Devilry Afoot: The Beast in the Fog

 Well, I'd had every intention of going to Harlequin and playing Warhammer: The Old World tonight, but I slept really poorly last night and just didn't have the energy to fight rush hour traffic, play a 2 1/2 hour game and then drive home and need to sit up awhile to relax enough to try sleeping. I did still want to get some gaming in, however, so I cleared the dining room table and set up for a game of Devilry Afoot.

I couldn't find my roster sheets from last game, so I wrote up some new ones:

• Captain Tennille, a Soldier armed with a sword and musket, with the dark secret Gambler.
• Squire Root, a Gentleman with a sword and lantern, accompanied by his Follower Robert the Musketeer. Root is also a Gambler.
• "Frother" Martin, a Religious hunter armed with a sword, Bible and Hound, with the dark secret Drunkard.
• Goodwife Patience, a Goodwife with a pistol and lantern, with the dark secret Slovenly.

I used the scenario "The Beast in the Fog" from the rulebook, replacing hellhound the scenario calls for with a Werewolf. The scenario would open with four tokens at the corners of the board, each potentially representing the Werewolf; the hunters would be scattered across the board, and a heavy fog would restrict visibility to 4". 

During the first turn, the tokens all moved closer to the hunters, with three of them revealing themselves as decoys. Squire Root and Goodwife Patience moved towards the bridge to rendezvous with their companions; Martin rolled a "1" on his first activation, resulting in his drinking habit leaving him hungover for the duration of the game. Captain Tennille became disoriented in the fog, wandering past the bridge until meeting with Martin. 

On turn 2, the werewolf revealed itself, immediately catching a pistol shot from Goodwife Patience. She rolled phenomenally well for damage, putting three wounds on the monster immediately. It only had 5 wounds to begin with, so it was well on its way to being defeated.

Maddened by its injury, the werewolf charged Patience, but failed to successfully hit her and turned and fled back towards the shadows. Recovering its composure, the werewolf turned back around and leapt at Squire Root, killing the gentleman instantly and sending Robert the Musketeer fleeing off the board.

Captain Tennille charged on to the bridge, firing his musket from the top of the arch (mea culpa - I forgot about the 4" visibility limit) and putting a fourth wound on the werewolf. The beast towards the nearest shadows it could hide in, and then leapt on to the bridge, attacking Martin, who had just staggered up level with the Captain. Wounding the preacher, the werewolf then changed its tactics; it gave voice to a devilish howl, intimidating Martin into fleeing while the Captain struck at the werewolf ineffectively with his sword. 

The werewolf used its intimidating howl again, sending the Captain running. Patience was less than impressed, and shot the werewolf in the back at point blank range, killing the beast. 

The surviving hunters divided up the 60 shilling reward for killing a werewolf between the three of them. Martin, having been wounded but survived, is now infected with lycanthropy. Fortunately, for the low, low price of 20 shillings and a handful of hair off the werewolf that bit him, a cure can be brewed! 

This was a great way to spend the evening, and I'm really glad I was able to get some gaming in after all. I've also submitted to run demos of Devilry Afoot at the next Wargames Among the Warplanes show in September, so this was good practice for that as well. 

Figures Purchased in 2025: 120

Figures Painted in 2025: 121

Devilry Afoot: First Playthrough

With everything I needed to play out the first scenario in the Devilry Afoot book - "A Discovery of Witches" - painted and varnished, I was eager to get the game on the table today. Even more excitingly, I've got a couple friends coming into town next weekend for a day of skirmish gaming, and they're both interested in giving this a go as well. So I definitely needed to get the game on the table and get a feel for it! What follows is a slightly simplified and condensed version of how the game went: 

"A Discovery of Witches" finds us on the outskirts of the sleepy village of Dunny-on-the-Wold; a coven of three witches has gathered for nefarious purposes, and a heavy storm is rolling in. The Dunny-on-the-Wold Neighborhood Watch has mustered to try and eliminate these witches before the storm hits. 

Today's heroes:

• "Frother" Martin, a Religious hunter with a sword, Bible and dog. He has the skill Theologian, giving him a bonus to quoting scripture at the forces of Darkness, and his dark secret is that he is a Sadist. 
• Goodwife Patience, a Goodwife hunter with a pistol and torch. She has the Devout and Swift traits, and her dark secret is that she is Doubting her faith. 
• Dr. Hessalius, a Scholar hunter with an axe, torch and three vials of Holy Water. He has the Academic skill, giving him extra funds between games, and his dark secret is that he is Wolf-Bitten, and secretly a werewolf. 

