Talomir Nights, Encounter 6

In which Johann decides that discretion is the better part of valour.

Exterior, day. A lone farm stands in a clearing surrounded by woods.

Caption: October 986, Ekra

[JOHANN, GOTTFRIED and GERVAISE are lying concealed at the edge of the woods, watching a group of Ekraen soldiers settling in at the farmhouse.]

JOHANN: Are the de Plastiques here?

GOTTFRIED: I don’t think so. I don’t see their heraldry.

JOHANN: We need supplies. How about a raid on that farm when it gets dark?

GERVAISE: Ah doan sink so. Zey ‘ave got seex knights, and twenty eenfantry, most of zem weez crossbows and arquebuses; and zey are alert, watching for trouble. See ze pickets? You can go down zere eef you want. Me and Jean-Paul weel stay ‘ere and look after Beatrice, d’accord?

JOHANN: Well, I suppose when you put it like that…

[Our heroes crawl carefully back from the ridgeline and move off.]

Game notes: The quest for the de Plastiques continues in the Ekraen countryside, but they are not here. There is however an encounter (2d6 vs 2, 2, 1 = pass 2d6) with locals (1d6 vs 4, pass 1d6) at a farm in a wooded area. A 2d6 result of 7 means Johann’s troupe is the attacking side in a raid. The enemy are alert (2d6 vs 5: 2, 6 = pass 1d6). A roll of 12 means the enemy have twice our CV, i.e. 32, and rolls on the Ekraen army list give us an opposition of 6 mounted knights, 7 infantry, 5 crossbowmen, 2 peasant foot, 3 mercenary arquebusiers, and 3 peasant archers. Gervaise may be exagerrating about the proportion of missile weapons, but I can’t see a good outcome to this whatever happens. I considered using the Challenge rules to send Gottfried the thief in to pick their pockets, but that probably ends in a dead Gottfried and the rest of us running for our lives from Ekraen knights again. We’ll move on, but it doesn’t seem right to roll for advancement or pursuit, since all the troupe did was walk onto the board, and immediately walk off again. Better luck next time.

Talomir Nights, Encounter 5

In which Johann learns that not even Ekraen knights are invincible.

I think Encounter makes more sense than Episode for these little vignettes, so I’ll switch to that.

It’s September 986, and Johann and Gottfried have decided upon a quest for vengeance, namely hunting down the knights who killed Alexa in Episode 2. That absolves me of any need to roll on the quest table, as I have effectively selected “destroy someone”.

“Alexa must be avenged and our honour restored!” declaims Johann, over the latest in what is probably a long series of ales. 

“Let it lie,” counsels Gottfried. “There’s nothing we can do against mounted chivalry with supporting troops, not just the two of us.”

“Vengeance!”

“At least let’s try to recruit some more party members. We need more people, especially another healer and some archers.”

Johann is persuaded of the wisdom of this approach, so our heroes start recruiting, having declared the current pub their Base for the moment. Page 12 says I must declare the party as not moving this strategic turn (easy, considering how much Johann has drunk) and roll 2d6 on the recruits available table; I pass 1d6 against the area Encounter Rating so will count a maximum of passes 2d6 on the Recruits and Replacements Table. I would normally roll 2d6; the modifiers look like they cancel out, namely -1d6 for being a foreigner and +1d6 for having recovered more casualties (Johann and Gottfried) than were left behind (Alexa). Johann rolls 5, 3 and passes 1d6, so he can recruit his CV worth of local ne’er-do-wells; that’s 6 CV of recruits diced up from the Ekran army list. This gets us two knights(!) and two crossbowmen, and I replace one of the knights with a healer, as is my right. Must try not to get this one killed. As Johann can’t recruit anyone with a higher Rep than himself, the other knight has his Rep dropped to 4.

I name the new characters as Sir Charles Atain, knight errant with a grudge against the de Plastique brothers; Beatrice the healer, whose motivations are currently unknown; and Gervaise and Jean-Paul the crossbowmen, thugs for hire.

