"Predator Hunt of 'Cavemen'?" Topic

Sparked by these suggestions:
TMP link
TMP link

How would YOU stage a challenging hunt (assuming you decided to go blades-only, of course)?

CC

How many cavemen per predator? What scenario(s) and circumstances?

CC

As many cavemen as possible, women and children being protected on the move, foraging/hunting. Attack on a cave

Limit the number of kills for the Predator until he has to go and strip the trophies this would give time for the cavemen to regroup etc.

A Predator vs. Cavemen Scenario

Even the oldest member of your tribe can't remember a summer as hot as this one. And to make matters worse, there's a wounded mammoth hanging around the watering hole. Every time your women go out to get water, the enraged mammoth attacks. Several women have been injured, one was trampled to death, and your back-up water skins are emptying fast.

You and the rest of the men of your tribe set out to drive off the mammoth, or to kill it if you can. It's a very dangerous undertaking, but it has to be done. Each warrior carries several flint-tipped spears, as well as knives and chopping tools to carve up the mammoth if you succeed in killing it.

At the watering hole, you find the mammoth's headless and spineless corpse. No one in your tribe has ever seen a beast killed in this manner. The painful wounds in the mammoth's flank, which drove it to madness, appear to have been made with a very sharp flint. You wipe the perspiration from your eyes and call on your ancestors for strength and courage.

You sense rather than see a flickering atop a nearby rock outcropping. As you yell a warning, the ghost moves, and a spear unlike anything you've ever seen before rips into the side of the warrior to your right. You and two other warriors hurl your spears. One of the spears strikes, and you are gratified to see that the ghost can bleed, even if his blood is green. The ghost also stops flickering and becomes visible for a moment. You can see that he is large, larger than the largest member of your tribe, and wears a strange head covering. Then the ghost or demon leaps away, faster than a snake's strike, and you and the other warriors move in pursuit. The real hunt has begun.

This is how legends begin.

++++++++++

The tabletop should be cluttered with a watering hole near one edge and lots of rock outcroppings, trees and bushes, gullies, and so on. Lots of places to hide or spring an ambush.

The cavemen enter on the edge closest to the watering hole and move toward the opposite edge. Off that table edge is the tribe's most sacred place, its burial cave. Also off that table edge, but unbeknownst to the cavemen, is the Predator's well concealed ship (the cavemen could never find it, even if they tried). When they aren't fighting, both parties move in the same direction, toward the cave or ship.

The Predator sets up in secret anywhere around the watering hole.

++++++++++

Each player controls 3 or 4 cavemen – the males in his family group. This includes a juvenile, an adult or two, and the head of the family, a mighty warrior. Rather than run this game as a straight-out free-for-all, give each warrior a specific objective. The juvenile just wants to draw blood and proves he's a man. The wife of one of the adults was killed by the wounded mammoth, and in his grief he just wants to die in battle, preferably taking the Predator with him. The mighty warrior wants to eliminate the Predator as a threat, or see at least two of his family group return home. Things like that, different for each warrior in each family. Using this method, a player can win even if all of his cavemen are killed.

You could even have one of the players, instead of the moderator, playing the Predator. Give him objectives that limit his one-man killing spree – blades only; he can wound the juveniles but not kill them (points deducted if he kills one); he can't kill the heads of any of the families until *all* of the adults are killed or otherwise incapacitated; when he makes a kill he returns to his ship with the head and spine, reappearing a turn or two later; when he takes a major wound he "disappears" to sew himself up, returning a turn or two later; things like that. If at any point he acts dishonorably, game over – the other Predators show up, wag their fingers, and blast him to atoms.

Alternatively, you could have each of the players in turn control the Predator. On the first turn, Player 1 controls his cavemen and the Predator. On the second turn, control of the Predator passes to Player 2, and so on. Obviously, a player isn't going to attack his own cavemen with the Predator; this can help represent the "inscrutability" of some of the Predator's actions, as reflected in the movies and comics. (He could have killed that guy easily; why did he spare him and attack that other group instead?) Give each player victory points for each caveman killed or wounded, or if he performs in a particularly Predator-like manner.

On the turns when the Predator is not present (either polishing his latest trophy or tending its wounds), the tribe keeps moving toward the sacred cave. After a fixed number of turns, or perhaps when a certain condition is met (say, when all of the adults are dead or incapacitated), the tribe makes it to the cave. Give them a free turn to enter, light torches, and get set up, then the Predator enters the cave and the fun begins.

