Gladiator Fight Club at TriaDCon

Of the three events I wanted to run at TriaDCon I ended up running postponing one until Fall-IN! and cancelling another because the "tempo of operations" got a little heavy at TriaDCon.


George

The event I DID run, 54mm Gladiators ("The Wooden Sword") was a lot of fun. Somewhat whimsically, a movie parallel came to mind.



Mitch Osborne, George Callanan from Baltimore, and myself sat down for a quick Free For All set that featured deadly dwarven tag teams, 2 retiarri, two hoplomachus, 2 secutors, 1 thracian, one horribly outmatched pugile, and TWO barely trained savage fighting bears. You can see where this is going, already, can't you?


Some disreputable character

Our game end condition was at second blood. Mostly because we were all hungry and wanted to go get dinner.



That's Mitch's Hoplo at the top of the page... We used 54mm mixed Italeria and Alpha miniatures. We used highly modified BLOOD AND SWASH rules with a very detailed variant written for gladiators by Steve Gibson, a friend of mine. I modified it somewhat further for 54mm and the grid pattern terrain map.



Early on in the game, Mitch's bear, Smokey, is under control. We made a saving throw for bears-- if they get wounded, the roll versus SAVE to see if they stay controlled. Alas, Smokey went berserk pretty quickly. Fortuntely for Mitch, they were pointed at George's dwarven tag team at the time!



Surprisingly, the dwarf did open up a minor can of whup-ass on the bear. Then he left in a big, big hurry the next time his initiative card was drawn.



Over at my end of the table, things are hotting up quick as the two closer forces smash together. That's MY Retiarus up top and George's Retiarus 2 below, his Secutor, my Pugile, and his Tracian. Nobody, but NOBODY could net anything in this game. The Retiarii were easy meat!!



Bill Frye, former Atlanticon Director, Former HMGS East Cold Wars director, dropped by and puts a dollar down on first kill. Now that we're playing for the big money, things get ugly...



MY bear, "Not Very Gentle Ben", mauls George's Thracian, and he cuts Ben in the vitals. Meanwhile, my hapless Pugile maneuvers around him for a Kidney Punch. There is no honor at Gladiator Fight Club.



Meanwhile, I add my own simoleon into the pot, but my colleagues wuss out. Since my Samnite is hammering his Retiarus into meat goo, it looks as if that sweet, sweet two dollars will soon be MINE!!!!



At this point George's Retiarus is down to something like 5 points remaining.



Over on the other side of the Arena, Mitch is having his own difficulties. The dwarves, who had enraged Smokey, had made him all berserk so he could no longer be controlled. That means he went after the nearest living thing, which was Mitch's big barbarian berserker. Alas, Smokey could run as fast as the fighter could!



It's looking like curtains for George's Retiarus as I get in a couple more hits.



Mitch tries to lead Smokey over to us to share the loving... he finally turns on Smokey and engages him. Anything beats getting clawed to death from behind...

AN UPSET!!!!

George's Thracian downs Not So Gentle Ben and kills him. Then he turns on my hapless, totally outmatched Pugile and chops him into chutney!!! All in about as much time as it takes to tell!!!!!!



And here's the result.

I had a great time at TriaDCon, which was in its first year out. I am really looking forward to next year!!!

(Attribution: Photos by Kaarin Englemann and Mitch Osborne, which is why Mitch isn't in any of the photos above)