"A village too far"

[Patrice]

A game we did last saturday…
There were 4 players: two Briton chiefs, one Saxon chief, a female player (it was her first game, she played the role of the Lady of the village), and me I was Game master, Pict and NPCs player.

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A Village too far.

Far in the north of Britannia, a small Romano-British village on a hill, not far from the country of the Picts…


On the earthen wall, we can see the Lady who owns this land.


But some neighbouring chiefs are on their way. A Romano-British chief called Grima comes from the south…


…and takes position on a nearby Roman road, where some merchants are travelling.


Another Briton comes from the south-west, Owein Map Riwalaon, we can see him with his cavalry:


A large troop of Saxons (or are they Angles?) comes from the south-east. Some of their warriors approach quickly:


The terrible Picts also arrive on the gaming table… Surprise: there's only two of them, and they are old! They walk slowly along their table edge, talking about the weather.


The Lady of the village is worried to see all this. She has some armed villagers and a few old soldiers with her, but it would not be sufficient in a real war. She must decide to ask support from one of the chiefs, but which one?


She is a Briton so she chooses to ally with the Britons. Owein arrives at the gates, just in time: some Saxons are already near the weaker part of the earthen bank.


The Lady tells Owein that she will only recognize the chief who will get rid of a terrible giant who lives in the forest, north-west of the village, all inhabitants of the area are very frightened of him. Owein promises to do that, but he wants to fight the Saxons first. Owein's infantry (white shields) and Grima's infantry (red shields) walk to battle against the Saxons.




A terrible battle!  For some time no side can win. Owein is wounded, he receives a javelin in his leg! The magic users sing but not very effectively. Then the Britons send their cavalrymen against the flanks of the Saxon troop, this decides the victory.


The Saxons accept to negociate. Owein hesitates, he wants to tell them to go away from this land; then he asks them to find and kill the terrible giant!

[Patrice]

The troops are positioned again, so we considered that it is the following day. Owein's wound is not cured yet. Grima's troop camp outside the village. The Saxon troop did cross the table and stopped near the forest.
The two elderly Picts were still there, talking near an impressive standing stone: "Oh, this is a nice standing stone, yeees. We don't see many of these now" "Oh, my Gods, no, young people don't know to make a standing stone properly now, they don't know how it was done in the past" "No, they believe that they just can take any kind of gravel and sow it any time, but no. You must follow the moon when you sow the gravel, if you want nice standing stones to grow" etc etc…

The Saxon chief told these two men that he wanted to ally with the Picts, they went away immediately. He sends three warriors in the forest; they find the giant's dwelling. A dwarf comes out and tells them to go away. They refuse. The giant comes out too and he looks angry.


The giant kills one of the warriors, the two other Saxons kill the giant and cut his head, and they capture the dwarf. The giant was not strong at all! In the house they find a female Briton prisoner. They ask questions to the dwarf and he tells them that a small pot full of gold is buried under the house; they find it, they give a quarter of the gold to the dwarf and they let him go away.

A group of ten mounted Picts has arrived. After talking with the Saxons, they cautiously advance on the table to watch the village.


The mounted Picts arrive on the Roman road. Without dismounting, they urinate on the Roman road and they shout insults to the Britons!


Then Grima's cavalry attacks some of Owein's men by surprise!


Grima wants to kill Owein, he besieges the village. The Saxons too come back near the village! They negociate with Owein and the Lady, and throw the giant's head in the village as they had promised to do; then they accept to free the female prisoner (the villagers have recognized the daughter of their miller).


The mounted Picts have hastily come back to their chief (off-table) to tell him what they have seen, and a whole Pictish army appears!


The Saxons are happy of this and say they want the lands; they prepare to attack the village. Grima is still besieging the other side, and the Picts are near… Things are very bad for Owein and the Lady, but the Saxon says he let them go free with their soldiers and villagers if they go away.

Mounted Picts enter the empty village and set fire to the houses.


Saxons and Picts on foot run to the village; in the background Grima's soldiers go back home in good order. The land will be divided between the Pict tribe and the Saxon chief.


This will be remembered in the whole north of Britain, and Owein wants revenge from Grima…!

Same text in French here:
http://argad.forumculture.net/t551-un-village-trop-loin

All the pictures here
https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/104553899327656870315/albums/5778650225800940881

[Colonel Tubby]

Nice report, liked the part with the giant - it had right sort of 'myth' feeling.

[CyberAlien312]

Great report - I also really like the terrain.

[Paul]

Looks great. I like the terrain and the giant as well.

[Patrice]

Thanks guys.

Yes they are mentions of "giants" in some of the old arthurian texts; no real fantasy here, just a big guy and not necessarily very strong.

Terrain - we need to make more hills; especially as we love very long tables for long adventures!

Miniatures - ooOOooh, close up pics have revealed that a few of them are still wearing some Humbrol which probably dates from the Late Roman Empire...   The little buggers were safe enough before all these internet battle reports, but now they can't disguise any more, we'll have to do something about them

[Little Odo]

Thanks for the write up. Nice little village and a great selection of figures. The giant was a nice addition to the tale - put me in mind of the Beowulf and Grendel film with Gerard Butler.

[tomogui]

Great report! Really nice to have so many photos and minis to look at.

I like the way the two old Picts wandered onto the board like harmless old codgers before an army of mounted Pict warriors appeared. And the mythic interlude with the giant was excellent, like some old saga. Poor old giant. And I do like a good village torching, and Briton-on-Briton betrayal is always nice. Good stuff!