Welcome to my blog, the story of my continuing journey into the World of Zombie Wargames.

Monday 1 October 2018

Prehistoric Rules Review

OK, so I've been taken by Prehistoric games, from well before I started this blog, looking at the few available set of rules and figures which were then available. What put me off was not the rules, as many. back then, were available and still are!
The first set I recollect coming across were the rather good looking "Prehistoric Settlement Rules" from Steve Barber, along with its two supplements, though why ten or so years on they haven't been incorporated into a single rulebook and in PDF form eludes me.
It's a four player set-up, requires a host of figures, 'buildings', terrain and at least a dozen or so animals. Matakishi Tea House showed his set-up  with everything for a game, alas these post seemed to have disappeared from his new site !
The game is a base building exercise and looks very playable with all the elements you'd expect from a decent Prehistoric game. The only gripe I have  with the game is that the food units (food is collected to build anything) are in multiple units of 25 and hundreds of food units are not uncommon. I would immediately convert 25 units to a single one and everything else accordingly. The number (and cost) of the components made this a non-starter for me (at the time) and though the 20mm figures looked fit for purpose they were soon to be replaced by 28mm figures,
I recently bought the "Battles Before Time" PDF for £0.76 from "Wargames Vault", as at the price, I thought it worth a punt. It's from a member of the Yahoo Cavewars group, but wasn't at all what I was expecting - must remember to do a little more research before plunging in.
The Cover was the first thing that made me realise I'd made some sort of awful mistake as it shows an apparent  prehistoric chariot pulled by two beasts of undetermined origin. Quickly moving on to the contents - the first thing I noticed was points! Yes, you make your force up using points and I'm no great fan of any point-based games! I stopped reading after the mechanic used for just about everything was drawing counters (stones) from a sack - I'd get pretty bored after the first half dozen times especially when a D10 could do just the same thing.
I didn't mention movement  - which is done by finger lengths, hand widths, spans etc.
OK, so it's a fantasy set of rules, there's magic, Orcs (of course), dinosaur men and lot more that leaves me cold.


Moving on to one of the latest games on the market "Palaeo Diet - Eat or be Eaten" ( not the greatest of titles imho). I was drawn to this set of rules by many of my fellow bloggers inspiring reports of their own games.  Much of its content is reminiscent of similar games and the rules are very simplistic, using D6's, but is none the worse for it. The key mechanic to the game is probably movement, where one throws up to three dice (players choice), for the number of actions one has to use and the animals react to your successes or failures.
Other games, of course, have animal reactions (they shouldn't really just stand there and have spears thrown at them!) but the variation of the actions of both the hunters and the hunted are varied and apt for many different situations, such as the presence of fire or shouting etc.
So, being taken with the game, I've ordered the four Caveman sets from "Copplestone" (via North Star of course) and I'm now looking at further orders from, Arcane Scenery and Steve Barber for the animals, but there's no reason why I can't try a practice game using what I already have for 'Jimland'.  
There are several other sets of rules out there, "Tusk" is now available in PDF (and now much more attractive), sounds very similar to others, but the Lost World type of game with guns etc. put me off when I first looked at these rules (and it wasn't the all-singing-all dancing glossy version).
 "Saurian Safari", I also looked at, but again Dinosaur hunting by men with guns doesn't really get my juices flowing.
There are several other rulebooks out there, that all have their pluses:
Looks fun, but I didn't want to fight "battles"
Another set, now in it's second edition
I'll obviously be posting more about this genre as I put together this project, but I haven't got a target date in mind and I'll write a more comprehensive review of Paeleo Die tin a future post.

In other news, I've had a renewed interest 'Adventuring in Jimland' after interest from a fellow blogger and his interest in participating in my game. I have a lot of ideas, stimulated by his input, but nothing concrete yet, though the old brain is working overtime thinking all my ideas through.

So that's it for another week, thanks for taking the time to visit and as always your comments are welcomed and appreciated.



22 comments:

  1. Very interesting Joe & I look forward to your take on the cavemen, you've lots to keep busy with :)

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    1. Thabks Frank, the Copplestone fiugres are more Hollywood than anything near historical, but I do like them!

