A Tale Of Two Tortles: Game 9

Well, it has been quite a while since my last game of Five Leagues From The Borderlands! Over three months. So during that break, I played through five campaign turns of "resting up" which included recruiting three new warband members, getting Morgan all healed, and re-equipping Tundaline for melee combat, since her ranged abilities were, well, somewhat lacking. Plog The Elder, a Tortle Mystic and Weppi's cousin, joined as a new Hero. Followers include Brarkisy the Feral and Grushnag the Duskling (of a different tribe than the group Our Heroes are driving out of Armskirk.)

I decided I wanted to play a regular game with this new team before I pursued the Quest further, so a quick check of everything yielded a Desperate Mob of eight men from The Ruin Within led by the notorious Captain Shiver, retrurning from a raid. We needed to drive them out of the general vicinity of The Crossing by Securing The Area.

The first turn saw advancement from both sides, Captain Shiver's slingers trying to move into position with Weppi and company moving forward to attack. Plog The Elder realized there were unseen combatants coming around the buildings to the left flank and began planning to delay them.

Turn two saw my first ever use of a Mystic ability: Plog The Elder created a Wall Of Fire (Barrier) between those slinkers trying to get on the left flank and Grushnag. We also saw our first combat attempt, with one of the slingers trying to hit Weppi. The shot missed, but was an omen of more deadly things to come. Everyone else tried to manuever into good position for the upcoming combat.

 
Turn three: Plog The Elder was unable to maintain his Barrier, leaving Grushnag to face three bad guys moving in on him. Weppi defeated Captain Shiver, but not before sustaining a wound. Grushnag took a wound from the slinger on the left flank, and Morgan felled one of the enemy.

 
On the fourth turn, Plog The Elder managed to get his Wall Of Fire back up to protect the wounded Grushnag. Weppi felled another cutist before in turn being laid low by a sling. Tundaline found her mark and killed a cultist, and Morgan managed to wound one. Brarkisy ran over to give Grushnag some back-up.

Turn Five included, in no particular order, Tundaline kiling a bad guy, Morgan charging towards a slinger (who then fled the batte,) the other slinger took Brarkisy out of action, and Grushnag killed the cultist revealed by the extinction of the Wall Of Fire. The enemy force now included exactly one slinger, and he didn't run away. Truly faithful to the cause!

There were a further four turns of trying to defeat this lone enemy. He managed to take out both Grushnag and Morgan, and Tundaline finally took him down. What a game!

After the game, Weppi, Brarkisy, and Morgan were all found to be just Knocked Out. Grushnag is going to require a turn to heal up from a moderate wound. We burned through 10 adventure points to reduce The Ruin Within threat level by two. We managed to get some tools and rations out of the battle, the tools sold for 2 Gold Marks and the rations have been added to the Stash. Plog The Elder made an advancement roll and gained +1 Casting.