Frostgrave - Loot the cart

"Loot the cart" is the third scenario in the Thaw of the Lich Lord campaign for Frostgrave.
   Guarding a broken cart in the centre of the board are four Death Cultists. In the cart are four treasure tokens.. The Death cultists are waiting for reinforcements. At the end of the third turn a gang of four ghouls will turn up...perhaps to lend a hand with cart maintenance? Two other treasures were placed normally on the board.

   We decided to use Ulterior motive cards. I had "Ice storm" which meant that at the end of turn four there would be a deadly blast of icy weather... if one of my spellcasters was standing on a special trap door at least halfway across the table, then they and anyone within 12" of them would be safe from the icy attack... Lizzy drew "Galvanize" which involved getting two of her figures in contact with a runic stone and a magic gateway 10" away from each other and completing a magic ritual to empower one of her figures with a deadly fighting ability.

Table set up at the beginning of the game

Death Cultists guarding their broken cart full of treasures..

   So after the disaster for my last team in scenario two, I decided to try and play things a bit more cautiously with my new (very similar) level zero Summoner... My Wizard plus a couple of Infantry men and a thief headed off up the right hand edge of the board (moving towards my secret trapdoor objective)... my Apprentice plus a thief and a couple of thugs started heading towards the broken cart, and my two crossbowmen made for some steps up onto a walkway that would provide a good views of the centre of the table and hopefully a good spot for a bit of shooting.
   Lizzy's team also moved in groups from her starting edge towards the middle of the board.. two of her guys split off from the rest - one heading up some stairs on the opposite end of the walkway my crossbowmen were going up...and the other towards the treasure that was nearest her end of the table...

 

   The next round saw my Wizard and Apprentice attempting to summon Demons... They both succeeded,  my Apprentice summoned an Imp, and my Wizard damaged his health by two points to empower his spell and summon a Minor Demon. My crossbowmen moved onto the walkway over looking the Death cultists and failed to hit them with their crossbows.

   Lizzy's team crept more towards the centre of the board, her guy on the stairs moved nearer, and hid out of line of sight of my crossbowmen...and one of her team picked up a treasure...at this point a giant rat appeared in the middle of my starting edge...

 

Giant Rat attack!!

    My wizard maneuvered nearer to his trapdoor objective whilst sending the minor demon to take on one of the Death cultists. One of my thieves picked up the treasure token nearest to my board edge. This was when a couple of Snakemen turned up behind Lizzy's team and made a beeline for her slow moving guy carrying the treasure... Snakemen are quite nasty as they have poisoned weapons and if you take any damage from them at all you are "wounded" (losing one of your two actions). A bunch of Lizzy's guys turned around and ran to help fight off the Serpent dudes... They succeeded, but one of her team was knocked out, and two were wounded in the process...
   Meanwhile my apprentice's Imp killed the giant rat, my two crossbowmen failed to hit anything again, and my thief dragged his treasure nearer to the board edge whilst trying to keep out of sight of everyone... and then at the end of the third round, four Ghouls arrived on the right hand side (my right) just behind where my Wizard and my Infantry men were...

Lizzy's warband struggling to fight off a pair of Serpent Men...

Some of Lizzy's mob moving in towards the treasures on the cart...

 Lizzy's soldier on the walkway ran and engaged one of my crossbowmen, some minor scuffling ensued around the broken cart... my Imp died, and so did a couple of the Death Cultists... My Infantrymen positioned themselves between the reinforcement ghouls and my Wizard, and my Wizard moved onto his target trapdoor. One of Lizzy's dudes managed to pick up a treasure from the broken cart...just at this point three more ghouls turned up on the same edge where the giant rat came from earlier... The reinforcement ghouls surrounded my two Infantrymen - reducing them to 1 and 2 health respectively. Then it was the end of round four, which meant I had to reveal my secret objective and resolve the effects of the Ice Storm! Not much happened damage wise - apart from the last Death Cultist being finished off by a hail of ice... but then the three remaining treasure tokens were caught up by the wind and randomly moved 10" away from the broken cart...
  

A pair of terrible shots overlooking the chaos...

   There was a mad scramble for the treasures - whilst one of my crossbowmen dropped down from his perch to try and secure one of them, a melee erupted over one of the others - resulting in one of Lizzy's guys getting knocked out by my Wizard - then my Wizard getting knocked out by one of Lizzy's dudes (so much for being cautious!!) and then my thief running off with the treasure. Both my crossbowmen were then finished off by the remaining members of Lizzy's team... One of my Infantry men was knocked out by the ghoul gang...and then making his final stand, my other infantryman who was down to only one health point, managed - in a frenzy of desperate two handed skull smashing, to kill all four ghouls...and then limp off the table....

Minor Demon holding off the ghouls!

My wounded Infantryman down to 1 health point faces off with the final ghoul...

   So in the end we managed to secure three treasure tokens each... Lizzy had two casualties, and I had six including my wizard... this time they all recovered unscathed apart from one of my crossbowmen who died. Unfortunately Lizzy didn't manage to complete her Ulterior Motive this time, but she got over 200xp and some interesting stuff... One of the treasures I got was very cool - a "Vampire Blade" which heals the wielder a couple of health points when it causes damage to living opponents... my Wizard will be rocking that in the next scenario! I managed to get enough xp to go up to level 3... so that was great!
  I didn't end up being that cautious in the end - but it all turned out ok this time....luckily!!