Dragon Rampant - Solo Game

For some time I have had an urge to do some fantasy gaming. I used to play a lot of Warhammer Fantasy Battle, but I stopped playing just before AoS came out. I sold off most of my miniatures and only kept a smaller Empire army, a handful of undead characters and a bunch of zombies.

Now it should be mentioned that I actually play Middle-Earth, which certainly is fantasy gaming, but for some reason I make a difference between Middle-Earth and other fantasy gaming. Probably because I feel that my LotR miniatures collection is tied very much to the game Middle-Earth, even though you could easily use other rule-sets to play with them.

Since my Warhammer days I have seen and discovered a lot of other fantasy manufacturers, but I still have a strong connection to the Warhammer universe, and I still think the GW miniatures are (mostly) great looking. So I will, at least initially, look to do some kind of Warhammer armies, but use other rules to game with, such as Dragon Rampant, Saga Age of Magic and Oathmark.

Since I have a small Empire army and a very small collection of undeads, one of which is a female vampire I have used in a Mordheim warband, I quickly thought of a narrative scenario which hopefully will be the starting point to a new and exciting world.

Elvira Le Borgne was a young noble woman from one of the smaller houses in the Caedoran kingdom. She was seduced by prince Cassius, the heir to the throne, and fell madly in love with him. When the prince eventually disavowed her in favour of a wealthier noble woman, Elvira was left disgraced and dishonoured. 

She fled to the eastern island sea to plot for her revenge. Here she met Lord Acheron, a powerful and ancient vampire, who was more than eager to enlist Elvira in his ranks and aid Elvira with her vengeance. Once her powers had grown Acheron gave her 3 companions, and she went on her quest for retribution.

The scenario is Elvira and her companions first attack on a small Caedorian outpost close to the coast. I use the Dragon Rampant rules in a self-made scenario. The rules is a sort of sandbox where you can make your own units from a set of preset unit templates. I will not go into detail how the various units work, apart from 'The Companions' unit which is one where I have tinkered more with the rules to make a unit that worked for me.

Armies

The Undead Army:

Elvira - Elite Foot - 9 pts.

Special rules: Ranger, Hatred(humans), Fear, Undead

 

The Companions - Heavy Foot - 9 pts. (approx.)

This unit is comprised of 3 different characters; a Ghoul Lord, a Spectre and a Necromancer. The characters must be within 12" of one another. They can be ordered either individually, or as a group of 2 or 3 in which case they have to be within 6" of each other. The Ghoul Lord and the Spectre have 6 attack dice each and the Necromancer has none. The 3 characters have 4 defence dice each. If the they are within 6" of each other they will use their combined attack/defence dice. Each character have 4 strength points. If more character than one character is involved in a fight or the target of a shooting attach, they will divide any hits equally starting with the closest character to the enemy.

Special rules: Undead (Ghoul Lord and Spectre), Fear (Ghoul Lord and Spectre), Venomous (Ghoul Lord), Invisibility (Spectre), Summoner (Necromancer)

Zombie Horde - Ravenous Horde - 3 pts.

The Necromancer can summon zombie hordes using the Summoner rules. Only 2 Zombie units can be on the table at any one time.

Special rules: Undead, Fear 

The Caedorian Army:

Captain - Light Foot - 3 pts.

Wizard - Light Foot - 5 pts.

Special rules: Wizardling (spells: Almighty Prod, Stronger Shields, Sharper Blades)

Halberdiers - Heavy Foot - 4 pts.

Special rules: Wall of Spears

Swordsmen - Heavy Foot - 4 pts.

Special rules: Wall of Spears

Crossbowmen - Heavy Missiles - 4 pts.

Scouts - Scouts - 2 pts.

Deployment 

The outpost is in the center of the board with some woods to the west and a ruined monastery to the east. The Companions start in the woods, while Elvira starts behind the monastery.

The Captain and Wizard start in the tower. The Swordsmen are in one guard post and the Crossbowmen in the other. The Scouts are posted at the wall towards the woods, while the Halberdiers stand in front of the tower. The Caedorian soldiers have to spot Elvira and THe Companions before they can attack them. This is an action on 8+ if within 12" and 9+ if over. If one Caedorian unit spots either Elvira or the Companions then all other Caedorian units can see them as well. Conversely if Elvira or The Companions attacks the Caedorians then they are spotted by all.

Elvira sneaks through the ruined monastery while the Companions approach the outpost from the opposite side.

It takes 6 turns before the Caedorians spot the Companions. The Captain immediately descends the tower, but the rest of the humans seem petrified in fear and fail to activate.

Meanwhile Elvira gets closer to the Crossbowmen, who fail to spot the vampire, probably distracted by the shouts from the other end of the outpost.

After having been spotted the Necromancer summons a horde of zombies.

From the top of the tower the Wizard tries to aid the Caedorians, but apparently he's a novice, as he often fails to cast any spells. Or maybe the Spectre in the woods somehow messes up his spellcasting.

The Swordsmen move to defend the walls against the zombies. The zombies are easily pushed back but at least keep the Swordsmen in place.

On the other side Elvira finally ambushes the Crossbowmen. Apparently they are so shocked by this attack they immediately runs away.

The Ghoul Lord has crawled over the walls and attacks the Swordsmen who almost flee, but stand their ground thanks to the Captains nearby encouragement.

After slaughtering the Crossbowmen Elvira moves to attack the Halberdiers, while the Companions press the attack on the Swordsmen.

Elvira attacks and push the Halberdiers back up the tower.

The Swordsmen manage to kill off the zombies across the wall, but more zombies appear from the monastery. The Captain bravely attacks the Companions but is pushed back battered.

Elvira kills the Halberdiers, while The Companions move towards the Scouts. The Swordsmen and zombies kill each other by the monastery.

The poor wizard is trapped in the tower and is effortlessly killed by Elvira and thrown out off the tower. The Scouts were also killed easily by The Companions, leaving only the Captain alive, who wisely decide to run for it. Elvira first attack was a great success. The outpost will be burned down, and Elvira will assemble more troops to continue her attack on the Caedoran kingdom.

This was a great, narrative game that went really well. I did make some rules errors throughout the game, but as it was a solo game it didn't really matter. And it was my first game of Dragon Rampant, and several years ago I last tried Lion Rampant. My rules for the Companions worked really well and was a fun narrative addition. 

I also liked the look of the game. The cardboard terrain was new and from a company called Battle Systems. I really like the buildings and the scatter terrain, but am a little unsure about the walls as they lack some depth to look entirely natural. But in general I think it works very well.

In general the game was probably in the Undeads favour, but as this was a narrative game, that was perfectly fine for me. It should be noted, however, that the Caedorians rolled rather poorly throughout the game, so it could have been more close. And the Ghoul King was one strength point away from dying, and the Spectre two, so they could have died as well. Elvira was a beast, but I thoroughly enjoyed that.

I have already ordered some more reinforcements for Elvira's army, but I need to paint them before I can play again (and the zombies as well, sorry about that). I'm thinking about playing some games of SAGA Age of Magic and Oathmark as well, but I don't think I have enough Undead troops to that properly. 

So we'll have to see what the future brings. I really want to continue this narrative, so I'll be thinking about of ideas to how that story shall continue.