Musket and Tomahawks at Mike's

Last weekend, Mike hosted a French vs British set in the French and Indian Wars. The British were tasked with protecting the settlers and the French were supposed to burn all the buildings. As this was a play test for a convention, these divergent goals played a huge role in the outcome.

I took the British regulars and the friendly Iroquois while Larry controlled the light troops, the militia and the settlers. I hid the Iroquois in the corn fields as a surprise for the French.

Things started up badly for the French when my regulars took a long range shot at some French lights who were deployed in the open. A kill and a retreat put them out of being a threat for a while.

Luck turned the French way as the French Hurons blundered into my Indians. But the French got another Indian activation card and managed to get into an advantageous battle. Both side's Indian massacred each other. The difference was that all of mine disappeared in the subsequent recoil while the French managed to keep a few from each Indian formation. This eventually was the turning point.

Meanwhile, Larry was having problems dealing with the French militia and regulars. Eventually, numbers counted and the British lights had to give ground, which lead to the burning of one cabin and inevitable burning of the other. On my side, after the clash of Indians, the way was open for the French irregulars to burn the largest building, which they did. The remaining Hurons slipped over to the other building and set it on fire too, despite the intervention of a second British regular unit.

But remember those civilians? We had provided them with enough time to run away into the woods, and as far as we were concerned, we had fulfilled our victory conditions. So the game was basically a tie with both sides having achieved what they set out to do.

So onto my thoughts on the rules. I'm not all that impressed with them. They have the typical problem of all card driven games in which everyone else waits for the guy who has had his units activated to do something. This isn't necessarily a killer but it has the potential to really bog down a game.

The firing seems a bit clunky to me. First you determine your base to hit. Then you modify it for terrain and range. This is pretty standard but the chart wasn't great at showing it. After you hit, you then roll for effect. It's basically modelling power or lethality. The problem is that basically all of the weapons in use were a 3+ to kill and the only units that weren't using a 3+ were some of my Indians and they never got off a shot. This essentially turned the second roll into a "restore 1/3 of your troops" event.

The melee makes the firing seem smooth by comparison, It is a huge time-suck as you resolve each set of figures one on one. So instead of taking 6 dice for 6 figures and rolling them as a group, you have to do it individually. Then your opponent rolls for his defense. Then you do it all over again as your opponent strikes back. And you keep doing this attack and defense until there's no more figures in direct contact. After all of that, you finally roll for morale to see what happens to each unit in the melee. If your units recoil or flee, you have to check each figure to see if they run away completely. This is what did my Indians in.

The morale is very volatile with a roll of a 1 or 2 on a fresh unit recoiling back or a 6 saving the sole figure in a unit from running to the hills. It's OK in effect but something to remember.

Would I play it again? Yes, but it won't be my first choice. I think there should be better games out there.