Murnong 25

There have been numerous Turnip 28 events in the US and UK and, I think, in Europe. But to the best of my knowledge there has not been on in Australia. That is, until yesterday, when Murnong 25 was held as part of Shirecon in Sydney. This was put together by June from our club, who had discovered that there were several people keen to play who'd not had a chance up until now.

As it was we had fourteen players turn up. Of those it looks like only a few of us had ever played the game before, and the four or five games that June and I have played over the past nine months or so made us virtual veterans of the game.

Turnip 28 has a whole set of scenarios using 3' x 3' boards. June chose seven that offered five objective markers, and we had a present board for each. Each player had a scoresheet which assigned them to three boards during the course of the day. The Tournament Champion would be the person with the most wins and, in the event of a tie, the total number of captured objectives would be used a a tie-break.

I used The Gentleman's Gentlemen. This was:

2 x Brutes with Black Powder, 1 x Chaff with Black Powder, 1 x Whelps with Close Combat Weapons

We were using Cults in this tournament. June and I hadn't used those before, so it would be an interesting experience. Cults basically give each army some additional bonus - access to special units or weird special rules, or even both. I went with the simplest one - Stranglin' Harry's Wretched Recruits. This gave all my snobs an extra would, and allowed my units to remove panic tokens if they performed certain sensible actions. It basically rewards you for sensible play.

Round 1

I played Matt, whose force was part of the Procession Of Woe. This cult is led by a fearsome Root Shrine, and can manipulate panic tokens. In addition once their units have a couple of panic tokens they become zealots and gain extra close-combat attacks, making their units very dangerous indeed.

We played the basic Long March scenario; there are five objectives on the board, with the one in the centre being in defensible terrain. 

Look, I didn't take detailed notes of any of the fights, and they were all pretty chaotic. I also forgot to take photos a lot of the time, although I'm sure other people didn't and that there will be plenty around on various Turnip 28 forums and channels. So I'll just try and tell you what's happening in each picture.

Here's one of my brutes taking their first shot of the game, at the enemy shrine I think. Killing all of the enemy leaders is one way to win a game of Turnip 28. 

Some of Matt's fodder capture an objective in some dangerous terrain, although a few of them got eaten by it doing so.

I sent a unit of brutes forward to grab the objective in the centre, but they didn't make it before being charged by enemy bastards (heavy cavalry). I lost the melee and retreated, bu the bastards suffered badly as well.

They charged The Milliner who, amazingly, finished off the last figure.

I sent in my cavalry. Whelps are not as tough as bastards, and I'm beginning to think they are better off with missile weapons as skirmishers rather than being used for charges. Anyway, in this game they attacked and whilst they did damage to the enemy fodder they were repulsed and destroyed.

Matt's melee fodder attacked my chaff and reduced them to one figure.

I can't remember how I did this though; Matt's Root Shrine was forced to retreat, fled into dangerous terrain and was destroyed!

My last chaff put up a brave fight to hold off a horde of fodder in order to stop them taking an objective. He died.

With the Root shrine gone I reckoned that I stood a chance of taking out all three enemy leader. The Milliner attacked an enemy opposite number. The Milliner lost.

My brutes had captured the objective in the centre of the board and defended it against the enemy chaff, wiping them out.

Here's me losing an objective whilst some of my brutes simply watched. 

At the end of the game I held one objective to Matt's four. So not a great start.

Round 2

In this round I faced Damiano (I think) who'd chosen not to use a cult with his force.

The scenario is a silly one (or sillier than other T28 scenarios, anyway). Both forces have been swallowed by a giant fish and then vomited up onto the board. The fish is in the centre of the table. You start with two units and your toff deployed somewhere in the central zone, and then the rest of your force arrives one unit per turn, also deployed anywhere in the central zone. The fifth objective wasn't placed until the final round.

It worked. It was fun.

Here's the start of things, with Damiano's brutes attacking mine in some dangerous terrain.

I think it all went pear-shaped for my guys. 

A Toff Off! My Toff challenged Damiano's to a duel. With my cult ability I had an extra wound, so had the advantage in the fight.

We chose to fight on the fish itself.

The Winner!

My whelps, looking very splendid. They were the last of my units to appear.

Meanwhile my toff got slaughtered by the surviving brutes from the first round.

The last stand of my other unit of brutes. I was beginning to find that brute units are quite fragile.

The enemy bastards then rode down The Captain.

My last whelp dies. At the end of teh game I had a single figure left - The Milliner. But I still held two objectives.

Round 3

The scenario was called Burnt Toast. The board is dominated by three blocks of impassable terrain across the middle. Both sides have objectives on their own side. Halfway through the game the central area of terrain is removed and the space then gets the fifth objective.

I played Kaleb who was using the Lopers Of Maudlin Marsh. This cult gives your army stilt-walkers, which offer all kinds of spotting advantages as well as a rather powerful specialist assault unit.

Here we are set up and ready to go.

I massed my brutes by the central building ready for when it vanished.

Kaleb set his bastard cavalry around my flank, but they fell foul of shooting dfrom my chaff as well as some dangerous terrain and were reduced to a single model. I charged with my whelps and drove them off.

The fifth objective!

I moved up some brutes to capture it, driving off the enemy brutes in the process. They retreated through tow friendly units and were lucky not to lose figures.

Those brutes came back to stymie a flanking move by my whelps.

In the centre my brutes were driven off. I'd done some damage to the stilt-walkers, and they had a decent amount of panic on them. So I opted to charge them with The Milliner, on the hope that they'd panic and flee. They didn't and The Milliner found himself in a fight he couldn't win.

The stilt-walkers marched over my army and took one of the objectives in my half.

I put up a fight for the one in the centre.

A charge by enemy fodder ...

... was repulsed.

But that was the only objective I held.

So I lost all three games and held a total of four objectives across all of them. Amazingly that wasn't good enough for last place, and I finished joint twefth. The winner was Kaleb, with his Lopers, so that last round loss wasn't quite so bad.

I need to have a think about my army. I'm not sure if I'm using it badly (highly possible) or if its reliance on units with small numbers of models makes it too fragile. It seems to me that you need at least one unit of fodder to provide bulk to a force, and that maybe brutes with anything other than close combat weapons are maybe not playing to that types strengths.

The whole event was great fun, with some beautiful armies on display that I totally failed to take pictures of. A huge thank you to June for putting the whole event together. It all ran very smoothly indeed, and there was a lot of good-natured play, especially as many of the players were playing the game for the very first time. I hope we get to do it all again next year.

Footnote: Murnong, also known as the yam daisy, is an Australian native plant with edible tuberous roots that were a staple food for Indigenous peoples in southern Australia.