The Wardens of History

Earth as we know it is threatened, but not now, in the past! Since the discovery of time travel and the translocation gene, you have been worried about the possible threats. Now those threats are being realised, and if the small team of specialists you have brought together can’t keep us safe, the world will suddenly change, and we will never realise it! This is a war, but one we never imagined, and the fight will take us throughout history, and even to alternatives we never imagined!

[These rules sprang from a desire to play a campaign against lots of different figures across history and the fantastical without creating a new rule set every time, or maybe it was just a good excuse to collect and paint a whole bunch of different figures, either is completely legitimate a desire I’m sure.]

The Translocation Gene is very rare so when anomalies are spotted a team has to be pulled together from the most appropriate group that can be found, including some general military types, as well as the specialists.

First up is our Warden, David “Sinjin” St John, a suave historian with a sardonic wit, who has been given a choice of three of the nine possible specialists currently available. Selecting carefully from the choices of Linguist, Inventor, Medic, Martial Artist, Weaponsmith, Sniper, Spy, Action Hero, and Archeologist he chooses the key members of his new team; Dr Margaret “Mags” Stanton (Medic), the enigmatic Tibetan “Tiger” Li (Martial Artist), and the tough guy Steve “Bruiser” Barnes (Action Hero).

The final six members of the team are their “security”, there to deal with the local hirelings who will be trying to defeat the Warden and his team before they can stop the timeline being broken by whatever nefarious plot is being cooked up by the adversaries. Lead by experienced traveller Aidan “Alpha” O’Brien, the rest are only known by their call signs, though Beta is a genial history buff and Zeta is a young and very raw recruit.

[These are all metal figures from Crooked Dice, I really like them for one-off figures, they also took on some of the Otherworld minis when he retired, you will have seen some in my Fantasy stuff.]

The Arc

“Heads up Warden, this is a bad one! Someone seems to think it is fun to genetically engineer terrible beasts and release them back in time. Of course, when the locals notice, things will get entirely out of hand. We don’t think it’s some dastardly plan to actually achieve a timeline disruption, so we can’t spare multiple teams mopping them up. Which means it’s down to yours.”  

[I have decided to play Story Arc 4, and in this arc someone thinks it is highly amusing to pick points of Earth’s history and actually release the kind of horrifying creatures that the people of the time apparently believed in. In fact you could argue that they were at least partially successful and that’s how the myths started in the first place!]

Game 1 - Warden, scramble your team, something strange is running loose, and we need you to play at animal control. 

I had already decided I want to table some Vikings for this one, while the monster type is “Winged” so I’m using a Pegasus, and I rolled Woodland for the table.

Arrival - Well, I have a new team to break in and the bosses have sent us back to the dark ages to find out why there are myths about a flying horse popping up. As always with a new team, it’s a struggle deciding who to take, but as three of the team are still in basic time travel training, I am taking Mags and Tiger along to see what they can do, with three of the security team; Beta, Epsilon, and Zeta. We approached the area of the most recent sighting, dressed in viking garb with Epsilon and Zeta packing bows, Beta and I with swords and shields, and Mags and Tiger playing at being simple folk. 

Round 1 - We began trying to track down anyone we could talk to and eventually spotted someone, but they seemed aggressive towards us?

Round 2 - Beta fanned out to our left and spotted a more sensible looking fellow, but then an armed man sprang from behind a bush and headed directly towards him menacingly. That was enough for me and I told Beta to take him on. Unfortunately the true norseman was better with his sword and shield than Beta, and gave him a wound, so Tiger and Mags went over to help.

This left me with Zeta and Epsilon, who decided to take no chances with the first guy we spotted.  Epsilon shot an arrow into him, then Zeta got one somewhere more critical and the guy was down. This did phase the other guy though, who fought back against Beta, wounding him again and knocking him to the ground! 

Meanwhile the more innocent looking local start off away from all this trouble, and while we thought we saw other movement, nobody else revealed themselves.

Round 3 - Tiger waded into combat and I don’t think the viking was expecting to be attacked by an unarmed man, so got a surprised look on his face when the monk hurt him. This in turn gave Mags the opportunity to go and patch up one of Beta’s wounds, while the rest of us also converged on the viking warrior. This still wasn’t enough to rattle the norseman though, he attacked Tiger only to be surprised to find himself hurting even more and lying on his back! Meanwhile the harmless looking fellow now decided to head over too.

