Shootout At Gongville

We played our first club game of What A Cowboy (WaC) last night. We tried to keep it simple and limit the number of players; we went with four people each running two gunfighters.

We'd been concerned about what terrain we had, but the loan of some suitable buildings from Darren, plus bits of terrain from Caesar's Bolt Action setup helped a lot and we had plenty of cover on the table.

Caesar and Graeme had the Outlaws:

Creed 'Scarecrow' Morrison - Gunslinger - 2 x Revolvers
Dorothy 'The Widow' Carson - Shootist - Sawn-Off Shotgun, Revolver
Lewis 'Scar' Simpson - Shootist - Revolver
The Orinoco Kid - Greenhorn - Revolver

June and I had the Law / Townsfolk:

Martha Bischoff - Gunslinger - 2 x Revolvers
Nan Goth - Shootist - Shotgun, Revolver
Agent Webster - Shootist - Revolver
Byron Goth - Greenhorn - Revolver

June rolled this spectacular set of action dice for Nan Goths first move; she was going places fast, but would be unable to do anything when she got there.

The buildings with flat roofs proved tempting. Byron Goth got himself a good position on one. As a greenhorn he wasn't very effective from up there, but he was able to keep up enough fire to occupy the outlaws' attention for a chunk of the game.

Nan joined him, although the effects of a shotgun meant that he took some peripheral damage from a miss when Nan fired.

Martha (out of shot on the main street) scored the first blood of the game with a well-aimed shot that wounded 'The Widow'.

From that point on everyone very much stayed in cover. We set up a straight fight for the scenario but, of course, that has the problem that whilst the aim is to take out the opposing side, keeping your own side safe and sound also becomes an objective. Both sides pretty much hunkered down in cover for a lot of the time. 

Creed took a rooftop position and took on Webster, the Pinkerton man.

Martha moved up to assist Webster.

And 'The Widow' came up to support Creed. She fired off both barrels of her sawn-off at Webster who dodged what would otherwise have been a nasty wound.

Despite being a complete novice, The Orinoco Kid made a flanking move and kept Nan and Byron Goth busy, even scoring a couple of hits.

After lots of firing but little in the way of damage we decided to call the current turn the last. This mean the everyone went a little wild. I sent Martha in a blood run across the street (using a Bonanza! token to get an extra turn) and gave Scar another scar or two with some enthusiastic close-range shooting as she went past.

(Yes, the grey buildings disappeared at this point - Darren, who had lent them to us, had to go home and took them, so we replaced them with more Middle-Eastern dwellings).

Final positions. 'The Widow' had got up close to Webster and added to some injury he had taken from Creed. Webster was badly hit and was down to his last action dice. A couple of others has lost a dice to wounds and a few to shock but overall the fight was inconclusive.

I think part of the issue with the lack of a decisive result was given above; neither side had much incentive to leave the safety of cover and in WaC cover is very useful; it makes you harder to spot and gives you a good chance of 'saving' against any shot directed at you, no matter how well aimed it is. It strikes me that scenarios where one, or both, sides are on the move are definitely the way to go.

That's not to say that the game wasn't fun. We got the rules pretty well-sorted, and that was really the aim of the game.

One rules query we had was to do with the sawn-off shotgun. The firing table gives it and a pistol a +1 at up to 4" range. But under weapons it's listed as having the Sawn-Off trait, which gives it a +1 at up to 4" range. We weren't sure if the firing chart modifier is simply stating that, or if the Sawn-Off trait is in addition to it. It seems irrelevant to have a modifier on the firing table that stacks with the trait; you may as well make the trait a +2 at 4" range if that's the intent. We decided that it just gets a +1 (it gets another +1 for being a shotgun at up to effective range anyway).

Overall we liked What A Cowboy.

What A Cowboy - First Game

Our club is trying out What A Cowboy (WaC) this week, so I thought I'd get ahead of the game by giving them a try at home. So yesterday evening I set up a simple game with Mrs Kobold.

We had two figures each, one a shootist (the average category) and one a gunslinger (who is good, but not the best). Each had a single revolver. We started in opposite corners and it was a simple shootout; last pair (or survivor of the pair) standing would win.

Here we are ready to go. I had Martha (gunslinger) and Webster (shootist) at the bottom left, whilst Catherine had Scar (gunslinger) and Sack-Face (shootist) top left.

