Roaming through the old world - ep3(ish)

 After an exhausting night at the Hooded Man inn, the party glad to be able to make their way onward in the comfort of a Coach. Aaron helps Heinrich manage the horses through the thick muck of the road whilst Cressida watches the road cradling her newly acquired blunderbuss.

Marie and Saskia opt to ride in the "fresh" air on the roof of the coach - much to the other occupants' relief as does Eivor. That left Nynn and Rudiger to accompany the Kurtzmann sisters inside the Coach.

The day's journey was uneventful, the sisters provide some distracting conversation within the coach whilst the occupants of the roof entertained themselves. The coach turned onto the Middenheim/Altdorf road sometime in the mid morning and the coach pushed on to the Coach and Horses Inn, arriving before dusk.

The signs of bustle and activity reassure suspicious minds as the coach enters the gates of the inn and pauses under the archway.

the party de-buss into the bar whilst the coach is led around to the back of the Inn to allow the horses to be stabled. 

The warmth and noise of the Inn bar wash over the group, the inn keep is talking loudly to a rather drunk pair of men sat in chairs near the fire.  

A very well dressed gentleman casts an appraising eye over the group as they enter. He loses interest in them as they notice him and returns to nursing a large glass of wine whilst propping himself up against the bar.

A trio of women sit at a table: an obvious noblewoman picking disdainfully at her food, piercing green eyes briefly raising to the noise of the opening door before returning to the contents of her plate. A small, mousey girl in plain clothes sits sullenly to her right, her clothes shouting her station as servant next to the finery of her mistress. To the lady's left sits a broad shouldered muscular mountain of a woman, blue eyes staring icily at the party as they enter.

At the far end of the bar appears to be a large book propped up on a table, from behind which a hand occasionally reaches round to reach for a tankard. 

A tall, lanky barman frowns whilst cleaning glasses behind the bar, muttering to himself under his breath. His focus seems so absorbed in his task he pays no attention to the group of travellers at the threshold.

"wet beds! warm roads! Caaww!!" screeches across the laughter of the coach men as a crow hops along a shelf above the bar, bobbing its head and flapping its wings as it does so,

"Oo, shut yer 'ole Blackie! Don't you mind her sirs and madams, welcome to the Coach and 'Orses" The inn keep, having extricated himself from the coachman bustles over and greets the group. "the name's Gustav Fondleburger, I take it you ladies and gents will be wanting to stay the night?" Baggage is collected by young porters who appear from nowhere and the group are shown to a table with the promise of hot food and good drinks.

The Kurtzen sisters excuse themselves to "clear the dust from the day's travels" and make their way upstairs. 

Aaron takes a keen interest in the noble woman whilst the others nurse their drinks and discuss the events of the last couple of days. All agree that something strange is going on and that sticking together for the remainder of their journey to Altdorf would probably be a good idea.

the night is passed in general conversation and drinking. Aaron recognises the lady's family colours as belonging to the Von Strudeldorf family. the young woman is surprised enough at being recognised by such a common ruffian that she briefly lets her guard down and engages in conversation with him. much to the annoyance of her bodyguard.

the well dressed fop at the bar wanders of and introduces himself as Phillipe Descartes, a thick Brettonian accent colouring his otherwise excellent Reikspiel, to which Marie replies in fluent Bretonnian! A friendly game of Scarlet Empress ensues which leaves the purses of some of the party somewhat lighter!

Saskia is persuaded that the horse trough is not the place for a young lady to refresh herself and a copper of hot water is prepared in a bathing shed off the back of the kitchen. Saskia spends some time marvelling at the feeling of hot water before washing herself and all of her clothes - much to the relief of the group when they see her later.

Rudiger and Cressida strike up conversation with the two coachmen by the fire. Gunnar and Hultz are already several sheets to the breeze but are happy to accept more drinks for the chance to gossip and brag. Stories of with hunter burning villages, coaches going missing, increased bandit activity and the Emperor annexing Ubersreik paint a worrying picture of the Empire for both of them.

 the evening draws to a close and the bold adventurers retire for the first restful night of sleep in several days.

the following morning the Kurtzman sisters bid farewell over breakfast: Heinrich is taking them on to Middenheim after picking up a second coachman. Of Gunnar and Hultz there is no sign....

