Random Solo Gaming: It Happens.

Katie Mae and her twin Uzi's! Perfect against an onslaught of Aliens!

        I have met quite a few wargamers out there over the years, and lot of people have told me how lucky I was to play so many games. A good portion of these games are played between my wife and myself. Our friend, Danny helps with this as well. However, I am aware that not everyone gets to see fellow gamers in their area, because there might not be any or just bad timing. This is when I see those "Solo Games" being posted on Facebook game groups and such. Well, I am here to tell you that even I am not immune to such games. I played this one the other night!
        Originally, I wanted to test out some ideas on some Aliens attacking humans trying to escape for dear life. The Zombicide game that we have played the weekend before made me wonder why similar rules had not been adopted to other areas of fantasy for, say, convention games. I like the whole idea of never ending threats that players would have to escape to win the game. The whole cooperative part was interesting to me, since it is possible to win. Or......it could play out like the Oregon Trail game! I like to call that particular game: "The Lord Hates You, So Give Up On Life" game. It should be in all Caps, but that is just slightly how I feel about that video game. And it is also a card game. We own it!
       So I turned to my trusty Xenomorphs and the Hassel Free Miniatures that Kalissa and I bought for my future Sharknado Game I keep forgetting about. August 4th should be a good reminder! At Historicon, we did not pick up the newer Aliens Vs. Predator Version 2 game. I am sure there are some improvements from the first game. But I wanted a reason to set up a jungle board and to play with these models. Kalissa was on board with this at first, but then, a surprise visit from her parents interrupted that. It was a pleasant visit, but wiped out my wife. Hence, my late night self decided to play a game without her.
      The basic idea was to try to get as many people to the town location. If I had some Modern Special Forces, I would have whipped out the Predators and called the game "Get to the Chopper!" However, along the way, there are various spawning points for Aliens. They are set off like land mines that can spawn as many as six Aliens at a time! The good news is that most of the characters are packed with something useful. All, except for the one I named after myself armed with a chainsaw. He had the same issues as I do in most games I play: he rolled terribly! He was the first to go carried off by the Xenomorphs to hug a friendly Face Hugger! At least, he killed one Alien. Every one of the other characters figured out how to kill at least ten, except for Bob. Bob was the character with a baseball bat and a jug of moonshine. Since movement was based on a D6 roll at the normal and 2D6 at a run, Bob could only move at a normal move with a D6 and a random direction die, since he was rated as drunk. He sobers up and moves as normal on a roll of a natural six. He was definitely one that did not make it in the end.
       Either way, for a solo game, I did surprisingly enjoy it. I played and watch the first two Robocops. "I'd buy that for a dollar!" Over 100 Xenomorphs met their demise in the end. Three charaters made it out before I called it a night. What I learned from my idea was that I can use this in a smaller more detailed board in space. Kalissa and I were play testing for a future AVP game that was similar to this concept to what I played. However, someone had broke the confidential agreement that cancelled the game production. The figures that we could have got for free for play testing purposes are (Surprise!) the ones for the new AVP 2 game! Plus, Fox went a different direction with the franchise based on Alien: Covenant. Okay movie, but screws a bunch of timelines. Anyway, here are some more picture of yours truly playing a solo game! Enjoy!
 

The board. I am not sure why I do not join the Darkside and play more Pacific Theater stuff. 

Other side. This was a commission work for the mat. He wanted a jungle theme, so I picked a more red clay color for dirt trails, since it cover more possible conflict areas involving deep jungle. It is interesting to hear people's reaction to the question of  "which jungle are they wanting to model?" 

Happy Trails of Doom!

Village side

Some Marines. I made the "Smart Gun" pretty bad ass! However, not so good in close encounter combat.

Some Civilians: Katie Mae; The drunk, Bob; and Katlynn, a stripper with a Katana Blade!

Even this Alien is like: "What gives, drunk dude?"

Lots of Aliens and I still have 30 more I have not built somewhere in the house hold.

The landing pad to safety.