Establishing the Narrative
Tis the season once more, my dear friends! If you are like me then your freezers are filling up with party food, you have a ham on reserve at the local butchers, and you cannot shake that nagging feeling you still have one more present to buy for…. Someone?! That’s right, time to gather the extended family for the annual check in of who’s still alive, who’s balding, who’s pregnant again, and who still thinks Brexit was a good idea. Again, if you’re like me, Christmas day is more like Christmas week, and can get pretty exhausting by the end. Well, I have a cheeky little strategy to boost my energy levels and top up my crimbo meter – I sneak in as much wargaming as possible in the gaps between the mayhem.
Lucky for me most of my tank friends also get a healthy chunk of time out of the office for the festive season so it’s easy to wrangle us up a game or two. So considering decorations are up, mince pies are back in the cupboard, and we’re all living under the constant and harrowing threat of being Wham!-ed, it’s only right we look to festivitise the wargaming table as well. I don’t mean red and green table runners, and a cracker in the dice tray, I mean bringing some seasonal shenanigans to the gameplay through the medium of narrative scenarios….
So quick terminology check – Narrative games are ones that tell a story over one or multiple sessions, and usually facilitate the player to shape and direct the story through their actions, successes, and failures. Some Wargames have narrative elements baked into their design, while others require a degree of imagination from the participants to insert some story, For example: this Space Marine has missed all his shots so far. I am naming him Naff Nigel and he just needs to stay alive for two more battles to qualify for the Imperium’s laser eye surgery scheme. There you are, you see? Now I care about Naff Nigel and his life or death fight for an optics upgrade, and want to keep playing to see how his story unfolds. Narratives are a lovely way to get players to invest themselves in wargaming, and flex well to any style of play from silly/daft/chaotic to gritty/dark/edgy, etc., and all are valid as long as all the players involved are having a good time. It may surprise you to hear that I am on the sillier side.
With that in mind, let’s have a little think about some simple, system agnostic ideas you can use to deploy Santa on to your tabletop, and get everybody on a holiday high. While I might give examples of specific game systems, I want to keep this as generic as I can to maximise the number of systems they apply for so it’s down to you to come up with the nitty gritty within your ruleset of choice. Just use the following nonsense to get those creative juices flowing but I heartily encourage you to swap, cut, alter, and disregard these thoughts entirely as you cobble your own narrative game together. These musings can stretch to competitive, co-operative, or solo gaming alike, I’m sure.
Also, I recently ran my own special game of Bolt Action based on some of the below and have included some pics for further inspiration.
Saint Nicholas / Santa / Big Daddy Crimbo / etc.
Wouldn’t be Christmas without Santa, and there is plenty of room for him on the tabletop. Often, fantastical settings deep in their own lore have an in universe equivalent of a red hat/suit wearing, present bringing/stealing, face of the festive season – looking at you Games Workshop – which works just as well subbing in below. Might I suggest:
● Santa is lost and needs finding. Players compete over secret objectives which once claimed are flipped to reveal either Santa himself (worth some tidy points), or some other festive bounty – upgraded weapons, body armour, etc.. Once located, what needs doing with him? Are we an alien race trying to capture him for our intelligence implies he is a being of great power? Or are we simply doing Mr’s Claws a favour by reuniting him after he’s had a few too many merry measures?
● Santa is under siege! Players work together to rescue Santa from a horde of [insert setting appropriate foil here]. Perhaps a player is running the horde faction, or it follows a simple AI such as attack nearest enemy or if no viable target then move X towards nearest enemy it can see. Does Santa bestow players around him with some crazy buff to hold back the horde for a one off overpowered session? Or are we holding ground for his sleigh to airlift him to safety?
● You, Santa + elves, just delivered to the wrong house and now you’ve been abducted or snared. Can you stealth/bash your way out through this haunted house or prison facility, Manhunt style? Who has done this foul deed? Are you being stalked by some villainous imposter trying to steal your power? Or are you fleeing Halloween Town and the horrifyingly misguided Jack Skellington, or fetid Oogie Boogie?
● Oh no, something is wrong with/someone has replaced Santa! Maybe he’s doing the hunting this time, or he’s sowing Christmas carnage, dropping exploding presents down chimneys, or tearing up the streets in a battle sleigh kitted out like a Mad Max antagonist. Can you knock him out/kill the imposter before Christmas is ruined?
Red Sleight Down
So the big fella lounging on his flying sky sofa is one of the most enduring images of the season, and is a goldmine for story driven gaming too. Consider the following:
● Santa’s Sleigh has been shot down/crash landed and now lies in the middle of a battlefield making it the primary objective to hold/claim. Does Santa need a medivac? Or does the sleigh need towing to your board edge? Does it have hitpoints? Does moving it risk the fragile presents, and what if it’s used for cover, or caught in a blast radius? Maybe the ones who shot it down are there too, trying to grab the sleigh before you can.
