Entropy City: Making a Wargame

Honestly I’ve never written a battle report before but given that during every episode of the XLBS that OnTableTop do Gerry eventually makes a sly remark about how more people should write them I am giving into this imaginary peer pressure, potentially embarrassing myself and I am trying to write a battle report. Is this an exercise in writing Entropy? If so its appropriate, welcome to Entropy City’s first Battle report.

Firstly for those that are not aware Entropy City is a miniatures game I started developing in June last year, a game I’d been planning to develop for at least 9 years prior to that, Entropy City is a motorcycle gang wargame where the criminal element have gained control over the city, currently in its 2nd phase of testing we begin with 5 bikes per side, teams that are completely even, this game is taking place on the streets, most test games are remaining on city streets at this stage but future testing will push the game into other environments on the city limits.

We started the game by each player rolling for deployment and team 2 wins out with a 8 vs 4, our second role was a 9 vs a 1 and team 2 chose to go first, the very first move that team 2 makes is to set up their shotgun rider in front of the overpass, taking a stop action and choosing to put them into overwatch in the hope that someone takes the chance for the shortcut to pay off. Team 1 sends their knuckleduster rider out to the left trying to set up an attack in turn 2 if someone can get close to her within turn 1 then she will attack back if possible. From here the next movement is from the rider with the lead pipe from team 2 who comes along on the same side but isn’t close enough for an attack, team 1 is back and this time it’s their shotgun rider who comes around on the left side, they choose not to stop however and take the risk with an shot at speed 2 and the rider holding the lead pipe is within range. Sadly with only a 16 he wasn’t able to hit the rider however with the experimental rule the shot is close enough to give the rider stress 2. Up next is the knuckle duster rider from team two who stops just infront of his shot gun wheeling friend and then team 1 brings their hammer rider around on the right hand side of the board to try and set something up in turn 2. The chain riders from both teams and a hammer rider joining her on that side keeping everything generally safe team two and team 1 joining her and we finish with the hammer rider on that side of the field to end turn 1. The very last movement of turn 1 however is where team one decides to take a risk, hoping that the partial cover from a car will give them enough luck to pull off a risky move down the centre hoping to steal the first activation in turn 2 to smack their opponent up the side of the head with their lead pipe. Needing a 17 to hit and succeeding on a 21 he gets a lethal shot and the 20 from the lead pipe biker isn’t enough to save it, take risk of pushing their luck one more time and crash out of the game with a final score of 26 to end turn 1 with one rider down.

Turn 2 begins with team 1 scoring first turn with 6 vs 4, the first activation brings team 1’s shot gun rider around the corner to take a shot at the opposing rider’s gun hoping to take it out before it causes any further damage but he misses, needing an 18 and not getting enough to make any impact. From here I starting keeping track of the game at the end of the road instead of every activation, at the end of turn 2 team two had lost another rider and it was their hammer however they had also managed to take out one of their opponents rider as well leaving the current forces at 4 vs 3 in team 2’s favour, that wasn’t all however as team 1’s chain rider was stunned and at risk of crashing out at the very start of turn 3 if things didn’t go well.

The very first activation of turn 3 brought things to a more even keel as the stunned rider shook off their condition and then hit one of their opposing riders from behind for a surprise attack, this pushed the opposing rider to max stress and they failed their dodge to crash out of the game. During turn 3 team 2’s shotgun rider had reloaded his weapon the overpass in the centre of the board was a danger zone at this point with 1 bike from each team having been taking out underneath it, the right hand side of the board was in a similar situation by the end of turn 3 with 3 bikes littering the road and as we moved into turn 3 one rider on team 1 was going to be facing off against two from the opposing team and team 2 had the first activation, one rider had just focused to reduce their stress and brought their knuckleduster rider around to join their friend but team 1’s shotgun rider came from behind attempting to hit their opposing shotgun rider with the butt of their gun (as he was out of ammo) however the attack failed meaning it only stress the rider and was not enough to take them out, from there the shotgun from team 2 came to a stop, focused their shot and pulled the trigger. The final roll from team 2 was a 19 giving them a lethal shot if successful, team 1 rolling a 16 was not going to be enough so they pushed one last time and busted taking themselves out of the game. The battle that had started with 10 bikes ended with only 2, two friends riding off into the streets together having defended their territory from the invading rival gang.

Once the attacks had started they really didn’t stop in this game but from the very moment their rider was taken out early on it felt like team 1 was on the backfoot and was taking a few risks, they almost turned it around a couple of times but ultimately the dice never really was enough to take control of the game leaving team 2 with the victory.

And that’s the game, its fast paced back and forth action with your most almost always on the move, stopping isn’t something you do often as it leaves you vulnerable if someone can get to you while its happening. A fun game at home inbetween other things it went well but theres a lot more testing to get done, phase 3 will be giving the forces their skills and then getting them to balance but we’re not quite ready for that yet.