A club game of ‘In Her Majesty’s Name’ with 2 armies from the base book lists. Lord Currs company using the North Star figures with some additional adventurers from Wargames Foundry (Lord Curr, Mad Mick, Lady F., Singh, 5 Incorrigibles) against the Black Dragon Tong, figures from all over the shop (Wu, Lieutenant, Yeti, 3 Warriors, 3 Tong). The Tong field a Yeti but in this game a Triffid is standing in using the same stats.
The scenario is breakthrough with a few tweaks. After 6 turns the rozzers will show up and arrest anyone they come into contact with. Without some sort of clock in this scenario it can degenerate to a shoot out or melee with the survivor winning rather than having one side try to get off-table. Lord Curr’s lads are trying to break through with the Tong defending. Lord Curr has a strong shooting force and the Tong would be better at hand to hand. In the game the vehicles move up and down the roads and the civilians move randomly. Either will provide cover or simply get in the way.
Relying on the terrain items to hand we present Mexican California Alta. There is a strong Chinese population attracted by work on the railway to Mexico City. The Tong are spread out along the East board edge but Lord Curr has gone for a concentrated push to the South West.
The Tong hurriedly re-deploy to cut off Lord Curr.
Crisis comes as the monster charges in, accompanied by an expendable minion. Lady F. (the target of the monster charge) breaks off and the other company men open fire. The tiny cogs are being used to indicate game status such as not moved or ran.
The monster goes down, not an auspicious start but a company man is also down. Singh takes out a Tong swordsman with his machine gun.
The game is starting to morph into a series of melees and short range firefights. This is to the advantage of the Tong as figures shooting and fighting are not figures getting off the board.
The authorities are on their way and the path ahead is still blocked by the Tong.
The Rozzers de-bus and arrest some of Lord Curr’s lads. Singh is the recipient of a citizen’s arrest. Without the police intervention Lord Curr could have run onwards and possibly taken down Wu and his lieutenant. It makes more to sense to come quietly and sort it out with the authorities, doubtless money will be changing hands. A clear win for the Tong.
The game took about 1 1/2 hours so with some time left we reset and tried other options. ‘Catch The Pigeon’ has a moving objective that one side must catch and take off board. We deployed the objective at the table centre and its first action was to move directly towards Lords Curr’s lads who promptly captured it with the Tong still way downfield. A lesson in thinking through a scenario before setting off with it.
Trying again we set up ‘Bad Jack’. The forces are trying to take down an escaped monster. It is not clear if or how the monster moves but it has a speed bonus. We had it move along an axis perpendicular to the 2 player forces. If a player’s model came within its charge range it would move to contact. Lord Curr was the first to get close, Bad Jack charged, Lord Curr’s people bravely ran away. The Tong moved up and lost a man to Curr’s shooting. Soon afterwards one of Curr’s incorrigibles rolled a 10 for shooting followed by a 1 on the monster pluck die; the best possible rolls in the game. ‘Bad Jack’ was down, game over.
Gaming in Blackshaw Head 