Mordheim: City of the Godamnit

Hello blog? *solemn bell tolls.....tumbleweed.....wind howls...*

Things have been a bit quiet on here lately, so thought it was time to give 'Yo Dawg....' a kick to see if it's still moving.

At the weekend a group of us met up to play Mordheim again in Oxford, taking orcs and goblins, beastmen, the possessed, ogres, the carnival of chaos and skaven to the streets.

Some choice highlights:

Two heroes out of action? Ah well, anything but a one....anything but a one....oh sh-

 Let’s do the subplots rules! -2 modifier to all shooting because of a gale? FFFFFUUUUU-

 Just hit! HIT HIM!

 Only need to wound....ahhh a one again.

 I can see him! I CAN SEE! It’s short range, three’s to hit, come on....one. Well, to be expected.

 Two more heroes out of action....surely I won’t roll another lot of ones, right? Ah I see, I CAN!

 A goblin’s got experience! Anything but lads got talent...anything but lads got talent....cheers 11. *removes goblin from roster sheet.*

Quite frankly, I’ve never rolled such appalling dice in all my life. It even beats the time I rolled 5 ones out of 7 dice when making armour saves for my chaos terminators against a dark reaper squad 10 years ago (yes, it’s still fresh in my mind, some things never leave you!)

I would talk of dice being weighted and how everyone is a cheating bastard (Jason) but it seems luck had gone on holiday for me.

At the end of three games (I didn’t have a warband to actually play anyone) I had lost:

My orc boss
My shaman (TWICE!)
Both Big ‘Uns (one of them twice also)
Both squigs
Both goblins armed with spears

My remaining force consisted of:

A goblin armed with a club and short bow
An orc boy
A newly purchased big ‘un from the end of the second game.
And 9 gold coins in the bank.
Yeah liquidate that.

Despite this horrendous display of how NOT to play Mordheim, it was great fun all in all. Some other players suffered also, with Marc’s beastmen being whittled down to only 7 models and a newly hired centagor getting an old war-wound in his first battle; Jason’s possessed brethren lost 2 of their number in the first game and Oly’s newly-formed ogre warband were thoroughly play-tested.

On the other hand, Rion’s skaven seem unstoppable at the moment and Prakash’s nurglings are absolutely lethal little ankle biters – ones to watch.

But beware, for there’s been a change in the air, a sinister figure has appeared...the corpses of these poor-dead goblins and blooded orcs will perhaps have some use...

Some bit of buildings and stuff

Greetings nerds.

I've been making some scenery this week. This is actually a slight detour from the 8 gamers thing as it involves our Mordheim project. With an effort to replace the rather *ahem* tatty buildings we have currently (one is an old grey plastic monstrosity with the words "all hail!" and a crude smiley face drawn on the top) I've finally finished or at least, in the finishing stages of one piece and working on another.

With Mordheim primarily focused on ruins, behold....some weird crypt thing and a mashed up building:

They both still need some work, maybe a broken gargoyle on the ruin on the left and some highlights on the crypt and some touch-ups to the areas that are flaking. It's not brilliant, but it will do. 

Painting wise, the boars are all done and so is most of one of the riders. I've actually got another project I'm working on, which will either go really well or be a waste of £20 and a lot of time. 

Remember the goblin heroes I bought ages ago? Well, I've started on them. By started I mean "I've glued the cloak on the shaman, cut him off his metal base and in the slow process of making him a cool-looking action-packed base of awesome." The goblin warboss on the other hand...I think I bodged his arm, so he's now holding the spare spear from the goblin boss on giant squig model, which is held on with a lot of superglue, 2 types of green stuff (normal and liquid) and hope, lots of hope. 

I'm a troll man...

Here is a painting update! I've been a bit slack recently, but I've finally started work on the howdah for the big spider. I actually don't know how some parts go together, so expect it to be bodged, at a jaunty angle and badly glued together. It will also have the web flinger because quite frankly, I don't want a goblin shaman miscasting, then exploding on my lovely big spider.

Also, I've nearly finished the river trolls. They haven't been based yet, nor had goblins stuck on them (at least one of them is going to have a goblin sitting on his back). Here they are so far:

Pokey

Fishy

Sicky

 

 

Can't wait to get these lads into a scrap. Or rather, can't wait to fail those stupidity tests and have them stand about doing naff all.

The magic in this game is dumb anyway.

Previously on Warhammer, a game of Fantasy Battles:

"Irresistible force, what could POSSIBLY go wrong?" ZZAPP

"Hey guys, anyone seen a shaman - level 2, green skin, purple cloak, funny expression? No? Hmmm...."

"Oh the squigs are going the wrong way, fantastic."

"Why is he swinging that ball near us? No, the other way THE OTHER WAY...OH SHI-"

"Get on the blower someone - more savage orcs needed. Plus, better warpaint."

