A Song of Ice and Fire and Rangers of Shadow Deep Introduction Games

After a few months hiatus I was back at the League and Mark had his beautifully painted A Song of Ice and Fire (ASOIAF) miniatures from Cool Mini or Not (CMON) that he was itching to get out on the table. He provided both sides and we spent the morning playing a brutal game (I got slaughtered to a man!).

First impressions? The mechanics are elegant, the miniatures beautiful, and just like the background there's an element of strategy happening off the battlefield that I like (the constant command decision pressure of deciding to move a unit and risk my opponent seizing an area of the tactics board which is also needed or vice versa). I can't see myself getting into the game (way too many projects!), but if you like Game of Thrones and all that then this is pretty good at recreating the world. Although it's marketed to some degree as a boardgame, it's very much a wargame.

The afternoon session had me stepping into Jack's character for a Rangers of Shadow Deep game, run by Mark with Dave T, his son Jonathan and Bruce. I was flying blind for most of it, but picked up the basic elements pretty quickly. There were three rooms our band had to fight through, the knolls giving us a hard time. I controlled a Wizard, Caitweazel (I assume a variation of Catweazle) and an unnamed red shirt companion.

I had to leave just as the third room was entered, so got the update from Mark. Both Bruce and David's characters fell in the final room (mercifully surviving their injuries when rolled for later) as did all of the remaining companions. This left Mark's Ranger and Caitweazel (played by Jonathan) to struggle through, which they did, if only just thanks to some lucky shots with Mark's crossbow. A staircase was found at the end, so the scenario was won but possibly with a deficit in the next scenario.