Aaron and cressida take it on themselves to ensure that the Altdorf coach is tacked up whilst Rudiger and Eivor chivvy the Coachmen to Breakfast and onto the coach.

It's very soon apparent that if they're going to get anywhere, Gunnar and Hultz will have to sleep it off whilst Aaron and Cressida take the reins.

The pattern is repeated for the next two days  until the morning of the third day sees the coach cresting a hill revealing the splendour of the heart of the Empire before it: Altdorf at last!

I fought the claw...

 

...and the Claw won!  

Proud dad joke moment or not. Not sure. Anyway, Bloggers Tank, Pel and I played a game of the new second edition of Frostgrave just to see how it went. It went well for me (apparently rolling high on d20s is my special skill. Great for DnD & Frostgrave, trash for Infinity) and less well for Tank whose dice were really just not on fire. 

We played the scenario in which there are five treasures, one of which is a Genie. Each time a treasure is grabbed, we check if it's the genie and if so, it comes out and wreaks merry hell. 

The Chronomancer's minions head into battle!

All three wizgangs advanced rapidly to the centre of the board - Tank's Summoner leapt one of his warriors onto a treasure and Pel's Chronomancer teleported onto one himself.

The Undead stare down the teleporting Chronomancer

The Necromancer's apprentice attempted to stop the leaping soldier but utterly failed. His master, on the other hand, summoned claws of bone to grab the Chronomancer. And then we went into a period of failing to cast a darn thing!

The Chronomancer's wizgang meet the Summoner's wizgang

The Chronomancer spent a couple of turns trying unsuccessfully to teleport out of the grip of the claws while his troops and the Summoner's troops got into a massive scrap in the middle of the board. You can see in the photo above a Thug trying to free the Chronomancer by fighting the claws. Let's just say it did not go well for the Thug.

The Summoner summoned an Imp to the battlefield to defend himself and his apprentice but it, and one of his warhounds, were savaged by a couple of Thugs from the Chronomancer's wizgang. Tank's dice at this point were just abominable. There were odd highlights (and at least one natural 20) but they never really came good. 

 The Undead arrived in the middle of the board and over a couple of turns most of the soldiers fell in battle. The Undead cut down both the Chronomancer and his apprentice (since the Chronomancer never managed to escape from the claw!) but his soldiers felled most of the troops from the Summoner's wizgang.

Hilariously, the last treasure to be grabbed, the bottle, contained the genie! The Necromancer's apprentice opened the bottle, the genie appeared, looked around and promptly disintegrated the foolish apprentice to end the game!

The end state...

Post-game thoughts

So one game in to the new edition and the changes we ran across seemed really good:

• The new treasure token setup and table setup rules work really well.
• List building for a starter wizgang (see here for definition!) was HARD. I forgot the change to standard and specialist soldiers but it didn't matter as all three wizgangs still bulked out on Thieves and Thugs.
  
• A lot of the spell changes seem really solid - we ran through Leap yesterday and didn't find it too heinous - and the change to a minimum resist number was super relevant. 
• I cast six of the eight spells I chose and failed on the seventh. Super pleased with that. Casting a debuff was worth doing rather than just an attack spell. Great! 
  
• The maximum range for shoots and spells didn't really come up but I like that it's there, especially for Elemental Bolt. 
  

We didn't get to being able to do the post game as it was late but my initial read through of the dial-back on monetary rewards seems really nice and, combined with the changes to wizgang structure, seem like it'll be a lot less likely to have one player scream out ahead with more money and advantage.

 Some Painting!

I finished up the second base of Grimghast Reapers for Kings of War:

More Reapers

 

This one was a tougher painting effort as the selection of models for this base were a lot slimmer and getting paint onto the interiors wasn't as easy as I would have liked. But I'm happy enough with the outcome and all together they look pretty neat: 

Boo 2 - Electric Boogaloo

Necromunda Highlight Photo

Blogger Tank and I also played a game of Necromunda with Blogger Pel at the club - his first outing with his Orlocks. We played the Gang Moot scenario in which our leaders arrived to parlay and then it all kicks off. I didn't take a heap of photos but I loved the posing of these two models.

