Here's a report on the Darkest Africa Game I ran last Saturday. Cast of Characters: Each side had two units and two senior leaders British: Professor Balderdash and Major Mustard lead two units of Askari with Sikh NCOs. The befuddled professor hopes to find proof that he's found the Elephant Graveyard. Major Mustard hopes to finally earn a promotion to Colonel. Played by Nick. Americans: Teddy Ruseavote and Tex Critter are on a hunting expedition. Teddy hopes tomake headlines to boost his political career. Tex just wants to shoot stuff. Played by Charlie. Zanzibaris: Anwar Sedate and Taliban are after ivory. Anwar is the wise and calm leader, Taliban is the crazy young hot head. Think of them as Danny Glover and Mel Gibson in "Lethal Weapon". Played by Bill. Belgians: The slipper Major Deceit and his sadistic second in command, Lieutenant Van Damme, are after ivory. They also have a grudge against the Zanzibaris. Played by John. Africans: African warlord Idi Ameany and his hemp smoking sidekick Tupac are looking for ivory to finance their army. Played by Ted. Germans: Klink and Schultz are trying to prove to their superiors that Germany should annex more territory in Africa. They despise the British. Played by Ceaser. Pygmies: The pygmies want to eliminate all intruders. Played by Phil The players moved onto the board to start the game. John and Charlie's commands were within musket range and they couldn't resist shooting each other. Old habits die hard. The shooting produced few results and after that they contented themselves with lobbing hostile arguments back and forth. The Zanzibaris ran into elephant trouble right from the start. The pygmy player successful sicked the beast on them. His argument included the fact that they had killed his mother. This was accepted by all the other players and became a good excuse for sending the elephant after the Zanzibaris again and again. Elephants never forget, you know. For reasons that were never made clear the Zanzibaris didn't just shoot the beast. Even after I helpfully pointed out that they should consider him as mobile ivory. Instead we were treated to the comical sight of Brutus the Elephant chasing the Zanzibaris around a tree. Everyone was afraid to go near the river for fear of crocodiles. This severely hampered their movement. Ted expressed disappointment that his Africans didn't have any bare breasted females, so I brightened his day by giving him a couple he could use as porters. This seemed to cause the Belgians to attack him. Perhaps they were horny. Idi Ameany's unit was torn to shreds but he personally wiped out half a dozen askari with his sword. Teddy met Dr. Zaius, the lost and hungry missionary. They struck up a fast friendship. The British and Germans advanced aggressively, wiping out two bands of pygmy hunters. The pygmy king was disgusted that his archers couldn't hit anything. He helpfully suggested that they throw away their bows and try stabbing with the pointy ends of the arrows. Then he went over to the box of unused figures and found a native holding a sun umbrella. He placed it next to the king declaring "Rank has its privileges." The Germans used an argument to send poor Roger the Rhino stampeding through the pygmy village, demolishing two huts and trampling the queen and two of her bodyguards. The Belgians offered a truce to the Africans, which was startling since earlier in the turn they had again charged into melee against the fearsome Idi Ameany. Their insincere offer was rejected. Tupac led a force to execute the Elephant which was still terrorizing the sheepish Zanzibaris. The British crossed the river into pygmy land but were forced to stop when an askari was attacked by a crocodile. The Belgians convinced Tiger Jack Moron, the big game hunter, to take a shot at Teddy. He missed, and was wounded by the return fire. At this point several players began secret negotiations using notes and whispered conversations. The results were an unholy alliance between the British and Germans. Apparently neither player had read their character bios, or perhaps they didn't care. Teddy convinced the pygmies that he wasn't after the ivory, he just wanted to shoot animals. He was allowed to advance into their territory with a porter. Teddy used his porter to lure a crocodile out of the river, then he shot it. The crocodile, not the porter. He was so proud of this that his porter wore the carcass like it was a hat. It was that kind of game. The jealous British did the same with the crocodile they killed. Dr. Zaius, now working for the Americans, made a citizen's arrest on Tiger Jack and convinced Jack's guide to lead him back to civilization. The Belgians continued their vain attempt to kill Idi, but he was indestructible. In a fury, he single-handedly charged the remnants of one askari unit and massacred them. The British climbed a hill above the pygmy village, went prone, and started shooting at anything in range. Tupac managed to get some ivory and wound the elephant. The Zanzibaris finally summoned up the courage to shoot at the elephant. Teddy rushed to the scene hoping to get a bullet into the elephant before it died. His plans came apart when the British shot him. And his porter. The British shooting at an American? Nick wasn't interested in role playing today. Teddy managed to stagger on badly wounded. His buddy Tex tried to buy off the German Askari with ivory but they were loyal to their officers. They fought a bloody melee. The Zanzibaris finished off the elephant but, to add insult to injury, the elephant fell on them, squashing two men. The players made one final argument to say what happened after the game. Teddy Ruseavote returned covered in glory due to his hunting exploits, rescuing a missionary, and arresting an attempted murderer. He rode the good PR into the White House, God help us all. The pygmies decided the neighborhood had gone to Hell so they moved deeper into the interior in search of a new valley. Idi Ameany looted the dead and escaped with two beautiful bare breasted women. The Zanzibaris managed to limp home with some ivory, as did the Belgians. The Germans and British annexed the valley, splitting it 50/50. At least until the British can figure out how to double-cross their naive partners. Post Game Analysis The game was a success, everyone had fun. I'd give it a grade of B. TSATF proved to be unsatisfactory and next time I'll return to a simpler and faster set of rules I invented. The players quickly caught on to the argument idea but their arguments were very vanilla. Hopefully they'll be more imaginative next time. I insisted that the players phrase their arguments in a particular way: action, result, up to three reasons. This made my life much easier. Sometimes I coached them so that their arguments would have a better chance of success. I'm pretty sure some of the players didn't read their character bios. Maybe next time I'll have each player read their descriptions out loud or something. Back to Table of Contents -- Matrix Gamer #28 To Matrix Gamer List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2001 by Chris Engle. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com