Start of a Rangers of Shadow Deep Campaign

Rangers of Shadow Deep is a solo/cooperative game by Frostgrave author Joseph McCullough.  It uses a slightly modified version of the very versatile Frostgrave system.  The concept is that small groups of Rangers, think Aragorn-type heroes, serving the fantasy Kingdom of Alladore battle an encroaching negation called the Shadow Deep, think the Nothing from The Neverending Story.  The rules contain a number of programmed scenario that are linked into larger narrative missions.  A campaign system allows you to further develop the characters.  I decided to try a few adventures solo.

Here's my part of rangers - Sir Osmer of rey, a younger son serving with the Alladorian Rangers in hopes of making a name for himself.  His father at least provided him with some mercenaries to keep him alive: a pair of Lygoshi barbarians, Kyra the Red and Bogdan the Black (this latter is an homage to my very first D&D character that I ran for too many years to count), and Hanali the Wood Elf.  Sir Osmer was actually created as an NPC "companion" in game terms while I created the other three as player characters.  The three main heroes are from Hero Forge while Sir Osmer is from the Dracula's America line of figures from North Star.

I started with the basic scenarios in the rule book.  The first mission, "The Missing," consisted of two scenarios. The first is the "Deserted Village."  Our heroes had to investigate an now abandoned village which has been overrun by zombies, as well as a few giant rats.

 There were several clue markers around the village.  After dispatching the few visible zombies and rats, the party split into two teams up to investigate the buildings in the village.  The buildings are from a Russian company called Umbum and are wonderfully detailed, very easy to build, and pretty reasonable price-wise.

This led to the toughest part of the game when Bogdan and Hanali found themselves surrounded by four zombies and rat swarm (the scenario called for giant rats but I only had rat swarm pieces.)

With no small amount of luck, including a judicious use of a reroll special ability, the pair proved victorious.  Although it was a win for the party with only minor wounds suffered, the experience and treasure gained were only moderate.  They did discover strange tracks which led them to the second scenario in the mission:

The "Infected Trees" scenario, wherein our heroes discover that the village had been destroyed by a nest of giant spiders.  The heroes had to destroy the nest, including the four (later five) trees infected by the spiders, as well as free any villagers who might still be alive after being ensnared in the spiders' cocoons.

 The game opened with Hanali getting a lucky shot in, killing the closest spider.  This set the tone for the rest of what proved to be quick game.  Hanali would shoot at a distance and the rest of the party would move up to kill each spider in turn.  Luck with the random events draw helped a great deal with the party having plenty of time to dispatch the individual spiders.  Freeing three villagers from the cocoons also gave a boost in numbers for ganging up on the spiders.

In no time, all of the spiders were killed, the infected trees set a flame and three grateful villagers saved.  This ended the introductory mission on a high note and allowed the heroes to advance an experience level. 

The next mission in the book is "The Beacon Tower," in which the rangers must discovery what has happened at Tor Varden, a beacon tower on the kingdom's border with which contact has been lost.  I only had time to play the first scenario of the three-part mission.  On the way to Tor Varden, the heroes find their way blocked at a bridge occupied by a force of evil Gnolls, servants of the Shadow Deep.

The bridge was heavily guarded and several archers patrolled the closer bank of a rushing torrent.

Our heroes managed to sneak up on the bridge and positioned themselves to ambush the Gnolls.

Hanali uncharacteristically misses her bow shot.

Bogdan is luckier with his throwing axe.  A nearby Gnoll archer comes to investigate and is struck down as well.

 However this alerts the rest of the Gnolls who swarm our heroes.

In the ensuing melee, Kyra the Red is struck down.

Hanali and Sir Omser, having killed anothe Gnoll archer, rush to Bogdan's aid.  On the way, Hanali spots a flock of messenger crows, likely sending a warning to the new occupiers of Tor Varden.  She manages to knock them from the sky.  (The scenario calls for a vulture but I only had a crows available - the rules themselves suggest being flexible about using substitute figures.)

Bogdan duels with the Gnoll Sergeant who with great difficulty is overcome.

Unexpected help arrives.  A survivor from Tor Varden's garrison has escaped and appears on the farther shore.  He attacks the two Gnolls left in camp and with great luck manages to slay both of them.

Hanali, who has a Heal spell revives Kyra and the reunited party defeat the remaining Gnolls.

The last surviving Gnoll attempts to retreat across a nearby ford but is intercepted by Sir Osmer and the Tor Varden survivor, a man-at-arms named Helmer.

With the river crossing secured, the party prepares to set off for the tower itself.

This was where I had to stop but I hope to be returning to this adventure soon.

Rebels of Space Deep - Star Wars using the Frostgrave System

There is a Facebook Group for Rangers of Shadow Deep, a solo/cooperative fantasy skirmish game by Joseph McCullogh based on his Frostgrave system.  Someone on the group recently posted an adaptation for Star Wars, called Rebels of Space Deep.  My group decided to give it a try.  We found it really matched the feel of the movies. 

Here's some pictures.  I should note that we are not big players of the various Star Wars games and so my collection of such miniatures is fairly limited.  We had to use a number of substitutes, in particular I have no distinctively white-armored Stormtroopers but used some Space Nazis instead.  I hope the purists are not overly offended.

The scenario we played involved a group of rebels attempting to find a droid in a vast junk yard just outside Mos Eisley on Tatoine.  The droid contained a file with a listing of all the Imperial informants and double agents in the galaxy.  The heroes had to find the droid, retrieve the file, and escape to their spaceship in a hidden hanger in the city itself.