Tank's Delaque ganger charged into Pel's Ganger and backed him up to the edge of the platform. After a couple of rounds of handbags, Pel's ganger happily gunned down the poor Delaque. He did the same thing to my ganger with the big hammer too!

 Next Time

Honestly? No idea. There's loads of half done stuff sitting on my bench at the mo and I'm not really sure what I want to do. It'll be something from the rapidly decreasing pile by my painting desk. I've kind of lined up a Christmas break project but other than that it's all very bitsy. 

 

Catching up on the arms race...

 And.....BOO!

And BOO!

 

This is the second base of ghosties for my Kings of War Nightstalkers army. These are GW Spirit Hosts and they'll be Spectres in KoW. I really enjoyed painting these - it's a slowish job but the finish is really nice. I decided that I would deviate from the recommended paint scheme and use a bit of Nighthaunt Gloom around the heads and shoulders to tie them closer to Reapers. Most pleased!

 Mistakes were made

I put the blame squarely on blogger Pooch for this one. He got a Warhound for The Stupid and when the opportunity came up for me to pick one up, I totally did. And so, I give you a Warhound titan of the Legio Vulpa:

Ululatus Os - The Howling Maw

Surprising no one, these models are as good as the knights. The little details, the trim and some lovely poseability. I really enjoyed painting it too. I'm not sure it comes up in the photo, but I did some research into other people's titans and there was a great model with a really textured surface. I derped around with some old kitchen sponge and created a really cool pattern on the big flat plates. The trim drove me to distraction more than a little but I love the finished product.  

And with wrecked Hawkshroud Armiger

Thanks to friend Canny, an amazing painter (check out his Insta!) and whiz with the 3d printing, whose excellent work you can see here and here, for the claw. I went for a hunt through Thingiverse for an Ursus Power Claw and came up with that beastie. I sent it to him for a print and he came back to tell me it was a touch large for the print bed. Seemingly it's for a 28mm Knight or maybe even a Titan! Anyway, some clever rescaling later, including the socket for the joint, and lo! I have a claw (pronounced clerw, of course!)

Next Time

Good question. I''m hoping to power through the second set of Reapers for my Kings of War Night Stalkers (so that I can have a legal army and maybe throw it on the board for the lols) and then I can reward myself with the amazing Knight of Shrouds. Otherwise, it's club day next week so I'm sure I'll book in a game of something, fail to take enough photos and generally blather my way through a batrep of some sort! 

Roaming through the Old World - ep2

 

Last session left our "heroes" in the middle of the road, getting soaked to the skin, surrounded by the corpses of highwaymen, beastmen, mutants and some hapless coach passengers.

At this point,  Aaron Gilmour remembered that the Hooded Man inn was less than half a mile further on (cue flash of ominous lightning and rolling rumble of thunder). Given the liklihood of meeting further chaos nasties if the group stayed put, they all trudged through the mud. Dark thoughts and curiosity nagging some minds, gnawing hunger and chilling damp nagging others.

After what seems like a sodden eternity, the hard edges of a man made structure appear through the gloom. As they group gets closer, a lightning flash illuminates the high walls of a coaching - the sign of The Hooded Man swinging in the gusty wind.

 hammering on the gates elicits no response so Aaron moves around the side of the walls to look for another entrance. He comes across the keeper's hut for a small ferry crossing a river to the side of the inn, the door swinging in the wind and no sign of illumination inside. Overturned furniture and a bloody track across the threshold attest to a vicious struggle sometime in the near past. 

At the end of a track leading back to the inn, he finds an unlocked side gate into the inn's courtyard. Summoning the group they move in.

The courtyard appears deserted, the coach house and stables closed. Light seeps around the shuttered windows. As the group crossed the courtyard, the sound of laughter and merriment from the inn grows louder. Rudiger knocks heartily on the door, halting the laughter. After a brief silence,  the sound of chairs being hastily scraped across the floor is faintly heard before bolts are slammed back and the door opened.

An immensely rotund figure peers through the crack in the door, 

"yaars? wot yer want?"  

The huddled group in the rain share bemused glances before explaining the need for food, drink and warmth. After initially pleading a full house, a voice from within the inn shouts "Otto! stop being such an ungracious host and let the poor travelers in!"

