Venitian Who-dunnit!

                             Wednesday 14th November

                                         As a few of you will remember we have partaken in a few games that have taken place in Venice ranging from WW2 through Victorian capers,stopping off with Blake's 7 and even a St Trinian's type bus tour.Well tonight found as back in the city of Carneval but this time in the company of Doctor Who.

Some snapshots of Venice.

                                                This was a game that Colin Jack had picked up on one our forays to Partizan and after painting up all the figures for it ,decided it was time to play through the rules and Dave O'Brien and myself were to help with the playtesting as nobody else in the Gothenburg Gamers was available for selection.

My travelling companions.

And their attributes.

"Don't kick my dog"

                                                The arrangements for the evening were coming to be a bit of a norm at the moment with a couple of turns played before a little excursion to the local inn for a pizza and a foaming ale.The sides were divvied up and I ended up in charge of the fourth doctor who bore a strong resemblance to Tom Baker.He was ably assisted by two glamorous companions,mainly Leela and another Time Lord Romana.Dave O'Brien found himself in charge of the Ice Warriors complete with their Empress of Mars

A female crewed steamboat-only in Colin's world.

Lying at anchor.

And they are still chirping away.

                                               Colin's gang came in the form of the Papal Mainframe complete with Mother Superior Tasha Lem and her headless monks assisted by some Judoon mercenary police.
The object of the game apart from playtesting the rules was the collection of vortex spheres that were scattered around the board so as soon as the whistle blew we all headed off in search of the spheres.
                                 

Colin's headless monks backed up by the Judoon.

Dave's all conquering Ice Warriors.

Coming off a boat -never a Tardis when you want one.

Sneaking down an alley.

"All present and correct ma'am!"

  As usual Dave had malice in mind and proceeded to cover Venice in ice before destroying one of Venice's beautiful bridges with a blast from his mothership due to the use of an event type card hampering my efforts to collect some more spheres. The subject of his advances were Colin's headless monks whom three of his Ice Warriors came into contact with in a Venitian building.These monks were duly done away with giving Dave the opportunity to smirk.In the meantime the rest of Colin's force were sweeping up the spheres on his side of the board and hoping for the opportunity to enact some revenge on the Ice Warriors.They dutifully headed back to their own side of the canal with Colin's Judoon in hot pursuit.

The source of victory.

Rummaging around the docks.

Ambing towards the monks.

"Shall we dance!"

                                                        My Time lord duo were moving around the nearby buildings sweeping up the spheres and visiting some tourist hotspots along the way.Leela had taken advantage of her ambush card and lay hidden hoping to jump out on some unsuspecting lone victim but this was proving hard as all the bad guys and girls were going around in groups,except one-The mother Superior and this one was to be the target of my attention.

"Ha Ha-No one expects the headless monk inquisition!"

The Doc finds success in the San Marco Bell Tower.

The first fisticuff about to start.

Without any success for the monks.

                                                              Colin had delegated his Judoon to follow and waylay the Ice Warriors whilst she left the building of the headless monk debacle and proceeded to claim all the vortex spheres on her side of the river hoping to hold on to them until the end of the game.I had other ideas and as the Doctor and Romana headed over the canal bridge to follow her,she ran away straight into Leela who was waiting in ambush and after a consultation with the rules Leela started to grapple with her albeit to no success.

The ultimate confrontation-or so we thought.

"Oi!Watch you don't stand on my scarf!"

"Surprise!"

                                                      Meanwhile across the canal Colin's Judoon were on a fools errand as one by one they were done away with by Dave's Ice Warriors with even the Empress performing a coup de grace on one of the downed Judoon.Dave duly dispatched all the Judoon with hardly a scratch to himself leaving the Mother Superior left to fend for herself.She disengage from Leela's embrace but couldn't retreat far enough as Leela took aim with her trusty knife and duly brought down her target ending the game there and then.

The beginning!

The end!

Never get in the way of a flying knife.

                                                                 Victory to the Doctor and his companions with Dave sulking in his ice.A good game but another read of the rules is required before the next game which should be next week Napoleonics or Onward to Venus providing.
                                                        All the game parts and figures provided by Colin Jack.
                                                                   

Congratulations to our titanic trio for coming second in the last show of our year.Beaten by the dastardly Leuchers bounders.Revenge will be swift.