The Quest for John Avery's Treasure (Pirate Game battle report)

[Sinewgrab]

Well, I gave my homebrewed generic ruleset a good shake down yesterday, and I thought I'd best post a few pictures, as my entire fleet of Megabloks ships got to get pushed around with crews of minis on them.

The basic premise was that a couple of boat loads of pirates heard the rumors that Avery's treasure had been discovered and stashed on an island between Madagascar and the North African coast, and that the same ship that had the treasure and disappeared had the daughter of the local head of the East Indian Trading Company on it as well. Vile rumors persisted however, that Avery still guarded it from Davy Jones Locker.



I was originally set up for up to 8 people, but only 3 showed up - family emergencies derailed several of the players. Nathan took up two ships, Jeff took two as well, and Warren (from this very forum) took the undying guardians, while I, while running the game, took charge of the sharks and the cannibals.

Nathan's fleet


Jeff's fleet


Warren's vile skeletons


The woeful daughter (looks like a trap!)


The first turn saw nothing but a bit of movement, and the cannibals emerging from the trees.



It was after this movement that we found I had made ship to ship cannonfire far too hard. Not a ship was sunk for the entire game - the way I had set it up was nigh unto impossible. I'll have to change that next time.

[Sinewgrab]

Turn 2 saw more movement and more ineffective cannon fire.


Jeff sent his fleet straight at the town, assuming (correctly, in fact) that the treasure would be stashed there. What would cannibals do with gold?



Meanwhile, the cannibals decided not to wait, and hopped in canoes to go find a meal.


Nathan's fleet began by barely moving - beginning a trend of horrifying dice rolls that would continue throughout the day.


Warren, however, moved quickly and decisively, beginning the first combat of the day, and only losing one skeleton to the waters as they swung over on ropes. (There was a rule in place that allowed for movement between ships, but a roll of a 1 on a d8 caused you to fall in the water. Humans could swim - skeletons could not.)


Nathan's die rolling led to him losing his captain, and most of that unit.

[Sinewgrab]

We now had a little more action going on.


Jeff decided to use ropes to swing between his ships, and get more crewmen over to the island to search quicker, and just in case I threw something in to eat him. (Not that *I* would do such a thing.) 
Unfortunately, a crew member and his first mate slipped to the waters below.




On the Green Dragon, Nathan's dice continued to doom him against first mate of the Dutchman, who repeatedly slaughtered all comers. The ship was now down to half its crew.

[Sinewgrab]

The next few turns saw more bloodshed, and the First Mate of the Dutchman swinging back to her as she left the Green Dragon with a mere 6 of the original 18 crew.



Jeff's crews continued looking for gold, but his crew did not get out of the water in time to avoid being eaten by sharks.




I took a ton more pictures, but found something had gone very wrong in the interim to make them almost unusable. (grumble grumble) I think there was an error when I transferred them from the camera to my computer. I'll see if I can fix it, but I think that they are pretty much gone.

After this, the cannibals rowed to the other island, and fought the pirates who found Avery's treasure chest, and some of them hopped on the belabored ship of Nathan's to leave him practically without any crew at all on that ship, and Warrens ships were attacking the mostly uncrewed ships Jeff had left behind in his desperate search. At that point, we called it, due to time constraints. The daughter got to continue enjoying the hospitality of the cannibals, and there were no clear winners. It was a blast, though.

Anyone who is interested in the rules we used, feel free to PM me, and I'll send you a copy - I wrote them generic, and my next goal is to make them VSF friendly, and run a game of that in a few months.

[Gutbukkit]

That's a great looking set up you have there. Excellent photos. It's also a reminder that my crew (a motley bunch of orcs, dwarfs, goblins, skeletons and humans) is lacking somewhat in the ship department. I must try get hold of some of those megablok's ships they do look good.

[warrenpeace]

In case anybody missed it, there are a few more pictures in this older thread:

http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=22040.0

I was very impressed with the "Green Dragon" version of the Black Pearl.  That one was far better looking at close range than you can see from these pictures. It's perhaps my favorite ship in Sinewgrab's fleet. The "Blue Devil" was also an inspired piece of work.  But the "Dread Eye's Phantom" was truly astonishing to look at.  That was the first Mega Bloks pirate ship that I ever saw, and it is what inspired me to look for them later and tell Sinewgrab about the Mega Bloks ships. That one has been out of production for four or five years, however, and Sinewgrab had to find one on ebay.  It is as fantastical a ship as one could ask for, more impressive even than the really spooky Flying Dutchman.

I found the skeletons to be pretty deadly against humans, per the ratings that Sinewgrab gave them. One unit of six of them made short work of 12 of my nephew's crew on the Green Dragon. Of course, I was rolling 7's & 8's and Nathan was failing his saving throws.  I eventually left him to the tender mercy's of the cannibals and turned the Flying Dutchman away to give some attention to Jeff's forces who where going after the treasure.

[Christian]

That is amazing! It looks like a true adventure!

[Furt]

A great BIG pirating adventure! This looks like a lot of fun. 

[Sinewgrab]

It was fun. I am going to definitely do it again - maybe in 6 months or so. I need to work on a few issues with the rules, and make them more consistent, but everyone said they had a blast, and I am choosing to believe them for my own sanity's sake.

[revford]

Fantastic characterful looking ships, I love the Cannibal Island too.

[Ray Rivers]

 

Amazing game!

Fantastic looking ships!

You are a pirate God!  

[Colonel Tubby]

Amazing looking game - love the ships!

[Sinewgrab]

Amazing game!

Fantastic looking ships!

You are a pirate God!  

I will gladly take that comment from you, Ray. How's that Egyptian tank coming?

[warrenpeace]

If anybody is looking for a small pirate boat which could be easilly converted for 28mm, take a look at this "ghost" pirate boat for sale at Toys R Us.  It's a recast of the brown pirate dinghy that was out last year in an odd lavender shade of plastic, but the deck and mast are dark brown, and the hull could be painted:

http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.jsp?productId=4107165

Hopefully, Neil will be able to upload more close ups of his ships and their interesting details.  That Dread Eye's Phantom is really worth a closer look.

Too bad there are no surviving pics of what happened latter in the above scenario.  Jeff's crews off the Black Pearl and the Blue Devil ran into one canoe load of pygmies, but found the treasure and were hauling it back to the Blue Devil.  The Dread Eye's Phantom put two units of six skeletons aboard the Black Pearl, minus a couple that didn't make their swings and sank.  Those killed the captain of the Black Pearl, but were having a much more even fight than what had occurred on the Green Dragon. The Flying Dutchman slowly circled, getting ready to pounce on the Blue Devil when it tried to make its exit with the treasure.  We had to call the game before this was resolved.

Nathan, after being savaged by the skeletons aboard his Green Dragon, was set upon by some pygmies from a canoe which killed the last leader figure aboard the Green Dragon.  His brown Predator ship went in to rescue the girl on the pygmies island and was attacked by the pygmy chief and his unit.  It was looking like Nathan might be able to get the girl and have perhaps two units of six or so pirates left with which to get his brown Predator and his Green Dragon ships off the map, but it was taking him forever to fight through the skeletons and then the pygmies.

[axabrax]

Wow--the ships look quite convincing--I've never seen them before. Did you do any conversion work on them or are they straight out of the box?