Round 4 - This was getting us nowhere! I gestured for Mags and Beta to head off the bystander while Tiger and Epsilon rendered the warrior out of action, and Zeta an I kept looking for other people to talk to and spotting another harmless looking individual through the trees. The guy we spotted just stood there looking at us, but the other fellow walked right up to Mags and Beta. After a quick conversation with Beta where he confirmed the reports of the flying horse but only from hearsay, and then he agreed to get on his way. As he left though, they saw another warrior that had been approaching from behind him. Then another one appeared and headed right for them!

Round 5 - I can’t really account for what happened next, and I’m pretty sure Epsilon was surprised too when the shot he fired at the advancing viking, went in deep and the warrior drop dead! That gave Mags the opportunity to heal Beta’s other wound, while Tiger hurried over to be ready to take on the other warrior. While Zeta and I went to talk to the other guy we’d seen. The warrior kept advancing, the bystander seemed to be waiting for us, and nobody else showed themselves.

Round 6 - I was close enough to the bystander for a nice long chat, so we discussed the flying horse (he had heard of it but hadn’t seen it himself) and how this wasn’t a great place to stick around (he agreed and said he would let others know) and he headed off. Tiger decided to head straight for his target, while the rest of the team continued through the woods. 

The warrior decided to wait for this strange man to approach him, another bystander appeared further through the woods, and then we saw it! Sure enough, trotting down from a hill was a winged horse!

Round 7 - Tiger took on his opponent, knocking his sword from his hand a landing a solid punch. I headed for the guy who had just appeared in front of me and convinced him to leave before he saw the pegasus. It was a marvellous looking beast but we had no choice, to protect the timeline we needed to take it down, so Zeta shot it. 

The warrior facing off against Tiger was not at all happy and ran off, and then the beast revealed its true nature, bearing its teeth and heading straight for the other norse civilian! Thankfully he had the good sense to head towards the nearest members of our team.

All this had the effect of bringing everyone else still around into play, one more bystander and two more adversaries!

Round 8 - The team sprang into chaotic action; Tiger headed for a warrior, Beta tried to convince the scared Bystander to leave (without success), Epsilon shot at the pegasus but missed, Zeta shot the other adversary, Mags tried to see who was in the most danger, and I ran to get back to where everyone else was. 

The adversary facing Tiger went straight for him and landed a hit with his axe, the one wounded by Zeta and seeing a very annoyed winged horse too close for comfort, ran off. The pegasus kept going seemingly heading for the battle between Tiger and the viking, possibly drawn by the smell of blood. The guy Beta tried to talk to hustled past him, while the other bystander was rooted to the spot in terror!

Round 9 - Tiger fought back against his opponent, and this time caused the viking some damage. Mags had a go at convincing the bystander to leave and he did (but afterwards he babbled about a winged horse so much he ended up killed in a drunken brawl). Beta and I got out of the way to give Zeta and Epsilon a clear target, and two more arrows ploughed into the pegasus. 

The viking fighting Tiger got the better of him and put Tiger down, but that seemed to draw the pegasus towards them again, and through all this the last bystander just stood and watched, dumbfounded.

Round 10 - I’ll be honest, I think we all wanted the pegasus to do away with the remaining viking and although Mags hustled off to try to talk to that petrified bystander, the rest of us just stood and watched! However, the warrior stood his ground and the pegasus turned around and headed for the bystander! The bystander finally shook off his fear and headed towards us. 

Round 11 - Mags convinced the bystander to flee the scene, but that left her as the nearest target for the pegasus. Then suddenly there were two more arrows in the beast and it fell to the ground, leaving us just the warrior to deal with, and he obligingly headed our way.

Round 12 - two more arrows and a round of hand-to-hand combat with Beta sealed the viking’s fate and they were off to Valhalla to see the Valkyrie and more winged horses! 

Aftermath - “As required, we dealt with the body of the beast, removing and destroying the wings and making it look like wolves had savaged it, before heading back to base, with the injured but still alive Tiger. On our return it was confirmed that we had not broken the timeline and so our first mission was hailed as a success. Personally though, I was wondering why we had been attacked so swiftly, and why that viking hadn’t seemed scared of the rampaging Pegasus.”

Game 2 - You won’t believe this, another report of something nasty that ought to be a myth, but seems to be real. I don’t get why those other guys attacked you last time, but stay alert in case it happens again.

The second game and I rolled the Valley. It’s a “Trapper” monster, which can be something like a giant spider but I’m using a giant serpent. The adversaries are Shooters and I’m going to use some WWII US Glider troops that I’ve just painted for a mate and he bases them himself.