Webster moving into position. WaC uses an action dice pool system. each figure starts with six dice which they roll when activated. Each roll allows a particular type of action; ones allow movement, for example. Sixes are wild and some types can change dice to other scores to give them some flexibility. As a shootist Webster just had to work with what he rolled. He got plenty of movement rolls but movement is also random, and he consistently rolled low for distance. This is why he is plodding slowly across open ground. Beyond him you can see Martha adopting a more cautious approach. As a gunslinger, she could change one of her dice to any roll she liked.

On Catherine's side the outlaws were moving more quickly. Sack-Face was already in cover and Scar was moving confidently towards some.

Martha got the opportunity to move, spot Sack-face, shoot and then move to cover. She took it. But Sack-Face managed to duck out of sight before she could fire by using up his Bonanza token. These allow you to interrupt someone's action, but you only get a limited supply of them; one for a shootist like Sack-Face. Martha missed her chance, but Sack-face wouldn't be pulling the same trick again.

Martha moved across the board to the cover of some rocks. She had a clear shot at Scar, but he still had tokens to play and I suspected that Catherine would use them, so I had Martha go for Sack-Face again, who was lurking in the scrub behind him. She hit, and forced him to go to ground. A hit is assumed to be a shot in the general area of the target, who may possibly dodge it. If they fail then they take a damage effect. If they pass the shot has no effect but forces the target to duck into cover and go pinned. Pinned characters are restricted on their next move.

Sack-Face quickly recovered from being pinned and got a great set of moves allowing him to get the jump on Webster. Fortunately Webster was only hit for shock; this forces a character to temporarily lose action dice (wounds cause a permanent loss of dice).

And that's what happened to Martha; Scar fired a fusilade of shots inflicting both shock and an arm wound. Martha's dice pool was looking very puny.

Webster finally got his act together and blazed away at Sack-Face, forcing him to duck for cover with his dice-pool depleted as well.

Sack-Face went for revenge, and rushed into fisticuffs, partially because Catherine wanted to try the rules. Webster actually had a significant advantage, mostly through having a full dice-pool, but the fight ended in a frustrating draw, and both parties pulled back exhausted.

Too exhausted for Sack-face. The fight left his dice-pool empty. When that happens a figure either runs for it or is too wounded to keep fighting. In Sack-face's case he skedaddled.

This left Scar fighting alone. He stayed hidden whilst he reloaded.

Martha and Webster started to close in on Scar. Martha had played a Bonanza token to remove some shock and rolled well, ditching all of it and getting back to an almost full dice-pool (she was down one for the wound).

Scar came out fighting. Webster got in a useful volley of shots that left Scar floundering, allowing Martha to come in from behind and finish the job. Scar fled for the hills, his dice-pool deleted, albeit that he was only lightly wounded.

Reading the rules after wards I found that we only made a couple of minor errors. The game flowed well, and I didn't have to much trouble looking up stuff as we needed it. True, we were playing with foot figures only, and simple weapons, but it was fun, with the dice-pool mechanism forcing some interesting decisions. Catherine struggled with the spotting rules a little, but they're pretty good. I think each character needs a small, unique, marker to place next to whoever they have eyes on, though.

Anyway, I feel a lot more prepared for this week's game.

Gunfighters - The Second Batch

The first ten gunfighters I did represented what's possible with one sprue each from the Great Escape Games' Gunfighters and Gunfighters II plastic multipose sets. I have now finished the first batch of figures from the second set of sprues. Each box has two identical sprues, so you get the same five legs and bodies, but obviously I tried to mix things up a little

Every group of gunfighters needs a sheriff. I went for an elderly gambler look with mine, and gave him a shotgun. I actually love the head with the top-hat and really wanted to use it. Making him a sheriff was an afterthought but he turned out a real character because of it.

Another figure with a shotgun. This lady looks like she doesn't take crap from anyone and, is indeed, based on my wife. The sprues contain a few objects to put on the bases; Gunfighters II gives you a couple of chickens, so I added one. The chicken is in honour of Bad Janet, an elderly member of our flock who died whilst I was putting this batch of figures together. She escaped from the pen several times, and once came back after being missing for several weeks. She was a true Wild West Hero.

I needed more figures with rifles, so did these two.

Finally there's this chap who, like the sheriff, was based around my desire to use one of the head options. They actually do a head with a sack over it as a mask. He could be a masked avenger or an outlaw. 