By October, the troupe of six is ready to take on their sworn foes. I roll an 8 on the Is It Here? table (p. 50), showing that the dreaded Ekraen knights and their retinue are indeed in the area, and a roll of 2 shows they are in this very settlement, which I now dub Carcassone, because I expect it to be full of carcasses shortly. We now go to a pitched battle encounter. The How Many Enemies? table on p. 70 says the opposition has one more CV than me, which would make them 17 to my 16; close enough to even.

No need to check whether they are locals or intruders, because Johann is hunting Ekraens. I roll 2d6 many times on the Ekraen army list and discover the opposition consists of five knights, three infantry, one crossbowman, one peasant foot, and three peasant archers. Slightly out of sequence, I also check their alertness using the table on p. 46; they pass 2d6 against the knights’ Rep, and so are fully alert and activate first. This is going to sting a bit, I fear.

Terrain? Well, we haven’t moved, so we’re still in mountainous terrain. Carcassone is probably bigger than the one clear tile from encounter 4, though, so I’ll regenerate terrain assuming we’re in a different part of town. I decide rather than doing the dice terrain, place terrain, shuffle terrain dance, I’ll just roll 2d6 for each square in a 3×3 grid on the terrain table on p. 18. Much faster, and gives me a mostly clear board, with a road in the southwest corner, impassable terrain in the northeast and east, and a patch of rough terrain in the centre (half speed through this and visibility limited), which sounds like it should be the town dump. One for the Rackham terrain tiles I think, which are very pretty for 2D terrain and full of buildings. Must get some more of these for a bit of variety.

Both sides now roll 2d6 vs Rep on the Deployment table on p. 70; Johann passes 1d6, and the de Plastique brothers pass 2d6; being the larger force and having passed 1d6 more than Johann, the de Plastiques are the attackers. Obviously they got wind of our recruiting and come looking for us. Johann’s company sets up in the middle of the clear terrain at the north of the board, hoping the opposition will be slowed down in the rough terrain and buildings, and the knights set up 18″ away in another clear area. Set up so far about an hour, but I was interrupted by ‘phone calls a couple of times, so probably less than that in reality.

Turn 1: The knights and their entourage wend their way through the buildings for 6” (so that the infantry don’t get left behind). Johann’s Company don’t activate as their activation roll is more than Johann’s Rep. Neither side has line of sight to the other through the buildings.

Turn 2: Johann rolls 4, the de Plastiques 6; only Johann activates this turn. The Company take cover inside a house; with the possible exception of Sir Charles, nobody is going outside against knights on horseback.

“Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes,” cautions Johann.

“Zey are weareeng ‘elmets,” Gervaise points out. “Ah weel not see ze whites of zeir eyes.”

Turns 3 and 4: Activation repeats turn 2; Johann is tempted to send the crossbowmen out after the knights, but decides against it.

Turn 5: Knights roll 4, Johann rolls 2; both sides activate, but the knights roll higher so go first. They advance another 6” in a zigzag pattern through the streets. They have no line of sight to the Company, so although they are now within 12”, I decide nobody takes a Test of Wills, because it seems to replace the In Sight Test of other THW games, which is triggered when one group sees another for the first time. (Yes, I know Johann knows they’re coming; he is the Star, after all. No doubt he has bribed local urchins to bring warning.)

Turn 6: Both sides roll 5, so nobody activates – this happens on doubles. Perhaps the knights are asking directions.

Turn 7: Johann rolls 2, Sir Bertrand de Plastique rolls 3. Both activate, knights go first. The knights continue their cautious advance another 4”, at which point the groups sight each other. They are already within 12” so we go to a Test of Wills.

Bertrand rolls 5d6 (Rep 5) vs a target score of 3: 1, 2, 2, 4, 5 – he passes 3d6. Johann rolls 4d6 vs 3: 1, 2, 3, 3 and passes 4d6, one more than the knights. This would normally mean the impetuous Company would charge the knights on foot, but since they are defending a wall (of the house they are in) they won’t. If they tried it, as a Star, Johann would choose to pass 3d6 as well, forcing a draw. He’s been ridden down once this year, and it’s no fun. Both sides halt in place and do nothing except exchange insults in Ekraen, most of which Johann doesn’t understand.