Arrival - Tiger out with a general injury, Mags not doing well, and a couple of the security team suffering from niggling injures pretty much means the team this time picked itself. Anyway a first outing for Bruiser is useful, and the rookie Zeta seems really on the ball. This time we are in the French countryside in 1944, dressed as British troops and all packing period firearms.

Round 1 - The team approach carefully, looking for someone to talk to, and quickly locate a local who tells the Warden they are in the right area before being convinced to leave. However, the next person they find, is an American soldier, who immediately shoots at Zeta and wounds her. So Bruiser shoots back with unerring accuracy and kills him! At which point the monster, some sort of gigantic serpent, appeared!

Round 2 - With no further need to find out if they were in the right place the team decided to deal with the monster. Alpha, Gamma, and Epsilon managed to wound it before the Warden’s lucky shot took it out. With a sigh of relief the team started thinking about who was going to check it was really dead.

Round 3 - The Warden and Epsilon headed over to the huge corpse while the rest of the team paired up to check there were no more locals lurking about. 

Round 4 - The Warden was close enough to tell the thing was clearly dead, and was considering call the team back together so they could translocate with the body, when Zeta and Bruiser found another local civilian lurking behind a hill. This was followed by another civilian appearing up ahead of Alpha and Gamma, then a US trooper appeared behind them, and US trooper appearing next to the serpent’s body, and a shot being taken at Gamma that missed! That shot then must have signalled their fellows as two more appeared from different directions, and all these GIs were brandishing weapons and seemed highly annoyed! 

Round 5 - Something was definitely off here. The GIs should have seen British troops as the allies but had fired on the team twice now. The Warden barked orders to the effect that these ones couldn’t be trusted. Zeta convinced the civilian on the left to get well clear while Bruiser shot and wounded the GI. Epsilon fired at the soldier behind them but missed, the Warden at tge one near the serpent’s body but also missed, Alpha ran towards the other civilian, and Gamma shot and wounded another soldier. The GIs all fired back, wounding Zeta, the Warden, and Gamma, while Epsilon was incapacitated!

Round 6 - Furious shooting all over the place left another GI down and three wounded, while four of the team took wounds, including Alpha who failed convince the bystander to leave and then took a bullet from a GI for her trouble.

Round 7 - It’s five verses four and although there’s still one civilian to worry about the air if filled with the sound of gunfire that results in two more wounds on each side, and nothing conclusive.

Round 8 - It has become a battle of attrition as everyone opens up again, and as the noise dies away there are two GIs down, but so are Alpha and Gamma!

Round 9 - The team get into cover and try to coordinate their attack on the remaining adversaries which is enough to get one of them to run off, but one is still a threar and tgat damned civilian still has a ring-side seat to all this.

Round 10 - Three shots ring out and the final Adversary is dead and the Bystander heads off to report what he has seen. 

Aftermath - “We gathered up our casualties and the body of the serpent and headed back to base. Epsilon is going to need a couple of weeks to recover but Alpha and Gamma will soon be fighting fit again. Thankfully, despite the eye witness, the timeline was not broken. Why the Americans fired on us is still a mystery though.”

Game 3 - I hate to treat you guys this way, but there is no other team available, can you go deal with yet another one?

The next incident in this arc is against some non-military types so I’ve used as an excuse to table my wild west figures. It’s out in a rocky area and there’s a giant scorpion to contend with.

Arrival - The Warden is now down to taking the Team members that are in the best shape, so this time it will be Mags, Bruiser, Alpha, Gamma and then Delta despite his niggling injury. The Team are kitted out as appropriate for the period often referred to as the Wild West. They had been told that the anomaly was a “giant scorpion” but they had no concept of what that meant … until they saw it!

Round 1 - While we could see plenty of movement around, the rocky terrain was making it hard to determine who was a gawking passer by likely to get into trouble or whether any of the locals had been paid to guard the thing. Consequently as the Team starts checking behind the rocky outcrops they are poised ready to shoot anyone who seems threatening. Gamma is first to uncover an innocent bystander, so the Warden wanders over to have a word, and convinces the snake oil peddler to leave. Meanwhile Delta flushes out a combatant and Alpha gets a shot off, wounding him. This makes him cower down behind the rock. 

This shot being fired brings two more adversaries out of hiding while some old guy is spotted going to remonstrate with the Scorpion! Which of course is enough to get the Scorpion moving but it ignores the old man and heads for one of the armed guys who are supposed to be protecting it!

Round 2 - Bruiser gets a bead on the cowering cowboy, but it seems the weapon he was given is duff and it won’t fire! Delta also gets a bead on him though and lands a second wound. Gamma shoots and wounds the armed guy on the far right while Tarrant and Mags get into cover.

