Pre-Sigmar Setting Project

As Barlog is taking so much space with other threads (and I dont want to mix my ideo ove his threads only ;P) I decided to make this ideas own thread.

So here's the original:

leonemaster wrote:

All right, this is my idea:

A total turnover for mordheim: game will be set in a pre-sigmar/rightwhensigmarwasborn time.
The world is totally uncivilised but for Elves and Dwarfes. Men aren't united yet and there's nothing like the empire or bretonnia: they are all marauder-like. The expansion will be mostly based on different human-type warbands, Orc and Goblin barbarians and Dwarfes and elves. The existent cities have been all destroied by the wars between elves and dwarfs, therefore the settings will be:
-Forests
-Ruined cities (mordheim-like but very old)
-Human rural villages

The warbands:

There will be a wide range of human-like warbands that rappresent both how the few humans present in the old world gather together to survive (or to defend their homes) and the options of gods/civilisations that were starting to rise.
Examples of human warbands:
-Farmers/warriors of a village, lead by the village chief, two strong-men, a 'healer' or something and the chief's son maybe?

-Groups of robbers/pillagers who are actually relatively "good" but have nothing more to loose and therefore pass on the 'bad side? maybe lead by some chief, a good archer, a dog teamer and a skilled robber/assassin?

-The very,very,very first Sigmarites: they saw the comet and feel, no KNOW, that the ONE is born. They are looking for him in every village and HATE orcs more than all. Maybe lead by a Warrior priest-like character and two other cool guys who are filled in by the poewr of some god but with very bad henchmen?

-Humans who leave in forests, in small groups but have learned, through a mixt of taming and magic, to make wolver, bears and other animals do their bad work ;P

-The first Chaos warshippers, who, n the worse desperation beg for help to the sky and get answered from one of the Chaos gods? I'd do specific warbands with quite different styles per god... Another option I thought of is the one of having Demoniac warbands in which a group of easely corruptable humans get approached by some lesser deamons (like Bloodletters, Daemonettes, Plaguebearers or Pink Horrors) sent by a big one to begin his corruption of the old world?

-Orcs and Goblin primitive warbands with fuhrs and all.... And maybe, referring to a passage from the 6th edition rulebook -"They came from the far east, sloughtering and reducing in slavery the human kind..."-, have them be able to enslave their prisoners and use them as very poor free henchmen in they have a particular kind of hero?

-Bands of awful beastmen, which are here Waaaay more powerful than in the original mordheim as other warbands will be worsly equipped and all, makig their natural streanght and toughness just great!

And more if you can think of

I wouldn't include elves nor dwarfes as whole warbands as they have ended their conflict for the old war long ago and plus they would be way too strong... they will be included as hired swords though....
other hired swords will be dark elves, chaos dwarfs, lesser deamons and more....

Hired swords are here crucial as, to represent the rarity of actually good weapons, the fact that the warband includes a hired sword dwarf, for example, will give the player the option of equipping a hero with a powerful hammer or axe etc...
Iron Weapons are rare, to represent this, the streanght of armor is way multiplied but has some better effect (eg you can modfy your d6 throw of +or- 1 when rolling for injuries after battles) other than the normal armor effects. Also weapons such as swords and axes are rare. common weapons will be primitive spears, knives, wood axes, hammers and other kind of maces. Bows are quite rare but not much... I would represent this by letting only heroes be equipped with certain types of rare items.

Tell me what you think and if you like it well, than, let's get working!!

- leonemaster

The humans in the time of sigmar were only savages who just knew that a wheel was round, if I'm correct. A setting such as these would focus on the rival factions at that time, probably orc and dwarf with some elven influences in there as well.

At that time, both the elven and dwarven empires were at their peak and therefore highly advanced. Seems fun, yet this would require a total revision of the warbands and their balance.

If I remember correct they were primitive, but not THAT bad. They were in the bronze age I think. With Iron weapons and armor reserved for only the chiefs and his champions.

I agree a total re-balance would be needed, but in this era the Elves have high-tailed it on out of the Old World on over to Ulthuaan and the wood elves are just starting to become their own people. Dwarfs just had the snot knocked out of them in the War of Vengeance (Beard if you are an Elf-lover)

I suggest making it a warband of 'heroes'. Just drop the henchmen/hero distinction and allow all models to roll injuries and level ups as a hero. And the Leader to roll twice on the injury chart and choose which he wants to take.

