The King's Holm Game

Wulfbertie has been asked by Queen Alfleda to help her design a new palace at the old Roman Ruins at King's Holm.

The Citizens of Glewcaster have built a well on the site of the spring which Wulfbertie found at King's Holm.  Alfleda thinks this will mean that the Palace will have a reliable water supply.

Can you help Wulfbertie to design the new palace and to build roads to connect it to the River and the City?

The image below is a link which will open a map of the site.

The King's Holm Site Map

The Rules

Build a palace, defensive walls, paths and roads by drawing on a copy of the site map.  

There are some existing Roman walls which you can use either as defensive walls or Palace walls.  The final palace will need at least two gates in the walls, roads or paths connecting it to the road and the River Station.  You may need to negotiate with the local farmers Leogar and Balgruff.

But you must keep within the budget.  The Queen only has 300 Marks to build the Palace.  You must not exceed this cost.

• You cannot build over Scree or Marsh.
• You must first level scrub and slopes before building on them.
• You must fell trees before building on the space they occupy
• You must first build a path before you can build a road
• You can convert a path into a road
• You must have at least two paths or roads reaching the Palace - each must join at a gate 
• You may not build over the Sheep-pen, Well or Roundhouses
• The design should be attractive and practical and ideally have a good view of the River.

Wulfbertie's instructions

In preparing the design, Wulfbertie spoke to some people about what the Palace would need.  This is what he was told:

Wullfbertie should also respect the Citizens' hope that he will build as many good new roads as possible.

The Costs

Franc has helped by dividing the site map up into hexagonal spaces.

He has also told Wulfbertie that building work and materials will cost the following amounts:

If you want to build over one of the farms you will have to reach an agreement with the Farmer:

• Leogar will let you build a path or a road over his land if you also build a path to connect his Roundhouse to a Road;

• Balgruff will let you build a path or road over her land for 2 Marks per space.

Good Luck

Many of the things Wulfbertie saw in the dark ages are now in the Gloucester museum.

Wulfbertie supports Gloucester (Glewcaster) Cathedral

All drawings by Paul Evans.   Extraordinary!

The Brothers, Uncles, Beogren and other adults like to read clever stories at Tilebury