An Afternoon In The Outback

Australia. It's a Saturday afternoon in a time before Saturdays existed. The local fauna are enjoying the abundant food and water.

We can see some dubious kangaroos at the billabong, some dromornis eating the shrubbery and a trio of diprotodon just passing through.

But this antipodean idyll is about to be disturbed by a mob of hunters looking for food. There's five of them; one has a club, one is skilled with the boomerang and three have spears. 

With a range of options the hunters decide to go after the roos at the billabong. Four of them work their way along the opposite bank of the shallow river. The fifth is tasked with convincing the diprotodons to move out of the way so that when the hunt kicks off they don't get panicked and maybe start attacking.

The hunter calls out and the diprotodons simply watch him. 

Unfortunately in trying to drive off the diprotodon he instead spooks the roos, which splash through the water away from the approaching hunters.

However one diprotodon is now isolated and the hunters change their plan. A single diprotodon will give them over half of what they need to feed the tribe's hungry mouths. The hunters move back to try and take it down.

The nearest hunter injures it with a thrown spear. The beast runs away ...

... to where the club-armed hunter is waiting. He hits it again, and it lashes out, hurting the hunter.

A second blow finishes the beast off. 

After some initial bad luck, a run of good fortune has seen the hunters well on their way to their goal.

One of the hunters has coaxed the roos back towards the billabong.

He throws a spear, injuring one. He's about to drive them towards his mates when another hunter stumbles, calls out in surprise and causes the roos to scatter again.

The hunters chase after them. A mistake now will see he roos flee the hunting grounds, forcing the hunters to look elsewhere. But if they're cautious they can finish off the wounded roo and that will give them their quota.

A stealthy approach pays off, and the hunter finishes off the wounded roo.

The dromornis continue to graze peacefully, whilst the remaining diprotodon amble about in confusion.

And here's the reason the hunters adopted the plan they did. On eth other side of the hunting grounds lurked a megalania. This is not something to approach too closely and it's also best to avoid killing things near it lest it wanders over for a look. Both kills were made out of its line of sight, so it remained blissfully ignorant of the potential easy meals available to it.

The hunters and their kills.

Thus ends a pleasant game of Palaeo Diet. The five hunters needed to score five bulk for a successful hunt and got it with only one hunter injured. They started off badly with several blunders causing teh animals some unease, they got some great attack rolls when they finally decided to take out the diprotodon. Switching back to the roos saw them blunder again, and the roos stampeded, leaving teh hunters trying to chase them before they quit the board. They managed to get one to reach their target. Both kills were made with terrain between the dead beast and the megalania, so its predatory behaviour was not triggered. This was why the hunters ignored the dromornis; they were well within its line of sight. 

The diprotodon were Large Grazers but with a bulk of 3, whereas the roos and the dromornis were Herd Grazers. The megalania was an Apex Predator.