Hunting the Man-Killers

A CHAIN REACTION ENCOUNTER

The drum talk interrupted the usual night sounds of the crackling campfire and nocturnal creatures.  “Mukesh,” snarled Jack Gable standing in front of his tent buttoning his shirt, “what is so important to wake the jungle at this hour?”

“A village beyond the Napondi has been attacked, people ripped apart” replied Mukesh.

The country beyond the Napondi River, like much of Nobelongga, was unexplored.  Any creature capable of ripping a man apart would be quite a trophy – a trophy that would put him ahead of the competition.  In Jack Gable’s book, big game hunting was a competition and Americans thrived on competition.  He smiled and then barked “Break camp, we leave at first light.”

Introduction

Welcome to Hunting the Man-Killers, an encounter for Two Hour Wargames’ Chain Reaction rule set.  The encounter takes place in the late 19^th century or very early in the 20th century in the kingdom of Nobelongga, specifically the unexplored part of the country around the Napondi River.  The drums warn of great carnivorous apes who rip people apart and of something more sinister.  To further complicate things, the Watutu, who deem the apes as sacred, do not allow any outsiders into their lands.

Needed to Play

In addition to the rules, you will need some six-sided dice, counters or miniatures to represent your character and the non-player characters (NPCs) and if playing Chain Reaction 2015, a measuring device. Chain Reaction 2018 is played on a 8″ by 10″ battle board and Chain Reaction 2015 is played on a 3′ by 3′ table surface.

Building Your Group

Chain Reaction was written with an aim toward modern and near future settings – think World War I to 2080 Cyberpunk for example. So, we have to make a few changes in order for the game to work for the era of Colonial expansion. One of these changes you can make is to the group size. In the 19th century, expeditions sometimes numbered hundreds of men and women. One expedition even carried a large steel boat in sections through hundreds of miles on unexplored rainforest. Increasing the group size doesn’t affect the game mechanics, but it does make for a longer game.

For this encounter, I like to use a group of 10 (including the character), this is twice the normal group size. The encounter works with the normal group size – however, the jungle is brutal, so don’t count on all of your group to survive to the end.

Your character leads an expedition of European Adventurers. The expedition, or group, is composed of characters from different classes or troop types. You can choose the members of your group from the group’s list. Each class is presented with a minimum and a maximum number of characters. An entry with (0 – 4), for example means you can take from zero up to four characters of that class, whereas an entry of (1 – 3) means you must take at least one character from that class and as many as three.

European Adventurers Group

Encounter Classes

This encounter is set in the jungles of Nobelongga, a fictional kingdom modeled on the Congo River basin. Your group will be made up of individuals from the following classes or troop types found in expeditions of the late 19th century.

Who Are They? – European Adventurers

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1	Leader	5	Breech-Loading Rifle, Pistol
2	Adventurer	5 (1-2), 4 (3-6)	Breech-Loading Rifle, Pistol
3	Adventurer	4	Pistol

Who Are They? – Arab Traders

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1	Leader	5	Sword*
2	Arab Trader	5 (1-2), 4 (3-6)	Rifled Musket
3	Arab Trader	4	Sword*
4	Baluchi	4	Rifled Musket
5	Baluchi	3	Rifled Musket
6	Baluchi	3	Sword*

Who Are They? – Askari

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1	Leader (NCO)	5	Breech-Loading Rifle
2	Askari	5	Breech-Loading Rifle
3	Askari	4	Breech-Loading Rifle
4	Askari	4	Rifled Musket
5	Ruga-Ruga	4	Rifled Musket
6	Ruga-Ruga	3	Rifled Musket

Who Are They? – Tribal Natives

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1	Leader	5	Spear & Shield or Rifled Musket
2	Tribal Native	5 (1-4), 4 (5-6)	Spear & Shield
3	Tribal Native	4	Spear & Shield
4	Tribal Native	4	Rifled Musket
5	Tribal Native	3	Spear & Shield
6	Tribal Native	3	Rifled Musket or Bow

Who Are They? – Pygmies

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1	Leader	4	Throwing Spear or Bow
2	Pygmy	3	Throwing Spear (1-3), Bow (4-6)
3	Pygmy	3	Bow

