Attack on Santa's Workshop: 2018 Doctor Who Christmas Game

Attack on Santa's Workshop game using DWMG 2 rules.

Conflicting schedules meant we did not get to play this 2018 Doctor Who Christmas game until January 13, 2019.  But I think it was worth the wait.

This game is set near the North Pole at Santa’s Workshop which is being attacked by the forces of evil who want to wipe out Santa and Christmas.  Santa's workshop is being defended by the Heroic side that includes Santa, the Doctor, Ice Warriors and U.S. Marines with Steve Austin.  The villains (Monster side)  include the Great Intelligence, Yeti, Cybermen  plus Jack Frost and his allies.

Santa's workshop with Santa, Dougie the Christmas tree and Jack Frost.

The Forces:

Heroic: 

1. Santa, Mrs. Clause, Assistant, 6 Elves (1 with a flame thrower) & Christmas Ferry.
2. Sixth Doctor and Peri, 4 Cryons and Lyton.
3. Reinforcement: Lt. Alfredson, 6 US Marines + Medic and Lee Majors with Gatling gun.
4. Reinforcement Ice Lord and 6 Ice Warriors.

Santa and his group start in the workshop, the Doctor and his group enter from the side of the board just behind the workship.  All reinforcements arrive based on a random dice rolls sometime between turn 2 and 5.  

Monster:

1. The Great Intelligence leading group of 6 Yeti, 
2. Cyberleader with a Squad of 6 Cybermen and a cybermat
3. Jack Frost leading 6 snowmen, a snow beast plus Dougie the killer Christmas tree..

The Monster side deploys and advances from the opposite side of the table from Santa's workshop, and have an option to have one contingent roll for a flank march on either side on their half of the board.

The Objectives:

Santa = 10 points if captured, 5 points if killed, Jack Frost 10 points if captured, 5 points if killed. Plus 4 presents each worth 3 points and deployed by each of the 4 players (at lest 12" from the board edge and at least 12" from the workshop).  Each present objective also nets the finder an event card.

The Battlefield:

 The playing surface was 4' x 5' as shown below and there were two players on each side.

The Battlefield

 No doubt someone is asking, if it is at the North Pole why are there pine trees as it is passed the Tree Line? Answer -  Its Santa's Christmas tree farm, and if you don't believe in him or his tree farm he does not believe in you and your silly tree line.

The game:

 Turn 1:

The Forces of evil / monster side advance on Santa's workshop as the defenders are unaware of the impending peril.  The Yeti under the Great Intelligence plus Jack Frost and his snowmen conduct a frontal assault while the Cybermen launch a flank attack.

The advance

Snowmen advance over the ice toward the objective a red present

Yeti slowly advance

Turn 2

The attacker move into range and start firing on the workshop, but no friendly reinforcements arrive to help the defenders. The attackers gain two present objectives.

Enemy advance, Cybermen struggle through the woods.

The Cybermen fire into the workshop

An Elf is hit and killed inside the Workshop.

Turn 3

 The Defenders must move first but try to hold fire until the attackers get closer.  Unfortunately for them no reinforcements arrive this turn either and they are on their own.

Defenders await the enemy onslaught

Snowmen open fire

Defenders launch a surprise trap using an event card.

A trap is sprung on the snowmen, 3 of them are stunned.

Santa's assistant leaved the safely of the workshop and  runs to get one of the objectives and is gunned down by one of the rifle armed snowmen who was not stunned.

Santa's assistant is slain by the Snowman

Despite the trap the remaining snowmen advance

The defenders kill one snowman trying to enter the house and wound a snow beast.

Turn 4

 Finally the defenders receive some reinforcements from the U.S. Marines and Ice Warriors, plus the Doctor and his group.

U.S. Marines advance towards the workshop

The Defenders in the Workshop are taking a lot of enemy fire.

The Doctor and Peri (brown markers mean they have gone prone)
followed by the Cryon's cautiously advance towards the Workshop

The Cybermen turn to attack the Marines

The Great Intelligence uses an stun weapon (event card)

The Monster side used and event card (Attack from Above) the caused a widespread stun effect (light green rings) and poor dice rolling on the defenders part meant that a large proportion of the Ice Warriors and Marines were stunned and out of action.  A resulting morale test causes many of them to flee (yellow markers).