● Santa’s sleigh has arrived but there are too many [insert setting appropriate chaff] for a safe landing. Can you clear space for Santa to make his delivery? Do you need to clear a landing strip? Take out the AA guns? Mark the chimneys of the good boys and girls with flares?
● Santa is airborne above the battlefield and is providing close air support, or dropping presents/supplies which appear/scatter randomly for the players to fight over. Maybe his fire is being directed by little elves acting as forward air observers who can be captured/influenced in some way. Do you score points for holding the airdrops? Or are they in game boons?
● A bit obvious but for any vehicle based games, be they racers or tanks, but you can just add a Santa sleigh into the mix. Maybe it has custom go faster stripes or jet engines, or maybe this one has been built by orks so it’s brimming in scrap metal, grots, and DAKKA.
Presenting the presents
Surely we all have some plastic dudes on our Christmas list, just like our plastic dudes have medkits, plasma launchers, and blessed +1 swords on theirs. Loads of room for ideas here, such as:
● Someone or something has stolen the presents from your castle/base/HQ. Can you track it down? Or maybe it’s dashing around confident you can’t catch or kill it because it’s too nippy, too well armoured, or has so much health. Maybe it drops presents every time it’s hit, or maybe it’s trying to reach an escape point.
● Santa is otherwise indisposed and needs help delivering presents to the right locations. The pink present needs to get to the pink objective, etc. You can lay out presents and objectives to create likely chokepoints and overlaps to cause units to smash together as they scramble around like heavily armoured Uber delivery drivers.
● After a mix up at the elf factory all the presents intended for the local dungeon lord have ended up at the village down the road. All manner of unpleasantries are bursting out of boxes and wreaking havoc in the village, or maybe every box is a mimic! So is the sleigh/Christmas tree/cooked turkey/uncle Gavin, etc.
● Presents are sprinkled across the table alongside other objectives. Units can open them if they can get there first and roll on a table to see what they get. Higher numbers offer better rewards but for every extra present opened you take a -1 or -2 on the roll because Santa doesn’t like greedy kids. Roll low enough and you’ll get nothing but coal, or maybe even something harmful for more of that risk vs reward vibe. Debuffs, bombs, feral elves, gender politics at the dinner table, etc.
Feast like a king
● Uh-oh, the Christmas dinner supply truck got lit up by an artillery strike or orbital barrage. All the ingredients for the Christmas dinner at the barracks are now scattered across the field. Players are dashing to claim supply crates, and popping them open to see what they’ll have to plate up. Each ingredient is worth different points and maybe some combo together – bonus points if you can get bacon and sausage, or all the root vegetables. Even better if you can steal already claimed nosh from other players by killing the unit that holds it. You’ll have veterans storming into melee just to get their power gloves on the maple cured ham. Worth it.
● The supply truck is on its way to base but the other player or NPC faction is trying to hijack it. Can your garrison or escort forces keep the truck in friendly hands? Lose an ingredient (points) for every hit it takes but don’t push it too fast you might spill the gravy!
● Has the Christmas market become the battleground? Can you save the civilians from the roaming villain or zombie horde, while also seeking random powerups at the food stalls? Why not go full Dead Rising and clobber your foes with a giant Currywurst?
Wrangling the reindeer
● Oh deer (entirely deliberate), something’s gotten into Santa’s reindeer and they’ve gone feral! Who can tranquilize or capture the most as they scatter about the board? Maybe they need returning and saddling back up to Santa’s sleigh? Maybe you have to find the cure first, or destroy the source of this corruption – Chaos at it again!
● It’s a foggy night and Santa can’t launch the sleigh. He has heard of a unique creature, not necessarily a reindeer, with a magically luminous nose, eyes, anglerfish-like esca, whatever… that might just be what he needs. Catch is, it’s in enemy hands or dangerous territory. Maybe the creature needs taming or battling first?
● Looks like someone has trapped or stolen the reindeer. Do you need to sneak around unlocking the manacles or releasing bear traps? Or are you leading an all out assault on the facility holding them with Santa at your side? Why would anyone want to catch the reindeer…. Unless they were trying to make their own Frankendeer – hm, that one needs work.
Anti-Santa and names from the naughty list
There are plenty of folktales and horror films focused on less jolly alternatives and antagonists to Santa which make an awesome one shot villains, for example:
● Your little lads have done far too much war to be on the nice list this year. Now they are under assault by a hungry Krampus and his legion of cursed elves. Maybe it’s a wave assault and he’s the final boss, or maybe he’s the other side of a pitched battle and charging you down. Is he stalking you serial killer style? Or hunting you like the Predator? Or Maybe you’ve been sent to capture or kill him once and for all.
