I have had a feeling for a while that I wanted to change my medieval/fantasy campaign on the continent of Petaudia in some sort of way. I did not want to change the political or geographical aspect as I had built that up over quite a few years. So I thought that altering the scale of the armies might be an idea. Instead of figures representing ten, twenty or thirty of their type, just have them representing one individual or creature. In other words, move towards skirmish level gaming. After all, Petaudia is not a big continent; if it were a reality, a person could walk from one end to the other, north to south, using the best roads, in about thirty days or so. So anyway, I dug out my old medieval skirmish rules, which are based on various sets of rules read or tried over the last thirty years or so, made a few fantasy additions, and put on a game.

The scenario has a goblin raid on a village in the north of the Celerian Marches, close to Harpagia. The attackers had a bow-armed band, a band with spears, swords, clubs and mattocks, half a dozen wolf riders, half a dozen goblin guards and a very bog hobgoblin on a giant boar was commander. The villages had a dozen armed peasants and a dozen mercenaries who were accompanying a merchant and his wares who had stopped off to overnight en route to a market in Harpagia. There was also about a dozen unarmed civilians who would move randomly about the village.

The goblins would get points for capturing civilians, the merchant's wares and mules or wagon, and looting and burning the houses. The  defenders would get points for holding on to the moveable goods and beasts of burden, as well as protecting their homes and fellow villagers.

It was very much a fun game and I played it enthusiastically for three hours, which is probably a long time for a skirmish game! Anyway, in the end, the goblins gained a victory, mainly because they caused enough casualties to the mercenaries to make them abandon their client, leaving the poor peasants to fight on alone. The latter had very little hope against the goblins and eventually fled their village, so that the goblins scooped a major win.

It has made me consider the idea of making Petaudai's battles much smaller in scale, although keeping track of who was wounded, stunned, out of arrows, etc., was a bit fiddly! The rules allow groups of figures in base contact to move as one, but once they started to break up into small groups or individuals, it slowed things up quite a lot. However, there was the compensation of some brave deeds or amusing events, such as the only peasant with a bow shooting dead a goblin wolf rider on his first  attempt, or the poor civilian who spent the whole game roving back and forth across the village green until finally being captured by the goblins, or the three peasants who traded blows with a goblin for turn after turn but with neither side making any hits!

Anyway, if you have any thoughts on skirmish gaming, I would be pleased to hear them. In addition, her are some photographs with captions. The table was 4 feet by 3 feet (120 cm by 90 cm).