Devilry Afoot - Hunt the Right Bunny!

 Last night was Trumpeters' first meeting of the new year.  Corey came over from Victoria eager to put his new were-rabbit onto the table, so we collaborated to host a couple scenarios for Devilry Afoot.  Fletch and Walt joined in the games.

Corey created a scenario he titled 'Hunt for a Hare'.  The short summary is that strange things have been happening at Farmer Ben's place every time there is a full moon.  Something odd is going on with the rabbits.  The players need to hunt the rabbits - as rabbits are small and fast, the only way to achieve this is by shooting them (so the hunters need to bring shooting weapons).

My hunters - Daphne the Goodwife, with her dog Scoob, and Fred the Soldier.

Walt's Slava Hetman, a gentleman, with his retainer, and the scholar Volodomyr Beley (in the blue coat).

Corey brought the preacher Brimstone Jones and his soldier friend the Shiny Hat.

Fletch's hunters were Dr Goldstein, a scholar, and his soldier friend Ensign Tuck.

The farm, with bunnies scattered around.  The little bushy area in the centre is actually a carrot patch!  Rabbits activate when the red markers are pulled from the cup.  A d10 is rolled for each rabbit, then the bunny moves 4" in the direction the d10 points.  If they reach the carrot patch, that's where they stay, and if they reach the edge of the board, they bounce back into the play area.

The game begins, and the hunters move onto the board.

The scholar is very confused, not realising that the bunnies are busy eating the carrots in the carrot patch behind him!

Then he turns and sees them :)

Meanwhile Dr Goldstein and Ensign Tuck chase rabbits through the livestock paddock.

Back to the carrot patch, where the wererabbit has been revealed!

The wererabbit charges scholar Volodomyr!  Smoke puffs are placed to show which matchlocks have fired and need to reload.

The wererabbit takes down Volodomyr, and is then felled by a fusilade of matchlock fire.  Success for the hunters!

As the first scenario finished quickly, we quickly reset the table with a cemetery in the center. This is the 'Danse Macabre' scenario from the DA rulebook.  A revenant has appeared, and appears to be raising more of the dead.  The hunters must enter the hallowed ground, and then quote scripture to make the dead return to their rest.  Here Ensign Tusk faces a revenant playing a bone flute.

Meanwhile Brimstone Jones confronts a spectre at the edge of the hallowed ground.

More revenants appear, including Jerry Garcia!

Revenants combine to attack and subdue Ensign Tuck.  Brimstone Jones successfully banishes the spectre!

The hunters move into the hallowed ground!  Some quote scripture, while others hold off the revenants.

Finally the hunters succeed in quoting scripture.  The Word of God takes hold, and the revenants return to their eternal slumber.  All in all, a fun pair of scenarios to start the year!

Devilry Afoot in the Canadian North

This past weekend, Arthur and I visited Victoria, where Corey and Brian introduced us to Devilry Afoot (DA), an RPG-lite skirmish game based on 17th-Century monster hunters.  We had a great time hunting a pack of werewolves.  So of course I bought a copy of the rules so that we can play it ourselves!  Coincidently Arthur is currently painting up some of Bob Murch's Flint and Feather settlers in New France and New England.  They're not ready yet, however, so as an interim we decided to play in a proxy setting and instead played the Hunger scenario, relocated to 1920s Yukon.  Tyler and Oliver joined Arthur, each taking two hunters, while I attempted to be the gamemaster.

In the Hunger scenario, a group of hunters sets out in advance of a winter storm to protect a community from the raging of what I've decided to call a "forest spirit".  It's supposed to be a Wendigo, but my model looks more like a Sasquatch.

The board in DA is small, only 2'x2'.  In this case, the forest spirit is stalking a group of houses in one corner of the board, while the hunters arrive on the opposite corner.  The blue strips mark the boundary of the playing space.

Hunters arrive on the board.

Activation is randomly determined by pulling chits from a bag.  Here we can see a couple of hunters working to pin the forest spirit in place as other hunters work around on the flank.

Activations are never guaranteed, either!  The lady in the red coat was successful with multiple activations and advanced quickly across the table, but her friends had a few failures and as a result moved forward more slowly.  This did not work out very well for the goodwife in red!

The forest spirit then got a few consecutive activations, and was able to move and attack the goodwife, inflicting two wounds!

On the forest spirit's next activation, the beast chose an intimidate attack, which caused goodwife to flee from the table.  However, her comrades stood firm!

Despite the loss of the goodwife, the remaining hunters continued to stalk the forest spirit.

The spirit then turned on the wealthy gentleman's assistant, wounding him.

On his next activation, the gentleman, with no concern for his assistant's safety, turned and fired on the forest spirit, and ended the game!

As this was our first playthrough of DA without the guidance of a more experienced player, so as I re-read the rulebook I am certain I will find that we made many errors.  It was still great fun, and we will definitely play more games, both in the 1920s Yukon proxy setting as well as in the 17th Century once Arthur's new figures are ready.

For anyone interested, I simply used straight substitutions of weaponry for the hunters.  Modern rifles use the same stats as flintlocks.  Modern revolvers substitute for black powder pistols.  We handwaved reloading with the idea that anyone shooting will go full Hollywood-style blazing away, so they need to reload after each shot!