Ayah's Hunt

Ayah was hungry and she was getting worried, very worried. She had gotten herself separated from the Clan, they were making their way north away from the sun, heading to the cooler lands, they had been doing this ever since she could remember, following the herds north and then after a few moons following them back south again. That’s the rhythm and cycle of a nomadic hunter gatherer’s lifestyle.

The Clan had found a strange forested area that they’d not explored before, they were hunting and gathering, as always, when suddenly Ayah realized there was no sound from the rest of her family, she called and yelled but there was no response, she was alone.

The forest was thick, as dense as any she had known in her short life and she knew it would deaden the sound of her calls, hopefully nothing dangerous had been attracted by her shouts.

She was lost and adrift from everything she had ever known. She knew by instinct and training which way she should be headed, the sun the moon and the stars would always point the way. However it was only in a general direction, she could not know exactly which way the Clan would go.

Moving quietly now, knowing that there were creatures in this thickly wooded area that could track and chase her down, she needed to think hard, without the Clan she would not last long in this hostile environment. She needed to find them quickly but her more immediate concern was hunger and she must eat, sooner rather than later, leading such a nomadic lifestyle meant she was travelling light and only carried a flint knife, she was going to have to be very smart to survive this predicament.

That’s when she heard the screams and yells, they were not the clan but sounded similar, the same noise that the Clan made when hunting and preparing for the kill. They had some animal trapped and were building up the courage to dash in and kill it, risking injury and maybe death themselves but food was every animals prime concern.

She had to know what was happening and the safest way seemed to be to climb one of the many trees and check if she could see what it was.

Climbing five or six man heights up the tree she froze, seeing some Simians, small humanoid creatures, about half her height but certainly just as strong as she was. From her position she could see at least 3 of them, but it sounded like there were more.

One was looking directly at her, and her blood turned to ice. On the Savannah she was sure she could out run him but in this thick jungle she was not so sure, he was in his element she was not. She waited, no, it didn’t appear to have seen her, but closer inspection revealed at least 4 of them, maybe more.

To the side of the small ape was a bloodstained rock, a big flat rock, she wondered what it was for, she knew the shaman of her Clan offered sacrifices to the spirits who looked over her people but they were offerings of food, berries, nut and the occasional small animal, but this one looked well used, there was lots of blood covering the stone.

Quietly she climbed down from her eyrie and moved back through the trees to consider what she should do next. The forest looked the same whichever way she faced, the only thing that didn’t stay the same was her hunger which grew as the sun fled across the sky.

She made the only decision that she could, and it was not a bright or heartening prospect, she was going to have to take the Simian’s kill away from them.

She could rush in and frighten them off, that was one option, not the best though, definitely a high risk strategy. She preferred the alternative approach, wait for dark, creep in quietly and steal it, then get away quickly, well before they knew she was there.

Every hunter knows that one false move and the prey will escape, but in this case one false move would be the death of her, so she waited patiently for night to fall.

For the game I’ve scattered tokens around the carcase to represent potential Simians, all my characters have various attributes such as stealth, awareness etc that I can use to make decisions in a solo game.

So in this case Ayah moves and then has to pass a stealth check to see if she has made a noise, if so, the nearest token has to pass an Awareness check to see if it is aware of the noise.

I then carry out an opposed check roll, if the token wins it identifies the noise as Ayah, is she wins, she successfully avoids detection. If the Simian passed its awareness roll but didn’t identify Ayah, it is still awake and aware, so more likely to identify her if she makes a second noise, after a certain time, 1D6 it falls asleep again and starts from scratch.

A bit convoluted but for my solo game it’s more interesting than just a straight 1 die roll.

Having done all that, I then check to see if the token is actually a Simian or not, that’s because she has to see it to identify it.

So the other thing that is happening is that Ayah is trying so see sleeping Simians as she moves forwards and avoid them, when she has the possibility to sight a token she checks to see if she sees it, then I determine if it is a Simian or just a false token, it’s quite possible for her to blunder into one and wake it without seeing it.

I’ve used sighting and stealth rules before but in an ad hoc sort of a way based on game requirements, here I’m trying to formalise it into a written rule to be used in the future, so any suggestions you might have are more than welcome.

Eventually as it always did, the sun disappeared and tonight the moon provided enough light but not too much. Ayah started towardswhat she now regarded as "Her Food", the Simians had left a large part of the carcase of whatever animal they had killed on its flat, blood soaked top of what was probably a sacrificial stone.

She moves stealthily and is now within sighting range of a token and test’s to see if it’s visible to her.

If you’ve been eating lots of carrots and your eyesight is as good as a prehistoric woman’s, then you would have seen this. She doesn’t wake it and decides to circle left, before moving towards her destination.

You’ve probably realized by now that I’m quite pleased with how the jungle photos turned out because there’s lot’s of them.