Turn 8: Johann rolls 2, Bertrand 4; both sides activate, knights first. The knights split their party into a Rep 5 group lead by Bertrand, and a mixed Rep group led by the crossbowman, who at Rep 4 is the best trooper they have. I now roll on the NPC Action Tables on p. 48 to see what they will do. The knights, unsurprisingly, roll 2, 4 vs Rep (5) and pass 2d6. Since they are mounted melee troops and the enemy is holed up in cover, they will dismount and then test again as if melee troops; they roll 1, 5, and pass 2d6, which means they will close on foot, firing if possible (no, they have no missile weapons) and charging if possible (it is).

The knights now take a Charge Test; 5d6 vs 3, rolling 3, 4, 5, 6, 6 and passing 1d6. Johann’s group also takes the test and can choose the number of successes since he is the Star; oh, I can’t resist this – he chooses to pass 4d6, three more than the knights, so everyone in the Company charges out of the house screaming vile war-cries, and the knights rout! They are removed from the table. All figures on the knights’ side immediately take a Leader Lost test, rolling 2d6 vs Rep. The crossbowman (Rep 4) passes 2d6; he can continue to fight normally. The three infantrymen, the peasant footman, and two of the peasant archers pass 1d6; they break off the battle and retire from the field unless Johann & Co try to stop them, which seems unwise. The remaining peasant archer passes 0d6 and routs off the table.

As I’ve been playing about an hour and am running out of time, the crossbowman decides he doesn’t fancy his chances against a group of six, and legs it after the others.

“Let the cowards run,” crows Johann. “That will hurt them more than any physical pain.” Although he fully intends to inflict that as well, in due course.

I now roll for advancement. For simplicity, I’m not going to bother doing that for the new joiners, but I will keep on for Gottfried since I’ve already started. Johann gets nothing; Gottfried’s social standing drops to 2. So we now have:

• Johann: Warrior, Star, Rep 4, AC 4, Hardiness 3, SS 4; Halberd.
• Gottfried: Thief, Rep 5, AC 2, Hardiness 3, SS 2; Dagger.
• Assorted ne’e’er-do-wells to the number of four.

Lessons learned: Working from the PDF of the rules rather than a printed copy is faster, because I can search for specific terms. It wasn’t actually necessary to lay out the table for this one; that seems to be the norm for Warrior Heroes so far, which is a little strange for a set of tabletop miniatures rules, but so long as I’m enjoying the game I won’t worry about it.

For further study: It looks like the Star’s Rep, Hardiness and SS should stabilise at 5 over time, because once it reaches 5, the chances of an increase and a decrease are equal.

Talomir Nights, Episode 4

Johann and Gottfried have escaped the mountain village where they were held captive, but are now being hunted down by the Ekraen knights who took them prisoner.

“Eet eez like hunting, non?” says Sir Bertrand de Plastique. “Except ze prey eez more cunneeng, which makes eet even more fun.”

I next determine the size of the fugitives’ lead. This is (6 – ER) hours, or two hours. What of the pursuers? I roll 1d6 and add the ER for a total of 7; consulting the table on p. 55, this means the pursuers have twice my CV or points value. Hmm. The points value of my group has changed because there are only two of them now, with different statistics; a quick recalcuation puts it at 6, so there are 12 CV worth of pursuers. Ouch. Let’s see who they are; I roll 2d6 several times on the Ekraen army list, selecting figures until the Ekraen CV total is at least twice as large as the party’s. This gives us a force of three knights, four crossbowmen, and two infantry. This could be a challenge. However, they have to catch us first!

Each side now rolls 2d6 and tries to pass the lowest Rep in their group. Johann rolls 4, 6 and passes 1d6. The knights roll 1, 2 and despite having a lower Rep pass 2d6. As they passed one more d6, the lead reduces to one hour, and the pursued reduce their effective Rep by one point, to 3. As the lead is now one hour or less, the pursuers have caught us. It looks like we now set up a Battle encounter, which I assume is the pitched battle encounter from p. 70. Feh, it’ll do. I skip over generating forces as I already know what they are.

Each leader now rolls 2d6 trying to pass his Rep for deployment. Johann rolls two sixes, which would be good in most games but not Warrior Heroes, and Bertrand rolls 1, 6, passing one die. This means he is the attacker and has the advantage. The defender (Johann) sets up 12″ from his table edge, and the attacker sets up 18″ away from the defender.

