"Evalon looked around him - the dwarves, elves and men had been coming back in trickles from the great battle beyond the ridges for the past hour. The greatest battle of the decade and here he was, guarding the baggage. Spurned in love and humiliated at court, his brother officers were away earning fame and honour in glorious combat whilst he managed a legion of cooking pots! Lost in his bitter reflections, Evalon didn't notice the rider galloping towards him. "The men have broken! The cause is lost! Goddodin orders you to hold as long as you can, the fate of the army depends on you!" the rider cried, then urged his maddened mount on. Evalon rose to his feet and unsheathed his sword, at last, his hour had come ......
Introduction: This is a solo game using the HOTT rules from WRG. The player starts with one element - that of Evalon the Hero General. However, he has the opportunity to rally (temporarily) other elements and bring them back into the fray.
Turn Sequence
- Draw cards
- Introduce new forces
- Roll PIP dice
- Spend PIPs to Rally, Halt, or Move elements.
- Move fleeing troops
- Move pursuing troops
- Combat, combat involving PIP controlled units first.
The Map
At right:
Deployment and new units
- Evalons Hero General unit can be placed anywhere on the table.
- 12 baggage elements (combat factor +2, Combat outcome - destroyed if role less than opposition, based and move as artillery) are deployed as indicated.
- Other forces come on according to the drawing of cards. Take one pack of playing cards excluding the Jokers and sort the cards out into the four suits. Form two decks, one of hearts and clubs and the other of diamonds and spades, and shuffle the cards in each deck. Each turn draw one card from each deck, hearts and spades indicate something has turned up:
| Card | HEARTS (goodies) | SPADES (badies) |
|---|---|---|
| 2 | 1 x Spears | 2 x Hordes |
| 3 | 2 x Shooters | 3 x Hordes |
| 4 | 1 x Blades | 2 x Beasts |
| 5 | 2 x Spears | 1 x Riders |
| 6 | 2 x Shooters | 3 x Beasts |
| 7 | 1 x Riders | 2 x Warband |
| 8 | 2 x Blades | 2 x Riders |
| 9 | 1 x Knights | 4 x Hordes |
| 10 | 2 x Knights | 2 x Knights |
| Jack | 1 x Flyers | 1 x Flyers |
| Queen | 1 x Behemoth | 1 x Behemoth |
| King | 1 x Hero | 1 x Hero |
| Ace | 1 x Cleric | 1 x Dragon |
Clubs and diamonds are blank cards, indicating no new troops from that deck this turn. New troops on the uppermost edge of the map. For each element role 2Dl2 to indicate how far in inches from the top left hand corner the troops appear. If one element would appear on top of another then place it immediately behind the other element as it will come on later that turn in fleers / pursuers.
Halts, rallies and PIPs
- Evalon has a command radius of 600p and ld6 PIP dice per turn.
- PIPs can be spent moving Evalon's element or other rallied elements in the normal way, or rallying fleeing units or halting rallied elements. It costs two PIPs to rally any fleeing unit within 600p of Evalon. On the turn it is rallied the element does not move but turns to face any direction desired. Each rallied element must have 1 PIP per turn on it either to move it or to halt it, unless it is part of a group including Evalon's element, in which case it moves as part of that group in the normal manner. If no PIPs are spent on a rallied unit it will start fleeing again, moving in the flee phase of the current turn.
Fleeing Elements
- All fleeing elements move as single elements at their maximum speed, deviating only to avoid difficult going, toward the bridge at the bottom of the table.
- If contacted by enemy elements, the element will turn to face and fight. If the element scores less than the enemy element, it is destroyed. If it pushes back or destroys the enemy element, it will continue to flee next turn. If the result is a draw it will continue to fight next turn.
- All baggage elements are considered to be fleeing at the start of the game.
Pursuing Elements
- All pursuing elements move as single elements at their full speed, avoiding difficult going if mounted, towards the nearest enemy element, fleeing or otherwise.
- Pursuing elements continue to fight and pursue until destroyed.
Winning
- The game ends when the first "evil" element crosses the bridge at the bottom of the board, or when Evalon's element leaves the board by the bridge or dies.
- As a measure of success add up the total number of "good" AP which left the board via the bridge prior to the game ending. Baggage elements count for 2 AP each.
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