Castle Siege: Quest of Vallahelm

About the Author

Nathan Keighley grew up on a small farm in North Yorkshire and continues to be passionate about the countryside, as well as his academic pursuits. Nathan is an enthusiastic writer of scientific texts; he has authored two books (The History of Life on Earth and Miraculous Medicines and the Chemistry of Drug Design) as well as scientific research articles. He has since been inspired to write fictional works in the fantasy genre, with Castle Siege: Quest of Vallahelm, which he hopes the reading audience will find to be an exciting and intriguing tabletop game and story.

Copyright Information ©

Nathan Keighley 2022

The right of Nathan Keighley to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398472198 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398472204 (ePub e-book)

www.austinmacauley.com

First Published 2022

Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd®

1 Canada Square

Canary Wharf

London

E14 5AA

Foreword on Castle Siege

Castle Siege is a fantasy role-playing war game. The game is played out through tabletop enactments of the story portrayed in this book. The particulars on how to play the game are detailed in the rule system and the appendices. Each army, a hero army and a monsters army, start off with a given number of soldiers and a subset of this army may be deployed to battle a given campaign detailed in the book chapters. This continues until all the characters in one of the armies are defeated. The heroes must amass a strong enough army to defeat the monsters and complete the adventure, while the monsters must amass enough of an army to oppose the heroes and prevent them from reaching the end of this story.

Rule Systems

Castle siege is a battle between two sides: Heroes and Monsters. The story portrayed in this book can be enacted as a tabletop war game using these rule systems. The game commences inside of a castle and the goal of the game is for one side to defeat the other in combat to decide who occupies the castle. Later in the story, scenarios in other terrain settings are laid out, and of course, you can expand the game to create your own narratives and settings.

Main characters

The population of the game is made of two teams, heroes (Humans, elves, dwarves and wizards) and monsters (Orcs, goblins, the undead and sorcerers).

Special characters

Special characters can include dragons, giants, demons; any powerful creatures that occupy your imagination. These creatures hold no allegiances, so can affiliate with either side of your choosing. However, in the course of the story, allegiances will be predetermined as you follow the narrative. Special characters move two times faster than the main infantry, which moves four spaces in a turn, so may move up to eight spaces. However, due to their size, special characters are only permitted to traverse suitably spaced paths and doorways i.e., the models must fit through the gaps in the terrain. They also have three hit points. Playing the game is far simpler than many of the other widely available tabletop fantasy games. The characters move across the board, come into contact, and fight!

Moving around the board

On each player’s turn, their army may move up to four squares (Or inches, if a grid system is not being used) for all their characters. You can choose to move fewer spaces for some of the characters if you wish. For example, two characters move forward three squares, while one moves just one square to block a doorway. Characters can move forwards, backwards, diagonally, and independently of other characters. Characters cannot pass through occupied squares or walls.

Engaging in battle

To engage in battle, the player’s characters must be adjacent to an enemy i.e., their bases are touching. The first player takes their turn by rolling a coloured dice, which will determine an attack score. The second player rolls a white dice, which will determine the success of an action where there is an element of chance involved, such as defending the attack.

For characters under attack, the score of the white dice must be equal to or greater than the opponent’s coloured-dice attack score to successfully defend the attack. It is now the second player’s turn to make an attack roll. Meanwhile, infantry movement can bring other characters into position to engage in battle under that same attack roll. This procedure is then repeated for player one. Each dice roll is for all infantry characters in one turn.

As the encounters progress, experience points (XP) are awarded for defeating enemies and achieving mission objectives, which contribute towards level-ups of your armies. The infantrymen will improve upon their defensive scores and attack roll. Rules of engagement are as follows:

The Heroes team goes first.

Move then attack (Or perform an action). You cannot move away from an attack but may defend the attack, then move or counterattack. An attack can only be directed towards one opponent.

An action may be to collect treasure or open a locked prison cell. You cannot perform an action and an attack in the same turn. Actions that involve an element of chance may have their success determined by rolling a white dice. For example, jumping over a crevasse.

Ranged attacks: Players with long bows/crossbows can attack from a range of up to twelve inches. However, the attacking player must be able to demonstrate that there is a clear shot to the enemy. This must be along a straight path with no obstruction from another character or a wall.

Magic: Wizards and sorcerers are equipped with spells that can be used continually throughout the game. 1) Infinite shock: Every enemy in a straight line (That is not blocked by another character on your team or a wall) is subjected to the attack. 2) Energy blast: Any enemies occupying a space that is directly adjacent to the magician is subjected to the attack.

A fair game: Teams with ranged weapons and magicians have the advantage, so it makes sense to include equal numbers of these in each team. However, it can be interesting to mix things up by having fewer characters on teams with magicians and archers to battle it out against a horde on the opposite side when you write your own game narratives.

Flanking: Individual characters can be attacked by multiple opponents in the same turn if all the attacking characters are adjacent to the character under attack. This means that the attack roll made with the coloured dice is multiplied by the number of attackers. Flanking can be especially useful for defeating special characters with a high defence score. Flanking cannot be done with ranged/magic attacks.

Number of players

Two teams only: A hero’s side and a monster’s side. However, each side can be made up of multiple players. For example, one player might control the Orc characters and the other controls the undead characters when battling the heroes. Each team takes one turn.

Types of game play

We suggest three types of missions that can be undertaken during Castle Siege game play. These can serve as a premise for writing and playing out your own narratives.

Death match: There are many permutations of battle possible with different numbers and races of characters, as well as including special characters on teams. The objective is to destroy all of the enemy’s players.

Treasure search: One player hides treasure chests (Marking an ‘X’ on a map of the terrain) and the other player must locate all the treasure and return to their base with the treasure or destroy all enemies.

Rescue: A character is imprisoned in the castle, and it is up to the players to unlock the prison door and safely escort that character back to safety.

Castle Siege is designed to give players total freedom in the game. Use miniatures from your own collection. With the advances in 3D printing, you can even create your own custom miniatures. This can be a great idea for creating special characters, or you can cheaply craft special characters by modifying old kids’ toys! There is no set rule for the number of characters involved in the game. You can include 10+ characters on each team and have epic battles!

Players of tabletop games often enjoy building dioramas, and Castle Siege is no exception. Make the terrain for the castle out of foam or card. Construct buildings to fit the rooms