I choose Johann’s table edge, and roll on the terrain generator to produce a town on a board mostly covered in hills and woods, but with one piece of clear terrain, which as luck would have it is on Johann’s table edge. Johann sets up 12″ onto the table, on the edge of the clear section. The knights set up on a road section, with 6″ of clear terrain, then 12″ of hills (which halve movement) between them and the party. All town buildings must be placed in clear terrain, so this board square is packed with them; it must represent a corner of a larger urban area.

The party rolls 2 and the knights roll 4; both activate, but the knights got the higher score, so activate first. What will they do? Well, I expect since they are pursuing the party they will want to close in, so they will try to advance 12″; they haven’t taken a test that will allow them to charge yet, so they are moving at a canter.

However, after they have moved 6″, they are within 12″ of the party; time for a Test of Wills. Sir Bertrand has Rep 5, so rolls 5d6 and is counting successes (rolls of 3 or less). 1, 3, 2, 5, 2 so four successes. As a star, Johann is allowed to choose the number of successes he rolls, and with Rep 4 he gets four dice. He chooses four successes, since any other result ends with the knights charging him and Gottfried, which is unsafe when you’re on foot with no armour. Both sides halt in place; I picture one of the knights launching into a speech in Ekraen, which Johann probably would not understand. This means the knights have not yet surged ahead of their crossbowmen and other infantry.

Now it’s the party’s turn to activate. Johann decides this is a good time for a Fast Move Test, and he and Gottfried turn and run. Both now roll 2d6 against Rep; Johann scores 3, 5, passes 1d6, and moves 150% of his normal move, or 9″. Gottfried scores 1, 6 and does likewise. The group are now 3″ from the table edge and 21″ from the knights (who stopped after moving 6″, on the edge of the hills).

New turn; the party rolls 1 for activation, and the knights roll 1 as well; a tie, so neither moves. The knights continue to pontificate in Ekraen, and the party looks frantically for somewhere to hide, as the townsfolk sensibly run inside and bar the doors.

Turn 3; Johann rolls 6, knights roll 1, so Johann and Gottfried stand about trying to look inconspicuous as the knights advance 6″ through the hills, becoming separated from their infantry. They are now 12″ from the party, so time for another Test of Wills. Sir Bertrand rolls 4, 4, 4, 3, 4 and passes one die. Johann opts to pass one die as well, since anything else will trigger a charge test which he could well lose.

Turn 4: Johann rolls 1, knights roll 6, so Johann and Gottfried activate and the knights don’t. Our protagonists move 8″ and sneak away off the board, mingling into the crowds.

Another encounter survived, another set of advancement rolls; Johann’s Hardiness increases to 3, and his Social Standing to 4, while Gottfried’s Rep increases to 5, and his Hardiness to 3. I decide that their actions in this encounter don’t constitute running away, since the precedent in other THW games I have is that running away only counts against you if it was the forced outcome of a reaction test.

Lesson learned: I could have played episodes 1, 3 and 4 without setting the table up at all. So, in future I won’t bother putting lead and terrain on the table until combat is joined.

“Was nun, Kleiner Mann?” asks Gottfried, as he liberates some disguises from a washing line.

“We tool up,” says Johann. “Then we go looking for the knight that rode Alexa down. And make him sorry.” Pause. “And don’t call me Kleinermann. My name’s Johann.”

Talomir Nights, Episode 3

Gottfried and Johann find themselves held captive in the mountain village they were trying to raid in episode 2. It has no dungeons, merely an old house. By midnight, Gottfried has managed to open the door to the room where they are held, and the two sneak out, relieving a couple of sleeping guards of their hand weapons. Their own weapons and armour are nowhere in sight, nor is their companion Alexa; since she was last seen skewered on a lance, this is not surprising.

(No picture this time, as the terrain is laid out as for episode 2; our heroes start in the big building in the middle of the board.)

“No horses,” whispers Gottfried as they emerge.

“That way,” Johann replies, pointing back down the trail they used to reach the village initially. It has the advantage that they know the way.

