EotD - Skirmish report - Blissful Ignorance

Well before Christmas I purchased the Vampires starter box for Empire of the Dead. I still prefer the old starter boxes to the Requiem one, and I really wanted to add the Vampires to my collection. Since then my friend Michael had pestered me about getting them painted so that he could try them out.

After many delays, primarily because I am still working on my 1812 - Retreat from Moscow game, I managed to get them painted over the weekend, and Michael and I setup a game yesterday.

As usual we played on my London Docks board. My daugther, having looked at all my EotD minis asked me if I would play the Lycaons as they are her favorite. Werewolves vs. Vampires... not a bad idea I thought.

Despite me trying different changes to the rules, I have ended up going back to the original ruleset, with only three changes:

- No IGOYGO, we play with one mini being activated and then the other person activates one of his minis
- In Combat we add the Cbt score and whoever scores the highest is the victor and gets to try and wound
- When you charge you cannot throw weapons while doing so

We rolled for scenario and got Blissful Ignorance, one of my favorites as I get to have more minis on the table. In the night/day selection I won and chose night, as I was more affraid of the long range guns than the combat ability of the Graf and Consort.

These are the factions we came up with:

Vampires
Graf (two swords)
Consort (two swords)
4 x Thralls (heavy pistols, knives and one with a hunting rifle)

Lycaons
Beastlord
Pack Master
Wolf
4 x Wolfskins (bow, crossbow, knives, claws of the wolfen, axes)

We set up the civilians and then moved them at the beginning of the round as the scenario dictates. For the initiative I ended up winning, in fact I would win all the initiatives in the game.Most of  first round was spent moving minis closer to the civilians, but but the Vampires and the Lycaons were able to get one mini in base contact with a civilian, but otherwise only one shot was fired as a Thrall took a shot at a Wolfskin but failed to hit.

Second saw a bit more action as we got into better positions and got in base contact with another couple of civilians. The round ended with two Thralls moving back towards their deployment zones with a civilian in tow. I still only had a single civilian in my control, but thought I had lined up my minis well for the next round.

Third round and another initiative win for me. I started by having my Wolf charge a Thrall, Michael moved his Graf into base contact with two civilians and dragged them back a few inches. My Beastlord had gotten into a good position and was able to charge the Consort. One of my Wolfskins managed to one shot kill a Thrall with his bow. When the Combat phase came up, we had two combats and some serious lucky/good rolling from me saw the Beastlord slash the Consort and my Wolf make short process of the Thrall.

When the fourth round began, Michael had to take a Bravado test, as I had reduced his faction to 50% - one of his Thralls had managed to get out over the table edge with a civilian, so he only had to roll for his Graf and one Thrall. The Graf easily managed his Bravado check, but the Thrall failed, leaving Michael with only his Graf on the table. Since there was no way I would be able to reach his Graf and the two civilians he controlled, we decided to end the game there rather than play out the predictable end to the game.

So both of us got three civilians captured/rescued, while the last civilian fled out over the table edge. I ended up scoring 44 shillings (15 for the civilians, 14 for having my seven minis still on the table, and 15 for killing three of the enemy), Michael only got 19 points (15 for the civilians and 4 for having two minis on the table).

While it was a short game - about an hour, it was very enjoyable. During 2014 I played a lot of Malifaux, but have taken an extended break for that game because IMO it lacks atmosphere and has spread it focus to widely. Empire of the Dead is the game for me in terms of setting and atmosphere, and I will see if I can't get a small campaign tournament setup with three of my friends.

Some images from our game.