Dux Britanniarum first outing.....

Somewhat later than most I had my first taste of Dux Britanniarum the Dark Age variant of the Two Fat Lardies rule suite Sunday evening.

The game plays along similar lines of other TFL games with a card deck for each leader dictating who the gets to take his action. Unlike other rules such as Sharp Practice there is no equivalent to ‘Tea Break’ all cards are drawn, so every big man gets a turn.

Troops are broken up into classes Levy, Warriors or Elites, organised into groups of 6 of the same type. Led by Nobles and Warlords who can sustain wounds equivalent to their status.

The addition of a separate Fate Deck of cards really makes for a dynamic game giving each player an advantage when it is their activation, e.g. a ferocious charge or the ability to retire from an advancing opponents or the ability to enhance your leader in a round of combat, the cards could be regarded as the equivalent of the battleboards in Saga but with perhaps less of a significant impact on the game (unless of course your leader is killed.)

With my Irish playing the part of Saxon's they set about raiding Chris's Romano British village. In this particular raid, the Irish/Saxons managed to get a four turn head start before the British turned up reaching the outskirts of the village, the plan was simple raid the buildings acquire the gold and head back to our own territory.

The British when they did arrived turned up in the middle edge of the table and soon rushed to the village centre, with warriors skirting the right hand side of the village looking to counter my advance.

In a bloodlust all thoughts of gold went out of the window as my Elite groups formed into a larger formation and crashed into the main British Warlord and his supporting levies.

Whilst my Elite troops had their rear exposed to the advancing warriors, it was to be in the centre that the battle would be won and loss, with shock and casualties mounting on both sides, the extra save on the Elite troops was to be telling.

The British faced with more shock than men and with Nobles with wounds forcing the army morale to zero, the battle is won with the Irish holding the table.

I am pretty sure we missed some of the finer details, but the rules were very quick to pick up, much like many of TFL's other rules, solid formations were able to withstand shock and able to force back isolated groups.

Dux gives me a great excuse to use my Irish in another setting and with the recent launch of "raiders" for Dux Britanniarum a suppliment listing three new factions to the game; the Irish, the Scotti and the Picts, it presents an opportunity to bring together my of the clubs various warbands into a larger campaign...

I can certainly see a few more outings in Dark Age Britian over the the coming months.