The Silver Bayonet at last!

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this game before. It ticks all my boxes: historical (I STARTED my gaming hobby playing with 1/72 Airfix Napoleonics with the Airfix rules), skirmish, horror/fantasy, alternate history. I got the rulebook and Egypt expansion at the end of 2024 at one of Osprey's periodic sales. And my FLGS brought in a box of the Egypt Unit for me late last year. 

AND I got the minis painted. Very surprising. It only took me a couple of months to get them on the painting table (as opposed to the couple of years it normally takes) and I got them painted within less than a week! It helped that there were only 8 models and - the painting deities be thanked - not a lot of detail. I'm fresh off painting some GW Necromunda minis with TONS of detail and these minis were like a breath of fresh air!

So my unit is (Front, L - R) Veteran Hunter, Captain, Artillerist, Bedouin Raider and (Back, L - R) Follower of the Old Gods, Janissary, Conscript, Infantryman. (It doesn't follow the models from North Star 100%).

I transposed the solo scenario "Wolf Pack" from the core book from the forest to the desert sands. Should have also converted the wolves to hyenas and werewolves to were-jackals. But you get the idea.

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Two weeks ago, a specialist unit was sent in search of a lost chapel, deep in the desert. They never returned. Now, your unit has been dispatched to find the missing unit, or to learn their fate, and to see if you can locate the lost chapel yourselves. If the missing unit is located, it is imperative that their orders be recovered, so that they don’t fall into enemy hands.

Following the trail of the previous unit proved no trouble at all, as they left obvious tracks, and there has been little rain to wash them away. For three days, you follow their trail into the ever-deepening gloom of the dry desert. Then, near dusk on the third day, you come upon a scene of carnage. It appears you have found the missing unit; however, before you can confirm this, you hear a bone-tingling howl from nearby and suddenly bright eyes are staring at you from the shadows all around.

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The unit has a simple goal in this scenario: locate the missing orders, then get off the table. Locating the missing orders means checking all the clues on the table, of which there are 6. Each clue either brings a boon (e.g. silver knife) or a bane (turns into a werewolf!) and one is the missing orders.

Turn 1, the unit races for the clues, confident that even though surrounded by wolves, they wolves can't get to them in one turn. They manage to grab 3 clues that turned into useful silver artefacts and weapons... but no missing orders!

At the end of Turn 2, the wolves have been engaged. Thankfully, many were wounded, and the unit escaped relatively unscathed save for the Bedouin Raider who suffered -5HP (out of 10).

Then the werewolves started appearing! All in all, 3 appeared on the map but thankfully only had a movement of 6, about the same as the humans and needed time to reach the unit. The unit quickly investigated more clues... and the Bedouin Raider's clue happened to be a werewolf hiding in the tent! How thematic. 🤦🏻‍♂️

Thankfully the Bedouin managed to wound the werewolf but because he wasn't using special weapons, only managed to inflict light injuries on the werewolf. The werewolf flubbed its return attack! The Follower of the Old Gods cast a spell to give the Bedouin flaming weapons. That enabled him to finish off the werewolf on the next turn.

The Follower of the Old Gods did sterling work, giving Flaming Weapons to each member of the unit that wasn't equipped with silver weapons. That enabled the lowly Infantryman to dispatch a werewolf with his blessed Musket. (WRONG! The spell only works for Melee weapons!) 

As it turned out, of 6 clues... the missing orders were in the last and final clue. wouldn't you know it. That enabled the Follower of the Old Gods to grab the missing orders while the other members of the unit dealt with the wolves that kept appearing on the map each turn.

And the start of turn 6, and the last 2 members of the unit (Follower of the Old Gods and the Veteran Hunter) managed to make it off the map, hotly pursued by 2 dark wolves.

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That was a quick, fun game. All in all, the scenario took 2 hours to play out, including getting familiar with the rules and game system.

The game uses d10s: 1 power die and 1 skill die so it's best to have 2 different coloured dice. The 2d10s are rolled against a target number (if it's a check) or against the target's Defense (if combat). Weapons will deal damage according to their type. Some will use the Skill die, some the Power die. That's why for lowly monsters with 10 or less HP, it's possible to one shot them if you roll high. Conversely, there's no way to one shot monsters who have more than 10HP.

There's also a Fate Dice pool, comprising a certain number of Power, Skill and Monster dice. You can use these dice to alter the outcome of certain dice rolls. For example, you roll your normal 2d10 and miss. you can use a Power or Skill Fate Die to make a re-roll, but you have to live with the outcome of the second roll. Monster dice are used to mess with the monsters, usually to make things worse for your opponent.

However, in a solo game, Monster dice are not used. You still do get a certain number of Fate Dice to use per scenario (usually one each). There are no Monster dice in a solo game because it doesn't make sense. Although I'd argue for the Follower of the Old Gods being able to manipulate monsters, contrary to the rules in the core book, which was written 3 years ago vs the Egypt expansion that came out last year. Why do I say so? Because the Follower only gets 3 spells, and one directly gives your side a Monster die if the spell is successfully cast. Otherwise the Follower is only 66% effective. Casting a spell does come with a cost: the Follower loses one HP each time she casts a spell, successful or not. So it's not without consequences. 

Mistakes I made:

- Forgot werewolves regenerate 2HP each time they activate (if wounded).

- Forgot a random unwounded wolf turns into a werewolf just prior to the Monster Phase. This was for the reinforcing wolves that came on at the end of each turn, according to a chart. I did remember for the initial 8 wolves that started on the table.

It's a nice, quick simple game when playing solo. It should be more fun PvP because the monsters are used like the zombies in The Walking Dead: All Out War where you can use them to mess with your opponent and both sides can do this freely.

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EDIT: I played the scenario again with the correct rules. This time only 2 werewolves spawned because I found the missing papers on my 2nd try on turn 3. 

I also spent more time killing or wounding the wolves so they wouldn’t turn into werewolves instead of going directly for the clues. My dice rolls this game were also better and only my Artillerist took wounds, even though I spent a Fate Die to re-roll a werewolf attack.

This game ended easily on turn 5 because on turns 3 and 4 I rolled rain on the random event table. Not great for shooting (max 12" visibility with a -1 penalty) but also no wolves appeared as reinforcements save for a lone wolf far away on the other side of the map where my unit wasn’t.