Sunday 1st December.
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| Our venue in all its frosty glory. |
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| Good advice-Keep Calm and Swim Faster! |
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| Part of our venue interior with great views across the River Forth. |
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| A bit over the top painting of Prince Charlie. |
Welcome to our first pirate extravaganza for three years.The Garvald film Studios outside broadcast found us in a rather frosty Prestonpans ready to have another day of shooting and looting in true pirate style.We had come together in the Gothenburg pub to bring the true spirit to xmas by eradicating any connection to the actual festival.This came from our sometimes compatriot Jim Conquer deciding that decimating any living creature both physical and spiritual meant he wouldn't be getting visited by three ghosts on xmas eve as he had annihilated them before the morning's play was over and that was before he started on Santa.
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| Jim ponders the demise of Santa whilst Donald is just Donald. |
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| Martin reading his orders from Bart-pity it is in Polish1 |
Eight of us gathered and after the usual early repast of bacon rolls and coffee we settled down to divvying out the pirates and boats.The rules we used were our late departed good friend Shug Wilson's home made rules consisting of a couple of A4 sheets.These were complemented by a basic ship to ship set of rules devised by our rule guru Bill Gilchrist and these were all the rules we needed for a great day's gaming.
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| Graveyard Island . |
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| Donald bullies Ian. |
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| H.M.S Bounty-my ship.I,would have preferred H.M.S Snickers. |
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| Hanging a pirate. |
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| Local Port-Au-Pans transport. |
The morning cast off with everybody heading for their boats and the chance to quickly get their treasure horde increased.Jim Conquer started as he meant to go on by invading Christmas Island which was a snow bound island home to Santa and his many kinfolk including his helpers,abominable snowmen and reindeer.Colin complete with his all female crew(what a surprise)headed for the nearby island Isla del Diablo hoping to increase his girls'trinket horde.Oor Bart and Martin seemed to have divvied up the Cornish island as they seemed to be having a thorough search of all the houses and buildings in order to increase their holdings without having a difference of opinion between them.Bill headed out to the cattle infested volcanic island situated in the middle of the sea hoping to make sure that beef was on the menu.The first set of fisticuffs took place between Ian Carter's pirates and Donald's redcoats and by the look of it Ian was on a hiding to nothing and that was to be the case as Ian's pirates were whittled down and he ended up the first participant to lose his gang.We had a rule to regenerate gangs if they disappeared and Ian was given a new gang randomly placed on the table but he ended up appearing like a Xmas turkey between Jim and Colin.From the frying pan into the fire.My plan was to head for the graveyard infested island and see what the pickings were.Not a lot.After digging deep I was rewarded with 30 dublooms,Wowee!
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| Jim's pirates taking on the ghosts of Xmas Present and Yet to Come backed up by a yeti. |
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| Christmas Island. |
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| Welcome to Cornwall. |
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| Bart comes ashore. |
Jim decided to invade Christmas Island and came face to face with a yeti.This was quickly despatched but was replaced by the sight of Dicken's three ghosts coming towards him.He had a quick scrap with him and done away with the Ghost of Xmas Past.I think he was hoping to do away with any sign of Xmas.Probably to save his own Xmas spending.Colin meanwhile had invaded the other side of Christmas Island and was doing away with all of Santa's helpers,candy canes and all.Both the invaders helped themselves also to the reindeer who were also inhabiting Christmas Island,obviously hoping for a nice barbeque.
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| Bart ponders his plan. |
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| Skull Island. |
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| "Where's Poldark when you need him?" |
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| Donald's men come a hunting! |
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| Mysterious Island sans wizard. |
Lunch time arrived and we all headed to the bar to enjoy some ale and some tasty lunch.My eldest daughter arrived with my two youngest granddaughters curious to see what grandad gets up too.They had a peruse to see what the game was like but decided that Mac & Cheese was more appetising than silly granddad's game.Little did they realise the reindeer used were from their toybox!Granddad's revenge!The grandchildren left shortly after that meaning I could get back to supervising all the cuthroats in attendance.
