"O Captain, My Captain!" - Our great return to the City of the Damned

Here we are again on Amarok's Lair! Three dry months for the blog, however not at all three dry months for the hobby. Summer's gone, and we just entered the greenest month of all (more on that later). However, between some holidays and various events for our families and ourselves, Grimbeorn and I managed to do something very big... the Biggest Battle We Ever Played. I'll add a link to that post as soon as I complete it.

Just yesterday, however, we started a brand new Mordheim campaign within our small club of friends. Our great return in the City of the Damned for an organized event generated from the idea of replaying from the beginning the first ever Italian national Mordheim Campaign, Necromantic Storm (in Italian Tempesta Necromantica).

WoV #7: Öldenhaller Manor

Seventh battle of the Wolf of Vengeance campaign.

The hints found in Dörthagen lead to Pfungzig, a rich city in the Province of Averland. But before following the tracks of the Adventurers is now time for a direct strike to the enemy: the Oligarchs.

The Sheep Campaign - Game zero for the Empire player

Second battle report for The Sheep Campaign 🐑

I cite from the Orc battle report the same introduction:

In the same afternoon we managed to play both games, since they were quite rapid. For right's sake, I have to admit that the new The Old World rules were not quite followed literally, since we played two semi-skirmish games, or however mostly with reduced units, to simulate how our Characters are just at the beginning of their career. No problem, though: we'll integrate the rules while we reach a normal point cap.

So, here we go with the first game for Grimbeorn.

The Sheep Campaign - Game zero for the Orc player

Here we are for the first battle report for The Sheep Campaign 🐑

In the same afternoon we managed to play both games, since they were quite rapid. For right's sake, I have to admit that the new The Old World rules were not quite followed literally, since we played two semi-skirmish games, or however mostly with reduced units, to simulate how our Characters are just at the beginning of their career. No problem, though: we'll integrate the rules while we reach a normal point cap.

So, here we go with the first game.

WoV #6: Dörthagen

Sixth battle of the Wolf of Vengeance campaign.

After battling the Undead in the Moot, Rhobar decides to head to Dörthagen: all the hints found in Hugo's house lead there, so it's the natural place to go.

WoV #5 - The Moot

Fifth battle of the Wolf of Vengeance campaign.

Here we start the Path of the Winds. This is a cryptic name, compared with the others. There's a reason for that: everything will became clear...

WoV #4 - Orchaeology

 Fourth battle of the Wolf of Vengeance campaign.

After slowing down the Orcs in Gisoreux, Rhobar enters the Forest of Arden to unveil the mysterious reason of the Greenskin reckoning... 

WoV #3 - The knights of death

Third battle of the Wolf of Vengeance campaign.

This game is set immediately after defeating Max Tarn in our first game. 

WoV #2 - Helping friends

Second battle of the Wolf of Vengeance campaign.

As I wrote in the previous report, probably this game set in Bretonnia would not be Rhobar's first choice of proceeding after defeating Max Tarn. However, I chose to follow a chronological principle in narrating our games, so to discover the different aspects of the story together with the Hero (and obviously Grimbeorn). From now on, little info about the previous game would be quoted in the briefing if needed.

WoV #1 - The convoy

First battle of the Wolf of Vengeance campaign. After Game Zero, this is the first official battle report of the whole series.

Originally we wanted to report the various games in the chronological order we played them. Thinking about in-game logic, this would not always be the effective order the main characters would manage their movements. However, years passed and our project remained a draft: so, this series of pic showcases and battle reports serve more as a diary of our campaign than a precise narration of the events, and Rhobar's story will be narrated in the briefing before and after every game, in the same order Grimbeorn discovered gradually the plot and the puzzling texture of the world he lives in.

WoV - Campaign setting, rules & Game Zero

In this post I will explain the setting of our campaign in the Warhammer World, the first game we played for Wolf of Vengeance WFB campaign and the rules we created to run this series of battles.

Fantasy Crusade - first battle report

When we posted on some hobby groups on Facebook our first post about the Fantasy Crusade campaign system, some good folks were really interested (and that flattered us a lot). They ask for some clarifications, which I still have to provide through a specific rules post, and I first need to translate to English all our notes and campaign sheets: however, Grimbeorn and I already (so to speak) played the first game!

We choose our armies from respectively his Ogre Kingdom Crusade and my Empire Crusade. However we played full strength, so 1000 pts on the battlefield.

We picked the sixth battle from the WHFB core rulebook, The Watchtower.

Ogres win the throw for the tower, so they start with a core unit inside it. Grimbeorn puts on the battlefield a Bruiser with two hand weapons (General), another Bruiser as BSB, 6 Ogres, 6 Ironguts and 5 Leadbelchers. BSB and core Ogres are currently garrisoning the tower.