● Bad guys and girls have just crashed your christmas party. Now it’s up to your small squad of ex marines/ex-cops/every day Joes to take up arms against the hostiles as you work through your venue of choice cleaning house. Maybe you are starting without the usual equipment and need to recover gear from your foes? Or perhaps it’s more important to restore power so you can call for help? Are you going barefoot with a hohoho machinegun? Or are you looking to prove you are old enough to be left home alone?
● Your preferred fantasy or sci-fi setting has its own version of Santa, or a copycat, who has completely reinterpreted or misunderstood the concept of a nice Christmas. Now they are drifting through the skies launching brussel sprout grenades, turning the children into toys or dolls, and summoning great vines of tinsel to strangle at the townsfolk caught at the Christmas market. Can this cursed Santa-like be stopped before they warp the meaning of Christmas forever?
● The Grinch – I mean take you pick here. He’s kidnapped Santa, stolen the presents/children, is attacking the village, is trying to burn down the village Christmas tree, etc. etc. etc.…. How do you show him the true meaning of Christmas, or maybe you just need to kill him with Kindness? Is Kindness a ritual you need to complete? Or a spell to cast? Or the name of your crew’s sniper?
Modeling
This can be a bit tricky as there isn’t a lot of festive terrain or minis out there. Games Workshop has a recurring character in miniature called The Red Gobbo who is very suited to some of the mischievous suggestions above. A lot of the bigger games companies do similar festive themed minis this time of year but be quick as they are usually limited and sell quickly. Alternatively, get a spare mini for whatever you are playing and just paint them in festive colours – red, green, and gold, always look best to my eye. If you are feeling a little adventurous then get some green stuff and add little holiday adornments like santa hats and baubles before painting.
Also, keep your eyes peeled for snow terrain and ice crystals which are common off the shelf products and are an easy way to bring your existing terrain boards into a wintery vibe. You can accent this with some big tufts of cotton wool laid over trees and roofs which work well as snow, or chimney smoke. Lastly, ask your nan to borrow her ceramic Christmas village buildings for a weekend as they come in all different scales and make for a hilariously festive wargaming board. Why not incorporate some Christmas lights – the safe LED ones only, please!! Maybe you are fighting over control of a power generator and whoever holds it has control of the colour/settings. Just have an amble down your local garden centre/department store/festive supermarket aisles and see if anything inspires you.
Further inspiration
Tis but a taste of the potential for a Christmas narrative game. Hopefully something above has tingled your festive bells and connects nicely for your setting or system of choice. If not, then don’t lose hope! Christmas films are an excellent inspiration for stories to steal from – they literally can’t stop you. It’s also fun if your players are in on the joke, especially if it becomes increasingly apparent as the narrative unfolds and they have that “ooooooh it just clicked, is this A Christmas Carol??” moment. See also, Christmas books, or even festive jingles for some extra kooky ideas. Why not try converting those classic jingles into narrative hooks or army theme for a game: ● I’m dreaming of a blight Christmas – Death Guard, Warhammer 40K ● Drifting around, the Christmas Tree – Gaslands ● Last Christmas, I gave you my heart ….and now I’ve come to retake it – Don’t Look Back
● God rest ye hairy gentlemen – anything with werewolves, dwarves, or weredwarves.
Final tips
Dude, just get weird with it. I have always liked to surprise my players but depending on your group you may want to prime them first. Maybe let them know this Sunday is going to be something festive, or at least light hearted so they can manage their expectations and build their force accordingly. Or not, maybe you want to maintain your usual competitive intensity as you war over pigs in blankies, which in itself is wonderfully daft.
Also, don’t forget the atmosphere! throw up some decorations if you haven’t already. Stick some merry tunes on the Bluetooth speaker, get some lights twinkling, and adorn yourself in a festive jumper if you have one. Impart those vibes!
Lastly, not that I need the excuse but for heaven’s sake get some festive snacks. You needn’t go mad in this economy but a couple bags of Christmas tree shaped nachos and a mince pie or two go a long way.
Last thoughts of 2025
So are you jazzed for Crimbo yet? Man, I hope so! You should absolutely give a narrative game a whirl as I have always found these my most memorable games. Careful though…. Pull this off and you might just forge yourself an annual tradition….. Merry Christmas kids. May Santa bring reinforcements to your pile of shame as you indulge in good food, better company, and fingers crossed your nan slips you a tenner for the 30th year in a row.
About the Author:
Hasvik is as Hasvik does. Hasvik enjoys wargaming, TTRPGS, and board games, as well as Jaffa Cakes, frogs, and rolling my dice on the floor to intimidate my opponent. Hasvik has no socials and cannot be followed for he travels only the hidden paths.