"Rat ogre steaks? GET IN!"

Not my finest hour. But certainly not my worst game ever (that avenue of enjoyment happened many years ago, and somehow I've blocked most of it from my mind - so many failed animosity tests.)

Things started off badly and got worse with my shaman casting irresistible force, then being sucked into the realms of chaos (he survived a strength 10 hit then decided to fail a toughness test). Bye. The squigs then ran off.

Other 'highlights' include:

• the spearchucka crew dying to the rat ogres after firing once and missing. The other crew also fleeing the board.
• the fanatics cutting back through the unit they were released from - several times.
• the savage orcs getting dicked by the ogres in a brutal overkill combat.
• the night goblins holding their own against the rat ogres and with the newly routed squigs, breaking them and destroying them!

Seriously, I've actually played a lot worse than that.

Musings:

• Avoid being charged by Ogres. The impact hits are brutal enough.
• Skaven magic can jog on.
• My own magic can jog on.
• In a 1,000 points, I need more hard-hitting, high-wound units. The spearchuckas are a waste of time.

All in all, I very much enjoyed myself. I can never feel down when playing orcs and goblins. They're just too comedy. I expect to kill half my own troops - frankly, finishing a game without Cheneying my own troops would be weird. The new rules don't seem all that different either; still need a bit of study mind. Oly and Rion seemed to enjoy kicking the crap out of each other, which is always good!

A detour to Mordheim

Hello!

I haven't posted much, due to being busy with other blogs and drinking heavily and as such, haven't had much chance to write anything since getting back from holiday (save for talking about how good squigs are).

Anyway, painting progress is slow. My second box of savage orcs are like a rather large lump of wyrdstone around my neck. I can see them out of the corner of my eye; laying in a heap on the cutting mat, half-painted green, with all the weapon hands finally glued on, but not effort to actually paint said weapons. Only one is marginally complete (the musician). I will work on getting these finished, as I was proud of the first lot (who need war-painting up!)

I've also been working on my cockatrice, which now sports a rather fetching pink mohawk and blue fur. It looks hideous. Also completed is another mushroom (this time on a base that's the right size). Tried taking some pictures of it and they look rubbish, so no pictures, sorry. Other projects include painting another screamer-killer Carnifex (sorry, 40K talk).

HOWEVER...I have got pics of a new addition to my Mordheim warband. Yes, a tangent - apologies, but I'm rather proud of this dude. Few games back, one of my Orc Big 'Uns (Morko) got a weapons expert skill (and because he can have shooting skillz, he now has a blunderbuss that "e found in da handz of sum humie wiv no legz." Yes...quite. Anyway, Morko now totes a blunderbuss. Now, converting one was out of my slightly inferior hands. However, using a technique know as 'copying'; I managed to cobble together something I saw on another blog, but in my own primitive style. It isn't the best conversion work, but it does the job and it's typically 'orc and goblins' in that respect.

yes, that's a spare spider from the Arachnarok kit, in the hand of a
40K ork, that had been cut and re-glued ages ago.

Shoddy, yes - but that's Orc craftsmanship for you. The little guy is Gorko, his mate!

Fungus Amongus!

Aside from the fanatics, squigs are possibly my best models that only have 1 wound in the orc and goblin army. What is essentially a ball of fungus stuck on some legs, with a head full of teeth and unpredictable movement. Not only is their weapon skill far superior to a lowly goblin (4 as opposed to 2); they have a strength of 5 (-2 to armour saves, nearly always wounding on 2’s or 3’s) and 2 attacks standard. Plus, when they go mad they cause D6 strength 5 hits on nearby units and for every 5 squigs remaining, add plus 1 to that. 8 points a model for something that’s an erratic killing machine. Of course, under my command, they wouldn’t probably attack my own unit, then flee through another unit and be destroyed.

I don’t nearly have enough of these dudes – think at a rough count it was 18 or 20 (mix of old, new and really old Gorkamorka ones that have Mohawks which Brett gave me). I think a massive unit of 50 would be good. Might have to work on a unit filler or something.

They’re also great fun to paint – why have cotton when you can paint them really stupid colours? Here are the newest additions. Note the big 'un and the little guy are from this set. I don't even know what this is but it's funny. Might use the goblin as a hero or something. Will probably do an army list or something soon. 

BOUNCE POGO POGO POGO POGO

Incoming Goblin Heroes alert

Yes! Thank you Mr postman for these! Also, thank you to trolltrader from ebay for the quick turn-around on these. They look ace, especially the shaman (yes, that plastic ghost-thing is some awesome cosmic power!)

He's on a shield! A SHIELD!

Avatar of War have some good stuff, that's pretty much compatible with GW's range. So stoked with these dudes. I can feel the power of the WAAAGH! Be afraid!