The guy behind the rock is not happy, he’s bleeding, hemmed in and has a Scorpion behind him. So he hustles past Alpha heading off the table. The guy with the Scorpion bearing down on him seems unaware of the danger and calmly shoots Delta to help his mate get away. The guy on the left takes cover. The old man decides all this is just a little too exciting and heads away from the scuttling Scorpion and the shooting. The Scorpion then seizes the cowboy and plunges its stinger into him, this guy is dead … he just doesn’t know it yet!  At which point the Team realises there’s another cowboy behind them! 

Round 3 - Alpha and Delta shoot the closest target and the fleeing cowboy goes down which has Bruiser running over to grab his gun. Gamma Shoots the new threat behind them, and boths Mags and Tarrant have a go too, but both miss! 

Their target is clearly a better, or at least luckier, shot as he puts Gamma out of the battle with a single shot! The guy with poison running through his veins breaks away from the Scorpion. The cowboy on the left decides to stay out of trouble behind his rock, while the old boy now makes a beeline for the Warden. The Scorpion chases up its prey and the cowboy drops dead (causing a break point). In the middle of the area another adversary is spotted. 

Round 4 - Alpha and Delta both shoot the guy who shot Gamma while Bruiser grabs up a gun. The Warden gets the fourth wound, so the guy behind them is down. Mags goes to have a word with the old man and although he leaves, she has the uncomfortable feeling that he wasn’t convinced (a second break point). The cowering adversary on the left is getting quite comfortable behind that rock, while the one in the middle heads off the right. The Team suddenly realise the Scorpion seems to be heading away too, and they can’t let that happen! To make things worse, Mags has spotted both another bystander and another adversary. 

Round 5 - Alpha and Delta both shoot the Scorpion, with Delta hitting somewhere critical and killing the beast, so now the Team needs to clear up the site. Bruiser decides his new gun is much better as he downs an adversary with a single shot, unfortunately he then spots someone watching intently and the guy looks like a Reporter! 

The Warden manages to wound the latest adversary while Mags feels a bit exposed and gets into some cover, just in time as the one hiding behind a rock all this time takes a shot that bounces off her cover! The wounded guy heads away. Mags is hoping the old prospector wandering her way will get close enough to talk to but then is shocked to see him keel over, guessing the old guy has had a heart attack, giving the Reporter yet more to write about (and a third break point).

Round 6 - Mags tries a shot at the guy shooting at her and is pretty surprise to hit him as the Warden rushes over to her. Bruiser and Delta also head that way, while Alpha runs over to talk to the reporter. Mags’ opponent is still shooting, but not hitting anything and the other guy is still headed away from the action. The Reporter actually heads towards Alpha, clearly sensing there’s more to this story. 

Round 7 - Mags shoots again and her opponent is down, while the Warden puts a bullet into the other guy to encourage him on his way, with Bruiser and Delta still trying to catch up to them. Alpha now has a deep conversation with the Reporter, who gets the message that his presence is not wanted here, but with no promises about keeping out of the paper, which Alpha takes to mean there will be a special edition later today! Warden shooting that adversary encourages him to keep going, as does the dead body of his mate. 

However Alpha has now spotted yet another bystander and another adversary, hopefully the last of the locals around here.

Round 8 - Bruiser shoots the new adversary while Alpha rushes over to the mum and politely asks her to leave, but both her an the kid have seen the body of the giant scorpion and are not buying the idea that “it’s a natural occurrence out this way”, causing a fourth break point. The Warden and Mags keep a careful eye on the other adversary but he’s had enough and keeps going out of the area. This leaves just one adversary, the last to show himself, who decides not to hang around either and runs off. 

Aftermath - “Thankfully Gamma’s head injury wasn’t too bad so Mags could stabilise her while the rest of us cleared away the body of the Scorpion, hoping that would be enough to negate anything the reporter tried to write, with no proof to back him up. Sadly we’d not allowed for that damn kid, apparently the mum wasn’t enough proof, but the poison in that cowboy and the floods of tears from the little girl were! So on arriving back at base I found top brass waiting for me and the first words I heard were, “What the hell did you do?!”

Game 4 - Well at least now we know that the hirelings and the monsters are somehow connected. Fresh reports keep coming in, but we'll start looking for culprits while you deal with the problems.

The next incident is my first broken timeline and I felt like tabling some of my Copplestone Post Apocalypse figures. It’s out in a rocky area and this time there’s a giant humanoid to contend with. I’m also going to try out the currently optional rule that the Team don’t know who is actually an Adversary until they attack them!

