The Harrowmark Run - part 0

#TheHarrowmarkRun
Skyship Pirate Orruks’ adventures in the limitless malignant forests!

A three-(or possibly more)-player Age of Sigmar Skirmish Campaign, based on the Triumph & Treachery battleplans, set in the endless malignant forests and isolated villages of The Harrowmark in Shyish:

Story Arc (A-plot)

1. Might is Right: once again a ship has crash landed in the Harrowmark, but rumours have it that this one was carrying a particularly precious cargo. Warbands converge on the area of the last sighting of the ship hoping to locate the crash site.
   (The winner's General can generate an additional Skirmish Command Ability)
2. Field of Blood: the ship has been located, but following the previous vicious conflict no single warband managed to get there unchallenged. Eliminate the enemy leaders and secure the crash site.
   (The winner earns an extra D6 Renown)
3. Artefact of Ultimate Power: the cargo was not on the shipwreck, rather it was flung not far away during the crash. Bruised and battered, the warbands rush to grab the fabled artefact.
   (The winner's General can generate an additional Artefact/Spell)
4. Tower of Screaming Death: with the artefact in their possession, one of the warbands is rushing to the Freebooter's Tower where they plan to enact a bloody ritual to wipe out their enemy. Of course, they'll do all they can to stop this from happening

B-plots

We will decide to whether to play a b-plot episode, and which one to play, based on the results of each story-arc episode:

• Lost! A warband has become disoriented in the endless forest and has to reach safety. (Breakthrough from Age of Sigmar)
• Man overboard! A crew member falls off a skyship and must be rescued.
  (Reclaim the Fallen Battleplan from the Khorne Bloodbound Battletome).
• Defend the village from a wandering Deadwalker herd!
  (Throne of Skulls Battleplan: The Deadwalkers)
• Something was dumped overboard into the dread forest by a flying ship your crew have been chasing. Find it and discover its contents: It might be junk, it might be something valuable!
  (Skirmish Battleplan: Treasure Hunt)
• Break into the walled garden and steal the secret hidden there.
  (Skirmish Battleplan: Seize the Relic).
• A hasty journey through the voodoo forest has to be made to get supplies to a neighbouring village - there is no flying ship available. Be on your guard for ambushing robbers… and worse!
  (Skirmish Battleplan: Fragile Cargo)

NB: all Renown earned after each game is halved for this campaign, when compared to the amounts given in the Skirmish rulebook, to slow down the growth of warbands and allow for the short game times we need to play in our lunch breaks!

Godfather Viktor is going to use Freeguild. I'm using The Ogresuns (Pirate Orruks), Wailslake is using Nighthaunts.

About seven leagues from Wortbad in the Harrowmark, in an area known locally as Blackrocks. A squat grey stone tower clung to a rocky hill overlooking the dark twisted forests surrounded it. The tower was weather-worn and moss-greened and infested with strange red crabs.

The Ogresun's skycutter glided gently in the breeze. The boat was crammed full of greenskins - two dozen Orruk Pirates (and a Grot almost everyone ignored) jostled for space amongst their cargo, as they approached the stony hill and prepared to land.

A couple of the crew took down the lateen sail while the pirate in the prow slung a rope over one of the jutting stones and jumped the narrowing gap between the boat and the hill. He caught the stern-line thrown by the hand at the tiller, looped it around another stone and hauled it tight, pulling the jolly boat parallel with the cliff. As the wooden gunwales bumped into the stones the crew piled out and started unloading the barrels and sacks from the boat.

Kaptain Ogbad stepped onto the hillside and ignored the hustle and bustle around him to survey the little hill and the tower. He seemed pleased with what he saw and strode purposefully towards the reinforced door at the tower's base. His ragged coat flapped in the cold wind and he pushed his battered hat tighter onto his scarred head so it wouldn't blow off.

The door was unlocked but still needed a good shove to get it open. Inside the tower was dark, the shutters on the upper floor windows were tightly closed, it was damp and musty inside. The walls were a foot and a half thick of mortared stone, so even on the hottest day it would be cold inside without a fire. The ground floor room was a dust-covered jumble of empty barrels and crates - the stores that the last occupants brought with them had been finished, or looted, years ago by the look of things. The tower had clearly not been occupied for a very long time. Ogbad hummed to himself in approval and started up the wooden stairs that wound round the outside of the tower.

Upstairs it was a similar picture of disuse and abandonment. The middle floor room was almost empty compared to the ground floor. The tattered remains of hammocks hung from the ceiling beams and rusted-through cooking pots were stacked in the fireplace but there was no furniture beyond a map-covered desk and a couple of crude chairs. With deep satisfaction Ogbad noted the stacks of leather-bound books, dozens of rolled-up charts and maps (and innumerable empty rum bottles) that filled every space of the wooden shelving built into the walls. The ladder to the flat roof was pulled up against the ceiling in a clever arrangement of counter-weighted ropes and pulleys that slowly lowered or raised the bottom without much force, and kept the steps out of the way when not in use.

The roof was empty - the Kaptain looked down over the ramparts at his little crew working on moving in and setting up their billets. Dredger and Hogbreff were capable officers and could be trusted to keep them busy. The empty boxes and barrels in the ground floor room started piling up on the rocky hillside as the crew cleared the space, ready for the fresh stores they had brought with them.