Otto, begrudgingly opens the door to admit the group, bolting the door hastily behind them. The warmth from the open fire soon starts steaming the rain from the group's sodden clothes as they take in the scheme. Behind the bar a gangly barman with large, staring eyes and no chin sullenly mops the floor whilst a road warden leans against the bar with a wry smirk across his face.

"full huh?" questions Rudiger. 
"we 'ad a full coach in this evenin', they've gone ter bed."

introducing himself as Hans, the road warden encourages Otto to provide food and drink for the travelers the proceeds to question their need to travel abroad on such a foul night. 

The conversation moves through the events of the evening and Hans relates the story of a bandit attack on the inn earlier in the day - hence the wrecked and bloodied ferryman's cottage. Once the party are settled with drinks in front of the fire, Hans joins Otto in the kitchen to "smooth the inn keep's nerves". Nynn attempts to list at the door but noisily knocks a chair against the bar as she passes. the bug eyed barman appears from the kitchen and shoos her back from behind the bar and continues his mopping.

presently, Hans re-appears and continues questioning the party as to their travel plans whilst Otto serves bowls of steaming stew. Saskia turns her nose up at the contents of the bowl and munches on some dried berries she had in a pouch, Rudiger and Eivor attack their bowls with gusto whilst the others pick at their food but ultimately leave most of it, the taste and smell of the stew managing to suppress even there appetites. Cressida spends her time cleaning the blunderbuss she looted from the highwayman's corpse, whilst Saskia stares longingly at the doorway out of the inn.

the question of accommodation brings a panicked look from Otto, but a calming glance from Hans elicits the offer of the common room for the night. Saskia point blank refuses and demands to be let out to sleep in the stables, this is done with an amused shrug from Hans.

The party are shown upstairs, along a bare, damp floored corridor to a musty, untidy common room. Upon entry, Otto locks the door behind the party and heads downstairs.

Nynn feeling more than a little unsettled at this point, drags a cot across the door to be doubly sure of her safety.

Meanwhile, Saskia makes her way across the courtyard and unbolts the door to the stables. She narrowly avoids being trampled by the panicked horses bolting from the stables as they force their way through the doors. Picking herself up, Saskia sets about recovering the stupid animals and returning them to the safety of the barn. Once the animals are settled, she curls up in one of the stables and goes to sleep.

Back at the Inn, Eivor and Rudiger start to feel VERY drowsy whilst paranoia gets the better of Cressida and, using her hammer and one of her spikes, proceeds to "tinker" with the door lock. Eivor decides the drowsiness is due to something in the stew so clears his stomach in the quickest way he knows. the group tries to settle for the night after getting a fire going in the hearth. Cressida, hears footsteps ascending the stairs and pausing outside their door. Whoever it was then retraces their steps downstairs and the scrape and thunk of the bolts on the inn door are heard opening.

Marie opens the shutters in time to see a figure moving across the courtyard towards the stables, shortly followed by the high pitched scream that she's heard before!

Saskia is woken by the bug eyed barman creeping towards her in the stable, she screams and lashes out with her staff and a struggle ensues. Hans quickly appears and also tries to subdue her!! 

The rest of the group rush from their room and out through the inn door to aid Saskia. Hans turns to engage this new threat and the fight is pushed into the barn. the horses panic and kick their stalls adding to the noise and pandemonium. as the group gain the upper hand on Hans, a spider-legged figure drops from the hayloft onto Rudiger and the party fight for their lives! Rudiger bellows for the blessing of Sigmar to smite his foes and, with a mighty swing of his warhammer, smashed the head of the spider-legged foe through his shoulders! Meanwhile, Saskia smashes the forehead of the barman with the butt of her staff and Eiver nearly be-heads Hans with a back handed swing of his sword.

As quiet descends, the party realise that Otto is nowhere to be seen. 

A return and search of the inn, uncovers the trap door to the cellar and the bloodies trail that starts at the top steps and leads down into the gloom. Finding the trail abruptly ending in the middle of the cellar floor, Saskia uncovers a secret trap door hidden in the flagstones. This leads down a flight of stairs, the flicker of illumination somewhere far below. 

gathering their nerve, the party descend further into a stone room, three corpses piled  on one side, bound, gagged and unconscious captives on the other. At the far end of the room stands a pink statue made of an unnatural pink stone stands at the centre of a shifting octagonal pattern on the floor. the surface pf the statue appears to writhe as if were some living liquid. saskia and Marie feel the chill slickness of evil magic crawl across their skin.