“Any sign of Alexa?” Gottfried only shakes his head.

Each time the protagonists move, as per p.56 of the rulebook I roll 1d6; if the score is equal to the current turn, their captors are alerted.

Turn 1: Johann and Gottfried activate and move 8″ towards the table edge, 18″ distant. The alert die roll is 3, so no-one has seen them yet.

Turn 2: Same again, except the alert die roll is 6. The table edge is now only 2″ away, and the tension mounts.

Turn 3: They activate a third time, the alert die roll is 2, and they’re away. Yay for the heroes!

The lesson learned here is that unless you’re unlucky, or gallop away on stolen horses, you’re quite likely to escape capture; more likely if you have a high Rep, as lower Rep figures will take more turns to move off the board.

A successful escape, however, may generate a pursuit encounter. I roll 1d6 against the ER of the region, and since I’ve now found that table, I can use the proper number: 4. I’ve decided that the knights would only hold Johann captive for a few days at best before realising he has neither a ransom nor any useful information, and killing him out of hand; so it’s still August, meaning there are no seasonal ER modifiers. I roll a 3, so there will be a pursuit.

Meanwhile, Johann and Gottfried have survived another encounter, and roll for advancement as per p. 16. Johann increases his Hardiness to 2, and his Social Standing to 3; Gottfried increases his SS to 3 also. They must’ve picked up the silverware on the way out.

Talomir Nights, Retcon of Episode 2

Meanwhile, in a parallel universe where Andy understands the melee rules, the fight plays out like this…

The knights, Alphonse and Bertrand, advance to contact. Alphonse engages Alexa and Gottfried, while Bertrand bears down on Johann. The active side chooses the sequence in which to conduct melee. Alphonse goes first, for no very good reason. Alphonse is Rep 5, and Elite Trained, so he has 5d6 basic and must pass at least 1d6. He is protected vs his opponent’s weapons, since his AC is at least their Impact, so gets +1d6. He is also on a larger base (because he’s on a horse), another +1d6. He is however outnumbered, which is -1d6. He will roll 6d6 for melee and counts shield dice because he has a shield. Gottfried is Rep 4 (4d6), with no modifiers. So is Alexa. Alphonse rolls 2, 5, 3, 3, 2, 6, passing 5 dice (i.e. 4 of those scores are 3 or less) and counting one shield die (the 6), which he can use to cancel one enemy success not matched by one of his own successes. This will not be required.

Alexa rolls 2, 4, 3, 4 and passes two dice. Gottfried rolls 2, 4, 2, 6 and passes two dice – he has no shield, so the 6 is just a failure. Alphonse has scored two more successes than Alexa, a Telling Blow. His lance has an Impact of 7 on the charge, easily more than Alexa’s AC of 2, so she is Out Of the Fight (OOF). This means she is so badly wounded she can do nothing more in this encounter; however, because she has Hardiness 1 she can take a Hardiness test on 2d6. She rolls 6, 5 – both of these are more than her Hardiness, so she passes 0d6 and the original result applies.

He has also scored two more successes than Gottfried, another Telling Blow, and Gottfried is also OOF. He rolls 4, 6 for a Hardiness test and is still OOF.

Johann would take a Crisis Test at this point to see if his nerve holds, but since he is a star and can choose the outcome, he fights on. I mean, what kind of hero would quit just because all his allies have been perforated?

Alphonse can now ride through the melee, because he has scored two or more successes against all his opponents while charging; but there are no more foes behind the first rank, so he cannot engage them, he merely moves out of melee and observes in case Bertrand needs help. This melee is now over.

Bertrand has identical statistics and equipment to Alphonse, so he rolls 6d6 in melee and counts shield dice. He scores 2, 6, 4, 6, 2, 4 and passes two dice with two shield dice. (Johann’s halberd has Impact 6, but Bertrand’s armour is 6, so he still counts as protected.) Johann is Rep 4, has a polearm on contact (+1d6), and as a star is Elite Trained so must pass at least 1d6. He is not protected currently (Impact 7 vs AC 6), but will be in subsequent rounds as the lance’s Impact drops to 4 after the initial charge. He rolls 5d6 but cannot count shield dice as he has a two-handed weapon.

