Right, so I’m sitting down now to put together my first warband for Five Leagues by Modiphius orginally by Nordic Weasel Games. By the rules you start off with four heroes and two followers — not a big crowd at all, more like what you’d scrape together from a small village if the horn went. For now they’re all going to be Men ¹ — four humans — though I’m already thinking ahead about how I might tie this game in with the others. One idea’s handy enough: they’ll be wandering the same hills and valleys where the Warmaster battles were fought years ago, the old mounds and broken walls still about the place. Another notion’s to bring in an Elf later on — one from Lindon who’s been tracking Sauron’s agents for centuries and was maybe at those same Warmaster battles when the world was younger. The main book doesn’t have Elves, but the expansions do - so I’ll start off with the Men and let the story and my experiance grow a bit before bringing in more rules for me to misinterpret.

There’s a few human backgrounds to pick from, but I’ll try to get a most. There’s five if you count the Mystic, and I’m leaving out the Zealot for now — too fierce altogether for the sort of quiet courage that sits well in Tolkien’s world. So here’s the four that took the field: a Noble, one of those Arthedain “Faithful” that reckon birth is worth more than skill, filled with disdain at the lesser Men; a Townsman out of Cardolan, sharp enough to know that sometimes bending the knee to the Witch-king might keep your folk alive; a Frontier lad, lean and weathered, who knows the tracks of wolves and worse; and a Mystic, no grand sorcerer, but one who sees things sideways, through the corner of the eye.

It’s only a small crew, but there’s plenty of story in it already — a bit of duty, a bit of memory, a hard edge, and a hint of mystery. Like Tolkien never said, “Little by little, one travels far.” We’ll see how far these four get before things start turning dark.

Each hero gets to roll on a capabilities, mentality, possessions, and training to make them a bit unique.

I’ve rolled a Wily Rogue and a Brave Villager for my two Followers and given them Light Armour with a Standard Weapon, and a Staff respectivly.

The first hero becomes my Avatar (so +1 Will and +1 Luck). My roll on Avatar History gives me a Friend. We get +3 Gold and 2x doses of Silvertree.

Commentary

One thing I’ve noticed — though we’ll see how it plays out over time — is just how much of Five Leagues hangs on that little d6. It keeps things quick and easy to grasp, but the steps are big. Each +1 to Combat Skill increases success odds by roughly 16%. A warrior at +0 wins an even fight about 42% of the time (with another 16% ending in draws), but with +1 he’s already winning nearly 60%, and by +3 he prevails in four out of five contests before any other factors come into play. Makes me wonder if warbands might end up too powerful too fast. Maybe the game balances that with how easily your folk can get hurt, or how often some mishap sends them to an early grave. Still, it’s a curious balance: the simplicity of a single die gives the game its charm, yet its very coarseness may hasten the rise—and fall—of heroes. One might imagine that using a d10, or even 2d6, could offer finer gradations, but that would also alter the odds landscape—flattening or curving distributions in ways that change the feel of every skirmish. For now, I’ll leave the dice as written, and see whether fate—or mathematics—proves the sterner master.