SS&SS: Through the Badlands With Emil, Part 1

It has been a long dry summer, also in the gaming department, but today, at last, I had an appointment with Emil for an introductory game of Sellswords & Spellslingers.

As usual, for a new player's first game, I set up the table for the scenario Through the Badlands. Get your party off the opposite table edge, fairly simple, right?

Well the God of Dice did not quite agree, but I shall elaborate on that in due course.

On my advice, Emil had made a party of three Player Characters:

• Leonides, Barbarian with Two-Handed Sword
• Christina, Wizard with Fireball
• Quake, Ranger with Longbow

I fielded my usual suspects, Shaggram the Terrible, Rhagador the Righteous, Finghal the Sober, and Argesïl the Cunning.

The initial setup after random placement of the initial Foes:

Emil won the Initiative Roll, and started out rather cautiously.

I rolled three Activation Dice for all my Characters, and of course I triggered some Events - It started raining, among other things.

Quake managed to snap his bowstring on his second attempt to hit the Orc Brute near the board edge. while Christina fried a couple of Orcs.

Argesïl decided to pilfer the smoking corpses, while the remaining Orc charged Leonides and died horribly for it.

Shaggram moved in position, but failed to cast his Fireball, and Rhagador was assailed by an Orc Brute, Finghal running to his aid.

Christina peppered the lone troll with Fireballs, and Leonides followed up, quickly dispatching the hulking monster.

Finghal charged home and helped Rhagador get rid of the brute pest, while Shaggram went for something shiny in the shrubbery.

Argesïl was busy picking up the spoils of war.

The Brutes closed in on Leonides' party, and much slashing ocurred. The rain stopped, but to no real relief, as the only bow on the table was already broken...

Argesïl went for the Troll carcass, while Shaggram picked up some jewelry from the bushes.

Rhagador, having suffered some wounds by the now dead Orc Brute, patched himself up a bit and followed Finghal.

Leonides was overwhelmed by Orc Brutes and had to bite the dust - his companions could only watch with dismay.

Shaggram doubled forward, muttering an incantation, but the Spell failed, and the second attempt drained the magical energies from his body!

Rhagador was ambushed, but quickly dispatched the Orc rabble coming at him, while Argesïl ducked and weaved to escape another ambush.

Things were looking rather bleak at this point - one Tank, one Missile, and one Spellcaster out of the equation, already, and we were only about half way through the table...

Will the heroes overcome their hardships and get through the Badlands alive?
I shall continue this tale tomorrow, if everything goes to plan...