1927: Following rumors of a hidden valley of giant reptiles in a remote corner of New Mexico, famed explorer Ray Carter discovers a place where time has stood still! Along with the headstrong naturalist Natalie Nichols, bumbling engineer Chuck Packer, a small contingent of U.S. soldiers, and his faithful mutt Bones, Carter vows to prove his discovery to a skeptical scientific community by bringing back specimens dead or alive—including the dreaded "king" of the valley, Giganoto!
So I've been getting backing into gaming after a LONG pause. I re-learned two things: 1) I still can't paint worth a darn, and 2) as long as the minis look good while squinting from a distance, I don't care.
Anyway, this was a fun scenario I created on the fly for Ganesha Games' Palaeo Diet Pulp, based on the "To Kill the King" scenario from the book. However, I ignored the scenario's turn limit and I thought I equipped my party with enough firepower to do the job – I was almost wrong.
(And yes, this scenario was inspired by The Valley of Gwangi. I thought of it as a sequel of sorts.)
The goal for Carter was to kill or capture one Styracosaur and the Giganotosaurus (aka "Giganoto") that ruled the valley. My engineer was carrying explosives, but I ruled that they were bombs filled with knock-out gas, so if he delivered the "killing" blow, the animal was knocked out instead. (This had no effect on gameplay. It was just roleplaying.) There was a small herd of Styracosaurs—two adults, two sub-adults, and one juvenile – that I treated as large grazers although I lowered their stats a bit, because there were five of them and they were not the main objective. There were also three Dimetrodons I classified as pack predators but they ultimately played no part in the game.
I got off a good start. I took down two Stryacosaurs without taking any wounds, with Carter's dog Bones making the kill in one case. However, I got a taste of what was to come: My engineer, Chuck (get it?), moved in to throw a gas bomb at one of the dinos. It landed short, so he was caught in the blast. I rolled a six, meaning I had to roll again, and sure enough I rolled a five – Chuck was taken out on his very first attempt to throw a bomb. (Technically he wasn't dead, just knocked out, but there was no way to revive him).
Meanwhile, the baby Stryacosaur separated from the herd and made a straight line toward Giganoto. I know the rulebook says the baby would run around the dinosaur but I ruled that if the little guy made base-to-base contact, then Giganoto could perform an attack to scoop up the baby and eat him. Sure enough, that's what happened. It added a nice touch of menace to the game.
Now it was time to attack Giganoto. I got off to a good start by landing two hits again him early. Sadly, after that he sent my adventures fleeing in every direction with a series of roars. Carter's "faithful" mutt Bones ended up running out of the playing area, removing him from the game. So did my only solider with an SMG. Soon Giganoto was killing adventures left and right, starting with two of my soldiers and then Natalie Nichols (whose naturalist ability, unfortunately, never came into play). All the corpses distracted him, allowing Carter and my last solider to get VERY lucky with a series of shots. The solider delivered the killing blow with his rifle, giving Carter a nice trophy to show off if nothing else.
Final tally: Three dead adventures, a cowardly dog and soldier who fled into the desert, and a groggy engineer who wakes wondering where everyone went.
