Yesterday, in our Mordheim session, my Osterlanders (rating 165) chalked up a couple of wins. First, vs. Rod's fledgeling new Skaven warband (rating 60) in a straight Skirmish scenerio, not a single Osterlander was taken out of action, and three of the rat people were on the sidelines when they routed. Tactically, I bunched all my guys up into a building right before being charged, and then executed a counter-charge. You never know how it's going to go. It could easily have gone badly for my human mercenaries, but the dice went my way. Even though the Skaven were smaller in numbers and experience, having five heroes to start with is enviable at exploration time, and underdog bonuses will have their rating higher in short order. Also, those warplock pistols have a strength 5, so they really pack a punch, and Rod's a really good player, so I'm sure the Skaven will be beating the crap out of everybody else before long.
The second scenerio, Treasure Hunt, was a three-way battle between my Osterlanders, Rod's Skaven and Rob's mighty Cult of the Posessed (rating 227). In Treasure Hunt, your guys are looking for a valuable chest, which shows up in the first building somebody explores where 12 shows up on 2d6, or the last building on the table if this does not occur. Then as a victory condition, you have to drag the chest off your table edge. We had about 16 buildings on the table, and when there were 3 left, I lucked out and two Osterlanders who had split off near Rob's table edge found the chest. I was very concerned, because they were pretty far from help, and outnumbered. Since we were both underdogs and Skaven have such great movement, I allied with Rod. From my perspective, it looked like the Osterlanders had just handed victory to the Posessed's horrifying cadre of Beastmen, tentacled mutants and other unspeakably frightening monsters. My henchmen group of two, each armed with two-handed swords, was immediately cut in half by three beastmen. The remaining guy, reduced to half movement by the heavy chest, was luckily not stuck in, so he moved just out of the way. Help began to arrive; the rest of the Ostlanders weren't quite as far away as I feared. My alliance with Rod's Skaven allowed them free movement closer to the big fight near the chest. The bulk of the Posessed were starting to arrive. Swampy, one of my heroes, held off being taken out of action by making an amazing three Step Aside skill rolls (a 5 or 6 on a d6 allows an unmodifyable extra armor save). I was able to get a more guys over to help with the chest, as my ogre and a couple other guys executed a fighting retreat. My captain was taken out of action by a terrifying tentacled thing. The Skaven ended their alliance and blasted all my guys around the chest with a powerful area-of effect fireball-like spell. Swampy succeeded in stepping into the role of captain and made the route check for the Osterlanders. Later that turn he himself was taken out of action. But through sheer luck and guts (yeah I know, a lot of luck), the Osterlanders, with two guys carrying the chest (and a lot of guys knocked down or stunned) dragged the chest off my table edge and achieved victory. With the spoils, the warband was able to buy three shiny new double pistols for its jaeger henchmen group.
Star Wars was crazy. Jon had arrived while we finished the second Mordheim scenario and built a Jedi Guardian character, the Trandoshan Drael Gracks. Through a long series of wheeling and dealing, the party has been smuggling Hutt weapons to rebel groups on several worlds, earning tidy profits in barter, which then had to be sold in order to cash in on the credits. Using forged Imperial agent and vendor identification and hacked computer codes, the party has been able to avoid problems for the most part. Accustomed to war zones, Akbar's Trap flew to Fivepoint, which is a highly populated Hutt/Rebel world under Imperial invasion. The group found themselves fighting to protect one of their customers, Governess Thora (at least until her credit could clear) from Imperial forces supplemented by the giant building demolition creatures genengineered on the Imperial research island of Dr. Balfir, as well as the Emperor's darkside droids, tanks, and stormtroopers. In the chaos of war and destruction could be seen gargantuan atomic monsters resembling a rancor, diablo, a giant spider, and a great slimy, shadowy creature that seemed to dissolve any building it touched. Destro S'Xauron disarmed two of the powerful darkside droids, causing them to go insane yet harmless. Jaina Brioli used her demolition skills to blow up some of the bigger threats, including the giant diablo, who easily picked up the power station building and crushed it. Meanwhile, Pieda Bowman II was directing a neighborhood militia while talking on the comlink to Garik Gracus in the ship, directing air strikes. The ship, maneuverable, yet heavily armored and armed to the teeth, contributed heavily to the battle, dropping powerful missiles and firing powerful energy weapons with deadly accuracy. Drael Gracks found himself dueling a darkside droid version of Darth Vader, then jumping on top of a rancor-like creature just before it would have crushed both duelists with one stomping foot. The Vader droid was crushed. Drael then started hacking away at the head and neck of the beast with his lightsaber, felling it just before it could destroy Governess Thora's transit center headquarters, and just as Destro grabbed Thora and tumbled her away to safety, and just as Jaina ran to a safe distance and detonated her charge on the giant diablo's feet. Meanwhile, allied forces had ignited the slimy shadow creature, and it burned away into harmlessness. Jaina salvaged the ruins of the Imperial tank, and the party clambored aboard Akbar's Trap and flew away.
I awarded 3,000 experience points for this adventure, even though we only actually played Star Wars for two hours. Technically the party earned no credits but everyone's reputation will go up by one.
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