Hunters of the Wasteland – Fallout Battle Report

Has it really been seven months since the last battle report? Apparently, it has. A couple pieces of terrain make their battle report debut which is exciting. You’ll have to read on and see if you can spot them both! Without further ado, let’s discuss the game and how it went.

Narrative – The Survivors and Super Mutants are sweeping the wasteland for food when the both sides locate a pack of ghouls and other critters hanging around the road. With both sides desperate for food, the hunters are about to become the hunted.

Scenario Setup – The goal in this scenario is to kill and capture more wasteland wildlife than your opponent at the end of eight rounds. Of course, the more trophies you have, the more you become a target for the other side! I used the AI to help guide the creatures and they only attacked either the Survivors or Super Mutants. With the exception of when a creature had already charged something, I determined creature activation randomly with a die as well. Each side, including the creatures has 300 points to work with and this game is on a 4 x 4 board which is a first for me in a Fallout game. Truthfully, this stretched my terrain collection pretty thin and the board is more bare than I would like but it certainly is motivation to keep chipping away at terrain projects in the near future.

Survivors – As I looked over my Survivors collection, I realized that I don’t have many miniatures I haven’t used before. I decided to use Ronnie Shaw for the first time to anchor the force as she looks pretty solid at ranged combat. I also gave her heroic as I expected her to inflict the most damage in this game. I also picked Dogmeat to give some melee capability and someone who can grab dead wildlife as needed. Finally, a humble settler rounds out the small Survivor side. As per usual, shooting well is key for the Survivors’ success as there isn’t a lot of melee prowess to go around.

Ronnie Shaw w/ Hunting Rifle and Heroic

Settler w/ Laser Musket

Dogmeat w/ Dog Bite

Super Mutants – I had the same problem with the Super Mutants in that I’ve used them a lot and haven’t expanded my collection much past the Core Box. I decided to use a Master, Brute, and two Super Mutants to give them strength in numbers. Everyone exclusively has melee weapons since that’s what mutants do best! Having lots of hit points and skill in melee combat would make them a great foil to the Survivors. The mutants wouldn’t be very scared or threatened by creatures who want to be in melee combat either, right?

Master w/ Sledgehammer and Blood Bag

Brute w/ Sledgehammer

Super Mutant 1 w/ Board

Super Mutant 2 w/ Board

Creatures – I picked mostly weaker creatures because I was concerned that using bigger stuff like a Deathclaw would make the struggle for points less interesting. This means that there were three Radroach swarms, three Mole Rats, and three Feral Ghouls. I might be wrong but this is likely the debut of all of these miniatures in a game. Unsurprisingly, the Ghouls are the most dangerous of the lot and about the only thing likely to survive an attack or two. Since the creatures deploy in the center of the board, it seemed reasonable to assume they’d be in combat with the Survivors and Super Mutants in short order and that proved to be the case.

Battle Report

Round 1
A radroach skittered towards the Survivors and was quickly dispatched by the Settler. Dogmeat claimed the prize and eagerly awaited for the next kill. A feral ghoul lumbered over just out of charge range. Ronnie fired several shots with her hunting rifle to take the encroaching ghoul down.

The Super Mutants advanced cautiously so that they wouldn’t be charged by all of the remaining creatures. The wasteland creatures moved and charged both sides after the Survivors and Super Mutants spent their actions for the round. The actual combat would have to wait until the next round however.
Survivors: 25 points (1 Radroach swarm) – Super Mutants: 0 points

Round 2
Dogmeat tore into the charging radroaches and killed them. Claiming his prize, Dogmeat scooped up the corpse to claim another critter for the Survivors.

The Super Mutants started dispatching critters with the Brute pummeling the Mole Rat.

The ghoul avenged his colleague by delivering a mean scratch on a Super Mutant for two damage. At this point, it seemed like that would be the only damage the creatures would manage since they were falling quickly. On the Survivors’ side, Ronnie fired off a couple of shots to kill another Radroach swarm. With only a Mole Rat left, the Survivors could nearly turn their attention towards the Super Mutants.

On the other side of the battle, the unharmed Super Mutant killed and claimed a Mole Rat for their side. The final ghoul charged the undamaged Super Mutant but looked to be overwhelmed in short order.
Survivors: 50 points (2 Radroach swarms) – Super Mutants: 34 points (2 Mole Rats)

Round 3
At the start of the round, I realized that the Mole Rat that Dogmeat was facing off against should have already been considered dead so Dogmeat claimed the prize without any further action.

The Master thumped a ghoul with his sledgehammer and killed it, clearing another obstacle. The final surviving ghoul was not so easy however. It shocked the Super Mutants and actually killed the one it had previously wounded!

The surviving Super Mutant and Brute had to combine efforts to take the feral ghoul down. With the last creature conquered, the Super Mutants and Survivors prepared to tussle. Ronnie used her critical shot on the Hunting Rifle to land three damage on the Master as the round ended.
No score for this round, I forgot to write it down. Whoops!