Our heroes included a Jedi recently escaped from a decades-long imprisonment in carbonite, a rakish Smuggler and his Wookie companion, a dashing pilot, and a commando droid.

Our heroes boldly enter the junk yard.

The smuggler lucks out and discovers the droid in the first pile of junk he investigates.  (There were 6 clue markers set up randomly in the junk yard.  When a player investigated it, there was a chart to determine what was found.  It turned out the first clue investigated gave the result of the droid.)

The pilot proved less lucky and encountered some Womp Rats.

 The mission became more complicated with the arrival of a storm-trooper patrol  The Jedi met them boldly, and using his light saber parried every blast shot back at them.  The storm-troopers are all dispatched but not before alert the rest of the garrison.

The pilot hears a noise but fails to identify it.  It turns out to be more Womp Rats.  They nearly kill the pilot but the Jedi helps dispatch them.

Meanwhile, an agent of the Imperial Security Bureau surprises the Wookie but the shot is missed.

 The Wookie responds by picking up the wreck of a small dune buggy and smashing it onto the agent.  (The wookie player rolled a natural 20 on his strength check, I let him use this a Fight roll and it easily killed the agent.)

 The party is able to leave the junk yard thus ending the first scene.

The players enter Mos Eisley proper

But are careful to avoid the guards at the Hutt's palace

Imperial reinforcements soon arrive to stop them.

A fierce gun battle erupts across the square.

The Jedi strides openly towards the storm-troopers hoping to draw them away from his companions.  

He is successful but finds himself surrounded.  A surprising tought Imperial NCO brings the Jedi down to a single hit point.  

Fortunately, he is able to cut his way free from the storm-troopers.  The commando droid flings the Jedi onto its metallic back, rushing to safety, using his light saber to parry the incoming blaster fire. 

As imperial reinforcements begin to arrive, all of the heroes are able, at the last minute, to board their spaceship and escape.

Historicon 2019: Snow Queens and Swamp Monsters

So I was able to attend Historicon this year, from Thursday through Sunday, at its new venue, the Lancaster County Convention Center in downtown Lancaster.  The new venue is wonderful!  I was lucky enough to get a room at the attached Marriot.  The view from the floor I stayed on was a bit different from that of the old Host:

I heard several complaints about parking and loading and unloading but as I was staying at the Marriot, I didn't have any problems.

The Games I Ran:

This was the seventh year that Nick and I ran a musical-themed wargame.  This time it was a mash-up of Frozen and Anastasia, called "Let It Go, Rasputin."  I was too busy to take many pictures from the game but I think it was quite the success. 

As in previous years, we both wore iconic costumes during the game.  I must say the looks I got from other gamers as I crossed the game room were priceless. 

This is essentially what the table set-up was:

A first for our musical games, we had two young ladies playing who were given the roles of Anna and Elsa.  As a result, the game was probably not as raucous as in previous years but was still very fun.  "Anna" who despite being only 8, was a really excellent player and won the coveted Wazzi award for best actor.

The other game I ran was the Creatures of Croatoan.  This was part of a series of Elizabethan fantasy/horror games using the Frostgrave/Ghost Archipelago rules.  I had run a game last year about the death of Christopher Marlowe and the search for a lost manuscript of Marlow's Dr. Faustus that could actually open a portal to hell.  This year's game was about the search for the Lost Colony of Roanoke.

 As with the previous game, this one had the players controlling distinct warbands with different goals.  This shows the two Spanish bands.

 This is Grace O'Malley's Irish pirates

 There were three different tribes of Native Americans: Croatoans, Secotans, and Powhatans

There were about half a dozen English warbands

 Including Sir Edmund Blackadder

 The players had to investigate various sites around the island, while fending off some of the strange creatures there as well as the other warbands.

The players could interact with various markers on the board that would give them clues as to the fate of the Lost Colony as well as encounters

 Things escalated pretty quickly:

Games in Which I Played

 I got a chance to play in a number of games.

The first was Last Kids on Earth, based on a YA novel series, in which a small group of kids try to survive a zombie apocalypse. We proved remarkable lucky and successful with all of our survivors making it back to our tree-house fortress with snacks.  A fun game.

I also played in Zeb Cook's dog-sled race game, a sort of Wacky Racers on Ice.  Another fun game, I was Santa Claus.

A magic sled pulled by 8 tiny reindeer is not as maneuverable as you would think.

I also played in one of the iterations of To Catch a King which was put on by Little Wars TV all weekend.  I usually avoid Napoleonic games as not quite my cup of tea.  However, this game was run by Miles Reidy who's an excellent and funny GM.  In this game, the French had successfully invaded England and the British were attempting to get George III onto a ship to reach safety in the colonies.  

A beautiful board and a fun scenario. I was one of the British players and we had to hold open a road to sea against furious French attacks while trying to get the less than mentally stable King to a Royal Navy ship.

We managed pretty well for a while and the King was about half-way to the sea when the French made a sudden break through and were able to capture him.  Fun and quick moving for a game of this magnitude.

The last game I played in was Howard Whitehouse's Gentleman's War, a visual feast of old-fashion shiny toy soldiers.  Given that I played this on Saturday night, it was a delightful end to the convention that gave a lot of laugh without taxing my exhausted brain too much.

Some Games I spotted:

Have Gun Will Travel - they were using a 1950s era board game as the campaign system. It look like a fun game with a great table.

This was a VSF race game.

Some sort of SciFi

Not sure what some of these games were but the terrain was beautiful

 There seemed to be at least two Pegasus Bridge games that I saw.

The magnificent Battle of Hoth game put on by the HAWKS

Pacific landing game.