Yes, what Balrog says is right: humans weren't THAT primitive. Its a time in which humans are divided into many different tribes and small groups, building the first villages and starting just now to discover agricolture, or just wondering around, struggeling for survival. Some of them so desperate to accept pacts with daemons and creating the first marauders of chaos, others occupying the old dwarf cities and rebuilding them. On the other sides we see hordes of orcs and goblins killing and enslaving the newly arrived humans and ferocious beastmen who slowly start to form small groups. Elves have pretty much nothing to do (or very few things) with this as they have left the old world and went back to Ulthuan. Dwarfes also gave up the fight for the old world and went back to their mountains but still remain in contact with the humans (especially as they need to fight the orcs too). It is the Dwarfs, in fact, who forged and than gave Sigmar's Holy Warhammer - which is now the simbol of the emperor's power - to humans.

I would make this a Hero only campaign too. Warbands shall be based on this idea I think:

1) a relatively strong leader
2) two warriors
3) a spellcaster (even though magic isn't really known now therefore this could also be somekind of beatmaster or something)
4) a youngblood that will eventually become the best fighter of the warband or else fail his destiny and become very very bad or turn ito a monster....

- leonemaster

I can't remember who, but someone posted a really cool Shadow Warriors alternative warband a while back on this forum that would be a good starting point for some of these hero ideas.

If anyone has access to the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying stuff there is a lot in the 1st (which is not canon anymore) and second edition (which is) on non-college magic.

I would like to see magic being more dangerous to the user maybe if you fail and roll doubles it is a miscast of some kind. I could see a simple hedge magic type which would be weaker, harder to cast utility type spells with situational use, but maybe immune to miscast unless on double 1's; a more powerful moderate risk approach to magic similar to lesser magic from the main Mordheim book; and then a very powerful, but ultimately damning magic path that allows you to use chaos 'dhar' magic. Maybe 3 dice keep highest two to cast, but ANY double is a miscast?

What I personally 'see' as a theme for this could be:
- Hero based narrative driven campaigns, maybe a GM or at least charts for random events as well
- Different materials of weapons and weapon/armor breakage and repair
- I would rather stay away from Sigmar himself and instead focus on the era a generation or two before him, and have these campaigns be able the humans rising to become powerful tribes with cities just about to start being built.
- More Cinematic approach to skills, maybe heroes level up slower, but get a stat boost AND a skill each time?

I do like the setting and most of the ideas here a lot, so some more thoughts. I wouldn't focus on special stuff like what some Hired Sword might do just yet, but instead work on the things that make it unique and give it a true pre-sigmarite feel.

- I do like the hero-only approach. First, it fits into the background, these are times in which every twelve-year-old can denfend himself against stray wolves and such. Second, I don't like how henchmen are treated in MH. I just cannot see myself in them. That said, 6 Heroes will not be enough. First from the lack of tactics you can come up with and second because every casualty is a hero and so many exploration-dice might not be thrown otherwise.

- while the steel for weapons is rare, so is the steel for armor. So no fluff-explanation for stronger armor. Btw what about just calling things steel that are mithril in MH? And bronze things that are steel? Easy, but maybe doesn't support the pre-sigmarite feel enough.

- since black powder and mostlikely crossbows are out of the question, I feel that some bows need to be made stronger somehow. Reason is, that otherwise BS might become a relatively dead skill.

- talking of dead skills: if it is a flatter environment, no tall buildings and such, just a ruin here and there, Initiative might turn out to be rather pointless as well.

All right so:

BalrogTheBuff wrote:

What I personally 'see' as a theme for this could be:
- Hero based narrative driven campaigns, maybe a GM or at least charts for random events as well
- Different materials of weapons and weapon/armor breakage and repair
- I would rather stay away from Sigmar himself and instead focus on the era a generation or two before him, and have these campaigns be able the humans rising to become powerful tribes with cities just about to start being built.
- More Cinematic approach to skills, maybe heroes level up slower, but get a stat boost AND a skill each time?

1.There's no need for a GM, I believe, especially as this would complicate a lot gameplay and even possibility to do so (eg you need to be at LEAST 3 to play a single game). Only-Hero narrative is definitively included. I like the random events and I was thinking about something like this just today; a chart with 2D6 possibilities (throw 2D6 every beginning of the game): most of them do nothing but than you have happenings like "A bear joins the battle and looks for the food in your backpacks: the bear will attack the closest targets and try to kill them. If he menages to kill one hero, he will be satisfaid and march towards the end of the table. If he is killed, your hero gets 2exp." with final thing something like a pack of wolves trying to kill everyone

2.I know we really should stay as far as possible to staff like Sigmar etc but if we set it Just after the first comet passed (which is at his born and therefore he would still be a baby), we could include some cool and strong 'enlightened' men who understood the meaning of the comet and are looking for the baby all around the Old World... but still... we will see.