Round 4
The Super Mutants charged across the battlefield to try and get in melee as soon as possible. The Master used its Blood Bag to remove the wounds from the previous round. Ronnie and the Settler stayed focused on the Master and hit it for 5 damage. With four wounds left, things weren’t looking great for the Survivors as the Super Mutants were breathing down their neck!

While it was risky and unlikely to be successful, there seemed no choice but for Dogmeat to charge the Master and hope to cause some real damage. Unfortunately, the loyal canine only managed a single wound.
Survivors: 116 Points (1 Ghoul, 2 Radroach Swarms, 1 Mole Rat) – Super Mutants: 134 Points (2 Ghouls, 2 Mole Rats)

Round 5
With the opportunity to go first, Dogmeat used his critical attack with Dog Bite to reduce the Master to one wound left but then whiffed on the second attack. The Master attacked back for 2 damage which left Dogmeat with 5 wounds. The Survivors managed to inflict two wounds on the Brute but the Settler took two damage in return when it charged. Another so-so round for the Survivors made it feel as though things have shifted heavily in the Super Mutants’ favor. They had the lead and looked like they could hold it the rest of the way. It didn’t help that Dogmeat was in a precarious position and was holding all of the critters for the Survivors.
Survivors: 116 Points (1 Ghoul, 2 Radroach Swarms, 1 Mole Rat) – Super Mutants: 134 Points (2 Ghouls, 2 Mole Rats)

Round 6
After the Settler failed to hit anything, the Master went next and knocked Dogmeat unconscious. The Master did not claim the spoils since the Super Mutant leader had almost no life left itself. Ronnie stepped up and put the Master down in a welcome change from the inept attacks of the last round or two. The Brute charged the Settler and nearly finished her off though. The Super Mutant grabbed everything that Dogmeat was carrying and charged Ronnie but failed to hit her, probably because he had too much loot!
Survivors: 0 Points – Super Mutants: 250 Points

Round 7
In an attempt to try and reclaim the critters, Ronnie managed a couple of wounds on the Super Mutant. It wasn’t going to be enough however as the Brute pummeled the Settler into the dust and gravel.

Both the Brute and Super Mutant charged Ronnie who was basically pinned at the back of the battlefield and had no realistic chance of killing either so I called the game for the Super Mutants.

Closing Thoughts – The Super Mutants conducted themselves very well overall and proved to be too tough for the Survivors this time. The Survivors just missed too many times to be able to win this one. Had they killed the Master sooner, for example, they might have actually been able to pull out a win. Truthfully, the Super Mutants missed a decent amount too so it wasn’t totally lopsided and strictly down to luck.

This was a fun game but also ever so slightly disappointing in a couple regards. I wasn’t expecting the creatures to be slaughtered quite as quickly as they were. Even having a Super Mutant go down to the ghouls didn’t really affect the result much. I’d like to try and play this one again and use some beefier enemies to see if that changes how this plays. It ended up having a kill and gather creature corpses phase and then a scrap between the two sides and I would have liked to have seen a little more back and forth instead. The creatures didn’t pose enough of a threat to either side as well and I suspect using some beefier enemies would change that and make that portion of the game more intense and interesting.

I don’t know if it was the sparse the terrain or what but there didn’t end up being many cool images come from this game. I consider a close game and some cool imagery a success for any battle report and I’m sorry to say that the photos weren’t quite up to the usual standard.

I think I say this after just about every game but playing this scenario made me realize how much more stuff I need to paint and make for Fallout. My terrain collection still has a looong way to go. I don’t have enough stuff for a 4×4 board yet really. I also have basically used almost all of the minis in my collection in a battle report which is nice in some ways but it also means I need to expand my collection further and get some additional units painted up to spice up future games.

Unfortunately, I broke not one but two of the flimsier weapons on the Super Mutants. Neither one of them can be easily repaired and so one of the miniatures is probably going in the trash. I somewhat stupidly would try to bend back the bent weapons when I got them out of the case and both were on the flimsy side so it isn’t surprising in hindsight that they broke. I will avoid that temptation in the future though I would also say that those two miniatures are not the best designs because its impossible to keep the handles on the weapons from curving pretty heavily. It sounds like Modiphius is going to re-release some of the earliest miniatures in hard plastic this year so I may end up rebuying the Super Mutants box and repainting those two minis which are almost definitely going to be sturdier but we’ll see on that. I also spotted some lightly damaged terrain during and after this game so I’m going to have to figure out a better way to store everything. I’ll talk more about these things in future updates as I get around to it. Instead of being sad or annoyed, I’m motivated to do better and get some stuff done for Fallout so hopefully that will help me move forward. As I’ve discovered in my time in the hobby, you have to be patient and methodically build up a collection to get where you want to be in a given game. Its almost impossible to get a great looking game going in a couple months of hobby time. That’s just the nature of the beast.

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed my latest trip to the wasteland!