Genesis Park

It's the early 17th century. On the fringes of a new World, a group of pilgrims are on a hunt. Led by Ahab (sword and pistol) we have Job and Isaac, who each have muskets, whilst bringing up the rear are Joseph and Ezekiel, with polearms.

Their prey? The giant satanic monstrosity that's been devouring their herds, as well as distracting them from their favourite pursuits - interminable sermons and recreational witch-burning.

Everything's set for a game of Palaeo Diet: Pulp. I set up the To Kill A King scenario - the hunters have 12 turns to kill a King Carnivore in the opposite corner to their entry point. with at least one of them surviving. It's designed for four hunters, but since only two of my 'pulp' hunters had proper guns I added an extra man. For this game I ran the muskets as rifles, straight out of the rules. This was just for simplicity's sake. A better way to run them would be as shotguns, with the added limit that they have to spend an action to reload.

Anyway, with the monster in sight (thanks to the randomised terrain being around the edges) The hunters moved forward swiftly, with the two musketeers to the fore.

An opening shot surprised the giant carnivore, but bounced off his scaly hide.

A proper leader, Ahab moved up to show his musketeers how it was done. But his pistol shot went wide.

In fact it caused the monster to flee, which wasn't really what the hunters wanted; if it left the hunting ground they'd have to abandon their mission.

Joseph boldly ran forward, attracting the monster's attention, and bringing it back towards the hunters. Joseph backed off as the creature roared.

Ezekiel moved up to and the creature charged, but he escaped injury.

The creature charged Job, who responded with a well-aimed shot that scored a wound. In the background you can see some interested scavengers. Ezekiel spent a turn driving them off.

The monster roared again, and the pilgrims fell back to reconsider their options.

Their plan was a bold on. Each halberdier would move in front of one of the musketeers, so that if the creature charged it would be them that bore the brunt of the attack and preventing teh musketeers from being injured until they could bring the monster down. Ezekiel faced a charge and was wounded, but his sacrifice allowed Job to wound the monster with a couple of shots.

The scavengers were sniffing around again. Joseph moved forward and attacked the monster with his halberd, but failed to wound it.

Isaac was the hero of the group. With three actions he took three shots at the beast. The first wounded it, causing it to charge, injuring Joseph.

The second shot missed, but the third felled the behemoth.

The scavengers closed in again, but the hunters quickly drove them off.

Ahab posed for a woodcut with his two brave musketeers. Although it was Joseph and Ezekiel, the halberdiers, who had actually been wounded.

Rifles are very effective, and you'd have to be careful how you balanced scenarios using them. For these figures a reduction in their effectiveness will make for an interesting game though.

I may try a more conventional hunt for the next game. But I'd been itching to get the dinosaurs on the table. In fact Steggy was in play as well, in a corner to the left of the action, but he did nothing but watch the action and failed to make any of the pictures.

Update: I tried it again with the muskets being treated as shotguns that have to be reloaded. It was a bloodbath. The carnivore and raptors killed and ate all of the hunters, although to be fair they came within one wound (and a single shot) of killing the carnivore still, so it was close.