A Tale Of Two Tortles: Game 18

 OK, so I played through Game 18 of my ongoing solo Five Leagues From The Borderlands campaign. When we last left Our Heroes, they were In Camp in an uninhabited part of Armskirk, The Ruined City. They spent Campaign Turn 34 travelling to Bradfordshire, a settlement outside the city proper that is a lot less destroyed. Campaign Turn 35 was then another Skirmish turn, resulting in this game. But first, there were important things to do in Bradfordshire; we need a new Recruit, which resulted in Quicktoes joining the warband (as an aside, I bought a Nolzur's Marvelous Miniatures "Halfling Rogue" for this new addition, and the model is wearing boots... who ever heard of a halfling with footwear?)

This time around, we wanted to bring the good fight to the frightful menace of the Duskling Warbands. They were skulking in the same map location as Our Heroes, so no travel would be required. Those fiends were hunting us, too. Per the rules, all of their ranged attacks would have the Poison trait. But as it was a Maddened Wave of goblins, there were no archers, so I made the executive decision that ALL of their weapons would have Poison. Make it a little dangerous! And if we didn't defeat them? They would be carrying out part of their overall scheme, which now seemed to be defeating us! But was it? We would have to search around their stomping grounds a little and find out what was really going on... the scenario would be Search For Something, with a randomly-placed Search marker and then a random table edge was determined for the Duskling deployment.

This was going to require some thinking. The Dusklings would be past the Search marker before Our Heroes could get to it, so I thought the trick might be to give Morgan the Ferret's Drink potion so she could circle around behind the goblins as we used the rest of the warband as bait to draw them forward and past the Search marker. So, on the first turn, we formed a battle line and did not advance very far forward as the Dusklings advance quickly towards us. Plog The Elder tried to cast "Foresee" so as to give Morgan an extra turn to search the Search marker, but failed to get it off.

Turn Two was much more exciting! Myrrh tried shooting at one of the oncoming goblins, but rolled a "1" and was out of ammo for the rest of the skirmish. The Dusklings surged forward, exactly as anticipated, but couldn't quite reach Our Heroes. Weppi then charged, killing one of the enemy. Quicktoes followed her example, but failed to find his mark. Tundaline then moved in next to Weppi, and killed another bad guy. Morgan had by this time circled behind the goblins and was in sight of the Search marker, and Plog The Elder managed to cast Foresee this turn as well. With the clash of steel and sparks of magic flying about, two of the Dusklings decided they had enough of this and promptly fled the scene.

On Turn Three, Weppi started string by circling around Tundaline and killing another goblin. The Dusklings then moved up to fight Weppi and Tundaline, one dying before Weppi's armored might and another pushing Tundaline back. Quicktoes and Myrrh leapt into the fray, but the halfling went down, out of action in his very first skirmish! Morgan made it to the Search marker, and succeeded in her Battlewise test to fulfill the Scenario victory condition.

By Turn Four, there were only two Dusklings left. Weppi and Myrrh dispatched them before they had a chance to act. Victory was ours and we Held The Field! Yay!

The Search marker? That turned out to be evidence of the Duskling plans (add 2 Adventure Points.) We gained another 2 Adventure Points for winning the scenario, and wagering the 4 Adventure Points we earned versus a d6 roll, we reduced the Duskling Warband threat by one level. Quicktoes was just knocked out, no real harm done. We were able to loot a Spring Vial from the Dusklings, and in the ruins a Grateful Volunteer revealed themself, adding a new Warband member if we decided to keep them. Finally, News Travels... a Caravan is arriving at The Crossing, and we can roll two additional times on the Rare Goods table if we get there within two campaign turns.

A Tale Of Two Tortles: Game 17

 OK, so I played through Campaign Turns 32 and 33 of my solo Five Leagues From The Borderlands campaign a few days ago. Number 32 was just resting up so Tundaline could heal, but we ran into a pack of pickpockets and lost three Gold coins. Those that could helped the Town Guard and did some Hard Work, slightly offsetting the loss to the pickpockets. For the 33rd campaign turn, we were ready to bring the fight to The Ruin Within at their hideout! 

But first, we spent some time at The Crossing doing town things, like helping the Town Guard, doing some Hard Work, and discovering where, exactly, The Ruin Within was hiding out. Once we figured that out (Adventure Milestone, 6 Adventure points wagered with a roll of 4, we found out with no problem!) we had to Travel there. While on the way, we saw Something in the distance and added an Unexplored Location to the map. We had arrived just as they were counting their loot!

Before the game proper started, there was an approach phase as we snuck up on them. Weppi clunked forward while Myrrh got a nice start on climbing to the second floor of a ruined building. Weppi clunked ahead some more and the bad guys spotted her, they were five Bloodstained Renegades with their Lieutenant and Captain. Our victory condition would be to kill these two leaders, but there would be additional benefits if we Held The Field.

The first game turn saw advancement to combat positions. Weppi positioned herself at a break in a wall, using her bulk to block the Renegades from surrounding her. Myrrh took a shot at an opposing archer without effect, who then returned fire with similar results. The rest of the Renegades surged forward to attack Our Heroes, not quite closing the distance between the opposing groups. Morgan and Grushnag followed up behind Weppi, while Plog The Elder and Tundaline brought up the left flank.

Turn Two brought menace and mayhem. Weppi managed to kill two of the bad guys but not without taking a wound herself, while Myrrh found his mark on the enemy archer he had previously shot at. Grushnag squeezed past Weppi and made a lunge for the Lieutenant, killing him on the first exchange. Morgan moved up right behind Weppi, while Plog the Elder and Tundaline tactically maneuvered. The other Renegade archer decided he had enough of the slaughter, and promptly fled the scene.

At the start of Turn Three, there were only two bad guys left: a Renegade and the Captain. By the time dust cleared, Grushnag was down, Morgan had killed the remaining Renegade, and Tundaline had finished off the Captain by inflicting two wounds, no clean kill there. We had Held The Field and stamped out the last vestige of The Ruin Within from Armskirk, the Ruined City!

As it turned out Grushnag wasn't just down, he was dead. He had been a good follower, and brought down his fair share of foes. He would be missed. The total haul from the battle was to be 3 Gold, 6 Adventure Points, four Torches, a Fine basic weapon, and a Fine bastard sword. After we settled in to Camp amongst the ruins, News Travelled that the rangers have been scouting the area, which added a further two Adventure points. Next up: travelling to Bradfordshire!