Aaron and Nynn move to untie and rouse the captives whilst the rest of the party cautiously move into the room. Otto lunges from an alcove halfway down the room, swinging an axe as he barrels into Rudiger. A vicious but short lived fight ensues, Otto collapsing into a bloodied mountain of flesh on the floor.

Rudiger approaches the statue and starts to pray to Sigmar to give him the strength to cleanse the foul place but is cut short as  a crossbow bolt, fired from behind the statue, grazes his temple and knocks him sprawling to the floor.

Cressida lets loose with her blunderbuss, missing her target but blowing chips from the statue. A pink and purple flash of light  and eruption of mist heralds the sudden appearance of tentacled pink and purple monstrosity!the four armed creature leers from a face set in its chest and rushes the group , flaming arms out stretched, gibbering and cackling as it goes!

meanwhile, a figure with a grinning skull for a head steps from behind the statue and proceeds to lay into Eivor with his sword. Saskia lets out a blood curdling whoop an sets to the daemon with Rudiger  and Cressida whilst Marie tries to support with magic darts. Nynn moves to support Eivor in dealing with the skull faced mutant. Aaron rouses the unconscious victims and moves them to the safety of the inn.....

A desperate struggle ensues in the underground room, the daemon shrugging off many of the blows landing on it and, even when it seems to be defeated, splits into two smaller blue versions of itself!

Skullface proves a tough match for even the combined forces of Nynn and Eivor but the group do eventually prevail, the daemon finally dissipating to mist and skull face bleeding out from a severed hand.

Rudiger takes to the statue with his hammer, chanting blessing to Sigmar whilst smashing it to dust. the pink hue fades to yellow sandstone and the Octagonal pattern winks out as the statue falls to the floor.

the captives turn out to be two young women, Etelka and Heidi Kurtzmann, travelling back to their parents in Middenheim, Kurt the true landlord of the inn and Heinrich, the surviving coachman. 

Later investigation of the stables uncovers the half eaten body of Kurt's young son in the hay loft. bodies are gathered, funeral rites for the dead humans undertaken by Rudiger and a pyre by the side of the river destroys the remains of the mutants.

Road wardens arrive at first light, questioning the party about the corpses found up the road in an abandoned wagon. Thankfully, the Testimony of the inn survivors allays most of the warden's suspicions, though Cressida does receive some pointed questions about her look alike in the carriage...

the party move on with Heinrich and the Kurtzmann sisters as soon as the coach can be tacked up, their journey continuing towards Altdorf.

In which we learn about mind altering substances in the 41st Millennium

I think I promised this would be a coherent battle report last week. It's going to be something but coherent might be a touch optimistic but I've got some pics and they go in an order. I'll try and put a narrative around them...

Sneaky Delaque

Tank and I played the scenario where we had arrived in the same ruined dome, both intent on harvesting the ghast that grew there and selling the mind-altering substance to enhance our respective gangs power. The Cawdor spread across the dome while the Delaque deployed in cover or in infiltration positons.

An unsuspecting Cawdor ganger advances...

The first shot of the game came from the Cawdor champion who put a shell from his long rifle square into the chest of the Delaque ganger in the distance. Saved by his armour, the ganger staggered back from the impact, fell two stories and broke his neck. Score one for Cawdor!

BOOM!

The Delaque advanced in force on their right ran into the other Cawdor champion who was on fire. Well, he wasn't, as it turned out but the Delaque gangers were...

Whoosh!

The ganger on the right there charged into the Delaque champion, failed to hit meaningfully with a chainglaive (he was unable to cut things while he was already cutting things) and was webbed out of the game for his troubles. About here, Tank played his favourite card from the Delaque deck and all the lights in the dome went out.

As the Delaque in the foreground gunned down the Cawdor champion with the long rifle (because Delaques like the dark!) the Cawdor ganger in the distance tried to harvest some Ghast from the deposit (yeah, we were subbing in for the recommended Shardwrack Spines). The plant puffed a whole pile of spores into his face and he promptly inhaled deeply instead of... not doing that. 

