The Sal’s Ford Connection, part 5 (The Finale!)

Skinny-men vs. Mersky Banda vs. The Cult of the Divine Illumination
3 player game: The Motherlode! (a home-brew scenario)

• Roll a D6 for each gang member. They only take part in the battle on a result of 4+.
• 12 loot counters on the board, placed 8" or more apart from each other)
  (Each loot counter had a 50% chance of being real, rolled when a ganger is in base contact. The counter was removed after searching and the gang gained 1VP if the loot was real)
• Turn priority rolled on 2D6 at the start of each turn.

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Three gangs (The Skinny-men, Mersky Banda and The Cult of the Divine Illumination) each sent a small scouting party to the Rad-Cliff Zone, hoping to be able to loot the rich pickings that were rumoured to be there.

The three gangs managed to search five separate locations within a matter of minutes but none of them turned up anything valuable.

Only five junior members of the Skinny-men gang were present: Heaton Park, Bowker Vale, Clayton Hall, Edge Lane and Trafford Bar.

Bowker Vale went down before he even managed to power-up his plasmagun!

A vicious exchange of fire between all three gangs ensued!

The Cult of the Divine Illumination were the first to bottle-out after Heaton Park took out a couple of them.

The Skinny-men were once again the victims of the mysterious "Scuttler" attacks in the gloom of the underhive!

After another intense fire-fight the Skinny-men had three men down and bottled-out, leaving Mersky Banda in control of the zone and in the strongest position in Mancunius Dome!

+++

The Tech Gangers of Mersky Banda won the final game and with it, the Shadow War campaign! The truth about the Scuttlers has not be uncovered so we will be returning to Mancunius Dome for another campaign, some time soon...

The Sal’s Ford Connection, part 4

Skinny-men vs. Mersky Banda vs. The Cult of the Divine Illumination
3 player game: Grab the Cache

+++

The Skinny-men picked up rumours that Mersky Banda and the Cult of the Divine Illumination had been fighting and escalating war. The two gangs had clashed recently and where squaring up for another round. The Skinny-men quickly moved through the underhive to Sump Crawl, on the border between Cult and Mersky Banda territory. They took up positions in the access gantries outside an abandoned manufactorum. As they set up, their scanners picked a source of emissions that normally indicated an archeotech horde. They started trying to pin down the source...

The Cult appeared and looked like they were scanning the area too!

The appearance of the Cult was closely followed by Mersky Banda's arrival. They immediately spotted the Cultists and started sniping at them from extreme range. Oldham Mumps, the Skinny-men's grenade launcher armed Heavy, opened fire and pinned down the closest group of Mersky Banda gangers, including their leader.

The Cult rushed forward, taking more fire from Mersky Banda and from each other! One of the Cultists shot his mate in the back by accident!

While to two gangs were focused on each other the Skinny-men rushed across the exposed bridge to the manufactorum.

Oldham Mumps continued dropping frag grenades on Mersky Banda.

While most of the Skinny-men prepared to make a rush for the cache.

Shaw Crompton sniped at the Cult.

The final stages of the battle were a blur of activity. The Cult leader charged Abraham Moss and floored him. Another Cultist grabbed some of the loot and ran. Abraham Moss took down a Cultist with a single shot but was injured by return fire. Newton Heath and Edge Lane both grabbed some ancient looking tech while under fire from the Cult and from Mersky Banda but the support fire from the other Skinny-men drove back both enemy gangs and the Skinny-men won the day and gain ed the lions share of the archeotech loot!

+++

The Cult of the Divine Illumination: 1 Promethium cache
Merskey Banda: 1 Promethium cache
The Skinny-men: 3 Promethium cache
Abraham Moss gained Frenzy as a result of his injuries

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.

Tor Megiddo - part 5

Tor Megiddo is a harsh Desert World where life can be a constant struggle. The few remaining city domes are places of opulence and slavery. But in the wilderness freedom, starvation and madness hold sway. There is still oceans of promethium in the earth and gas drunk tribes roam the sand dunes in search for fuel, water and food.

+++ The Slipgibbets +++

Techno Barbarian tribe of desert dwelling mutants: murderous, criminal and sneaky.

From the Broken Mountains to Endcliff, across the desolate expanse of The Barrens past Windgrip, Malady and False Hope, the Slipgibbets scavenge the desert and battle with rival gangs. Always willing to stab an enemy in the back (or a friend if, needs be!).

Kastorax Tech-Wytch - a hunched and bitter monster of a man claims to have psychic powers and that he can control, repair and jinx machinery at will. His followers believe him.

Flood - second in command to Kastorax this mutant has a prehensile tentacle that his is unable to control. It seems to have a mind of it's own!

Cobalt - this desert scummer has hard scaled skin all over his back, but hides it from view.

Atlas - a towering mutant with a withered left arm. He claims carries part of an eradication ray generator, but since it doesn't work no one can really tell what it is.

Hijack - a horned mutant who carries a broken servo-skull as a totem.

+++

The first batch of the gang is finished. I'm planning a vehicle for them next.

(The bases are as orange as I could go - I'm far to used to trying to make bases look neutral, so this was quite a stretch for me!)

Tor Megiddo - part 4

The Slipgibbets are still very WIP but they are starting to look like the dust-encrusted desert raiders I imagined.

The group:

Kastorax Tech-Wytch

Flood

Cobalt

Atlas

Hijack

The paint scheme is fairly basic so far: Black undercoat, (very light) grey zenithal spray base, Ushabti Bone drybrush, Rakarth Flesh on areas of skin, loads of washes (Agrax Earthshade, Reikland Fleshshade, Seraphim Sepia, Carroburg Crimson and Nuln Oil), then a few Pallid Wych Flesh highlights on skin and a bit of sponged-on Rhinox Hide on metalwork. I haven't done anything with the bases yet but Alexander is painting the desert scenery the table in a rusty orange, so I will base the Sligibbets in a similar way, which hopefully will contrast beautifully.

The Sal’s Ford Connection, part 3

Scavengers (4 loot counters)
Skinny-men vs. Mersky Banda

+++

The Skinny-men advanced into the unclaimed territory at Ancho-rage, in the Sulfured Quays. They carefully picked their way through the dimly-lit rubble and twisted ruins of the disused docklands buildings. They knew that they would be facing the Mersky Banda gang but something else was waiting for them in the darkness as well...

Newton split his gang in half, with a Heavy, a Juve and two Gangers in each group.

Mersky Banda appeared, as expected!

In the darkness a strange mechanical noise caught Oldham's attention. He turned his head slightly to see what made it but only saw a flash of movement as an insectoid metallic limb slammed into him and sent him sprawling across the platform.

Heaton Park was pinned by Mersky Banda's galvanic rifle fire.

Bowker Vale blasted Mersky Banda's Arc Rifle gunner and BarneZ, their leader, with a risky sustained high-power burst of his plasma gun. But Edge Lane was wounded by the return fire.

Heaton Park was pinned again!

Another strange mechanical sound distracted Clayton, but by now his nerves were on a razor edge and he instinctively lashed out with the stock of his lasgun. With an electronic squeal the thing withdrew into the darkness...

+++

After game: A draw! Both sides grabbed 2 loot counters, lost a fighter out-of-action (who both recovered), and gained 2 Promethium Caches.