Ninja, Ninja everywhere.

A good fun solo/co-operative play scenario ... each player could share the Hatamoto out between them!

Ninja, Ninja everywhere …
A solitaire/cooperative play scenario for Bushi no Yume
By Rich Jones 2010

Nakamura stirred on his futon, stretched his hand out and reassuringly felt the sharkskin on the tsuka (handle) of his katana. Turning to try and get back to sleep his senses tingled. Ever since arriving at his good friend Takamatsu’s house he had felt uneasy. The evening had been pleasant, a game of Go, entertaining dancing from the delightful Kiku San, rounded off with some warming sake, so why the unease?

Shadows moving is never good news; when there are a number of shadows seemingly flowing over the garden wall it bodes even worse. Tanemura had been waiting for revenge for the slight he felt had been dealt to him by Nakamura for a number of years. Hearing of his rivals visit to a near by house he saw his chance, a midnight meeting with a shadowy figure by the river side had set the deal up … one part of him was disgusted with hiring the ‘kusa’ (ninja), another part of him tingled with excitement; revenge at last!

Unease in the household had resulted in extra guards being posted, extra torches being lit. One of the Ashigaru guards quickly turned his head, unfortunately as his brain was asking why the stone in the pebble garden seemed to throwing something at him, it was too late! Five dark clad figures seemed to arise from the pebbles and scurry in a strange forward bending stoop towards the guest house. Suddenly there was a loud clang of a bell. One of the figures had failed to spot the twine made of hair stretching between the shrubs … the warning bell echoed around the walled garden.

Table Top: The table top only needs to be 3’x3’ in 28mm for this scenario as it must be packed with terrain. There should be a pebble/sand garden, a garden area with a stream running through it and at least two buildings. At least one side of the table should have a high garden wall running down the length, this will be the ninjas entry and exit point.

Set Up: there needs to be 8 markers to represent lit areas of the garden (use the core rule mechanics). Nakamura is ‘asleep’ in one of the buildings, the player must randomise which one he is in secret. The easiest way to do this is with a number of identical markers, the underneath of one will be marked. Then mix them up and pop them in the buildings. I use building models which are solid, when the characters need to fight inside I swap to a building template off table. In this way the building models can be smaller (as often table ground scale is smaller than 1:1 anyway). There should also be 2 warning traps with 2 dummy markers apiece. These are marked and although the player should place the 6 markers where ever he wants, the location of the 2 real traps is not known. If a ninja character comes within a Short Length of a trap marker they must make a Kyu roll on 1d6, if they pass they notice the trap and will avoid the trip, anyone in his group will instantly be aware of the same trap. Moving within a base width of the trap will be done using a Short Length.

Nakamura and his Yojimbo can only leave the building when the alarm has been raised and there is fighting within a medium length of the building. This represents them waiting to see what is happening. So the marker in a building can only be flipped when there is fighting within a medium after the alarm has been raised OR a ninja enters the building.

Ninja mechanics: The ninja are in groups of 4 and each group heads towards the nearest (but different building) on their activation until a group has identified Nakamura when they will all converge on their prey. There are two waves of ninja. The first wave consists of 3 groups, the second wave of a possible 4 groups. A group from the second wave will enter when one of the initial wave groups is down to 2 or less characters left. Each will activate as a ‘group’ and will roll 2 dice for activation unless they can see Nakamura in which case the group will always roll 3 dice in their haste to do their mission. NOTE: this scenario uses the Kyu 4 Bujutsu 2 ‘omake’ version of the ninja … any loss in combat will remove them from the table.

Tomozei: Nakamura’s uses the Daimyo stats out of the core rules. However, he also has the Menkyo Kaiden ability. His tomozei is bolstered by Takamatsu’s guard. Nakamura has 6 Hatamoto with him (one a Yojimbo is in the building with him) who are posted around the buildings. One of the Hatamoto is armed with a Dai Kyu and all are wearing chain under their Hakama and Yukata and count as wearing partial armour. There are also 4 Ashigaru guards (wearing partial armour) who can be stationed around the garden ready to give the alarm.

Scenario notes and tactics: remember to use the night time lightening and sound mechanics in the core rules. The ninja should try and sneak as close as possible to the gardens using the dark patches of the garden. In true movie fashion they should then ‘rush’ the building. Once they ‘find’ Nakamura it is deemed they have given the signal to all the other groups who then converge on them. The fact that the groups will often be turning the game over and the samurai should be activating a lot easier gives the scenario a real ‘movie’ feel. The Hatamoto (especially the Yojimbo) should be ploughing through the hapless ninja!

Have fun … and in the words of my Soke … “UNDERSTAND; GO PLAY’

The game is only over when Nakumura is assassinated or ALL the ninja have been wiped out!

Over the wall they go!

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