In another of a succession of good dice rolls, I rolled a six on the table of 'what happens when you inhale ghast, voluntarily or otherwise and my ganger shouted to the whole dome that he was the God Emperor himself gaining psychic powers and some serious skills!

The dark gave me one other advantage. Having snuck through the dense terrain of Tank's gorgeous Necromunda table, I launched a bomb rat at the Delaque leader. Everything went well and while it did no damage, it set the Delaque on fire. On the far side of the board, the champion with the heavy flamer had set everyone over there on fire too!

At this point I forgot to take photos for a turn or two - a Delaque with a long rifle shot the bomb rat launcher off the catwalk and seriously wounded him In revenge, the Cawdor leader hacked him down with a massive axe. My Champion with the long rifle recovered from being shot, tried to harvest some ghast and flubbed it hard. Tank got to activate him for a turn and spent it jumping back and forth across a gap trying to fail and his one run of good dice rolls made sure I still had a Champion at the end of it!

Tank's last ganger finally managed to successfully harvest some Ghast and made a run for it.

The Emperor strikes back....

Not to be denied, the Emperor, using his new god given powers, gunned down the only ganger in the dome capable of actually harvesting some Ghast in order to steal his little green bag. At that point, Tank's Delaques bottled out leaving the Cawdor gang with a single bag of Ghast and possession of the dome.

Ghosties!

I've finished up a couple of solos for the army this week and made a lot of progress on the first unit of Spectres (which just aren't going to get done for publishing today as I haven't quite got the wash dry yet....) 

A Nighthaunt Cairn Wraith which will be a Reaper Souldrinker in my KoW Nightstalkers

And this GW Banshee which will be a...banshee...

 

My plan is to keep rewarding myself with the solo models whenever I finish a unit so once the Spectres are done I'm going to wade into the Knight of Shrouds and the Executioner before I hit the second unit of Reapers.

Next Time

More ghosties, definitely, and I should really be getting on with some of the 40K stuff that's piled on the to-do list. I think I may have possibly failed at my goal to add something to a 40K army every month this year because I've kind of stopped keeping track of that goal...

Roaming through the Old World

 

As you've probably already figured out, we at the Regiment like to mix our gaming up a bit. For the last 9(!)ish years we've had a regular weekly RPG session going. We've played a wide range of games - From Infinty RPG to Iron Kingdoms, classic DnD, DnD 5e, Call of Cthulhu and so on. After just finishing an excellent 5e Curse of Strahd campaign run by McZermof, we've decided to return to one of my favourites: Warhammer fantasy roleplay.

This is a bit of a nostalgia trip for me, WFRP was the first RPG I ever played (nearly 30 years ago!! :oO ) and the first edition has always had a special place in my RPG repertoire. I'd run the first two chapters of the Enemy Within Campaign a few years ago for the Regiment guys and was keen to get back into it. However, with the passage of time, only 4 of that original party were still in the group and the other 3 had never played the campaign! With the re-release of the 4th edition by Cubicle 7 it seemed a great chance to re-boot the campaign and start with a blank slate.

As I said, I've always had a soft spot for first edition so moving to 4th was going to be a bit of big step. Thankfully Cubicle 7 have done a good job (IMHO) doing just enough of a refresh and tidy up to make a difference without losing the original flavour of a dark and gritty fantasy setting. I won't do a review of the rules, that's what google is for ;), but suffice to say one player's reservations about playing another "useless wizard's apprentice" were put to rest at the end of character creation. Who'd have thought the wizard's staff not only has a knob on the end but it hits like it's made of iron rammed through with 6" nails!

Anyway, This blog series is going to be a players view (as far as i see it anyway) diary of the campaign as we play through it. We're likely to take a bit of a hiatus between chapters to play other things (did we mention that we're a group of kleptomaniac magpies?) but we'll definitely work our way through this time. we're already one session in to the campaign so I'll kick off with a run through of the dramatis personae and a precis of the last session.

