the addition of three Outfolk Hunters, a 'beast' type from the Fireside Tales supplement, which represent other human hunters hanging around the edge of the hunt and looking to sneak in to grab any kills.

The terrain was thickly wooded in the centre, so the plan was to drive the roos to the more open northern area, away from the woods and the Outfolk. Two spearmen went to the north and waited in ambush whilst the two other hunters moved to the south of the group ready to drive them towards the other hunters.

The herd got wind of the hunters and fled slightly too early, a little to the right of the ambush zone.

The hunters spread out to drive them in the right direction, and got a few to go the way they wanted them to. The spearmen wounded a couple and this caused a general scattering of the herd. One hunter was injured when he failed to jump out of the way of a roo fast enough. But three of the six roos were wounded.

A lot of the roos fled into the woods, where they would be harder to hunt - no line of sight and slowed movement would make it something of a challenge creeping up on them. One was still out in the open though.

Two hunters brought it down. And since it was on the opposite side of the woods to the Outfolk, it didn't attract their attention.

However other roos were scattering towards the interlopers. A hunter killed one with a slingshot, but the Outfolk were terribly interested and edged forward. My personal rule for games such as this is that a hunt is not over until there are no active predators within Long of any kills, so the hunters now had to drive off the meddling outfolk.

Fortunately a warning shot from a sling, plus some intimidating hunting cries saw the Outfolk skulk away, and our heroes had managed a successful hunt with only one injury.

I did find a flaw in the Outfolk reaction tables, however. If they are triggered by the Howling Hunter column, one of their reactions is to Roar. This only affects hunters within a range of Medium. However there is a reaction column prior to the Howling Hunter one for hunters being within Medium range. So if there are any hunters in the range of a Roar, they will cause a different column to be used. The effect is that the Roar on the Howling Hunter column can never have a game effect. My solution is to change it to a modified Intimidate reaction - the Outfolk hunter moves one Short towards the hunter causing the reaction and then Roars. This seems more than appropriate for what is basically a shouting match.

(If you have 'Palaeo Diet: Fireside Tales' then please take a look at the Outfolk Hunter tables and double-check for me - a hunter can never be affected by the Roar under the next to last column, yes?)