My Imperial forces attack with a more various army (even compared to Grimbeorn's Empire Crusade I preferred to mix more diverse units: maybe less effective but I love the background effect). I field 5 Knightly Orders, 10 Greatswords, 15 Swordsmen, Helblaster Volley Gun, 15 Halberdiers with a 8 Crossbowmen as Detachment, 5 Pistoliers. My Heroes are a General on warhorse and a BSB.

Ogres move forward, but I try to start aggressively to avoid their charges, so I try to charge first. I succeed with every attempt (woah), but I lose two knights against the dreadful shooting of the Leadbelchers

Even without two men, my charge is devastating: my General unit obliterate the Ogres by successfully scaring off and destroying them in their attempt to flee

On the other side of the tower, my Halberdiers have a bad time against the Ironguts: they're really strong! We kill just one of them but we lose the combat...

... and the only survivor is the BSB, who holds the line for Sigmar and the Empire!

Its a brief heroic moment: the Ironguts literally eat him and turn to charge 😱 my poor Swordsmen. In just a combat phase this entire unit will be totally wiped out

Grimbeorn and his usual reaction to my double sixes

Turn of the events! With a charge, my knights leaded by my General successfully destroy all the remaining Ogres by pursuing them after winning the Combat phase. Second mark for them today

With just the Ogres on the tower remaining, weakened by my constant shooting, now the Empire just need to wait. Sigmar blessed my Helblaster Volley Gun which suffered just one misfire in the entire game!

My Greatswords charge the tower with the last Ogre still maintaining possession

The end of the game!

So, the first game of our campaign ended with a suffered victory for me. I lost both my core units, but Grimbeorn lost his entire army in battle. Our Crusade rules state that a unit destroyed in battle is automatically restored at its full strength before the subsequent game; however, we had to roll on the death chart for our characters.

I totalize 4 Glory Points with this game (1 for playing the game, 3 for winning) and Grimbeorn 2 Glory Points (1 for playing, 1 for losing). Some of our units gained an enemy standard, which will grant some experience and, maybe, some upgrades for our units. 

It was a nice, fun game, and we liked the Crusade-like army composition. With this game we beta-tested the post-battle sequence and we wrote something more accurate in our rules. More on that later. We decided to ignore, just for this game, the Saga system inside our rules, so we could just try the base rules: for the next game we're already writing down some ideas for this key feature of our Crusade Campaign.

I'm looking forward to fight the Ogres with my other armies: it's a fascinating enemy, and I really want to explore their potential and find their weak spots. I have an entire Crusade to do so...

A nice DBA Sunday morning

Today Michele and I played a DBA game before he left for holidays in Southern Italy. Just to stay on the topic, we had on board Nikephorian Byzantines vs East Frankish, so probably our battle could have taken place in Southern Italy too.

He chose to deploy 4 elements of 8 Bw and the double element 6 Kn. My only choice was about 7 Hd and Ps, and I mixed deploying one of each.

The initial situation. Terrain features are an hamlet near the centre of the board, a plough (which we eventually took of because we throw 2 on the first PIP) and a wood

The main battle begun on my right side, because Michele chose to advance with his Cv elements and I went on confronting them with my Kn. On the centre we carefully moved on ready to fight (my men feared the dreadful arrows of Byz 8 Bw

The two cavalry fronts made contact and started a long fight which went on for a couple of turns. Even if Kn are stronger than Cv vs mounted elements, Byz fought very well, using the Ps element in the hamlet to close the door on the enemy. Eventually I two Kn and Michele two Cv

The end of the match! Throwing away every caution (by his own admission) Michele charged with the 6 Kn, exposing himself to my Gen closing the door on him. I just wiped out his Ps on my right flank with an element of Kn in GG. The game ends 5-2 for me.

Multiplayer, multifighting, multikilling ⚔️ a Mordheim afteernoon report

Our newborn wargaming club (with which we played a little tournament during Spring 2021) reunited on Saturday afternoon to fight amongst the ruins of the City of the Damned. This would have been the first act of our Sword of the Herald campaign which we hope to start playing soon (but there's a big news, more at the end of this post).

There were eight players and warbands:

1. Gunnery School of Nuln (the winner of the former tournament!)
2. High Elves Shadow Warriors (the runner-up)
3. Witch Hunters
4. Blood Dragon Undead
5. another Blood Dragon Undead (this is a new warband, whilst the previous one fought in the tournament too)
6. Dwarf Treasure Hunters (Grimbeorn's warband)
7. Averlanders (Frontlineminiaturist's warband)
8. Orc Mob (my warband)

After a random assignment of the tables and the opponents, we were distributed between three battlefields.

Candle light fight for me and the more skilled Undead warband! This will not end well...

Two three-players battles for the others. Here in the first table there are the Dwarfs (on the right), the Elves in the centre and the other Undead on the left

Some prepping and the last sales before battle

Here you can see the Averlanders in the centre, the Witch Hunters down on the left and the Gunnery School on the right border. Randomly both multiplayer battles were using the scenario Ambush from Annual 2002 (which my pards and I already played the Saturday before)

All set even for us: my Greenskins on the right are ready to beat up the Undead for the control of the big house

We started the game! I took some pics of my table, but both my mates forgot to take any (a real reporter squadron eheh), so here's what we got.