I actually sourced his legs from a Perry Napoleonic infantry figure. In the male gunfighters set one set of legs are in a kneeling pose and I just couldn't come up with a combination of things I wanted for it. So I found some alternate standing legs. In theory if I can model a Milliput body I can still use the kneeling legs - I have plenty of arms and heads left over to make a figure with.

Here's the fifteen figures I've done so far. Today I assembled the final five.

Battleships!

We played Broadside: Empires Of Steel on Thursday, so Caesar would be practiced for the competition at Cancon this weekend. A French force and a British force battled it out around a couple of islands.

Caesar and I took the French whilst Darren was the British admiral.

Both sides had some battleships (hence the post title), some cruisers and a destroyer flotilla. This seems to be a standard setup for a Broadsides pickup game.

The French ships. Great names and wonderfully bizarre-looking vessels.

Things start to hot up. The battleships in the top-left (British) and bottom right (French) corners are already exchanging fire. Caesar was sending his destroyers round the island at the bottom on an intercept course with the British battleships. The islands block fire to and from smaller ships, whilst the battleships can shoot at each other over them.

In the centre my lead cruiser was after the leader of Darren's destroyer flotilla; taking out the leader makes them harder to control as a group. I sank it but fell foul of its final action when it torpedoed me.

Destroyers were taking each other out near the British flagship, King George V. But you can see three splash markers on the battleship; the lead French battleship Danton had the range and was scoring a few hits. The King George V has tough armour, though.

Caesar was running our flagship, the mighty Jean Bart. It was badly damaged and on fire.

Anyway, we ran out of time before finishing the game, but had plenty of fun with the time we had. I think the French were close to losing their flag, but HMS Invincible wasn't living up to its name either and was one good volley of fire away from a trip to the sea-bed. 

We called it a draw.

Spandau & Lewis v1.3

Thanks to the posts I did last year I have noticed some interest in my free 'Spandau & Lewis' WW1 air rules. I had a look and realised that the version that was currently online is a much older one than the one I'm currently playing, and doesn't include a couple of important changes. So I have now uploaded the most recent version.

One of my goals for this year is to write up a few basic scenario set-up, including the special rules. I have tried to explain how the games work in various blog posts, so you should be able to put things together from them, but really it should be in the actual rules.

Anyway, here's the link (which has been updated on the Free Stuff section of this blog as well)*:

Spandau & Lewis v1.3

*If it opens an older version of the rules try clearing your cache or opening it in an incognito or private browser.

Thursday HOTT

Last night saw my first HOTT of 2025 and, indeed, my first HOTT for a while. Once again I was playing against Geoff, who used a Gondorian army. In the first game they were a load of spears, some shooters, a couple of knights and support from a pair of Eagle fliers.

I used my Wild Elves - six warband, a couple of magicians and a couple of shooters. Geoff defended.

The eagles came out boldly and fell foul of the Elven archers

Geoff switched them to the other flank where the elven magicians dealt with them instead.

Both lines looked a bit fragmented as Geoff closed on the Elves.

He quickly overwhelmed my left flank.

I attacked his spears in teh centre with my warband, but couldn't get the rolls to make that vital first kill. Warband are always a gamble in that respect.

One of my magicians was shot down by the Rangers of Ithilien.

Geoff closed in for the kill. On my left my general was looking vulnerable.

My magician general was overlapped and killed, giving Geoff a 12g-4 win.

So on to the next game. Geoff dropped the poorly performing eagles and added Gandalf as a magician. I swapped armies and went for Flash Gordon and the Warriors of Mongo. This consisted of a hero general, four fliers, and airboat, a lurker, two warband and two riders. Geoff defended again.

The Hawkmen fliers were in a lump on my left. Not learning from the previous game I sent them straight into action with a vague plan of picking off some flank units before the rest of my army came up.

One of them got picked off my Gandalf but the others managed to mob an element of  knights, then draw them into bad going for a potential kill.

Unfortunately the knight fought well, and forced the flier opposing it to flee. I had to resort to the lurkers to finish the knight off and, in teh meantime, Gandalf took out another flier.

My main force was coming up on an enemy that was looking rather too well-entrenched for my liking.

Ithilien archers took out Prince Vultan. So that wasn't good.

I charged my meagre forces into the Gondor line.

On my right the Frigians managed to destroy more Gondorian knights.

But unable to make any headway in the centre, Flash was surrounded and, once again, I lost 12g-4

So two losses was not a great start to my HOTT playing year. We didn't have time for a third game; as the club meet started we had a (false) fire alarm and had had to evacuate the building, so we were late starting actual games.