Greetings,
Someone once said to me, “It is a bit sad that the most common miniature sports games out there are focused on American Football when Jousting is a thing.” This got me thinking....
Tournament: Pageantry and Pain is a game designed to be played with a small retinue of Knights and Squires. In Medieval Europe, the Tournament was the height of sport! Nobleman and lords would compete to attract the best Knights and put on the best show for their peers and peasants. Tournaments were popular year round, and a regular Tournament Circuit was created between the 11th and 14th Centuries. Therefore, this game focuses on Retinues of nobles travelling to compete in Tournaments for the season.
The base mechanics are very similar to The Games: Blood and Spectacle. The main driver of the action is use of a Model’s Combat Pool to attack and defend. The player allocates dice from the pool and then uses opposed success test to determine the results. In addition, there is a strong campaign element where one off events are built upon to grow and manage a retinue over the course of a season.
The primary design goals were:
1. Both players actively engaged at all times
2. Player have multiple, relevant decisions
3. Stand-alone and Campaign play options
4. Utilize The Games: blood and Spectacle rules whenever relevant
5. More than just Jousting
6. Customizable retinues
7. Model and scale agnostic
You can find the rules for Tournament: Pageantry and Pain here: https://app.box.com/s/vnizg9k3m8qdqn6i6tym24kemxg8au2i
Each retinue must have the following; A Mounted Knight, a Foot knight, and a Foot Squire. There is the option to add various skill levels of models, type of Retinue member, geographic differences, and equipment load-outs. Most retinues start out with only 5 to 7 models, so you and a buddy could easily split the cost of a few blisters and have two Lord’s Retinues in which to play.
To start my own Retinues for playing and testing, I have found a set of old WHF Brettonian Knights of the Realm. I think they came with the 4th edition boxset. These would be my Mounted Knights to start a few retinues. Once, long ago I started painting these with my daughter to play Full Tilt a jousting game published in a White dwarf many moons ago. We never finished.
This will be an open log, so feel free to add any of your own efforts at building Liege Lord retinues for Tournaments: Pageantry and Pain. This log will catalogue the progress of my little band of merry men, but the more the merrier. Next, I will need a couple of foot knights and a couple of foot Squires (probably with Bows or Javelins). Does anyone want to recommend me some figures?
P.S.- For those interested you can find my progress on The Games: Blood and Spectacle here:
http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?395299-The-Games-Blood-and-Spectacle-Gladiators-in-28mm
