Roast Beef For Dinner

In my last post I said I'd give the sabre-tooth a starring role in my next game.

I didn't.

Instead I tried an alternative set of stats for some of the other beasts I have - the cattle. They don't really feel like flighty herd grazers to me, but nor do they seem meaty enough to be giant grazers. So I went for something in the middle - run them as giant grazers for reactions, but with all of their stats downgraded by one (Savagery 5+, Resilience 4+ and Bulk 3). This makes them less dangerous and easier to kill than, say, a mammoth, but offering less in the way of reward.

Anyway, I sent out my band of five hunters after them. Since they are less bulky than mammoths I used more cattle - five to be precise. A wrong move could see multiple angry cows accosting an unwary hunter.

Here are the peaceful bovines, munching some grass.

A sabre-tooth cat watched them from the other side of a thicket. It had a good view; if any were wounded in situ then the cat would advance and become dangerous.

The hunters had to kill two bovines, so went for the standard strategy of isolating one and killing that. In addition Fire was sent wide to scare off the sabre-tooth, but also to keep the bovines from scattering too far in the one direction. 

Bow set up in position on one flank of the herd, whilst Spear and Axe went round the other way. The cattle mooed ominously.

Fire lit some fires, but they quickly went out so he lit some more.

Bow shot at one of the bovines, and scored a critical wound.

It panicked and ran towards Spear and Axe.

This excited the sabre-tooth which tried to edge past the fire towards the scent of blood. But the second fire was now spreading nicely.

The wounded bovine was very angry, and it's lowing made the hunters cautious.

But eventually Spear rushed in and finished the animal off.

Not a clever thing to do close to the herd; two of the cattle, disturbed by the death of their fellow, charged him and Spear was wounded.

The sabre-tooth had almost worked past the fire now, and some bovines were scattering in his direction.

Fire waved a burning brand over his head and made some noise, causing the cat to seek shelter in the depths of the thicket, out of sight of the hunt. Only an extreme reaction would now bring it out.

The surviving cattle scattered in response to the flames as well, and one was soon isolated from the others.

The hunters chased after it as it ran wildly in one direction then another.

Spear found himself isolated from the other hunters by a wall of angry cattle. Wounded as he was a direct confrontation was not advisable. (Actually his activation rolls were terrible, and the cattle kept eyeing him up and 'roaring', keeping him out of the action for now).

The isolated bovine was now really angry, and charged Axe, wounding him.

Axe scored a hit back, causing the enraged animal to attack Bow, who dodged out of the way.

As it fled, Bow wounded it again, and it ran back into the herd. Spear tried to work around the herd to intercept it.

But Bow was running fast too, and brought it down with a second arrow,

This caused the surviving bovines to react, putting Bow, who was close to them, at risk of an attack, but the cattle chose to run.

So the hunt was reasonably successful, with six Bulk gained against two hunters injured. This particular setup for the bovines worked nicely and I'll probably try it again.

New Beasts And Another Hunt

I actually managed to build up enough enthusiasm to do some painting the other day, and did a few more beasts for 'Palaeo Diet'. All of these are figures I bought from MY Miniatures last year - I still have others to do. They're 15mm, naturally.

Sabre-tooth cats. These will work nicely as Pack Predators but are big enough to become Apex Predators if the game requires.

These Elasmotherium are a nice Giant Grazer alternative to mammoths.

Finally I got some horses to act as Herd Grazers. They're disappointing casts to be honest; I think the molds are on the way out. The legs on a few were badly cast and seem brittle. But they painted up OK and look the part. In the catalogue they are listed as zebras, which have that proper wild horse look.

I set up a game using some of the new figures. Once again I sent out for hunters, Axe, Spear, Bow and Fire, and this time they were stalking a herd of seven horses, looking to bring down at least two of them.

A predator lurked in one of the corners. The terrain meant that there was a hill between the predator and the horses, so if the hunters could do their work efficiently and out of sight  the cat would not approach them.

The horses were in a hollow by a watering hole. The terrain and all the placement of beasts and hunters was randomised, so it was good fortune that the hunters had the herd trapped in a relatively confined space.

Fire was sent on a wide sweep to prevent the horses crossing the hill to the other side of the watering hole, and also to deter the sabre-tooth. In addition he would, once the other hunters were in position, startle the herd and drive them towards an ambush set up by Spear and Axe near the woods. Bow lurked on the flank ready to use his archery to keep the horses from breaking away through the gap between the woods and the rock outcrop.

One horse had got nervous and had broken away from the herd. Meanwhile Fire tried to start a fire, but it wouldn't spread; obviously the grass was too wet.