He rolls 5, 3, 5, 1, 3, and passes 3 dice. Johann has scored one more success than Bertrand, but Bertrand uses one of his shield dice to counteract this, so they are evenly matched, and remain in contact.

Activation for turn 2 follows. The knights roll 2, Johann rolls 5. The knights can activate (as 2 is less than their Rep of 5), but Johann can’t (as his Rep 4 is less than the die roll). The knights activate and decide to belabour this upstart commoner.

Bertrand chooses to go first, and has the option of continuing in melee or breaking off. He chooses to break off, since Johann is protected against his lance unless Bertrand charges. Bertrand wheels away, and moves off far enough for a charge on his next activation.

Alphonse grins under his full helm, and charges Johann from behind. He rolls 1, 2, 3, 1, 4, 5 and passes 4d6 with no shield dice. Johann rolls 1, 6, 6, 6, 6 – ouch. Pity he’s not playing a game where rolling high is good. He passes 1d6. Alphonse scores 3 more successes than Johann – a Killing Stroke! Johann is Obviously Dead (OD), and takes a Hardiness test on 2d6. He rolls 1, 4 and passes 1d6 despite only having Hardiness 1. He is wounded; the melee continues, but he loses 2d6 from his pool.

As the contestants were not evenly matched, neither can break off. The combat round doesn’t end until everyone is OOF, OD, or evenly matched, so it’s still the same combat round.

Alphonse rolls 4, 4, 1, 2, 5, 6 and passes 2d6 with one shield die. Johann rolls 3, 6 (he lost another die because this is not first exchange of dice rolls, so his polearm advantage no longer applies) and passes 1d6. Alphonse has scored one more success so the loser (Johann) is pushed back 1″ and loses another die from his pool. Since Alphonse isn’t in fieldworks or stopped by another opponent, he follows up and the fight continues.

Alphonse rolls 4, 5, 5, 2, 3, 1 and passes 3 dice. Johann rolls 1 and passes 1d6; again he is pushed back 1″ and loses another die from his pool. Because Johann is now at 0d6, he is rendered OOF, but because he has Hardiness he can make another Hardiness Test – he rolls 2, 4, passing 0d6, so he really is OOF.

This time all three of the Company are OOF, rather than two OOF and one OD. I think I can merge these threads handily, but it will be several more encounters before you see how.

Later: Actually, I still got it wrong, because when fighting Alphonse after the initial charge, Johann is protected from the lance (Impact 4 vs AC 6) so he should get an extra die. Also, the knights are not outnumbered when fighting Johann, so they should both get an extra die too. I don’t think that would change the eventual outcome, though, just extend the fight a little; plus it’s late, and I’m too tired to adjust the last couple of dice exchanges.

Talomir Nights, Episode 2

In which Johann learns why the knights are in charge… and Andy learns several things he has been doing wrong with the rules (which is the point of this trial run).

Deciding that caravans would give too many figures on the table until I learn the rules better, I had Johann’s Company follow the route from Altengard to Ekra.

The Company had no encounters between April 986 and July 986, as they moved from the heart of Altengard, to the country, to the border, across the border into the border of Ekra, and into the country of Ekra. In August 986, moving into the heart of Ekra, we find an encounter with locals. The terrain generator says it’s in a mountain village, that the encounter is a raid, and that being the foreigners we must be raiding. Rolling on the Ekra army list, I discover Johann’s opponents are two mounted knights, lounging about outside one of the buildings. (This is the first thing I did wrong, as there should have been a total CV of 7 to match the party, not the 4 I actually drew. Not that they suffered from being short-handed, as you will see.)

Now, the motto of Two Hour Wargames is “Just play the game!”, which is sound advice. So rather than messing around for hours looking trying to match the quality of the figures and scenery you get on the typical wargaming website, I had a quick rummage in my study cupboards, and came out with some prepainted em4 figures I bought a few years ago, and a couple of Stargate Jaffar bought off eBay (I have no mounted knights, and while I have a couple of knights I painted for a D&D game in the 1980s I’m not sure where they are at the moment). Scenery was some Rackham gaming tiles bought on a whim last year, and some photo albums to mark impassable terrain. Anything showing bare tablecloth is clear terrain. Here’s a picture snapped from my mobile phone at the start of turn 1:

Talomir Nights, Episode 2. Johann's Company face off against two Ekran knights in a mountain village.