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| Pirate booty! |
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| My crew acting up. |
The afternoon session started with all the participants who had kidnapped or taken any prisoners being recompensed for their booty in order to replace any shortcomings in enemies.Christmas Island was now restocked and Jim decided to head for Santa's grotto only to come face to face with a penguin.Jim's glee soon turned to dismay when he was told the penguin was an exploding penguin and the resulting explosion done away with one of his scurvy knaves.that'll teach him to mess with Santa.Colin was dividing his attention between clearing the Devil's Island of all it's treasure as scouring the frozen wastes of Christmas Island for any booty.Once again some bad guys(or this time bad girls)got too near an exploding penguin and bye bye to one of Colin's harem.Ian had legged it onto his boat and was heading for the safety of the high seas albeit temporary.
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| Ian needs some booty. |
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| Jim catches me awares. |
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| Martin and Bart's boats doing not a lot. |
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| Colin's means of transport. |
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| Bill goes cattle rustling. |
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| Martin's pirates cutting the wheat from the chafe. |
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| Graveyard Island getting busy. |
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| Colin ponders. |
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| King Kong goes gagga! |
On the other side of the table it was a tad quiet as Bart and Martin didn't seem to be getting in each other's way making me think there was a stitch up going on as I at least expected Bart to be on a killing spree but obviously he had other plans.Donald after dispatching(with a sinister cackle) Ian's motley crew invaded the peaceful Mysterious Island and plundering it of its wares.Bill just seemed to be wandering aimlessly,both spiritually and physically,around Volcano Island obviously hoping to add to his cattle haul.
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| Jim prepares to board my boat. |
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| The gorillas looking for some primatial revenge. |
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| Bill p****s off the natives. |
As the afternoon moved on we headed for the crunch encounters both on land and sea.Before this finale Colin had landed on Skull Island and had taken a few shots at King Kong.He wounded it resulting in Kong being p****d off and heading for Colin's moored boat but this ended being short and sweet as the ship's crew done away with Kong rather swiftly.Colin then turned on the smaller gorillas and wiped them out.So much for animal conservation.
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| Ian moves in for revenge on jim. |
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| And prepares to board. |
Jim's cuthroats had had enough of Santa and his elves and had embarked his gang and had headed to the sunnier climes of Skull Island much to my chagrin as I had landed there in order to try and increase my booty but only ended up with 60 doubloons and some smelly underwear.Not my day.To add insult to injury after a quick broadside from his main guns and a fusillade of musket fire my lads headed for Davy Jones's locker to keep Ian's crew company.My replacement crew materialised beside Cornish Island but Bart and Martin just shrugged and got on with their uneasy alliance.Jim sent a prize crew onto my ship and this go well for him for as soon as Ian had searched for booty from Graveyard Island, he cast off and headed for revenge against Jim's new flotilla.
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| Bill looks for a way out. |
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| Donald invades another innocent island. |
Bill meanwhile was whiling away his time by herding his rustled cattle aboard his ship when he annoyed the local natives and ended up losing one of his men under a hail of arrows.That's what you get for p****g of the natives.Bart and Martin were still looting Cornwall even to the extent of kidnapping priests and governor's daughters and fetching a good price for them.I had a fair idea there and then who was going to be the victor.
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| Some more of the Goth's paintings. |
The final skirmishes took place between Jim and Ian with some shooting and some bad words between them eventually ending up with a score draw.Donald had shifted his attentions and was headed to Volcano Island to indulge in some skulking no doubt.Colin was cleaning up on Skull Island whilst Jim and Ian were knocking five spots out of each other and Bart was sitting at the other end of the table with a smile bigger than the Cheshire Cat.
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| Bart as his character |
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| And Bart in the flesh-one better than the last time. |
Yes the game was won by Bart after all the ill-gotten gains were totaled up.He did state after he was going to be like Switzerland and just hoard which is totally different from his usual style of play which is kill,kill,kill!
A great time seemed to be had by all and the chance to get together and play a not too serious game.My thanks to all who turned up and also to the the staff of The Goth who went out of their way to pander to our every whim.
See you all soon I hope as we are hoping to indulge in one of Comrade Bill's concoctions and also finish the gaming year with a couple of seasonal indulgences.