Anyway Ayah having moved around the Simian is getting closer to her target.

Closer and closer, but not as stealthily as I would have liked, fortunately the Simians appear to be sound sleepers.

She has spotted this chap off to the right and didn’t wake him, having reached the bloodstained stone she just needs to grab the food without being discovered. I know I’m not making it sound tense but believe me it was. At this point she had seen and avoided 3 Simians, discovered 2 false tokens, there were still 3 undiscovered tokens and she was in the middle of them all. 

Surrounded.

She makes the required rolls I breath a sigh of relief and she creeps quietly away, carrying a large chunk of meat. Unfortunately the meat is dripping blood, and as we will find out (probably) leads the Simians onto her trail quite easily.

Just a couple of gratuitous photos taken in full lamp light, not as atmospheric of course but certainly much clearer.

Here she didn’t see the token to the right but did see the one to the left which proved to be a small ape so she carried on circling and didn’t stumble into the token and I still don’t know if it was a Simian or not.

Just to give an overview of the table, much smaller than it might have appeared in the game pictures. A new 2’ square board I made using a bit of ply and some capillary matting I bought a few years ago, I purloined our Lazy Susan so that I could turn it easily because access to the figures in the dense foliage was very difficult.

The dead trees were made for the Vietnam game but never actually appeared on the table, so I wanted to get some use out of them, I originally intended playing this as a follow on to the search for the Grimoire of Life but saw some pictures on Pinterest of prehistoric people and got enthused (distracted) by that instead.

This was a 12 turn game, she failed to move stealthily 6 times. 3 of those times the Simians then failed Awareness test and so didn’t know she was there. Then 3 times it went down to an opposed roll and she won 2 and one turned out to be a decoy token or it could have been a very less successful outing for Ayha.

My thinking with this is that,

1) Do I make a noise

2) Are my opponents aware of this noise

3) If they are aware of the noise do they recognise it for what it is or can I recover the situation by remaining quiet.

This requires throwing lots of dice but I prefer the averaging result of lots of dice rather than the dramatic result of say a D20 that can give a huge variable with just 1 roll. Just my personal preference.

My sighting test is similar, it’s a straight opposed roll, Am I looking for some one, are they hiding or not and again a bucket load of dice to give a very average result.

For the last 3 days I’ve been working on refurbishing my 1’ sq terrain tiles, I mention this because I want to do a chase scenario, the Simians discover the missing food and chase after Ayha, I intend to use the tiles as a conveyer belt to run the chase scenario so effectively my table will be as long as it needs to be. I’ve used the concept before, back in the Hunt for Mary Scroggins although it took at least 1 failed attempt before the searchers got off the original table.

Years ago I read the Desmond Morris book The Naked Ape but I was never really convinced by his explanation as to why we are not hairy, I’ve recently been reading some other thoughts which I quite like and so we will find out if the current theory of why we are naked apes works in my game.

I’m still not happy with the tiles covering the table, I’m sure it will look better with a bit of set dressing but even though the lines between the tiles are more disguised than previously it’s still not as seamless as I would like and I prefer a mat. The reason I’ve done this is because I’ve been using them when I need a river or coast as in the previous game and they looked quite poor, I wonder if static grass would be better at hiding the seams, although maybe not as durable. Anyway they are an improvement and lasted 40 years in their previous state so are unlikely to get another refresh in this lifetime.

If you got here, thanks for reading and …..

Take care out there – it’s a dangerous world.

Palaeo Diet – The Blood Bath

The Rock Ugly Clan having trained their “wolves who don’t eat you”, into “hounds who eat others”, are on the hunt for fresh meat.

Having killed and lived off dried Mammoth meat for a very long time, they tried their hand at more succulent horse meat before their last known escapade, entering a wolves den and stealing their cubs. The idea was to rear them as an aid to hunting, as well as a form of hot water bottle, useful in the long, cold, ice age nights, and then if the hunt went badly they would always be nourishing - roasted. Waste not want not as the old Shaman said, although Yani the new Shaman, or Shawoman, in this unlikely egalitarian clan was not quite so pragmatic.

The Clan had given themselves a strong Clan name, The Rock Clan, but after a series of hunting accidents, the sort where the prey fight back, most of them had suffered a series of disfiguring wounds, which to be honest is better than the alternative - being dead.

You will notice the grumpy one - Akoba doesn’t have a hound by his side, he was the only one not to rescue a pup from it’s evil wolf parents, and as he maintains they are nothing but trouble. They have to be taken for a walk twice a day, fed regularly and if not they start to eye you as their next meal, and then there are the plastic bags which you have to carry round and when full, hang them on trees as some form of offering to the gods!!!!

The Clan had been forced further south by the onset of global cooling and were looking for fresh succulent meat, the roots and berries they had been living on for the last few days were proving a tiresome and not very enjoyable diet.

