Scouring of the Shire - Part 3

The third episode of the scouring of the shire is the Brockenborings. A secret meeting is being held by Lobelia and Fatty in a remote hobbit hole. They were all having a lovely time, Fatty and Tippers were enjoying the drinks while the others were talking about the encroaching ruffadrim. Suddenly they hear a loud bird call from the nearby forest, that's a signal that there are incoming baddies!

In this mission, the hobbits all have to scatter - run off a board edge, while encircling ruffadrim as well as the evil Sharkey and Worm try to capture them. However, because the hobbits won the last mission, after setup they can move D6 figures. So originally they were all evenly spaced around the hobbit hole, but then I rolled a 6 and moved six of them all over to one side. So instead of scattering in all directions, with ruffadrim all over the place, I now only have about two ruffadrim to get past - seems almost unfair!

The hobbits all bolt for it!

Except Tippers who has had slightly too much to drink and just wanders around outside the hobbit hole door.

A ruffadrim catches up with him pretty quickly (they move 6" while hobbits only move 4") but fails to wound the wobbly hobbit.

Another ruffadrim takes on two hobbits, but no damage is done except to slow them down a little. 

And as the clash continues the hobbits back him up against a fence and dispatch him! Meanwhile Sharkey is trying to cast spells, but is a little too far away!

In a bizarre twist, Tippers manages to knock out the ruffadrim attacking him!

Sharkey casts Immobilize on Fredegar and halts his escape, but there's still nobody close enough to engage with the hobbits.

Finally there are a few combats, Sharkey catches up and takes one hobbit prisoner, another ruffadrim beats back a hobbit, but with no damage done.

Worm is actually bested by Bookman, who clubs him with a massive hardcover tome!

And another combat causes the hobbit to back away, but he avoids injury.

Tippers just ambles right back to the hobbit hole, ready to refill his drink flask.

And after that the hobbits mostly get away! Lobelia, Fatty and six other hobbits managed to escape, we may see them again in a future episode =) These games are pretty fun, super quick and, so far, very easy for the hobbits. I reckon this one would have been TOTALLY different if the hobbits hadn't had the free rearrangement at the start. If they had still been spaced around the ruffadrim would have been able to catch up with them much more easily and Sharkey would have been able to get some more spells off.

At some point we might get the newer version of the book, but so far these have been good =)

Scouring of the Shire - Part 2

The second episode is even more ruffadrim trying to get through a forested area. The hobbits have been busy in this one, there may only be a few of them, but they have trapped the area! I made a whole bunch of traps. These are just miniature bases with grass on the top side. On the bottom, however, there are some that just have grass, some that represent pits, some that have trip wires and some that have snares. Pretty simple, you get close to one, flip it over and see if there's a trap. If there is you roll a die, on a 2+ something bad happens to you (not seriously bad, often it's more like it just ends your turn).

So there are traps spread right throughout this forested area. Again, the ruffadrim just have to make it from one side to the other.

Here's the first trap sprung! It's a trip wire! I roll a 1, nothing happens.

A-ha! Another trap! It's a pit! I roll a 1. Nothing happens. However, with a pit trap you either have to jump across it or go around it some other way. So one ruffadrim tries to jump it... and rolls a 1! He falls into the trap (ends his turn and next turn he climbs back out). As well as this, a hobbit stone bonks a ruffadrim on the head! Knocks him right out!

On this side of the forest another pit trap is stumbled into... I roll a 1, nothing happens. These guys are getting closer to the edge now!

An archer and two stone-throws knock out another ruffadrim, who uncovered a snare trap... then I rolled a 1 so nothing happened.

The ruffadrim have broken through the hobbit lines and are just about off the board, but a remarkable turn of archery and stone throwing takes two of them out, right at the last minute!

And on the other side of the board, more stones bonk into another ruffadrim, there are now not enough left to count a victory for the ruffadrim - hobbits win again!

This was another fun, though silly, game. It was super quick, another 15 minute game. There were 7 traps encountered and I rolled a 1 every... single... time! Still, it was fun and I look forward to seeing them in future games too! The poor ruffadrim are not faring well, don't underestimate hobbits with stones, they may only wound on a 6, but sometimes those 6s come up more than you'd like!

Scouring of the Shire - Part 1

Just for something a little bit different we found the old Scouring of the Shire book on eBay (there's a new one that we might splash out for one day). So we thought we'd have a go at these missions. 

So in the first mission, Farmer Maggot's Farm, we have some ruffians (we'll use our old ruffadrim stand-ins) who are trying to creep by on a stormy night. They have to get off the far board edge but in between is some farm land and three dogs, Grip, Fang and Wolf. They start off sort of randomly patrolling around, but if they spot any foes they bark loudly, which may wake up Farmer Maggot who will then enter the game.

We skipped a few turns here as everyone just sort of moved around, and here we are right near the bottom of the board, the alarm has only just been raised and the ruffadrim are almost already at the end! Looks like they'll easily win this one!

Except that the dogs are pretty awesome, and there's only a narrow gap without tramping through the fields (at half speed). One ruffadrim goes down!

And their barking has woken up an angry Farmer Maggot! Some of the ruffadrim break off to try and get around the back, while another falls to the dogs!

