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Friday 1 April 2016

Lone Wolf - Battle for Magnamund

Something a bit different today and something I was much more excited to receive than chocolate eggs that's for sure!

This not so little beauty (the parcel was huge and pleasingly heavy) was waiting for me when we got back from a very pleasant Easter weekend with the family. Yup - one of the Kick Starters I backed finally came good. Well almost.

Lone Wolf - The Battle for Magnamund was and still hopefully could be a really exciting table top game set in the world of Lone Wolf. Gary Chalk has produced some beautiful new illustrations for both the board pieces and the card miniatures and after a first glance at the rules, the game itself looks like it has plenty of potential.



Like a lot of Kick Starters this one has run into problems. For various reasons it ran over budget and backers have been asked to stump up extra delivery money. Having already bunged a fair bit of cash in already I took the plunge and stumped up. Thankfully the game turned up in good time and I've got to say I was more than happy with the finished product.


There were some extras included for free which go some way to making up for it - the extra board pieces mean that I have rather a large area to play bigger games on - dog included for scale purposes!


Shame there wasn't a river corner piece - if I'm nit-picky.


One reason it went over budget was that the board pieces ended up being printed on much thicker card than had been planned. Despite the extra costs and postage this caused, it has meant that they feel really sturdy and high quality.


I played through the opening scenario with the kids and they managed fine with a bit of help from me, although to be honest the tactical niceties of the game were a bit over their head! Rather than the usual to hit and wound tables, combat and shooting is worked out by comparing weapon types to armour, factoring in other conditions like the presence of heroes, attacking in the flank, etc and coming up with a percentage score to hit. Two D10's are rolled to get a D100 score with successful hits coming in under the necessary percentage. Sounds complicated but works well in the game with only one roll being needed - successful hits kill normal troops outright, whilst heroes and monsters get a wound table to roll on.


So far the card miniatures include Giaks and various evil heroes and wizards like Vonotar the Traitor and Ironhide the Gourgaz. The forces of good are represented by soldiers of Sommerland with familiar heroes like Prince Pelathar and Lone Wolf himself.


Anyone recognise the scene below from a certain Lone Wolf game book?


There was also a metal miniature of Lone Wolf produced which can be seen in the middle of the line up below. He scales up rather nicely with the old Citadel Lone Wolf preslottas.


All in all, I'm glad I backed this Kick Starter thanks to the great quality of the game and its components, although there are still a few products outstanding which will hopefully be fulfilled if and when funds become available...

In the meantime I'm looking forward to exploring the game further and playing through the rest of the introductory scenarios.

8 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. Yeah - looking forward to getting deeper into the game and trying out some bigger engagements.

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  2. I thought about backing this...and then forgot all about it. I really like Gary Chalk's illustrations.... used to have Cry Havoc board game, and I am very interested in finding out more about the early days of Magnamund...when it was still in Joe Dever's head and early Pre-hammer battles.

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    1. Well in a way you dodged a bit of a bullet what with the problems this kick starter ran into but it is a great game. Hopefully it'll come good and we'll see expansion packs and card minis for the rest of Magnamund's armies.

      I heard quite a few folk talking about Cry Havoc - must look than one up some time as it's always remembered fondly.

      The early days of Magnamund would indeed be fascinating to find out about - on a similar note I've always wanted to explore the established world in more detail through the various RPG books available. Other than the original game books and the Greystar books, I haven't really read much.

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  3. Looks great. Is it likely that this will ever see general release?

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    1. I'd love to think so - it'd be great if it became successful so that we saw expansion packs and new armies of card minis. Part of the problem with lack of funds was that they ordered more games than they needed to fulfill the kickstarter so there's plenty of product that actually physically exists - not sure what the plans are for it though...

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  4. Hi Thansants,

    As the kickstarter has ended and as per usual I find out after the fact, do u know how one could get hold of the metal miniature?
    Best regards, Robert

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    1. I guess ebay maybe? I know the remaining board games were sent over to Megara in France which should have included the remaining metal miniatures but I seem to recall the minis went missing. Might be worth getting in touch with Megara?

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