Welcome to the Highlander Studios blog.

I won't promise any earth shattering revelations here. What I will be trying to do is post some new products as I release them, share some thoughts on gaming and show some pics of games and other stuff that I enjoy. So come in and make yourselves at home.


Sunday, June 6, 2010

Taking out the trash...

Rongar Darkhammer took a long swallow of his beer while he sat watching the goblin riff raff that had come in earlier. Usually the Ogre Bow was a decent place to drink. Tonight, however, it was filled with the raucous noise of goblin revelry. The bastards had come in about an hour earlier to blow off some steam and it seemed maybe even to celebrate some good fortune. He hadn't been paying complete attention to their childish antics, but he thought he had heard passing mention of a mine and kobolds in their conversation.


This information was merely of passing interest compared to the lowering level of beer in his mug. Rongar ordered a refi
ll and waited for it to arrive. He glowered as the noise level increased. The goblins were now engaged in an inter-table competition which involved one goblin dancing on each table while the others tossed bits of food at them. There seemed to be little rhyme or reason to the activity, but every now and then a cheer would go up, goblins would exchange places and the general fervor increased. The bar maid brought the refilled mug. Rongar paid with a bit of silver and drank about half in one gulp. He set the mug down deciding that if the beer continued to taste better each drink, the night wouldn't be a total loss.



His rising good cheer was doused by a wet plop and splash of beer on his face as a piece of pork rind dropped into his mug. Rongar's anger flared as quickly as his cheer had left. A low growl erupted as a bellow of rage. He gripped his heavy mug and charged the closest table of goblins. They scattered; one headed for the door, one ran to the pantry to hide and one jumped into the hearth attempting to climb up and out of the chimney.


There was a momentary pause as the remaining goblins and Rongar sized each other up. One goblin yelled, "Git em!" But he noticed the other two were busy stuffing their pockets with food and nuggets of ore and joined in.

Rongar advanced with grim purpose. "By the beards of my ancestors you'll pay for that beer thrice over."

The goblins decided three to one wasn't bad odds and attacked.

At first contact Rongar was swarmed, barely holding his ground as goblin fists scored multiple hits. His armor, sheer cussidness and good luck prevailed and in the next few moments he was able to disable the center goblin with a knee to the groin. The second fell as Rongar's mug smashed his shoulder. A back hand swipe caught the last in the temple dropping him with a ringing bong.



In the silence that followed, Rongar scooped up several of the nuggets and grabbed the gasping, groin holding goblin by the hair. "Now you'll be telling me where you found these, " he said.

4 comments:

Mr. Mahon said...

Funny game. Reminds me of the old Brewhouse Bash (if I recall the name correctly) from Games Workshop. Doesn't the bar come from that game anyway? Have you played the BB?

And most importantly: Is WHAA (because it seems to be the game you used) still fun in such small games?

cheers!
--
Mahon
Chest of Colors: All About Miniature Painting

Rodrick Campbell said...

Holy crap, for some reason comments in line with the post don't work.

Anyway, I have Brewhouse Bash but have never played it. The tavern tile came from some random download. Don't think I could find it again if I wanted.

The game used WHAA for the basic stats with Star Power substituted for Hardiness and the charts from Swordplay.

WHAA does work well with small numbers of figures. We've used it for various games involving less than 20 figures per side. I was just trying out the charts and such from Swordplay to see which I liked better.

Rod

Mr. Mahon said...

Have you tried the 'mass battle' rules included in WHAA? I played a few games with these rules and they easily work well for much larger numbers of miniatures. I still prefer the original WH for mass battle, but the ones in WHAA are pretty cool too.

Haven't played much Swordplay though. And so what is your opinion now after playing both WHAA and SP? Would you still use WHAA or move to simpler but newer SP?

--
Mahon
Chest of Colors: All About Miniature Painting

Rodrick Campbell said...

Haven't tried the mass battle rules. I tend more towards skirmish gaming since I have no real armies painted.

I like the looks of WH and Warrior Kings. I've started painting my Romano-Brit and Saxon armies for that. I also have several units of medieval Polish to fight my friend's Teutonic Knights.

I really enjoyed the combination of WHAA and Swordplay and will continue to use that for a while to see where it goes. Great thing is: no matter what I choose there isn't a lot of time invested in any one game and they all end up being fun.

Rod