++++++++++

The final battle with the last, strongest cavemen is in the tribe's sacred burial cavern. This should be on a separate table from the watering hole.

The cave is a typical D&D-type cavern complex, with lots of dead ends, pitfalls, unstable rocks to drop on the Predator, and so on. The cave also has some hot springs, lava pools, gas vents, and other such features, confusing the Predator's infrared vision and other senses. Maybe the fumes short out his chameleon effect. Also, the cavemen know every nook and cranny of the cave, while the Predator does not. The low ceilings also minimize the Predators advantages in mobility and maneuvering.

The tribe's dead chiefs are entombed in the cave, along with their weapons, so the cavemen can arm themselves with "powerful" weapons from the past. (The benefit to the cavemen, though purely psychological, should still be tangible – maybe +1 to all attacks.)

You can run this final battle as a "reverse" D&D dungeon crawl, with the remaining cavemen taking the role of weaker "monsters" who know where every trap, secret door, and weapon stash is located, and the Predator as the stronger "adventurer" who has to explore the cave very carefully.

++++++++++

To spice things up, you can add some random animal encounters throughout the game. Maybe the mammoth's herd shows up at the watering hole and attacks everything in sight. Maybe a sabertooth, attracted by the sounds of the wounded mammoth, attacks the Predator. Maybe the tribe encounters a wild boar. Maybe a bear has recently taken refuge in the sacred cave and doesn't appreciate having his hibernation interrupted. Maybe bats in the cave distract the Predator just as he's about to deliver a killing blow. There are many possibilities.

++++++++++

For this scenario, the Predator has no self-destruct mechanism; it's not necessary when the prey is primitive cavemen. If the Predator is killed, his comrades will recover his ship, so there's no need to blow it up. And they will retrieve his body and weapons the next night, even if they are returned to the tribe's home camp. They may also present trophy weapons to all surviving members of the hunt…

++++++++++

Just some ideas off the top of my head. Any other ideas along this line? Am I forgetting anything?

And if one of you does decide to game a similar scenario, post a battle report and photos!

Amazing!
I am speechless. I bought Predators for a relative recently. Now I am definitely getting my own!
CC

WOW! I dont play games much I just like painting figures but Boy that sounds fun. Good job :)

Jpattern,

Thanks for copying the scenario on our group as well!

CC
link

I'm slowly getting my predators painted and ready for this!

CC

Looking forward to the photos, CC.

For some, there's always the Horrorclix AVP Preds:

link

CC

How tall are those HorrorClix Preds anyway?

CC

Too tall for 28mm gaming. They are close to 40mm I think.

It looked pretty big on the original film:

link

If the human figures are around 30-32mm, and the Horrorclix Preds are just under 40mm, they might not be too far off from the 7-8 foot plus it looked like in the film, right?

CC

40mm makes a passable "BIG GUY" compared to 30mm, IMO. It's a bit extreme for close-to-true 25's but should be OK for what you want. In one miniature game I love (Legions of Steel) one race was done at 40mm compared to 32mm for humans and it looks fine.

I dont suppose anyone makes pred figs in 15mm scale? I guess a 20mm would work too, but the 25/28mm are just too big (even for 7-8 foot monsters)

Ground Zero Games make Kra'Vak aliens in 15mm and true 25mm. They're basically Predators, with slightly different equipment – there's power armoured troops, for a start, and guys with rifles.

Thanks Andrew, good idea.

Ive got a pair of (true) 25mm ones painted up, maybe they would work as Big Guys with 15mm Figs

Has anyone tried this theme yet?

CC

Someone has apparently seen the potential of having the Predators show up at different ages in our past:

TMP link

CC

preditors are like 9' tall so they work great with 28mm-30mm for me. I use them aqll the time for my Arnold scenarios.

What would you suggest for minis for the cavemen when using the Horrorclix Predators ?

If the Horrorclix Preds are just under 40mm, the best option might be the Copplestone cavemen/women:

link

If you like them more cartoony, then go with Reaper and Jeff Valent:

link
link
link
link

Copplestone, Reaper and Jeff Valent are all on the tall side (around the 30-32mm mark), so a 40mm Predator sounds about right for them.

Hope this helps.

CC

Cavemen were pretty crafty but, against Predators, I am not too sure if their honed hunting skills would help all that much:

link

CC

Predator hunt of early Americans might also be interesting:

link

CC

QRF makes 15mm Preds. I like the clix Preds. They are very impressive. I have the Gzg ones and they are decent but much smaller.

Thanks,

John