The few remaining Marines and Ice Warriors fight on

The Doctor's group only suffers the loss of 1 Cryon.

The Cybermen advance on the beleaguered Marines.

Dougie the Killer Christmas tree attempted to lob a couple of grenades / ornaments into the workshop, but his aim was off and they went wildly off course causing some laughter but no real damage.  His killer tinsel would do more damage inside the building later on.

Dougie the Killer Christmas tree, his explosive ornaments were not very accurate

Turn 5

 Things get worse for the defenders as the reinforcements can't make any headway.

The Marines and Ice warriors take more casualties

The slow moving Yeti are nearing the workshop

The Yeti and Killer Christmas tree break into the workshop and Santa and many of the elves retreat out the back window but are slowed by the Yeti's web guns. Mrs. Claus and an elf fight to the bitter end inside the workshop.

Santa is hit by enemy fire, Peri and the Doctor are trapped
 in the Yeti's Web (clear 5" template)

Santa takes another hit

 The elf nearest Santa has a flamethrower but while it damages the Yeti and one of the Cybermen it causes no kills.  The ensuing counter fire by the Cybermen kill the elf with the flamethrower.

The Doctor and Peri take cover, while Lyton leads the Cryon's forward

Turn 6

 Things get worse for the Defenders.

Two more Cryons are shot down

The snowmen use the tree as cover while firing on the Cryons

The Cybermen inflict the final 3rd killing hit on Santa

Santa is down, unconscious, seriously wounded, possibly dead!

The Doctor, Peri and the remaining Cryon's make a desperate rush to capture Jack Frost and gain the green present objective which would give them 13 victory points and possibly allow them to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, but the gamble does not pay off and they gain neither..

Cybermen advance on a third  objective, the blue present.

Steve Austin is wounded, but he can still fire his heavy machine gun

Austin's Machine gun fails to kill any of the Cybermen

With Santa seemingly dead (5 victory points) and the monster side in possession of two of the present objectives (6 points) and soon to gain a third (blue present) for another 3 points the situation for the defenders was bleak, in fact hopeless. The game was ended with a victory for the evil / monster  side.  Children cry as there will be no Santa to deliver presents this year!  But I have a feeling Santa's wounds are not critical and he will escape to defend his workshop next year!

Post Game Thoughts

It was an enjoyable game but with perhaps a little less suspense than usual as by turn 4 the defenders chances of winning became very slim. The defenders likely should have rushed some troops out of the workshop on turn 1 to try to grab one or two of the objectives and had the Doctor and Peri run to the workshop rather than go prone and crawl. It was also surprising that nobody tried to drive the snowplow, it  could have been a deadly weapon (see my blog on Doctor Who Snow Cap Base DWMG at Cangames).

The random reinforcements combined with poor dice rolling by the defenders when a deadly stun card was played by the attackers was the turning point in the game.  In hindsight the random reinforcement brings in too great an element of chance, which if  it goes wrong for the defender can be devastating.  If I run a similar scenario I will allow the reinforcements to all arrive on turn 2 and Lee Majors (The Six Million Dollar Man) will have better stats.

Lee Majors with Santa and Mrs. Claus from the film Scrooged

There may also have been too many special event cards, next time I might either just give out one at the start to each player OR make them a reward for gaining a present objective, not both.

Oops  As sometimes can happen rules mistakes were made, but on this rare occasion it was not the GMs fault!  We were using 5" diameter web templates for the Yeti's web gun as stated on the stats cards produced for the game by the author.  However I discovered after the game that the DWMG 2 rules themselves and the PDF ("2ndControl Room" that lists stats for all the figures) shows the blast template as 2"  for the web gun.  The latter is likely correct and there is a typo on the card.


Thanks to all those who participated in the game.

Here are some of the cards we used, many created just for this game:

Cards created for this game.

The Ice Warrior cards are part of the rules, other cards made for this game

Figure Manufacturers:

Wargames Supply Dump, Black Tree, Copplestone, Regiment Games and Reaper.
Santa's Workshop is from Michaels.