TNT: Hunt for the Dungerdon part 2

This is the second game in a small mini campaign of This Is Not A Test. 

You can read the first battle report here. In which the caravanner gang of Mama Stirling takes on a family of mutant cannibals. Mama Stirling has gotten a lot of clues and found the lair of the huge Dungerdon. 

In this battle the caravanners have come to take down the beast and try an recover a lot of loot from it (the Dungerdon will eat, but not digest, anything). But the crew has been followed by the Peacekeepers of the Common Order. They two have been hunting the Dungerdon - but unlike the greedy caravanners, they will not keep (all) the rescued loot for themselves. 

For this setup we decided to move from the desert border town into the real desert. Lots of cliffs in the area, some old trash. This is the Dungerdons lair. And as seen on the setup shot here, the beast is freaking huge!

This is the prize, this is what the teams are after (mostly its loot filled poop though) - but there's gonna be some good experience and caps in bringing down the monster itself.

The entire fire base of my warband setup close. All waiting to use the motivator skill of the leader, get those 2 action points, stay hidden behind the cliff (to not let the caravanners shoot at me) and start blasting the Dungerdon to meat pieces. 

Seeing as there's always new criminals (we make the law!), there's always new sacrificial lambs for the team. You get them back for free if they die. So the plan was simple. Use a single prisoner at a time, to tie up the Dungerdon in melee, while blasting it with all the other guys!

Those huge behemoth class monsters, can do a lot of damage. And this big but could vomit large blasts of half digested food at our guys and hit multiple enemies in close combat. So the tactic was to fan out the troopers, to avoid this, while staying hidden from the enemy team.

The caravanners had a lot of luck in their hunt for clues to the Dungerdon lair. Finding both a depend-o-bot and extra plasma weaponry for the team - so they were all ready for the hunt. Having spread out more evenly across the board, they start making the way towards the target.

We used small chits, to determine random actions for the behemoth. And from the start, with lots of hit points, it has a lot of actions. The big monster crashed right ahead, stomping stuff under foot and got straight into combat with one of my sacrificial lambs. 

By the start of this scenario, there's already some look on the board. Trashed, semi digested loot that has been a trip through a dungerdon. The caravanners didn't setup all members for a fight with the monster, but set people forth for looting an attacking the peace keepers in the rear.  

Being fairly safe, the caravanners where able to start blasting plasma bolts at the dungerdon, that was already occupied trying to eat and stump my guys. 

An experienced hunter, having gotten a few kills against the Wastebog Family, a caravanner sniper takes up a secure position. She'll be able to take shots at the monster and my troops equally. 

Choosing to let cover be cover Mama Stirling and the mutant envoy most into the open, the dungerdon is tied up in combat, but there's loot to be gained in the open. 

My peace keeper leader is armed with a laser carbine and he's getting support by an officer with a shotgun, they move forward staying in cover, also trying to gain some look.

A sacrificial lamb moving into combat with the behemoth. Plan is to fight, perhaps die, then blow them up and hopefully wounding the behemoth some more. It's a huge beast with tough skin and lots of armor. It's taking a lot of shots (even plasma) and simply shaking it off. It's damn hard to wound this monster.

As part of the scenario rules, the behemoth might drop even more loot during the game, all manner of stuff. Since the monster is closest to me, it's not that hard to move some troops around it and gather up these supplies for some easy and sage victory points and caps.

My guys were in combat with the behemoth for most of the game and I've never rolled more lucky for defense in my life. The behemoth simply couldn't crush my guys, despite attacking all of them each single turn. They didn't cause any wounds in return, but nevermind that. The behemoth was slowly wounded by incoming fire and the ground troopers stood their ground. 

While all my attention is on the dungerdon fight, three sneaky caravanners are getting close to my lines, taking some loot on the way. 

While moving forward, they are sticking close to the rocks and staying out of lines of fire.

After a ton of turns, we finally manage to take down the behemoth. You'll get victory points for wounding the beast, and some extra for taking it down. There's no doubt that the caravanners plasma has given it a lot of damage - but in the end the peace keepers manage to bring it down. As my guys have stayed close to the edge of the board, all warband members carrying loot quickly escape the area. 

Now, my sniper outrider has not done a lot this game. He's been hugging cover and takin pot shots at the enemy. But one of my prisoners manage to take down the big mutant envoy and a bit of revenge is in order. So running up close and personal a caravanners empties his hand guns into the outrider, taking him out.

The sacrificial lamb who had the strength to take down a mutant, he does not do as well against the depend-o-bot, but he does prevent it from taking some of the loot.

The game ends with a bang, as with the last shots fired takes out a prisoner and he explodes out in the desert. The battle is over, the dungerdon has been slain.

As the smell of burning plasma fried fur and meat fill the desert air, the winners of this encounter is clear. The common order peace keepers managed to secure far mor treasure than the caravanners, so despite doing roughly equal wound to the behemoth, they win. 

It wasn't a bad game for the caravanners. The didn't take any bad hits or losses during the game. The just didn't get rich. 

The peace keepers on the other hand get a decent amount of caps from the encounter - enough to hire on a new officer for the team. But the outrider is badly wounded and will have to sit out the next mission for the warband.