The knights pass 1d6 for Alertness, so activation is determined normally.

Turn 1: Neither side rolls low enough to activate, so they stand staring at each other.

Turn 2: The knights activate, but Johann’s Company does not. The knights make a full move towards the intruders, which brings them within 12″, and triggers a Test of Wills. Both sides score 3 successes, and since they have the same tally, they would stop and stare at each other; but that will not be a very interesting game, so I use Johann’s star power of being able to choose how many successes he scores to bump the Company to 4 successes, triggering a Test to Charge. Both sides pass 3 again, which would normally mean the knights charge, and the Company stands there like idiots. Again I use Johann’s star power to choose the maximum number of passes, so both sides will charge. (I think I missed a Receive Charge test or some such here.) The Company could fire or cast spells, if it had a wizard or any missile weapons; must fix that.

Then it gets nasty, as the mounted knights sweep down on the Company with lances couched. I won’t do a blow for blow as I did last time, as there are too many dice rolls; suffice to say that Warrior Heroes uses a melee system where each side starts with a number of dice, and in each round of combat the loser might be killed outright or lose dice. Alexa the Healer and Gottfried the Thief took on one knight, who comprehensively butchered them both over three sets of dice rolls; Gottfried however made his hardiness save and is just Out Of the Fight, whereas Alexa did not and is Obviously Dead. Meanwhile the second knight took nearly 8 exchanges of blows to drop Johann (there are advantages to being a star with armour and a polearm). Mistakes here included not reducing the first knight’s combat dice for being outnumbered, and I’m still not sure I understand how multiple melee combat works; if I’m doing it correctly, figures don’t suffer much of a disadvantage from fighting multiple opponents. I’ll ask the Yahoo group, but drive on for now; it seems reasonable that a mounted knight should be able to knock the stuffing out of a lady healer and an unarmoured chap with a dagger.

Episode 2 ends with Johann and Gottfried captured by the knights, so episode 3 will start with an Escape encounter, possibly followed by a Pursuit, which I think should then lead us into a Quest for Vengeance as Johann hunts down the knight responsible for Alexa’s death. I diced for setup before packing away, and got a night escape with no convenient horses to steal; I haven’t bothered with the terrain generator as it seems likely the knights would lock the Company up in one of the village houses, so we’ll use the same game board.

The cross-post to Facebook isn’t able to resolve tables, so I shall resort to bullet points; after the post-combat advancement rolls, and the loss of one Social Standing for leaving the fight horizontally, the Company looks like this:

• Johann (star): Rep 4, Hardiness 1, SS 2. Halberd, AC4 (both confiscated).
• Alexa: Rep 4, Hardiness 1, SS 5. Obviously Dead.
• Gottfried: Rep 4, Hardiness 2, SS 2. Sword, AC2.

The whole thing took 30 minutes to set up, 40 minutes to play, and 10 minutes to pack away again – well inside the two hours promised, despite considerable time dicing up “no encounters” (in future I will do those before games night so we move directly to the action) and even more time looking up rules to be sure I had them right (which should improve dramatically as I learn the game).

Johann’s Talomir Nights, episode 1

The best way to learn the game being to play it, I did that.

I’d just finished re-reading the WFRP Old World Bestiary, and was taken with the example NPC in the Slaughter Margin section; so decided to make a Warrior adventurer from Altengard, called Johann.

• I select a home of the heart of Altengard, alignment of the Setting Sun, and decide that Johann is a melee type armed and equipped like Altengard infantry, giving him a polearm (halberd) and AC4 (chain with some plate).
• I take the recommended Rep 4 and Hardiness 1. I roll 1d6-1 for Social Status and get a 2, reduced to 1.
• Johann’s CV is thus (4 + 4+ 0) x (1 + 1) / 6 = 16 / 6 = 2. He rolls to recruit followers, and gets two fellow infantrymen.
• I decide to be self-employed and so convert one of these to a healer, and one to a thief. I ponder for a while on what their Rep, equipment and so on should be, then I notice that the Random NPC table for caravans has a healer and a thief on it, and decide to use those as both have the same Rep as the infantry they were converted from. The thief’s weapon is “various”, so I select dagger. I take their alignments from the same table (otherwise I would have used the same as Johann’s) and roll for their SS, as I shall try out the option of giving these fellows advancement rolls.

