Wolsung, In The World Of Deadzone. 

A while back I ended a post with the words “more to follow…”  Seems a long while since that post, and until now, but the game I predicted did happen.

One game of Wolsung was all it needed to show that we would enjoy these rules.  Simple but effective.  Short but conclusive.

I was concerned at first at the three turn game limit in Wolsung, but this is actually enough to feel like you played a whole game, and it helps to focus your actions in a way that guarantees you try to get the most out of each and every move.

Although our newly constructed Deadzone scenery was not exactly the table we expected to play our first game on, it worked well.  Wolsung seems to favour dense scenery and height differences to add an extra layer of complexity to a simple kill the king style of mission.  Most of the missions in the basic book are assassination games where a varying number of victory points are placed on the heroes and awarded for killing them.  The new rules (post Kickstarter) seem to add more mission types but we have yet to attempt these.

Wildly differing height differences and raised walkways are something our scenery has lacked in the past.  I am now considering how I can add these features to the Victorian town and other scenery in the shed without adding a too far out effect to the overall look.

For the first game I played the Triad crew and my opponent played the Inventors.  2 heroes, straight from the starter sets, and we were on our way.  Our cat and mouse tactics were the result of not knowing how effective each others forces would be.  The Inventers appear to be full of close combat specialists (heavily armoured Golems…) and magical buffs. While the Triad starter is all about staying in cover and completing surgical strikes, as they don’t seem to excel at either close or long ranged attacks.

Whatever their obvious strengths, the synergy between all members of a crew is a key factor for success in all the clubs it would seem.

Game two showed the need to hide high value assets and commit hard with henchmen.

Game three was Triad Vs Ash and Oak.  The Ash and Oak club seems to favour long ranged snipers but can dish out the damage, up close, with their bruisers too. We proxied in figures for this game, as we didn’t have the starter, but we wanted to play the third club to see its worth.  I never expected to find a use for the old man in a wheelchair that I bought at Overlord about 5 years ago.  I think he is from the Dystopian Legions range. Great figure and a steal when I got him…  The other members of the club were from various Empire of the dead crews and a couple of Wyrd Miniatures from Malifaux.

One lesson I learned early on is that my ranged Triad henchmen are not meant to try to fight in close combat with anything other than a mouse…  Here she was mashed in one action by an Ogre Bruiser

Overall Wolsung will most likely dominate the table for the next few weeks. Until I go to Salute at the end of the month, which is when all manner of new toys will be likely to descend…