Cold Wars 2015: Election Riots and Regency Zombies

This is a brief report on my trip to Cold Wars.  Given other engagements and renting a table in the flea market, I only got to game on Friday but it was a full and fun day.

In the afternoon I played on Zeb Cook's Baltimore Election Riots of 1856.  A delightful game once we got over the fact that people actually fought over whether James Buchanan or Millard Fillmore should be President.  It was the Democrats vs. the Know-Nothings and I was one of the latter - perfect casting I suppose.  The Democrats got an early lead in stuffing the ballot box and just as we were about to "make proper adjustments" to the vote, they absconded with the ballot box.  Even though poor Fillmore lost, we had a great time.

A slight disagreement over politics

I ran my Sharpe's Pride and Prejudice and Master and Commander and Zombies game and thought it went very well.  Originally scheduled for 8 players, I ended up with 14 players total but all seemed to have enjoyed the chaos and everyone got to have their moment.  We ended up playing to a conclusion in about 2 and 1/2 hours - special thanks to Steve Braun for helping me run the zombie hordes. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to take too many pictures.

The games was really about the romantic travails of the five Sisters Bennett, living in genteel poverty in Regency England.  Oh, and there's zombies.

The zombies were primarily a distraction from the players' objective of rescuing Lydia, the youngest of the Bennett sisters who had run off with the scoundrel Mr. Wickham.  The zombies did provide the advantage of bringing large numbers of eligible men into the area, in the form of Richard Sharpe and the 95th Rifles, Jack Aubrey and the crew of HMS Surprise, and the Scarlet Pimpernel and friends who were somewhat at a loss of occupation since the Reign of Terror ended. 

The dastardly Wickham's carriage was wrecked while trying to run over a horde of Unmentionables.  He took refuge in a nearby butcher shop, using poor Lydia as a human shield.  This allowed the rest of sisters, with the aid of the officers, to push their way through the zombies (after coming up with the stratagem of ringing the village church bell to attract the zombies away from the shop), round up a parson, and corner Wickham.  Mr. Darcy, who was smitten with Elizabeth, bribed Wickham into marrying Lydia, Dr. Stephen Maturin having found a cure that would prevent the girl from joining the undead.  The game happily ended with a joint wedding of all five sisters, Maturin and Richard Sharpe being among the grooms.

 Here's some other games I spotted:

Neat Gundam-style game with Lego buildings.

Not sure what type of game was going to be played here but a nice table.

Sci-fi game of some sort, nice interiors 

Beautiful F&I Wars game

Siege of Malta

Star Trek game with wonderful "terrain"

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Playtest

As mentioned previously, I am preparing for Cold Wars next week where I will be running the Pride and Prejudice and Zombies game.  In addition to the characters from the novel, it will also include characters from the Aubrey-Maturin books as well as the Sharp series.  A couple of weeks ago, we did a play test with my regular gaming group and it seemed to go pretty well.

As in the novel, the focus of the game is on the romantic travails of the Sisters Bennett with the zombie apocalypse as a mere stumbling block in their pursuit of appropriate husbands. 

The Sisters Bennett

Mr. and Mrs. Bennett

The main plot involved the attempted seduction of the youngest sister, Lydia by the scoundrel Mr. Wickham.  Lydia has "eloped" with Wickham, thinking they will marry when in reality, Wickham has much less honorable intentions.  The rest of the zombie-fighting sisters led by the Elizabeth are in pursuit, aided by the wealthy but proud Mr. Darcy who hopes to win Elizabeth's heart.

In the meantime, Britain's military heroes have been recalled to battle England's Strange Plague.

The crew of the HMS Surprise is hard-pressed

That is until they lure the zombies into the path of the Army's rockets and their own powder cart.

Sharp dug in and let the rockets do his fighting.  They proved surprisingly accurate.

In the meantime, the Bennett hoped to use an acquaintance, Mr. Collins, a parson, to marry Lydia and Wickham, once they were apprehended.

The parson's wife is not looking too well.

Mr. Darcy aided by his aunt's ninjas

A damned nuisance for Mr. Wickham's seduction attempt.

The militia find themselves in an awkward position.

A certain lack of quality control at the burning fields.

The Reclaimers claimed

Mr. Darcy convinces Mr. Wickham to do the right thing.

A timely wedding.

A Zombie-off with Lady Catherine

Sharpe's Pride and Prejudice and Master and Commander and Zombies

I am going to be running a game at Cold Wars in March based on the very funny mashup novel Pride and Prejudice and Zombies but with additional characters from other popular Napoleonic era novels.  Here's the description:

 In an England overrun by the undead Unmentionables, can the Bennett sisters find suitable husbands? The chances are good since England’s heroes have returned to fight the undead, including a roguish rifleman and scallywagish sea captain together with their mandatorily Irish sidekicks. What hope do zombies have against some of the greatest heroes in English literature?

Here's some preliminary photos:

Table lay-out, the village of Hunsford in Kent with the nearby estate of Rosing Park

Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy beset by unmentionables.

Lady Catherine de Bourg and her ninja attendants

The 95th Rifles under Sharpe and Harper

Jack Aubrey, Stephen Maturin and the crew of the HMS Surprise

A militia encampment

Reclaimers, desperate bounty hunters who capture the unmentionables for the burning fields.

Pike & Shot & Zombies II

We based most of the campaign on the Plague City supplement to the game. Our heroes had to sneak into a zombie-infested city to get to a bishops abandoned palace to find a holy book that might give some clue as to the cause of the plague. They also had to save the daughter of the head of a band of local survivors who was trapped while scavenging in the city. In the process they learned a great deal about the undead.

The City of the Dead

The City Square

The undead have a singular incapacity of crossing low obstacles, like strung rope.

As the undead lack a need for breathing, the moat is a most efficacious hiding place.

Who would have imagined that a grave yard would be frequented by the undead?

One should not engage the undead unless a means of egress is readily available

Oft times, other survivors present a greater danger than the undead.

A well furnished room is a definite asset when forestalling the undead

A good back-stab is the height of gallantry when encountering the undead

One must not be overly sentimental about luggage when attempting to flee the undead.

An unceremonious exit is the height of good manners when leaving the abode of the undead.

Pike & Shot & Zombies

My regular gaming group just finished a short campaign of Pike and Shot and Zombies. It was our first time with the system and we found it to be fun and fast playing. The challenge of only having muzzle-loaders and melee weapons was a change from the regular zombie genre.

The characters were a couple of English mercenaries, Danny Smallbeers and Jack Shrapnell, who left service in the Swedish Army to follow a career as "petermen," men licensed to seek out salt peter for gunpowder. Unfortunately, they chose to start their career in the midst of a zombie apocalypse.

A Bad Place for a Breakdown

Those are not cows in that barn

Danny, we're leaving!

Help is on the way?
The family Frufroque, a scruffy band of Walloon camp followers

Running to catch a ferry

At least we're safe

The heroic Captain Torkilsen