A Squalid Little Affair - or Tales from the Trod

A slight diversion this week as the Gurk of Middle March took us all reiving. This was something of a playtest and the culmination of the Gurk's never-ending search for a set of rules to use with his (very nice) Border Reiver collection.
The rules in question were 'A Fistful of Lead' and despite their obvious western origins did give a passable representation of this level of warfare.

The McSwiss vs the Ridleys

Each of the five players fielded a band of 5 reivers in one big free for all. Obviously an actual  scenario would have been better but this was simply a learning exercise to get to grips with the game mechanisms. Said mechanisms were reasonably quick to pick up and were driven by a very clever card activation system. One of the player's commented afterwards, 'Well that was fast and furious'. For myself I was impressed enough to purchase the rules.

At one end of the table the McSwiss took on the Ridleys in an unseemly brawl. [Why Ridley?, you may well ask. Well it's a family name and also one of the so-called 'riding names'. Who knows, I may have actual reiver blood in me!]
At the far end of the table things were a bit more circumspect, with the Elliots taking on the McQuinces, whilst Kinmont Jimmie and his men dug in behind a wall.

The last of the Ridleys succumb under a pile of markers

There is virtually no book keeping required although the number of on table markers can be a bit of a problem. Still, this was a first try out and I'm sure this sort of thing can be tidied up.

Hopefully we will be seeing more of these reiver chaps in the future.