Things were off to a rough start for the hunters - Martin advanced towards the witches and was attacked, dying instantly to a witch's dagger. 

His dog sat by his body, barking at every witch that got close, for the rest of the game.

Patience tried repeatedly to shoot the witches, but missed every shot. Dr. Hessalius was charmed repeatedly, having to spend actions slapping himself out of it over and over again. 

Patience shoots at a witch disguised as a wolf.

Things started to get real messy when the witches began summoning Imps. Rules as written, you can have a maximum of twice as many imps as there are witches remaining on the table; I only have three imps painted, so I capped it at one imp per witch. 

One of the witches made it into the farmhouse, killing the inhabitant; once finished, he turned his attention to Dr. Hessalius - and again, rolled well enough to strike him down instantly with a mortal wound.

To her credit, Patience did manage to overcome her doubts long enough to quote scripture with enough vehemence to send an imp scampering away for a few moments, but ultimately she was overwhelmed, succumbing to the fangs and claws of swarming imps just as the rain began to fall.

So that was a big fat loss for the Dunny-on-the-Wold Neighborhood Watch! The witches emerged completely unscathed, quickly stripping off their robes for a celebratory nude dance-off in the Dark One's name. 

Overall, I liked the game, even if I didn't win; I felt like after turn 2 or 3 I didn't need to look things up in the rulebook as much, and was getting by with just the quick reference sheet and the bestiary entry for the witches. 

Monsters in Devilry Afoot are guided by a simple "AI" - for each witch, roll on a chart divided into columns for "A human is within 6"" "monster has been shot at since their last activation" and "all other situations." As the author is careful to note, monsters are irrational and act in irrational ways; I think I had two instances where a witch attacked, failed to wound, and then fled rather than press the attack. It may not have been the logical action, but it did give the heroes some breathing room. If the witches behaved rationally, the game might have been over in three turns instead of six. 

I liked the mechanism for determining initiative as well; tokens drawn from a bag is a pretty common one (Bolt Action and Sharp Practice both come to mind) but this is the first game I've played that uses it. I had a turn or two in this game where the witches activated twice back to back before any hunters activated and that was a challenge for sure. 

I'm looking forward to getting another game in soon; I may change up my selection of hunters (maybe some muskets would help even things up) or bump it up to add a fourth hunter to the group and see how things go then. 

Figures Purchased in 2025: 113

Figures Painted in 2025: 116

Devilry Afoot: The Dunny-On-The-Wold Neighborhood Watch

 I've finished my first batch of ECW figures for Devilry Afoot, painted (except for the dog) 90% with speed paints as part of an effort to try and get myself more comfortable with them. I may have to give "slap chop" a try; I think just speed paints over white primer doesn't give me the look I'm used to and like. The human figures are by Bloody Miniatures, while the dog is from Dunkeldorf. 

In game, these will make up a good percentage of the pool of heroes available; I've decided that my games of Devilry Afoot will primary take place around a small, ignored village on the Suffolk marshes called Dunny-on-the-Wold, which makes this bunch the D-o-t-W Neighborhood Watch. I haven't given everyone names yet, but intend to.

Left to right: Innocent bystander, Squire Root, faithful hound Snuffles, and Goodwife Patience

Left to right: "Frother" Martin, Captain Tennille, unnamed musketeer, Dr. Pimpel-Poppere

Figures Purchased in 2025: 90

Figures Painted in 2025: 120

More Figures For Devilry Afoot

 I've done some digging to pull figures out of my leadpile that can work for Irregular Wars' Devilry Afoot, and here's the first batch of them finished. I've started experimenting again with speed/contrast paints to move things along, with I think decent results. 

Farmer by Wargames Foundry, Andre the Giant-sized thug from Dunkeldorf

"Dulcima, Mooning Peasant" from Lucid Eye. She'll be a Pact Devil in Devilry Afoot, luring in the unwary with her charms.

Imps from Reaper Miniatures

Ghouls from Heresy Miniatures

I've also received an order of Hunters from Bloody Miniatures - beautiful ECW sculpts that arrived with barely a whisper of flash on them, and even more impressive, every sword and musket arrived ramrod straight, nothing needed to be bent back into place despite a very speedy trip across the Atlantic to my doorstep. 

Look at that - that helmet is cast completely hollow. I didn't have to clean any excess material around the nasal bar. I didn't know casting something that complex that cleanly was possible! 

Figures Purchased in 2025: 90

Figures Painted in 2025: 109