Nynn Tai (Scott) - A Cathayan envoy, refined, articulate, how she ended up in the backwaters of the Empire is a story she hasn't shared yet

Eivor Albrecht (Theren) - a furtive, outlaw Talabeclander on the run

Saskia (McZermof) - an Amber wizard's apprentice on the way to Altdorf to deliver a mysterious package

Aron Gilmour (Paul) - a clerk on a messenger run for his noble betters

Mari (Tank) - a scruffy, smelly, irritable hedge witch wanderer of the Empire

Rudiger Volksmaer (Mcbeth) - an alcoholic initiate of Sigmar, disillusioned with the ecclesiarchy travelling to Altdorf to see for himself the state of the church

Cressida (Chris) - an angry young engineer running to, or possibly from, something

We've stated a tradition of a session '0' in our group, a small side adventure to get everyone together before embarking on the main quest. I split the group in to three groups:

Eivor on his own, Marie and Saskia together and Rudiger, Nynn, Cressida and Aaron. The groups had started travelling together for mutual protection through the rural backwaters of Talabecland, just west of Delberen.

Marie and Saskia had been walking the roads together after the unwanted attention of a number of passing wagons. As the rain hammered down, soaking them to the skin, they caught the smell of roasting rabbit drifting from the trees.

Eivor had spent the day travelling through the Drakwald just back from the road, the comfort of invisibility from road travelers more than offset the risks of meeting whatever lurked in the woods. As the rain got heavier, he came across the bole of a tree that had fallen in a storm at some point in the past. sitting back against the root stock in the depressing it left in the earth gave him enough cover to risk a small fire to roast the rabbits he'd caught earlier in the day.

He looked up sharply at the sound of clanking pots and pans to see two faces peering at his fire longingly. inviting the two travelers to join him, the three of them settled down to relative comfort and a warm meal.

This was disturbed by the abrupt arrival of a huge beastman crashing through the fire! A brief struggle ensued where Saskia discovered that her apprentices staff was for more than leaning on! Through the shocked silence following the bloody slaying of the Beastman, the trio heard the sounds of movement all around them. the report of a firearm some distance off was answered with a braying call somewhere in the woods and a number of the creatures peeled off the main group and headed towards the road. Saskia, furious hatred at the perversion of nature that is the beastman race, took chase and was followed by the other two.

Meanwhile, Rudiger's group had hastily left an inn that evening after the Ulrican landlord and his friends thought the group were a soft target for some abuse and intimidation. As they neared the main Delberen road, Cressida heard the unmistakable sound of a firearm discharge! in the lightning flashes, the group saw a carriage stopped in the middle of the road ahead with huddled figures moving around it.

Moving closer through the gloom they realised that one of the shapes on the floor was a human. Aaron, sensing the change for a dry ride to the next inn raised his hands and called to the group. His cheery "hello good folks!" was answered with a cross bow bolt whistling past his ear! Two of the shadowy figures drew weapons and moved towards the group. A struggle ensued that saw Rudiger invoke the name of Sigmar to smite his foes, and boy were they smote, Cressida grappling with another figure as he brought a blunderbuss to bear. The struggle to aim the weapon resulted in a misfire into the carriage horses sending the vehicle lurching through the mud down the road. Meanwhile, Nynn and Aaron managed to handle the remaining assailants.

As the muddy melee drew to a close, a thunderous crash from the trees heralded the arrival of several beastmen and mutants! Battle was joined in earnest, with tentacles, horns and teeth being pitted against the best steel the Empire could offer. Eivor, Marie and Saskia arrived shortly afterwards to help turn the tide of the battle in the party's favour. 

At the end of the combat, with wounds being tended, their attention turned to the wagon and what remained of the horses. The creatures of chaos had managed to mutilate the horses so that the carriage was next to useless. inside were the corpses of 3 passengers, all showing signs of murder most foul! the original attackers were searched and found to be wearing old uniforms of the Ratchet lines coach line, though all had the tell tale signs of being stripped from corpses - blood stained rents where no wounds were apparent, the carriage itself was found to be in a state of disrepair no reputable line would countenance. the only answer - bandits posing as carriage crews had gathered some un-suspecting passengers at an inn and taken them to the middle of nowhere to rob them. In checking the bodies, Rudiger had a nasty shock when he realised that one of them was the spitting image of Cressida!

Cressida was able to pocket some documents from the body for perusal at a more private time and location. 

the group were now standing in the middle of the road in the pouring rain when Aaron remembered that the next inn was no more than half a mile down the road. the Hooded Man would be an ideal place to warm up, dry out and report the evening's events to the Road Wardens....

