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Hobgoblin is a "brutal combat" tabletop fantasy battles game from Gaslands' Mike Hutchinson [1]

['Gareth Branwyn']

Date: 2023-04-24

Seven years ago, game designer Mike Hutchinson had several titles he was developing. One was a miniatures-agnostic "rank and flank" fantasy battles game, called Hobgoblin. The other was a post-apocalyptic car combat game, called Gaslands, that used converted die cast toy cars. The latter, published by Osprey Games in 2017, was such a massive success that Hobgoblin was swamped in its wake. Until now.

Mike and Electi Studio (publishers of the wonderful Blaster game anthologies) have launched a Kickstarter to fund Hobgoblin and it looks like a whole lot of fun. It feels like good timing, too. Many of us tabletop wargamers have been so immersed in the world of small-band skirmish games for the past 7 years that a rank-based mass battles game sounds enticing again. The idea of using any miniatures you want also makes fielding a full fantasy army a little less intimidating. And with that logo-type on the cover, you know that Hobgoblin is going to be METAL \m/ \m/.

Here are some of the features of the game listed on the Kickstarter page:

Army & Unit Creation: Build any army you can imagine, using any miniatures you want.

Cursed Artefacts: Arcane items that bestow great power, but at a terrible cost.

Movement: Intuitive rules for wheeling and advancing with blocks of "rank and flank" troops.

Combat: Brutal combat ensures plenty of death, but also ensures that the units you bring into battle get a chance to fight, and fight as heroically or as devilishly as you wish.

Abyssal Sorcery: Allows players to invoke and channel the power of abyssal gods, using Mana Tokens to cast spells and gain special abilities, represented by the selection of a school of magic.

Fortune Cards: One-shot cards that can be played to change the odds in battle, they can be drawn at the start of each round Whenever a unit is removed as a casualty, they can be used to re-roll dice, change the target of a spell, grant bonuses to units, and other effects.

Procedural Scenario Generation System: Hobgoblin provides a set of "Chaos of War" tables that allows you to rapidly generate a unique scenario for your battle. You can also create custom battle rules by visiting our website.

Narrative Scenarios: The rulebook provides ways to play cinematic and asymmetrical battles, such as a fortress siege or the defence of a chasm.

Multiplayer Rules: Play with 3 or more players, broken into teams, forcing unlikely allies to work together to achieve victory.

The Kickstarter reached its goal in 12 hours and is now over $38,000 with 23 days to go.

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[1] Url: https://boingboing.net/2023/04/24/hobgoblin-is-a-brutal-combat-tabletop-fantasy-battles-game-from-gaslands-mike-hutchinson.html

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