Johann’s Company – Initial Status
Name	Reputation	Hardiness	Weapon	Body Armour	Class	Social Standing	Align
Johann (Star)	4	1	Halberd	AC 4	Melee	1	SS
Alexa	4	0	Sword	AC 2	Healer	5	SS
Gottfried	4	0	Dagger	AC 2	Thief	2	RM

Goodness only knows what Alexa is doing with the rest of us. Slumming, possibly.

March 986

Johann’s Company starts in the heart of Altengard, as I’m thinking about signing on as a caravan guard, and I’ve already decided that’s where his home is.

Since I haven’t downloaded the ER by country table I use the basic ER 5 for Encounter Rating and roll 4, 5: Pass 2d6 (i.e., both dice roll the ER or less) so there is an encounter. A roll of 3 tells me it’s with locals, and a roll of 3 followed by 1 for “Where Are They?” tells me it’s a farm in clear terrain; the Company is probably buying food.

Rolls on the Terrain Generator create a map like this; I used the generator for the terrain, and placed the actual farmhouse randomly in one of the clear areas. (Each area would be 12″ square on the tabletop.)

Clear (with farmhouse)	Woods	Hill
Hill	Hill	Clear
Hill	Woods	Woods

The terrain generator is clunky, since it uses 1d6 to place terrain, and duplicates shift along until every area is full. I see no real advantage in this other than allowing you to play the whole game with d6, so I shall use a d10 in future.

A roll of 4 on the Adventurers Encounter Table says that this is a raid; since we are native to Altengard, we are the defenders. The other side pass 1d6 on the Alertness Table so are aware.

The intruders are equal to us in strength, namely CV4; rolls on the Altengard Army List give me three infantry and a skirmisher. We’re all fellow Altengarders so we go to Talk The Talk, and the intruder leader passes 1d6 more than Johann.

Now I’m stuck, because that doesn’t seem to match any of the descriptions in the Talk The Talk table. However, I have a number of other THW games, and the description is closest to “pass 1d6” in the older games; plus, neither side has scored twice more successes, and they haven’t passed the same number, so that seems to be the one. (Later confirmed via the helpful THW Yahoo group.)

So, I have a choice between lending them one figure to help until the adventure is over, in which case I get them back later, or forfeiting one advancement roll. Again, I’m not sure how long an adventure is, so I treat it as an encounter. Since they seem basically friendly, I decide they want to borrow the healer as one of their group has been injured in an accident and is OOF (“Out Of the Fight”, i.e. injured). The healing rules on p 39 say that I move the healer into base to base contact and roll 2d6 vs OOF Rep on the Recovery Table. He passes 2d6 and recovers. (The Yahoo group advises me that an “adventure” is deliberately left vague so that you can pick what makes sense in the circumstances.)

Not what I expected, but then that is sort of the point for a GM-less fantasy campaign. Having survived the encounter, we roll for advancement; this is done by rolling 1d6 against the current levels of Rep, Hardiness and Social Standing – if the score exceeds the current value, or on a natural 6, the attribute increases by one. There’s also an option to increase skills, but that requires the Adventurer’s Handbook, which I don’t have yet, so I’ll ignore it and use Rep for skills as per the basic rules.

Johann’s Company – March 986
Name	Reputation	Hardiness	Weapon	Body Armour	Class	Social Standing	Align
Johann (Star)	4	1	Halberd	AC 4	Melee	2	SS
Alexa	4	1	Sword	AC 2	Healer	6	SS
Gottfried	4	1	Dagger	AC 2	Thief	2	RM

Alexa and Gottfried have become more Hardy, and Johann and Alexa both gain Social Standing. Talking nicely to people is clearly underrated. Maybe next time there will be a fight, and I can try out the combat rules.