"Ready to take it Bozz!"

"Hey Bozz doz wolves seem to me a little strange..."

The Undead move forward with their henchmen ready to taste Orc flesh...

Dire Wolf vs Goblin? Nasty!

My elite troops are waiting for the enemy, but in the wooden balcony something horrible lurks...

"Hey Bozz here comz the ugly onez!"

Argh! My Shaman is beaten up another time. I really need to cover more this guy...

Check on the other tables! Here the Undead and the Elves fight harshly in the edifice at the centre of the battlefield

And here the Averlanders are fleeing with the Wyrdstone while the other warbands try to stop them

"Goodbye nice Imperial folks! The Wyrdstone is ours!"

The Vampire is hungry for Elven blood

Nice afternoon of wargaming. We had a lot of fun, even cause for some of us this was the first Mordheim game since last June. But what was the outcome of our three battles?

1. Table 1, Orcs vs Undead: decisive Undead victory. I lost more than half of my warband, and even if I controlled one section of the building (almost two) the Necromancer cast a spell against my Goblin henchman and stunned him good at the very end of the game.
2. Table 2, Dwarves vs Elves vs Undead: another Undead victory! The players reached an agreement on the Wyrdstone counters on the table, but the Vampire's servants where winners on the field. Grimbeorn says: The Elves (who were the defender) deployed well but they played last in the first turn, so they were attacked by the Undead which had an easy time, the Dwarfs on the opposite side tried to stop the lightning-fast Elves with little success, managing only to extort a couple Wyrdstone counters in exchange of the life of one of the pointy-ears. Eventually, a draw between Undead and Elves, except that an humble Zombie came out in striking the final blow on the Shadow Warriors' Captain, making very proud (and a little jealous) his vampiric Master.
3. Table 3, Witch Hunters vs Averlanders vs Gunnery School: similar outcome than the previous, but with Frontlineminiaturist's Averlanders on the first place. They manage to flee with some counters: the others were divided amongst the players.

We run the post-battle sequence all together as always, and we had a nice talk about the games. Some of us have a lot of gold to spend before the next battle!

Lastly, we decided to join a great adventure: even if we like the idea of the Sword of the Herald campaign, and we can obviously keep it for the future, we agreed to join the first national Mordheim campaign set up planned by the Mordheim Italia Community from May onwards. The campaign is called Tempesta Necromantica (Necromantic Storm) and will be focused on some dark forces from beyond the grave which lurk in the cold streets of Mordheim...

Ambush in the City of the Damned

Yesterday Grimbeorn, Frontlineminiaturist and I played a Mordheim match. Since December we decided that every new game is part of our new Sword of the Herald campaign, even if it is not totally defined yet. This scenario was Ambush from Annual 2002.

My Orcs, Grimbeorn's Dwarves and Frontlineminiaturist's Cult of Possessed clash in the street of Mordheim, where the Greenskins found a giant stash of Wyrdstone and try to flee with it...

The battlefield was just nice, but at the end we decided that in similar occasions the centre of the board must be more protected, or the defender will be simply taken out in few turns

"I see some Goblins up there"

Here they are! My boyz are set around the house, and my Heroes carry some Wyrdstone. We need to flee of the field in order to win

The Possessed look from behind the gates and think of an obscure plan

The only possible outcome for the first turn: I try to run, they try to catch!

My Troll is protecting my Boss from the enemy's quarrels. I already lost some of my boyz, and both Dwarves and Possessed are still strong

On the left, I try to escape. The Dwarves are too slow to catch me, but they try to stop the Orcs by shooting at them. On the upper side of the board, the Possessed are trying to intercept the fleeing Greenskins and collect every Wyrdston shard they have

Right moment for a truce: my Hero drops his Wyrdstone to save his life. The Possessed agree...

One of the most epic moments: a single Goblin take out a Dwarf Quarreler and a Trollslayer! A true hero! At the end of the game, the Dwarves result in permanent dead... Grimbeorn will not forget this

The closing act of the game: my Boss is almost out of the battlefield, when Von Pfalz, Frontlineminiaturist commander, a dreadful Magister, possesses him with his magic. There's nothing to do against the power of Chaos...

... and my Boss turns and charges my Troll! Gork please help!

The game ended with my warband almost entirely out of action, every Wyrdstone shard in the hand of the Cult of the Possessed and some underdog Dwarves exhausted from running around... not the best, except for Frontlineminiaturist who collected a lot of gold. Fortunately, I permanently lost just a couple Squigs. In the future we need to train better to confront the forces of Chaos that haunt this streets...

As always, after the battle I feel particularly inspired... so I created a Wyrdstone token! I found a simple and nice way to do it rapidly, so I'm going to paint some of them for every occasion.

"That's mine!" "Come take it if you can!"

My precious...