That was where we left session '0', this weekend I'll follow up with events at the Hooded Man then put together the goings on from tomorrow night's session.

Cheers all.

Pooch's August Update

And with that, August is done too. Jeepers this year is odd.....

But still, progress continues! This month was a bit of a bitsy one, finishing up some things, and getting things prepped for future months. Still finished some things tho...

1. Paint a Kings of War Army- DONE

I finished up my Goblin Army a few months back, but actually had a couple more figures on back order. The Mollog's mob box was stuck in COVID related delays for months, so much so that I had mostly forgotten I had ordered it! 

A bit of paint later, and voila! Another Squig for my units (I was short one), and a Troll Boss (who my army obviously needed).

Flying Squig and Mollog

And now the Goblin army is totally done!

2. Create a table of terrain to support a game- In progress!
Still no further progress.... I really should fix that!

3. Complete the 6mm Apocalypse Challenge- In progress!

I've been a little light on inspiration of late, so when I spotted that Kapiti Hobbies had a box of Acastus Knight Porphyrion in stock, I couldn't resist the opportunity! It helped a lot that I had just sold some models, so the shared bank account was none the wiser either.....

One Acastus is 38 points, so I finished up yet another Leman Russ, this time an Executioner. The turret was 3d printed, and looks fantastic. 

Porphyrion and friend

Little wee Leman Russ....

Next month? Well, the box did have two Acastus in it.... But I have no clue what I'll do for the other 12 points! 

4. Run a narrative campaign for the group- not started

With the kids starting sport on Saturdays, it means that  I haven't been to the club in a while. I still have a plan, just haven't had the chance to action it.

5. Add a new detachment to one of my 40k armies- DONE (but ongoing)

More progress! Two Scouts ready to jump out of the Landspeeder Storm. One with a Heavy Bolter, one with a shotgun. Bases 3d printed, and heads were again supplied by Anvil Industries, because even in the grimdark future, you still need to wear a helmet.

Two scouts! 

And with their transport 

6. Buy a starter box and paint all of it- Some progress

Some progress made here, but it continues to be a secret.

7. Paint a Space Marine Heroes Series- DONE

8. Update a 15mm Napoleonic army for Blackpowder- not even started!

Er. Still nothing here..... I should probably make a start on it, eek!

9. Paint a stand alone force- DONE

10. Update and improve a table of terrain- DONE

11. Paint a Flames of War Army (In progress)

Progress on this one! And maybe, could call it a completed army? I painted up 5 76mm Shermans from Plastic Soldier Company. They aren't as nice to assemble as the Battlefront Shermans, but they look good now that they are fully painted.

5 76mm Shermans 

Another angle on 5 76mm Shermans!

With that, I now have my 80 point list all painted, which I will be taking to Flamescon in Auckland next month (lockdown willing!). I'd still like to finish up my 3rd Para platoon, and paint some 75mm guns before I call this one "finished" however....

The whole army as it stands...

12. Finish what I should have finished last year- DONE

And that's it, on to September!

Pooch

Morty is cautiously optimistic about the progress that has been made...

Test Paints come good!

Well colour me a happy painter! My test paints came up SUPER well when I finished them off. 

First off, some Questoris Knights, all armed with close combat weapons. Because if they're going to be knights devoted to Khorne, there's no way they're not going to be getting stuck in up close. I still need to do their transfers but I just haven't got to those yet. I need to do a bit more planning on how to create a slightly different pattern of markings on each one.

Questoris Knights of House Hyboras

All the Knights of House Hyboras

Secondly, the first base of ghosties! They took most of a day's painting to get through but once I'd got the order of colours sorted out it really was an exercise in just taking it one step at a time. McBeth suggested I put a final coat of white on them and I think I shall. I have no idea how anyone could use these on individual bases, especially without some serious weighting on the bases! I still need to base this unit - they're going to be getting staggeringly plain basing methinks.

Ghosties!

The second base of ghosties has been primed and should be a bit more straight forward as they're just spectres rather than the big scary Reapers. And then a second base of Reapers and some characters. I've got some plans for the next set of painting projects for this army which I'm quite looking forward to. 

Next Time

More ghosties I suspect and some pics of whatever we wind up playing on club day. If I'm actually organised, I'll try and manage a coherent battle report for a change!