House of the Jade Lantern

Another recent acquisition has been Might & Melee, from Wiley Games. One of three books doing a fantasy take on their Fistful of Lead game system, I found it to be a fun, colorful read. The author, Jaye Wiley, is a D&D player of way back and it informs his system and sensibilities. M&M is pretty much near historical fantasy – the magic and monsters really come in the later two volumes, with some ideas includes in this core book. It has, to me, an old school flair: minimal stat line and various abilities. The book includes the core rules, material on making a warband, listing of abilities, a handful of scenarios, and creatures, a pair of sample retinues and such.

It’s miniatures agnostic, so I used some old medieval fantasy 28 mm and set up a 3×3 board. M&M / FFoL uses a card draw activation system, which adds some nice friction for the solo player (me, in this case!), and a typical warband is a small handful (5 ish, unless you want to include some rabble teams). I had my blue team as a band of plucky, bow-toting Rangers of Bluetowne and one of the sample warbands as the Sheriff of Redville and his men. I grabbed some d10s (and d8s and d12s for the outliers), some tokens, cards and a tape measure … and then the assault on Weather … I mean, Ruintop began!

With the randomized activation, simple night fight rules, and small warband, it was a fun solo game. I wasn’t sure how it would go, actually, and the battle ebbed and flowed a bit.

In the end, the Rangers narrowly pulled off a victory, forcing the Sheriff and his men to retreat into the night. However, one of the Rangers, “White Cloak” was injured in the attack, and the Rangers will need to seek some remedy in the woods before they can continue their mission.

Probably obvious that I thoroughly enjoyed the game and system. I’ve gotten the follow-up two books (Magic and Monsters focused), and looking forward to adding those to some future games.

Until next time, Be Well and Good Gaming!