61. The Beatdown
RAW ✔️ House of Chains, p114
The following scenarios are designed to encapsulate House Goliath's way of waging gang war. They cover some of the broad themes common to the Goliaths, such as the random brutality of a barehanded beating to the carnage of the Feast of the Fallen – House Goliath's own festival of violence. When a Goliath player has the option of choosing the scenario for their game they can, with the permission of the Arbitrator, choose one of the following scenarios. Where one player is the attacker and the other is the defender this will be detailed in the scenario.
While the scenarios presented here have been designed specifically for House Goliath gangs, there is no reason that, with the permission of the Arbitrator, they might not be used for any gang. Some of them also lend themselves well to multi-player scenarios – such as the Beatdown where multiple gangs might have found themselves in a tense stand-off, perhaps after randomly running into each other in a seedy drinking hole, and now must prove their might without things getting 'too' out of hand. Other scenarios, like the Feast of the Fallen, can also make for interesting Arbitrated games. Perhaps instead of having a random ganger become empowered by an ancestor, the ancestor driven ganger could be controlled by the Arbitrator with the gangs trying to take them down – or for added mayhem, why not have gangs face-off against all five ancestors at once!
Wrong place, wrong time...
Battlefield
This scenario uses the Battlefield Set-up guidelines, as described in the Battlefield Set-up & Scenarios section of the Necromunda Rulebook.
Crews
This scenario uses the standard rules for choosing a crew, as described in the Battlefield Set-up & Scenarios section of the Necromunda Rulebook.
Both gangs use the Random Selection (D3+4) method to determine their crew.
Deployment
The gangs are passing each other in the underhive when the violence starts. Players roll off to see who places a fighter first. This fighter can be placed anywhere on the board provided they are not in impassable terrain. Players then alternate placing fighters within 12" of this first fighter, until both crews are deployed. If a fighter cannot be deployed within 12" of the first fighter, either because there is no room, or they would have to be placed within 1" of an enemy fighter, they may be deployed further away, though only just far enough from the fighter so there is space to place them.
You Looking At Me?
Two gangs have chanced upon each other in the underhive, and may well have gone on their way if one of the fighters hadn't decided they didn't like the way their rivals were looking at them. After both gangs have been deployed, each player receives a Ready marker. This Ready marker is then placed onto a randomly determined fighter.
In the Priority phase of the second round, and in each subsequent Priority phase, each player receives a number of Ready markers equal to the current round. These may be placed onto any fighter. This can mean a fighter who was given a Ready marker last round may not receive a Ready marker this round. However, the more fighters a player activates, the lower their rewards will be at the end. From the second round onwards players may also choose not to give Ready markers to any of their fighters, effectively conceding defeat.
Fighters without Ready markers take no part in the game (it can be imagined they are spectating), provide no benefits (such as Leading by Example) and cannot be targeted by attacks or damaged by area effect weapons. They do, however, count for Bottle tests. In addition, enemy fighters must still stay more than 1" away from them.
Gang Tactics
Each player may choose two gang tactics from those available to their gang. If, during the pre-battle sequence, the total credits value of fighters in one player's starting crew is less than their opponent's, they may randomly determine one additional gang tactic for each full 100 credits of difference.
Ending the Battle
The battle ends if, after the Priority phase, only one gang has fighters with Ready markers remaining on the battlefield.
Victory
The side with at least one fighter with a Ready marker when the game ends is the winner.
Rewards
Experience
Each fighter who took part in the battle earns 1 XP.
If only one fighter was Readied during the game, that fighter gains D3 XP.
If only two fighters were Readied during the game, those fighters gain 1 XP.
Reputation
The victorious gang gains 2D3 Reputation if they didn't Ready more than one fighter each round, D6 if they didn't Ready more than two fighters on any round, and D3 Reputation if they Readied three or more fighters on any round.