In the end Fire simply shouted and moved close enough to the horses that they could smell the smoke from his burning branch. A few of them ran for it, and one was ambushed by Spear and wounded.

This set of a general panic in the herd, and they stampeded towards the smaller rock outcrop. Axe ran alongside them ...

... and brought down the wounded leader.

This caused the survivors to stampeded in the opposite direction, towards Bow, who wounded another.

The herd was well and truly trapped between the hunters now. However the one wounded by Bow was in the centre of the herd and would be hard to finish off.

As the hunters closed in they caused the herd to break up, and one horse crested the hill to come into Fire's part of board, and also within sight of the sabre-tooth.

Fire moved quickly to place himself between the horse and the predator. Meanwhile the other hunters chased after the horse. Bow wounded it with an arrow, before Spear sprinted over and finished it off.

The hunters had the meat they needed, but just needed to be sure that the sabre-tooth was kept away.

Spear advanced on it, and caused it to react. Started by the nearby Fire, the sabre-tooth fled, leaving two tasty horse carcasses for the hunters to divide up.

I felt sorry for the sabre-tooth not getting an outing, so might give one a starring role in the next game.

Mammoth Hunts

Autumn is coming, so it's time to stock the larders with meat, ready for the cold months ahead!

I did a little bit of painting over the weekend, doing some new beasts for Palaeo Diet. They're still in the final stages of basing, so not ready for a game, but I thought I'd remind myself how to play yesterday evening, and ran a couple of basic mammoth hunts.

So, there are three mammoths in the centre of the table.

I used four hunters, one each of the basic types - Axe, Spear, Bow and Fire. I've not really used Fire that much so it was an interesting exercise from that point of view.

The goal was to take down one mammoth, preferably without losing a hunter.

The wind was from behind where the hunters entered, so I planned to use fire to drive them into an ambush. This meant that the bulk of the hunters had to work their way around the herd, whilst Fire stayed near the entry point.

Bow moved out onto the flank of the herd, ready to shoot one which could then be isolated.

He selected a target and planted an arrow firmly into the vitals of one of the mammoths.

The herd scattered.

Fire moved up, causing mild panic, and splitting one of the mammoths off from the others.

Bow shot some more arrows, driving the wounded animal towards the other hunters, whilst Fire moved onto the hill to prevent it rejoining the herd.

The mammoth was wounded again, and ran back and forth in total panic as Fire waved a burning branch at it.

As the mammoth rushed around the hunters raced to catch up with it and deliver the coup de grace.

It attacked Axe, who evaded the charge.

And it was Spear who delivered the killing blow.

In the background you can see that Fire had started a ground fire, the aim being to keep the mammoths from joining up. But it fizzled out pretty quickly.

I set up a second game with the same terrain and hunters. Their random start position was in a corner, with the wind blowing towards them. Wind direction affects how fires spread.

This time I complicated things by adding a pack of three wolves. However their random placement put them behind a wood and therefore somewhat out of the action since some of the reactions they use to get into the hunt rely on line of sight.

Again the hunters worked around the herd. Fire stopped off to set fire to the woods and keep the wolves away.

Fire then advanced and caused the herd to scatter, isolating one of the mammoths.

Axe closed in and made an attack, but missed. The mammoth retaliated and injured the hunter.

Spear inflicted a hit and the mammoth fled.

In fact it was getting dangerously close to the edge of the table, so the hunters had to tread carefully in order to drive it back into their territory.

One of the wolves skulked through the woods, scenting the blood in the air.

However it then scented Fire, and ran, with its companions joining it. All three wolves left the table.

Whilst Axe and Spear stalked the wounded mammoth, Fire and Bow looked at driving the other two back into the centre of the territory in case the first mammoth escaped.

Axe and Fire cautiously approached the wounded mammoth.

Fire did his thing, starting a ground-fire.

The mammoths shuffled away.

Spear closed in on the wounded mammoth and inflicted another wound ...

... but was injured in turn.

In the distance Bow had wounded one of the other mammoths.

A desperate fight ensued, with spear evading attacks by the wounded mammoth, but not quite able to finish the animal. Axe tried to close up, but couldn't manage it; he backed off every time the wounded beast roared.

However eventually Spear prevailed, and the mammoth was downed.

Fire was interesting to use. It's very powerful at driving animals around, but can be a bit of a liability since bad positioning or an unlucky activation roll can cause the animals to react to it before you're ready to exploit their panic. In the second game it was a great weapon against the wolves, but I think things would have gone differently had the wolves been more 'in play' at the start. I might try this setup again and see how the wolves make life more difficult for the hunters. And, of course, I have the bases to complete for the new beasts.