Things were looking up though and they had come across the tracks of a small herd of mountain sheep, they had finally caught up to the herd and were making their plans to chase them down. There had been a lot of argument about using the hounds, Akoba obviously favoured just eating them but the others had spent time training the hounds and were convinced they would be a great aid in hunting creatures faster than themselves, and in this primitive world everything worth eating was faster than the Rock Ugly Clan.
Text relating to the pictures is below it.

The herd were on one side of quite a large river and the Clan hoped to use this as a barrier to stop them escaping.

An over view from the drone shows the herd is between a low range of hill to the south (nearest the camera) and the river, the Clan are to the East and out of shot. Yani has gained great esteem with them and is proving to be the moving force in the Clan but of course she can’t be the Clan leader because she’s a girl. Akoba and Tumak know one of them has to be the leader, but neither of them wants the job, the pay is poor, the hours are long and it’s much more enjoyable to sit in the sun and be de-loused by someone else.

Yani has decided that their normal method of hunting will prove effective and has sent the others on ahead, skirting the herd, they will form a ring around them and once this is complete Yani who has stayed downwind to the east of the herd will drive them onto the rest of the Clan. She hopes her young wolf which she has named Dog will help drive the sheep forwards into the trap and save her a lot of running about, shouting and howling, this is probably the original labour saving device!

The 2 males are in place, they kept failing activations and on each failure the one or other of the sheep would move away but only gradually, the river is to our left and Yani is moving towards the herd but so far they have not reacted to her or Dog.

The rules call for 1, 2 or 3 activation tests each move per figure depending on what you wish to do, the 3rd test is harder but the 1st 2 tests require a D6 roll of 1 to fail an activation, I have never rolled so many 1's before. Each failure means that the nearest animal reacts, usually by moving away but not always.

This is Akoba’s view of the herd, he can see that there is a natural obstacle behind them that will prevent their escape, he doesn’t have a hound but does have something to prove.

So he rushes out from his hide prematurely and trips up, double 1!!! This causes the herd to react.

They stampede away from him and through a gap he hadn’t seen, if they continue they will go past Yani and escape. Akoba quietly swears to himself. I’m assuming early cavemen would have created swear words before other less useful words, like cooperation, help, common sense and so on, and although these words are lost in time I’m sure we would still understand their meaning today.

Fortunately Yani activates next and move forward to block the path. She has her faithful friend Dog on a leather leash, because although she has spent a long time training him, she does not have a lot of control when there are other animals about and he is likely to go chasing after them in spite of her commands.

The sheep stampede away from her and go behind the obstacle which is now acting a bit like a corral or a sheep pen. Akoba is going to claim this is what he intended when he came running out and set the herd off in the first place. Of course we know better, and so does the rest of the Clan.

Yani frees Dog and shouts kill, he chases after the sheep and attacks the nearest and smallest one.

An overview to show what a good move Akoba made when setting the herd in motion, they are just about to burst out of the trap. In the distance you can see Dog has killed the lamb but it’s mother has turned on him and inflicted a nasty wound with her curly horns.
Sometimes even the meekest animal will attack in self defence and this is the stone age, nothing is that meek here.

Nuponda is the only one sticking to the plan, she is still waiting for the sheep to be driven into her ambush. She realizes it’s hopeless expecting the others to stay close to the simplest plan and sees that the herd will escape if she doesn’t stop them. So she sends her wolf forward. Interestingly she was so impressed with Yani’s choice of name that she has also named her wolf - Dog.

To the left you can see Dog, maybe I should refer to him as Dog 2, the Clans counting skills go 1, more, lots so they don’t recognise he might be Dog 2 but it will save any confusion for my reader – if there is one!

Anyway the sheep are now headed back the way they have just come and are probably getting dizzy. You may remember one of the tenets of hunting is make your prey dizzy this saying stems from our days hunting Dinosaur’s and is just as relevant in this Ice Age as When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth.

There is a loud trumpeting sound and a small family of Mammoths march onto the scene.

Just as the Rock Ugly Clan are closing the trap on the herd of sheep. You will note that as these are robust and vengeful sheep they are not a flock and to illustrate the point the sheep in the foreground has attacked Dog 3. Yes Tumak was also impressed with Yani’s wolf’s name and so his wolf is also called Dog. They had very little imagination regarding naming their wolves, Rover, Spot and Bosun as names are a long way in the future, beside would you want to eat Rover, Spot or Bosun? Dog is much less intimate and infinitely more digestible.

If you look hard in the distance the Mammoth family are moving closer to the Rock Ugly Clan, this is going to mean trouble.

Another Drones view of the situation, the Mammoths are getting closer to the Clan which is unusual, they would normally avoid these two legged creatures, they may be small but they have a vicious streak as well as sharp pointy weapons and the mammoths know this. Yani has left her wounded wolf, Dog behind and he eats the lamb he killed.

