NAPOLEONICS, MAXIMILLIAN ADVENTURERS, AND PIRATES: APRIL GAME NIGHT

 

April Game Night, with the Usual Suspects at play in three games.  Off to the left (partially out of picture) Napoleonics; in the center, Pirates; and off to the right in the corner, Maximillian Adventure.

Life has interrupted art recently--meaning that although there has been hobby activity the time and energy available for blogging about it has been more limited. Thus, there is a happy (albeit modest) backlog of things to post about, which I hope to get to in the near future (now that the garage has been cleared out and reorganized...). So, to begin, in this post, dear readers, I will give a light report on our club's April Game night.  We started up our regular monthly meetings in the fall--a welcome return to "normal"--although my own attendance at game nights until how has been light (for a variety of reasons), hence the lack of "game night" posts (for anyone who keeping track--not very likely).   

An administrative note: I have been concerned about the small font size of my blog posts, and am experimenting with a slightly larger font in this one.  I'm using the same font (Georgia), but in the "Medium" font size as opposed to "Normal" (which was the previous size--which appears quite small to my eye, despite it's name).  I am a bit concerned that the smaller font actually fits my wordy style better, and that the "medium" font size (used here) may cause a wall of text to crowd out images.  Any feedback would be appreciated on the reading experience (and whether it really matters: was the previous font size even an issue for anyone?).  And, as usual, In this post, as usual, you may clix pix for BIG PIX.

NAPOLEONICS

Charlie (standing) hosted a Peninsular French v Spanish Napoleonics game using his rules set, Napoleon's Rules of War

The game featured the usual display of Napoleonic goodness in 28mm.  I didn't pay much attention to what was going on other than to catch a few snaps, but I believe that the French prevailed--and Charlie's rules, which he has been developing and revising and are now in their second edition, have held up to yet another outing. 

MAXIMILLIAN ADVENTURE

Byron (baseball cap) brought out an old favorite, a The Sword and the Flame game set in the Maximillian Adventure using  figures that were passed down to him from Mark Stevens, a lifelong friend of his who had sadly passed away several years ago. Mark did not live in our area, but he would host these TSATF games at Historicon for club members, who have many fond memories of them..

The figures may be vintage (I believe mainly old Foundry), but the painting and presentation remain state of the art. This was quite a lively game, and reports are that the four players had quite a romp--like many TSATF games tend to turn out--and the game lived up to expectations.

PIRATES!

I participated in the third game: Pirates!  Mike B (not pictured) ran this one, which was set on a 12'x6' table. Many of us in the club have our own pirate ships and crews (from a previous game day), and we were able to use these in this game, which was one of the attractions (Mike also had ships and crews available for anyone who did not have one, but that wasn't the case--we were all self-sufficient buccaneers, arrrgh!). He had a simple set of sailing (and boarding!) rules that worked very well (once we got the hang of them).

"Red Sails in the Sunset..." I and my eager crew of likely lads set sail for adventure in my very own Pirate sloop, the Blanche Dubios sporting her distinctive red sails. Readers of a certain vintage may find the illustration on the (appropriately) split-tailed banner familiar.  Yes, it's a man's life at sea..."Men, men, men, a ship full of men".

(Left) Dr Dick reaches for trouble while the pirate-bearded Phil looks on. (Right) Canny Pirate Phil's vessel lurking in the corner early in the game.

It was an "every pirate for 'imself" sort of game (what else?), with a merchant ship in our midst to fight over for a prize.

(Left) Dr Dick delivers a cowardly stern rake to the courageous Blanche Dubios. (Right) No matter: the Blanche Dubios and her fine crew boldly board the merchant ship right from under the noses the lesser pirates...

...who would then turn all their attention on the Meanderer and his prize crew aboard the merchantman to try and keep her from making port and cashing in. But in vain.  The crew got wiped out by a final blast of grape, leaving the captain as the sole survivor just as it pulled in to port (quite a finish!).  This was the best of all possible results, of course, for a pirate Cap'n; I'll miss the lads, but then again, there'll be no need to split the booty!  

And speaking of booty, at the end of the evening, I had hauled in the most doubloons and so came away "Top Pirate" (arrrgh!). 

Excelsior!