Last Saturday we played our first games of Dux Britanniarum. I had tried it once solo and knew that it was a good system, but I was less sure that I could teach it to the rest of the crew, one of whom was completely new to TFL games. It turns out my worries were unfounded. I had five guys playing and we ran through two complete games in less than five hours. Silly amounts of fun was had and at least three promised to buy the rules and asked me to start a campaign! I forgot to take any pics during game two, but below is a short report from game one.
We played using GWs LOTR figures with Uruks as Saxon and Gondorians as British. The scenario was to raid a village, straight out of the rulebook. The Uruks had to enter on the short end, search through the houses, nick anything of value and get back out. The Gondorians had to stop them.
The game starts with the raiders getting 1D3 free turns of movement. Some awesome dice rolling saw them sweep across the table like a wave of rusty swords, bad breath and blood lust. The poor Gondorians, focussing on the fact that they were playing the proto-Welsh, sat back playing the Men of Harlech-scene from Zulu on a smartphone!
First actual game turn and time to roll for the Briton/Gondorian entry point. The uruks had assumed that the Gondorians would be in the village. The surprise when they showed up in the uruk flank was complete!
A quick charge and a first use of a Fate card, Carpe Diem, sent the Warg Riders back unhurt but with five points of Shock. The Warriors pulled back behind the creek and lined up to defend themselves and hold the Gondorians back while the rest of their war band raided the village.
As this was the first time we ever played the game, we had no idea what various troops could do to each other. Six Gondorians rushed forward to find out...
...and one Gondorian was left to fight the second round of combat.
...and then there were none.
The uruks realised that the fight would be decided on the flank and turned around.
And not before time! The rest of the Gondorians, led by their Lord, came smashing into the uruk line, hoping to destroy the uruks piecemeal.
It was too late for the uruks. The Gondorians used their superior numbers to cut up the uruk line and attack the re-grouping cavalry.
The uruks in a desperate last gamble, for both sides were low on Force Morale, decided to go all out in a display of bravery: one of their Nobles challenged one of the Gondor leaders to single combat.
It was a good idea and it lead to a nail-biting final combat (we used the Champion rules from the pre-battle phase), but in the end it did not pay off as the death of the Noble and his units pushed the Force Morale below 0 and the uruks broke and ran.
At this time we realised that the whole affair had taken just under two hours and we could fit in another game today. We re-arranged the table and mixed up the teams before going at it again in the same scenario.
I did not take any pictures of the second fight, but it was just as fun. The uruks came up the centre in massed formation and the Gondorias came in opposite them, down the road. The Gondorians lined up in defensive formation but the uruks simply overwhelmed them and smashed through the line, breaking the defenders up and routing the Lords bodyguard.
I am currently pondering a mechanism for running campaign games where each player runs a company/horde of uruks or Gondorians but we are still able to get everyone present playing in each game. More to come on that.
To sum up, then: buy Dux! It's that simple.
