Millions of years ago, a gigantic alien spacecraft crash landed on prehistoric Earth. In time, it became buried deep underground. So sturdy was the ship though, that it still retained some function. The mighty reality-warping engines that folded space to propel it through the void still had power. Gradually, the buildup of tachyons and other exotic energies leaked into the surrounding rock and permeated the spacecraft. Every doorway and rip in the hull became a possible doorway to other times and places on Earth. These doorways often manifested deep inside caves.
Dinosaurs wandered into caves in their time, and found themselves inside the vast alien spacecraft. They wandered until they passed through another doorway which exited through a cave in the badlands of the American West, circa 1879. Cowboys being cowboys, they immediately roped and broke as many of the critters as they could. The local indian tribes also had great luck adopting some of the largest predatory "Thunder Lizards."
A scientist, Professor Explosivo, investigated the cave of origin of these beasts and found himself in the spaceship. In his explorations, he discovered a machine that boosted his intelligence ten times, enabling him to build amazing automatons to serve him. Of course, he was also made hopelessly insane.
The Prof. was not the only one to find the brain-booster. A pack of raptor dinosaurs also accidentally ended up being raised in intelligence to human level. They took to guns, robbery and rustling like entelodonts to slop. Now the Raptor Gang is one of the most feared groups of outlaws in the west.
The indians of the area have seen signs that a gigantic predatory thunder lizard has entered the area. Their chief and bravest warriors long to count coup on this monster to prove their bravery.
Now, all at once, Professor Explosivo and his automatons, a posse of lawmen led by famous ranger Rhett Lawmaster, a group of dino-rustlers known as the Dino-Gang, the Raptor-Gang, an away team of aliens searching for their lost ship, and a warband of indians with their hunting lizards have all met at the cave leading into the alien craft and from there to the past. Who will control the cave?
Pictures start here:
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They are all in my larger Weird West Flickr set, so look around.
What happened? Professor Explosivo started out controlling the cave entrance, but after a turn was surprised to find stampeding sauropods crushing his automatons from behind.
The aliens spent much of the game making and breaking alliances with the other factions, somehow avoiding getting killed in the process.
The lawmen were…ineffectual except for the sabertooth riding sidekick wounding an automaton.
The outlaws tried to sneak around, but the indians sneaked up on them and their hunting lizards killed all their dismounted minis in one round.
The Raptor Gang got kind of shot up at first, but then the psionic raptor managed to mind control a sauropod and step on Professor Explosivo.
When Gwangi (a giant red T-Rex)emerged from the cave he sowed chaos around the board. The indians saw their chance for great honor. They all managed to engage Gwangi, touch him and ride away without being eaten. Which was pretty damn lucky! Fortunately for them, Gwangi was distracted by some annoying lawmen who were trying to climb on him.
In the end, the clearest victor were the Indians, who accomplished their goal with no casualties. But, the aliens entered the cave on the last turn, skirting the triceratops that had just emerged. So they managed to enter their lost ship.
Rules were Savage Worlds Showdown, a perfect ruleset for this kind of mayhem.
Thanks to all the players, including Coggon and Sherifflee from here on TMP. Also Coggon's kids and their friend and Jim, who played the indians perfectly.
After the game pics are some detailed pics of most of the minis used during the game.
Starting here:
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I had lots of fun doing all the conversions. This game finally got me to finish some stuff that had been on the shelf for about 5 years. And I've still got more unfinished stuff to use in the sequel.
