Arena Games' Gladiatorial Combat - Play-tested At Last

Well, with only a day or so before Enfilade! (the local "big" historical convention), I was finally able to play-test the rules for the gladiator game I'll be hosting on Saturday night. Actually, it's more of a familiarization of the rules, as these are not new rules and by all accounts has worked well at other conventions in it's almost 15 year history. I just needed to get familiar with the play-action. This all thanks to one of the younger guys here at work - an OIF veteran and budding gamer with a love of Roman history, of all things.

There are enough gladiator figures for 12 players, but as this was an initial game for both of us, we just chose one figure each. I played a Murmillo and Joel (the OIF vet) played a Retiarius - figured he's smarter and can figure out the special rules for throwing and entanglement weapons. We both ended up with the same Activation Points with our D6 rolls - although my Murmillo was armored much heavier than his net man. Speaking of D6's - that was the one item I had overlooked to bring to work. I did have a six-sided Direction die and with the trusty label maker printed out numbers for that lone D6. We ended up rolling the one D6 multiple times for the six wounds for each hit.

Note: I wasn't sure which number goes on which side of the die

As always, no matter how simple the rules are, it is great to not only play-test them, but also have someone else's take on it. After a couple of turns, Joel asked, "What about the Stamina Point boxes?" Refer quickly to the rules. "Oh...got it, ah, that's pretty simple and makes sense." I'll also host the Actium game on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning. I haven't touched that game since the playtest a few months ago. Oh well, it's pretty simple too. I should be able to posts some stuff once at the convention.