Finally the ruffadrim are reduced to two models, meaning they can't win the match, victory for the farmer (well, really his dogs!)

This game was super quick! With very few models and nothing to track like you do with battle company games we were done in about fifteen minutes, which left us time to do another...

Rescue Hedger! Shire Protectors Battle Company Battle Report

Well, Hedger was injured and left at camp with Geleth and Monty while the others headed off shopping and stuff. And wouldn't you know it, along comes Mur'Baj's battle company - and they have a cave troll!

In this mission I start with three guys in the middle of the map, with the enemy battle company close by and the rest of the team only coming on from the far edge. If I can reduce the incoming goblins to 50% I win, if they knock out Hedger, they win!

And we're off to a good start! Geleth shoots one of the goblin archers!

And the rest of the team hussles in (at slow speed for the dwarves and even slower speed for the hobbits!) In round 2 Geleth uses one of his sneaky elvish songs to compel the leader of the company out onto the rickety bridge, and Hedger then makes a great shot to take him out! Cookie races ahead on his pony!

Monty the dwarf holds fast behind the ancient doors, while goblins attack!

Geleth sings another verse to his song and makes the cave troll run in the wrong direction, meanwhile Hedger is only a short way in front of a conga-line of goblin troops!

Cookie manages to hold off a goblin blackshield, Monty similarly repels two goblin attackers.

From above you can see that the magpie is lending some assistance here (allowing Monty to get a re-roll).

Hedger's new ability to move as well as shoot means that the following horde is being whittled down, but he's not out of the woods yet - literally or figuratively!

Cookie and Loki take out the blackshield, Monty continues to hold off the other two goblins.

Hedger is now at the rivers edge and will have to leap to the central island, the troll and remaining goblins are closing in!

With both Loki, Skodi and Cookie taking on goblins, another falls! It's getting close to 50% of the goblin force...

And Hedger has successfully made the leap to the little central island. The hobbits all throw stones and shoot arrows at the goblins, but fail to knock any of them out.

And on the next turn, the dwarves and cookie get the final kill required and secure the numbers necessary for a win!

But in a totally bizarre twist, two goblins leap over to the small island and beat Hedger's duelling rolls and then get a wound past his fate as well! Hedger falls! It's a tie!!!

At the end of the match Hedger receives a permanent leg wound, which slows him down to dwarf speed. A new dwarf, Archie the ranger, joins the company and Cookie again gets the mini of the match! 

Two of the three goblin heroes as well as the blackshield will be missing their next mission, but they're joined by another goblin blackshield to help pick up the slack.

More itsy bitsy spiders! Shire protectors battle company battle report 5

Not to be outdone (and to use the same scenery set up so we didn't have to think too hard) the Shire Protectors also found themselves under assault by eight legged beasties! With lower strength, defence, attacks, fight value etc. the Hobbits were really going to need protecting! I deployed down one corner, hoping to make the spiders take at least two turns to get to me if they appeared at the other end of the board (the six big terrain features were the spider spawning spots, with a D6 to randomise where they would appear).

Turn one started really well! Stones were thrown, arrows flew and two spiders dropped dead with one getting a wound on it!

It was then stacks on to two close by spiders, which both fell!

On the next turn, the spider the hobbits were fighting only rolled a two and a three and I had four hobbits and Cookie charging on the pony. The hobbits all rolled twos! Cookie rolled a one and... a 5! Phew!

The spiders continued advancing, my Sentinel, Geleth, kept singing Eldamar Madrigal, which made the spiders keep moving away from the fighting - very helpful!

Cookie on his pony kept on saving the day!

So far, so good, the dwarves, sentinel and Cookie have been doing the major work, while the other hobbits throw stones and fire arrows. The tough dwarven armour took a dent on this turn as Skodi took a hit from the purple spider, fortunately fate was on his side, though it used his might and fate points.

Hedger manages to take out a green spider, but the others are all getting very close now.

The spider against Hedger rolled double sixes, he needed a six to stay in the game...

And thanks to Geleth singing the Mirkwood spider away and joining in another fight, yet another spider goes down. Hatless Harry shoots an incoming green spider right in one of its eyes!

The Shire protectors continue to put a wall of slightly tougher warriors in between the spiders and weaker hobbits!

And on the other side of the tree Loki and Cookie intercept another spider, killing it.

The brave Sentinel, Geleth, puts himself right in the way of the Mirkwood spider, and it proves too much for him.

Loki intercepts another incoming beastie!

And on that final turn, both Skodi and Hedger lose to an orange arachnid, laying down their lives for the Hobbits!

At the end of the match, with the exception of Loki, the other proper protectors were all knocked out, but the halflings all survived! In the injury rolls they were all okay except for Hedger who has to miss a game to recover from the spider poison. 

Hedger managed to get one wound in, Loki made 6, Cookie got 7! Some of the other hobbits got a few hits in with arrows and rocks.

For rewards, Hedger received an elven bow and seasoned archer (can move and shoot). Skodi is now a blade master (can reroll a die in a duel). Loki is a dual wielding specialist (a skill we made up for dual wielders which allows either an extra attack or an extra defence instead of burly). As well as that a new dwarf, Monty, has joined the team (he has a shield) and also has a pet magpie. I've upgraded the models for Loki and Skodi as well so they look a little more epic after their spider slaying abilities!