Medieval Tournament (6)

Yesterday we played our "Grand Melee".

16 knights started the melee. After 4 were knocked out, the game was reset and we continued with 12 (the second toornament day). Then with 8. Etc. In the end, there was one winner emerging from the final round of 4 on the 4th tournament day.

Players got a gold piece when they knocked a knight out (1 GP), and when one of the backed knights (assigned randomly and hidden at the start of the tournament) ended in the last 5 (resp. 1/2/3/4/5 gold). The secretly assigned knights also made players guessing who was backing what knight, which was an additional element of fun.

When it was your turn, you could activate any knight you wanted, and had to choose from 3 possible actions (drawn randomly from ordinary playing cards). "Virtues of the court ladies" threw in some additional special benefits for chosen knights.

Bart took the win with a total of 10 GP, Phil came in second with 9 GP, and Eddy acquired 5 GP.

Overall, a fun game, although as usual, some rules tweaks are in order if we ever decide to run this again.

The start of the Grand Melee.16 Knights want to win the tournament. Yes, that's an original Citadel Warhammer Siege castle from the late 80s/early 90s.

A medieval game is always a good reason to bring out some old Warhammer Scenery.

The first casualty  of the tournament. Philips van Liezele is knocked out

Me taking a photograph of Bart taking a photograph.

Eddy and Bart pndering tactics. Who wil win? Barthold van Vetterling or Edward van Sterkenburg?

A bloody melee. Sigisbiduwald von Trappstein-Hohenschlieffen is knocked out, while Egon van Blauwen and Alexander de Croowaen are looking on.

The Status Board, used for identifying knights, although after some time we knew all miniature by name. Most of the names are tongue in cheek and refer to our past games or our own names.

Another overview of the tournament field.

A look at the castle.

A view of the melee field, in one of the later rounds.

One of the final combats. Egon van Blauwen vs Barthold van Vetterling vs Hubertus van d'Ardennen.

The final combat!!! Hubertus van d'Ardennen (who turned out to be one of Bart's knights) will knock out Alexander de Croowaen (who was backed by Phil).

Medieval Tournament (5)

Last night I wrote a first version of the rules for my upcoming tournament game.

The format will be as follows:

• 
  
• We will start the melee with 16 knights. When 4 knights are out of action, the tournament starts over imagine it is the next day) with 12 knights. A third round with 8 knights, and a final round with 4 knights.
• Each player will receive cards for 4 knights (random, secret) at the start of the tournament.
  
• During the melee, a player can choose any knight he wants to activate (not necessarily a knight he is rooting for), and chooses an action from 1 of 3 playing cards for that knight. The cards are from a common activation pool and replenished after each activation.
• If a player knocks out a Knight, he gets 1 gold. The last 5 surviving knights receive 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 gold for the player who holds that card. Thus, a total of 30 gold will be handed out during the tournament.
• The idea is there will be some bluff as well as to who holds what knight in his hands.
  

The melee rules follow a simple format as well.

• Hex-based.
• Within a hex: knights can be in contact or not.
• All modifiers are on die type (D4 -> D6 -> D8 -> D10 -> D12 -> ...).

Summary sheet so far:

 

Medieval Tournament (4)

Coming Friday, we will play a "Grand Melee".

The format will be that each player will be able to control any knight during his turn, but every player will also have (in secret) a number knight assigned randomly to root for (and score victory points with). Thus, there will also be a form of meta-game, trying to figure out who is (secretly) backing which knight to gain victory.

I needed cards for each foot knight (players will receive 4 card at random at the start of the game). I photographed 16 of my foot knight miniatures, and made up some medieval looking names.

Medieval Tournament (3)

I found one more item in my wargaming library:

Again, I am merely reading it for inspiration to come up with my own rules.

Meanwhile, I have started setting up the table. The big area in the middle will be the "grand melee" area. There should be enough room for hex-based movement (since I think that movement and manoeuvre is the fun in most miniature wargames). The table will get more and more detailed over the coming weekend.

Medieval Tournament (2)

Some more inspiration for my medieval tournament game a week from now ...

I probably have more stuff lying around, we'll see what else we can dig up.

Medieval Tournament (1)

Next week the plan is to run a medieval tournament game for my gaming group.

I always had a fascination for medieval tournaments (see some previous photos of my heraldic knights here), but they're not always easy to turn into a good game. The typical joust (only one part of a tournament) always struck me as being too much rock-paper-scissors. Although a number of games have been published that recreate the medieval joust, it's unclear to me whether there are enough interesting decision points for the players to make.

So, it will not be a joust, but rather a "melee for all". A quick look into my magazine collection turned up some useful inspirational articles. A very useful one was published in Miniature Wargames (with Battlegames), issue 363.

The idea is that we start with 16 knights, and every knight is backed (in secret) by a player. We will fight several melee events (with elimination), and whoever survives in the end wins the tournament. I will of course hand out some additional victory points throughout the tournament, but I still have to come up with a good set of skirmish melee rules. I have some ideas already ...

But for now, I have time for some more historical research. Yesterday evening, I spend quite some time reading my TASCHEN copy of the Freydal Tournament book. Inspirational stuff!

Tournament!

The Christmas break is always a nice time to bring out some toys and play around with some different setups. I decided to bring out my medievals - many of which date back to the 90s. Plenty of old Citadels on display ;-)

Anyway, I still have a plan to stage a game focusing on the "melee" of a tournament rather than the "joust", so this is a bit of a dry-run of how it could look visually.

All pictures taken with smartphone(s), so focus could have been a bit better here and there ...

General overview of the table. The castle is a plastic toy castle.

Another general overview.

Fishman in the castle pond. He always features in many of my games where there is some body of water.

King and herald, both Citadel knights.

Another overview.

The Joust.

A knight putting on his armour. Foundry vignette.

Knights from the old Battlemasters game.

Old Bretonnia Warhammer knights.

Melee in action.

More melee ...

And even more ...

Another overview.

Piers the Ploughman - Wargames Foundry.

Flock of sheep ...

Another pair of knights fighting it out.

View from the ramparts.

More sheep.

Carnival parade. Eureka miniatures inspired by Breughel and Bosch.

Falconer.

Tax collector inspecting the market stalls.

Nobles (Harlequin figures).

A black-and-white view from the ramparts.

The melee field.

Mercator coming out for some scientific observations ...

The herald.

Rabbit hunt.

Sleeping shepherd.

War engine.

More melee.

Melee once again.

And in the mean time, someone running's off with the treasure ...