Akoba could be right about the usefulness of these animals.

The reason for this unusual behaviour becomes clear, they are being hunted by Monkey Men, something even more primitive than Homo Sapiens, I know that’s hard to believe. They are being driven onto the Rock Ugly Clans hunt, there is a danger the sheep will break out if the Clan have to move away from the mammoths.

Various events were controlled by random timed dice rolls, the mammoths arrived after the 2nd 7 was thrown on 2D6 and the Monkey Men after the 3rd 7.

Akoba who’s as smart as a three toed sloth and brave as a cave bear moves towards the advancing mammoths and howls, an old hunter trick, this has the effect of turning the Mother and calf back onto the advancing Monkey Men. The male mammoth halts and stares malevolently at Akoba.

A view the Monkey Men were hoping to avoid seeing.

Look away now if you are under 18 or of a nervous disposition.

OK who didn’t look away? You know who you are and so does Google.

The slaughter has started, the herd is now a flock and are being hunted down.

As a bit of light relief, drawn by the blood a Sabre Tooth Cat appears on the scene, fortunately for our Clan he is on the far side of the river, but he arrives randomly next to a small troop of 3 Baboons.

To escape the slaughter the remaining sheep jump into the river.

Which might not have been the smartest move!

The Baboons are classed as pack predators and decide unwisely to attack the apex predator.

Meanwhile Akoba has moved nearer to the male mammoth and howled again, this caused it to turn and flee, he was joined by the female mammoth but the calf didn't follow it's parents.

Straight at the Monkey Men, a savage fight ensued and the male was killed. These guys might be small but they are as hard as nails. Well they would be if anyone had heard of nails back then.

The victory dance starts.

The Rock Ugly Clan has finished their slaughter and knows they will have to drive the intruders away, besides it might mean there is some mammoth meat to be had.

I know it’s tough and not very tasty but it’s better than nuts and berries.

The Crocodile seems to be able to swim faster than the sheep, especially as the adult is injured and seeping blood into the river.

The calf mammoth startled by the fighting panics and attacks the nearest monkey man.

The Rock Ugly Clan led by the belligerent males move towards the fighting.

Still doing their victory dance, these two are oblivious to what’s going on around them.

And don’t see that the mother and calf are making mince meat out of the rest of their troupe.

Another look away moment is coming up soon.

The mother succumbs to weight of numbers and two 6’s on the dice and falls to the ground, but the young calf is still fighting grimly, de ja vu.

The Clan charge in, Monkey Men fall to the floor but one of the victors who had killed the male mammoth has defeated Yani.

He beats his chest in triumph.

Just before Dog 1 attacks and tears his throat out.

The final Monkey Man falls to Tumak and Dog 3

The calf turned and attacked Akoba who responded quickly and wounded it, but Nuponda was just behind the calf and with her faithful wolf, Dog 2 kills the poor defenceless creature.

Yani looking very grumpy from this angle has to test to see if she survives the double wound. She throws a 6 and is fine except for an ugly disfiguring scar. Now how did that happen.

This didn’t end well, but the scene was edited out so I could get a certificate 15. The Sabre Tooth Cat ate both baboons and the third baboon ran away.

The Rock “very” Ugly Clan prepare for their next hunt.

Well it’s been a long time since I had a proper game. Since I moved house I've had 3 games of Wings of War and a couple of Sails of Glory but this was the first time I got any scenery out and onto the table. It’s really weird, I now have a brilliant games room, light, airy and freshly decorated but I’ve virtually not used it, where as with my other dingy dark and cramped room I played a lot of games, hopefully that will change in the future. Unfortunately life has been a bit busy lately, it’s this damn summer, roll on winter and I can stay indoors all the time.

I have started to make some jungle terrain for Becky’s next adventure, I have decided to go for small individual bases rather than big groups of blocking terrain, my thought is that I can group it together but remove individual bases so that figures can move through it, I'll see how that pans out.
The method I'm using is very quick and involves putting a dollop of brown acrylic sealant dapped onto a big washer, then stick the plant in and dropple it about a bit, then dropping flock on top. Dead easy and quick, you can see some in this game, they’re all aquarium plants and I will either matt varnish or dry brush them to get rid of the plastic sheen when I've finished some more of them. So far everything seems to have stuck well using the acrylic sealant, fingers crossed.

The lichen that I picked up from various walks is starting to get a bit brittle, I wonder if I should stick a damp sponge in the bags to try and revive it, any thoughts on this would be much appreciated.

Well hopefully this will be the start of a gaming renaissance for me but who knows, I always intended that the blog would be a record of my games rather than a weekly diary so it’s likely to be a bit sporadic for a while.

Well if you've read this far I would appreciate you letting me know, and if not, you won't be reading this.

Cheers