Strandhogg Game 11: She's a Witch!

It's been almost two years since we last played a game of Strandhogg, but when Martin asked to use some of the Gripping Beast Romano-British figures he has painted in a game, the rules were my choice.

We lack opponents for the Romano-British, so I decided my beastmen will play Fomorian invaders (led by the mighty Balor) in league with Picts. The scenario comes from Miniature Wargames magazine #383 and was written by Dan Mersey (thanks once again, Dan!).

The British have learnt that the pagans have set up a base in the woods and will be performing dark rituals by the light of the full moon. The Dux and his men pledge to thwart them and end the pagan menace once and for all...

The game starts with the forces at the ends of the table lengthwise. The Fomorians start in their sacred circle surrounding the sacred tree, with their priestess on a sacred mound in the middle of the table performing her ritual. The British start at the other end and the game begins with them shooting and wounding the priestess. They must then attempt to capture her and bring her back to the town to be burned, and also chop down the sacred tree. The Fomorians must prevent them from doing either.

The set-up.

Martin's Romano-British with a few Saxons mixed in, and my dwarf rangers pretending to be short humans.

Balor leads the Fomorians and Pictish allies.

The British have an early start and race up the steps of the sacred mound to capture the priestess.

One British warband races for the priestess as the other two form shieldwalls and block off the approaches on the flanks.

The British engage Balor while one fellow (on the right) drags the priestess towards their baseline. On the right a small band decides to go for the tree instead.

The Fomorians eventually managed to wrest the priestess back from the British (at one point nearly killing her with a stray arrow), while the British managed to damage the sacred tree before being cut down to the last man. Over all this rated a marginal victory for the Fomorians, although one earned at great losses.

The session like most was also a chance for us to pass stuff to each other. Just to give an idea of how dis-co-ordinated we can be: I passed Martin some 15mm Hellenistic figures and fg some spare bits from my Perry plastic WOTR; Martin passed me some 20mm Fallschirmjaegers and a Flak 38 plus some books on WW2, and returned me my Black Powder rules.

I was inspired by one of the WW2 books to order stuff for another modeling project, but the seller I approached is currently out of stock on the bits I need... Hopefully the re-order comes soon!