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  2. This is a period I have never played. That of course means I want to. I shall see how you get on and no doubt if time/space/money allow be but a few steps behind. I have no problem walking in the shadows of giants!

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    1. Haha, you certainly know how to cheer me up. I've been Hooked by all the excellent games on Vagabond's and C6's blogs!
      As for giants, I'm now at lwast 3cm shorter than I was teb years ago - something else about agibg that they didn't warn you about.

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  3. Ah, Settlement - that's a blast from the past!

    I have played it a few times and it has an interesting base premise. I'd add to your comments just this: I found the building progression/technology tree to have very little choice in it. Basically, we built the same things in the same order in every game.

    Personally, I'd love to see an updated version of the game with a bit more flexibility - there aren't many miniatures "god games" out there...

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    1. C6,I agree with everthing you've said. The very detailed (iirc) report from Matakishi seemed the sameas your experience.
      I think Settlements, in addition to needing a single volume and a PDF version could do with a re-write too. I found the layout very mixed.
      As you say there aren;t that many base-building wargames out there and I can't even think of one.

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  4. Sounds good. Not a genre i've had an interest in to game myself. Though I do need some Cavemen for 7TV for some reason. lol!

    Lucid Eye make some great Cavemen as well if your after more. antediluvian miniatures

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    1. Thanks Brummie, I can easily see their use in 7TV as well as Lost World scenarios (IHMN ?).
      Lucid Eye has both Cro-Magnons and Neanderthals as wellas other more exotic figures, some of whom I can see being used in this and other games.

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  5. Some nice figures to be had in this period!

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    1. Thanks AL,you're right, but I wish there were a lot more choice.

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  6. It'll be interesting to see what you come up with, as you say to start any hunter/hunted would do a starter. I was watching a review of tribal the other day, it looks novel but a bit contrived, there is I believe a spin off called primeval.
    I had heard good things of tusk but never seen the rules so can't comment.
    I agree with Simon the lucid eye range has some nice figures, I have the Neanderthals but they are for a cold climate whereas Copplestone are a warm one.

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    1. Haha, I'll be getting some of the Lucid Eye figures - eventually, but first I do need to get some animals to humt!
      Tribals and Primeval I havem't yet read reviews of but just the Warfare element put me off (plus the contrived honour thing).

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  7. Look forward to seeing your new project come alive mate. Even more heartening is your new found enthusiasm for Jimland!

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    1. Thanks dGG, my prehistoric interest has always been there, it just needed a spark to get it going.
      Jimland has also had a boost, as mentioned above, as a sort of competition and one sorted I'll be posting about it here (and hopefully so will another blogger!).

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  8. Looking very very good! Waiting for more ! :)

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    1. Thanks you Michal, I'm waiting too - for the figures to arrive.

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  9. I wish you safety in your new adventure(s).

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    1. Thanks Jay, but I reckon it'll be some time before that happens!

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  10. Sounds like a fun project, more figures is always great and nice to hear Jimland might be back sooner than expected!
    Best Iain

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    1. Thanks Iain, retail therapy certainly works !
      My interest in Jimland, though not entirely depleted had had a much needed boost of purpose, more later,

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  11. I wonder which set of rules you thought had the best campaign element to it?

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    1. Good Question David, my thoughts are always to campaigns in any rule-set I look at. I jew that Palaeo had campaing possiblities and character characteritics (Settlement is a campaign game in itself), which I think is a good starting point and enables some light roleplay elements. I dislike major character progression in most tabletop games - just tracking many changing abilies , special abilites etc. I find to be tedious at times. The current trend seems to be to have a swathe of various abilites on cards for each figure - something I find annoying, having to rmemeber and more often than not, to look up rules for.
      Having not had much extensive experience with the many rule sets, I plumpted for the one that other bloggers (Vagabond and Colgar6 specifically) have found to be usable and enjoyable without too much fuss. I've been writing /amending and changing rules for well over forty years for tabletop games and will no doubt be looking at writing some form of extended campaign rules too.

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