Axles and Alloys: First Game

One of our regular gaming group found a wonderful set of rules on the interwebz. It borrows heavily from Full thrust game mechanics, so there is some simultaneous plotting (of speed only), weapons hit on 4,5,6's (with slight modifiers for the targets speed), and damage is spread into rows that result in threshold checks for all your components at the end of each row. For extra fast play, one of those components is the gas tank which results in instant destruction if it fails its threshold check.


A few of our gamers have gotten excited and heavily modified some hot wheels (and other) cars. My bitz box came over for the evening to be raided by the crew for more weapons. I expect we'll see some additional creations in the coming weeks. 







 Vehicles can be small, medium, or large, which determines their top speed, number of turns they can make per round, advantage in a ram and number of weapon hardpoints.

Weapons include light and medium guns, light and medium ram plates, flame throwers, and a heap of dropped weapons (mines, spikes, oil, smoke, and napalm)




We started off entering the open table spread eveningly. Players move from top speed to slowest. Max firing range is 24", but mostly it's 12".

Firing can occur whenever you want (unless you've lost control) interrupting other players freely. You can only fire a weapon once per round though.

Turns can occur at the beginning, middle, and end of the move. You turn up to 45 degrees and then dice to see if you skid when you turn (faster speed more likely). If going at least 13" (I think), you can intentionally skid/drift; you turn more than 45 degrees and roll for the distance you roll distance you skip. All skids occur in the direction you were moving prior to turning.

Possibly the most important thing to remember is that if you hit terrain you die. Immediately. Also, when rammed, the losing rammer (a competitive die roll based on size and presence of ram plates) will spin out 1d6" and on a scatter die. This could take you into terrain and kill you as well.


Cameron's bus immediately went hunting for Mattie's winged VW. With a medium gun he could reach out 24" with a single die to attack.















 Most of the rest of us were closing without much in the way of attacks occuring. As Cameron raced around this rock feature, Mattie managed to drop some mine templates right in front of him. Due to the drift he had started it was going to be hard to miss the templates.

 The rod rod on the right had 2 medium guns to the front and had done some damage to Bryans saw van. The fire truck (grey) had managed to miss constantly with it's shots (In fact, I managed to roll 3 or less all night long, until a threshold check on my gas tank rolled my first 6 and promptly destroyed me).

In the top left you can just see the templates on the ground. The school bus clips one, but passes the roll to avoid the mines. Much like car wars, mine fields aren't a guaranteed hit (but do lots of damage when they explode).

 Meanwhile the saw van had rammed the Fire truck to good effect, heavily damaging it. After a ram the loser is spun out 1d6" in a random direction (note the scatter die on the table near the decorative crashed car). It then loses it's next turn. Finally when it can go again (starting from a speed of 0 + acceleration, which generally means last in a round) it can start shooting again. Losing a ram is BRUTAL. 

 Turning from the purple VW, the school bus cuts right and manages to smash into the damaged Saw Van, due to it's loss of speed from the ram (the winner has his speed halved). The poor saw van spins out in front of the school bus, which has just enough speed remaining to hit it again. First kill to the school bus. To be fair, Bryan rolled pants on both ran rolls.

 The fire truck fails to set the purple VW on fire as it's up to 8", and the hot rod is swinging around to get on the school buses behind.


Cameron lets off a cloud of napalm in such a way Ryan's hot rod can't avoid next turn. The fire truck releases a swarm of spikes, hoping to hem in the on coming school bus as well.

 The school bus uses up it's final shot with it's medium gun at short (12") range getting to roll 2 dice (instead of 1). It rolls a 6 and a 5, causing 3 points of damage, pushing the firetruck into a threshold check. First 6 of the game for me on my gas tank blows me up. Thankfully I block the gap and the School bus has to hang a righ.


 I had to leave with my ride at this point. The report I received later was the hot rod caught on fire, but was extinguished immediately. The hot rod was rammed to death by the school bus shortly there after, and somehow the purple VW caught fire with napalm and the driver was burnt to a crisp (failed threshold check).





 It took a bit of time for of the less frequent wargamers to grok the rules, but we managed to play a 5 player game to conclusion within about 2 hours. This included some setup and yacking on a friday night after a work week, so obviously these are fast play rules. This is a great game hiding here. I would imagine this would be an easy one for a rolling start where latecomers race onto the table with a fresh car and start fighting immediately. Two thumbs up.

Cameron over at Cameron's Tiny Little Men has some better pictures then me.