Arrival - The Team arrive in 1983, but due to their problems last time it’s a very different 1983 to the one they were expecting. They can’t let that throw them off though, there’s been signs of a huge humanoid in the ruins of a once prosperous town, and they are also expecting at least some of the locals to start shooting at them any minute. The Warden is a little concerned that two of the security team, Beta and Delta, seem to have been thrown off by the nature of this timeline, but he’s got a strong team with Alpha and Bruiser to take the lead and Mags along in case of trouble.

Round 1 - Braced for anything in this desolate land, the team move slowly forward to flush out anyone around. Although the team were sure they could hear movement, nobody appeared.

Round 2 - The keep cautiously moving and undercover an innocent bystander, but before they can even ask her about the so called “giant” any doubt of its existence is banished as they can see it themselves! Bruiser gets a shot off and just manages to hit it while the rest try to make some sense of what they are seeing. Then there is chaos, the giant starts directly towards the team, the bystander runs out in front of it, and two adversaries pop up out of the ruins!

Round 3 - Beta shoots an adversary, Bruiser can’t shoot the giant for fear of hitting the bystander, so instead bellows at the woman who thankfully gets the message and runs off. The rest of the team are torn between the huge monstrosity and the bad guys with guns, but Alpha takes out an adversary with a single shot leaving Delta to wound the giant, and Sinjin to shoot at the giant but manage to miss it! The adversary wounded by Beta takes cover, and the giant seems confused by all the loud noises and the pain of being shot and does nothing, but in the mean time another bystander and another adversary appear.

Round 4 - Beta shoots the adversary again, both Bruiser and Sinjin hit the giant but it’s still standing! Then Alpha’s firearm jams and Delta tries to shoot the new adversary but misses! The two adversaries fire back and wound team members, while the giant decides he’s angry about these pains he keeps feeling and picks a fight with Bruiser and causing him a wound. The bystander they can see is heading away and is joined but another and then a third, though Alpha is sure that last one had a gun and threw it away.

Round 5 - The Warden shoots the giant and it finally succumbs to its wounds. Beta gets a fatal hit on his opponent. Alpha hurries over to pick up a weapon from an earlier downed adversary while Delta takes a shot at the other adversary and misses, but Bruiser manages to land a wound. With the giant lying there plain as day, Mags decides to try and go and convince the bystanders that there’s nothing weird about that! 

The only adversary in sight is not put off by his wound and shoots Alpha again. The three bystanders are wandering all over the place. No other characters are sighted but the team figure there are probably more around somewhere and they’ll have to track them down.

Round 6 - Alpha is re-armed and shoots the guy who has been firing at him, the Delta makes up for missing with a headshot. Mags convinces the nearest bystander that they should leave and not breathe a word of this and is congratulating herself on her oratory when she realises that Beta has come running up behind her, maybe having some influence on the bystander’s decision? Bruiser and the Warden start hunting for other onlookers as one bystander heads straight for them but the other one, off in the distance just drops down dead! Still nobody else has shown up.

Round 7 - Mags orders Beta to sweep left and heads for the oncoming bystander for a quick chat, but he’s having none of and wants to argue, so Bruiser decides to get involved, which has the unexpected consequence that the fellow pulls out a gun! Luckily Alpha has been paying attention and shoots him, but this will not help them fix the timeline! The gunman doesn’t like his chances though and heads away from them all … but towards Beta!  Delta spots movement but it’s another bystander and she’s just about to relax when she realises another adversary is behind them! Then a shout from Beta alerts the team to yet another, and hopefully final, adversary over on their left.

Round 8 - Beta shoots the new on the left as Bruiser takes out the once bystander now adversary from behind. The Warden shoots the one behind them, as does Delta, but Alpha’s recovered weapon also jams on him! The adversary at the rear desperately looks for cover, but can’t find any, the one on the left shoots back at Beta but misses, while the bystander seems to be trying to sneak away.

Round 9 - Two more shots into the hapless adversary at the rear sees her off. Two shots into the one on the left doesn’t. A long chat with Delta convinces the bystander to leave quietly. The remaining adversary decides to fight it out and shoots Beta again.

Round 10 - Beta finishes off the final adversary, and so the area is finally clear for the team to deal with the huge body.

Aftermath - “Well that was a bit hairy at a couple of points, but we all came through it, and it seems we did well enough to fix the timeline, so I am pleased with our performance and this time so are the top brass!”