Who Are They? – Bearers

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1 – 3	Bearer	3	Confidence Attribute

Who Are They? – The Watutu Clan

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1	Leader (1-4), Witchdoctor (5-6)	5	Leader – Spear & Shield Witchdoctor – Spells
2	Tribal Native	5 (1-4), 4 (5-6)	Spear & Shield
3	Tribal Native	4	Spear & Shield
4	Tribal Native	4	Rifled Musket
5	Tribal Native	3	Spear & Shield
6	Tribal Native	3	Rifled Musket or Bow

Who Are They? – The Man-Killers

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1	Leader (1-5), Kong (6)*	6	Tooth and Nail
2	Carnivorous Ape	5 (1-4), 6 (5-6)	Tooth and Nail
3	Carnivorous Ape	5	Tooth and Nail

Who Are They? – Kong

#	Type	Rep	Weapon
1	Kong	10 or 12*	Tooth and Nail

Weapons and Spells

At the end of the 19th century, the bolt-action rifle made its debut in small numbers. The breech-loading rifles and repeating carbines still made up the bulk of inventories of the Colonial Powers and European Adventurers. They used smokeless powder in metal cartridges and were easy to load. Native populations had little access to these weapons. Instead, the bulk of their arsenals were rifled muskets and even some older smooth-bore muskets, all which were muzzle loaded and therefore provided a much slower rate of fire.

There were still many native societies which still favored spear and shield over the slower firearms. The bow had almost fallen out of use except among the pygmies.

Ranged Weapons

Description	Type	Range*	Target
Breech-Loadng Rifles, Bolt-Action Rifles, Repeating Carbines	Breech-Loading Rifle	48″	2
Rifled Muskets, Muskets	Rifled Musket	36″	1
Bows	Bow	24″	1
Pistols, Shotguns	Pistol	12″	1
Throwing Spears	Throwing Spear	6″	1

Melee Weapons

• Characters armed with sword, knife, club, spear – add +1d6 on the Melee table
• Characters armed with bayonet on rifle, sword and shield, spear and shield – add +2d6 on the Melee table
• Large Creatures with Tooth and Nail – add +1d6 on the Melee table

Witchdoctor Spells

For simplicity, I’ve limited the Witchdoctors Spells to that of psychological warfare. The Witchdoctor casts his or her spell during shooting, by rolling 2d6 against his or her Rep. If successful the opposing force is stricken by varying degrees of fear.

Roll 2d6	Witchdoctor Spell
Pass 2d6	Terror – One in four of the enemy force immediately take a Will to Fight Test (CR 2018) or (CR 2015) roll 1d6 against Rep, if failed – leave the battlefield.
Pass 1d6	Fear – One in four of the enemy force ducks back
Pass 0d6	Spell failed.

The Encounter

Now that we have all of the necessary tables and you’ve built your group, we are ready to play the encounter. As you can see, when using Chain Reaction, it is up to you to construct the world setting and to populate it with both friendly and enemy NPCs. Now let’s pause for a cup of tea and then carry on.

Objective

• Your objective is to resolve all PEFs and then eliminate the Man-Killers.

Special Instructions

• There will be 2+1/2d6 PEFs in the Encounter. You may resolve as many of them as desired. When resolving all but the last PEF, use the Who Are They? – The Watutu Clan table.
• Resolve the last PEF using the Who Are They? – The Man-Killers table.
• Play continues until the player has accomplished the objective, been incapacitated, or leaves the Encounter.

In Conclusion

I hope you enjoy this encounter, and the foray into Colonial Era gaming. Many, many years ago, before cable TV and the internet, we could pick up two channels on the television if the weather was right. On Sunday mornings one of the stations broadcast the old Johnny Weissmuller Tarzan movies. So at an early age I fell in love with the period. I hope you will too.

I haven’t thoroughly play tested this encounter, so if something doesn’t make sense or doesn’t quite work right, please let me know.

Please leave likes and comments, it’s the only way I can tell how to improve what I write. No Floozies were harmed in creating this post, though one of the voices in my head refuses to practice social distancing – it’s the whiney one and I just know she doesn’t wash her hands.