The following article, “The Dominator”, “Dasher”, and “Thor” Go to War is Part 3 in an Apocalypse Road After Action Report series from Stig Morten Breiland. To read Parts 1 and 2, go here and here.
Turn 1 concluded with Deadbeats and Mountaineers tied for the lead at 5 points. As you may or may not know Apocalypse Road has no end of turn events like Thunder Alley or Grand Prix, no points for being in the lead and no lapping. If your car is lapped, that only means he now has a chance to shoot at the car that lapped him. A missile won’t ask if the target has completed more laps than you, it will just explode and hopefully do some damage.
What does happen at the end of the turn is that the amount of points needed to win decreases by one. This is done by moving the “Armored Missile Of Ultimate Revenge ” or as it is known amongst the playtest components, The Yellow Pencil one step down on the scoresheet.
This means that it now takes only 11 points to be crowned the winner of this derby at Black Widow Hollow.
The Bakers had the First Player marker in the turn 1 and now it moves clockwise around the table and First Player for turn 2 will be The Deadbeats.
It’s time for Teresa “The Dominator” White to rev her 121 car up and go hunt for those wounded cars out there. It’s time go trophy hunting.
Just up ahead in that draft line she spots X9X, a Mountaineer with 5 damage tokens on his car. That could be an easy target as “The Dominator” is equipped with a cool targeting computer which will make a shot at a “1” defense car a sure shot. She moves forward and laterally moves into the lane behind X9X and then pushes it forward and let’s a hailstorm of bullets loose.
The Mountaineers car is already so banged up that the bullets in addition to taking out X9X it damages the MOX car in front. Not much, but it is damage.
“The Dominator” takes the Deadbeats into the lead again and Mountaineers places Lob Jammer in his 21 car onto the Chute. Cars put into The Chute start as activated which means that Lob Jammer won’t get to activate until turn 3. It also means that since Mountaineers lost an unactivated car this turn, they will have one less car to activate for now. Will that hurt their chances?
“Do unto others…” goes an old saying and Mountaineers have indeed heard it and taken it to heart. The, as of now unnamed, 78 car drops a RAM Movement card, aims for “The Dominator”, put the pedal to metal and hope to avenge Jean-Luc in the X9X.
The RAM puts 3 damage onto “The Dominator” which is 2 short of a kill, but 78 also suffers 2 damage itself. So not the most successful of RAMS and it also leaves “The Dominator” wounded and it remains to be seen if others take advantage.
The Gelatos, taking a brief rest from their Bakers quest, decides to send the 3 car after the wounded dominator.
Coming out of the ditch after spinning around last turn, 3 wrestles his way in between 78 and “the Dominator” and launches a missile. A 5HP bullseye gives Gelato a kill and they get up to 5 points, tied 2nd with The Mountaineers. “The Dominator” took a point, then left the race giving Gelato Division a point 2 activations later. That escalated quickly.
The pile of wrecks is getting bigger now.
SPT of The Bakers decides to fire his rear mounted machine gun before moving instead of after. He hits 444 for 1 damage before leading a whole host of cars through the rough and jump sections.
The Move event drawn because of the Red explosion icon on the move card allows him to swap places with his teammate in front of him. That means that he actually lapped his teammate, but no need to track lapped cars here, as they all score points if they cross the finish line. Being lapped just means you cross the finish line less times.
The state of the race after each team has had one activation each. The wrecks are up in the corner and the Chute is getting crowded.
Dasher Carsten of The Gelatos with 3 damage gets another 2 when “Stina” of The Deadbeats fires his way before moving the entire draftline forwards. Being just one shy of removing Dasher and getting the point is not cool. Will someone else steal the Dasher point?
“Dangerous” Derek Ciamell of the Mountaineers turns out to be less dangerous than he wants as his machine guns didn’t find the purple target at all. He turns the neat draft line into something less neat with his diagonal lead card.
But there will be more chances to shoot now with a packed field.
It’s time for Dasher to shine. With 5 damage he needs to put some points on the table before someone gives him the final shot.
With 8 in basemove and 12 sectors from the finishline, a +4 card is needed to get the point for crossing the finish line and then he can shoot at “Dangerous” Derek afterwards. Only problem for Dasher is that there is a Move event on the +4 lead movement card he uses.
While he pushes himself, his teammate 5 and Deadbeats OWL over the finishline to take both Deadbeats and Gelato Division to 7 points, his move event fails him. OUT OF POSITION means he won’t be able to shoot.
MOX of The Bakers unsuccessfully RAMS “STINA” and halfway through turn 2 Deadbeats and Gelato Division are tied for the lead two points ahead of The Mountaineers and three ahead of The Bakers. 4 more points needed to win for the leading pair of teams.
Deadbeats are next to go and pushes a whole host of purple and red cars forward and into the jokerlane. This jokerlane can be a hazzle as it is rough terrain. More chance of being hit my move events and you can’t change lanes there.
806, “Thor” of the Mountaineers are next and being just 2 sectors away from the finish line has his eyes set on lots of points.
You can follow along as he moves out and crosses the finishline himself, laterally displaces Dasher and then drafts his teammate across the finishline to make the race a three way tie, only to have his attack miss when a lone damage would be enough to take out Dasher.
Can Dasher survive this race with one health left?
Will The Bakers make a comeback from 3 points back?
Come back next week for the thrilling finale of this “7.62 MM Full Metal Derby” at Black Widow Hollow.
Articles in this Series: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4
Author: Stig Morten Breiland
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