3.I'd possibly add LOADS of new skills but throw away (or at least make lot rare) the stat boosts. I really wanted to build something about a yougblood special thing.

Grimscull wrote:

- I do like the hero-only approach. First, it fits into the background, these are times in which every twelve-year-old can denfend himself against stray wolves and such. Second, I don't like how henchmen are treated in MH. I just cannot see myself in them. That said, 6 Heroes will not be enough. First from the lack of tactics you can come up with and second because every casualty is a hero and so many exploration-dice might not be thrown otherwise.

- while the steel for weapons is rare, so is the steel for armor. So no fluff-explanation for stronger armor. Btw what about just calling things steel that are mithril in MH? And bronze things that are steel? Easy, but maybe doesn't support the pre-sigmarite feel enough.

- since black powder and mostlikely crossbows are out of the question, I feel that some bows need to be made stronger somehow. Reason is, that otherwise BS might become a relatively dead skill.

- talking of dead skills: if it is a flatter environment, no tall buildings and such, just a ruin here and there, Initiative might turn out to be rather pointless as well.

- About the 6 hero only thing well, its probably going to be like 6-8 I believe but you also have to consider staff like the ability (or skill upgrading) to enslave enemy models, buying slaves, taming animals and staff. There would be Hero only warbands, supported by a few non gaining experience henchmen, which will obviousely not be able to kill heros but at least be used for tactics and stuff and let heroes kill / save them...

- BS will actually be really important! Think about it: a time in which aonle very few can shoot from far but everyone (almost) excells at HtH, being able to kill a guy before he is next to you would be great! I was anyways thinking of having many different kinds of bows but especially including a pretty wide range of thrown weapons and even giving some guys the ability to throw stones!!

- about initiative I didn't think about that but dont think it will be a huge problem...

- leonemaster

Ok, here's a very fats Warband idea for Chaos, Khorne:

- Hero Daemon of khorne;
Sent by a major deamon to start corrupting this new race of humance, to see how much useful they could be.... quite strong and can make some very simple, HtH, magic. AS a model i'd use the one from the Avatars of War range. He has the ability of taming chaos warhounds(max 4)
- 2 Bloodletters;
Very strong in HtH. cause fear and have multiple A with 2hw. They have the ability to enslave enemy defeated models (if they get captured) and turn them in mutants with 1 random mutation from the 'possessed' and very low stats (one x bloodletter)
- 1 Human Chief;
He is the one that was leading the men when, taken by despair, they asked for help to the most evil. He is the one who will be judjed as human 'utility' by Khorne's messanger. This makes him the 'yougblood' of the warband. He starts with 'middle' stats in all. For every lost battles he looses one point from a random stat (not A or W). If one stat reaches 0 this way he is transformed into a Chaos Spawn and looses all skills and equipement. He gets one God's Honour point or something for every won battle. when he has enough he can spend them to receive some supercool daemoniac weapon.
- 2 Human Warriors;
The Chief's friends and adventure companions. normal mordheim heroes if you want

Hope you like it,

- leonemaster

I actually just realized that this is waaay too strong for the setting and will therefore changed this way:

- Hero Daemon of khorne (Bloodletter-like minor Daemon);
Sent by a major deamon to start corrupting this new race of humance, to see how much useful they could be.... quite strong and can make some very simple, HtH, magic. As a model i'd use the one from the Avatars of War range.
- 1 Human Chief;
He is the one that was leading the men when, taken by despair, they asked for help to the most evil. He is the one who will be judjed as human 'utility' by Khorne's messanger. This makes him the 'yougblood' of the warband. He starts with 'middle' stats in all. For every lost battles he looses one point from a random stat (not A or W). If one stat reaches 0 this way he is transformed into a Chaos Spawn and looses all skills and equipement. He gets one God's Honour point or something for every won battle. when he has enough he can spend them to receive some supercool daemoniac weapon.
- 1 Daemon tamer;
They are the chaos 'hunters': have relatively normal/low skills but may hire (tame) chaos warhounds (max 4).
- 1 Enslaver;
When an enemy is captured by the warband, he tortures him to the point he is inrecognisable. Must be equipped with a whip. He can turn captured enemies into Slaves.
- 2 Human Warriors;
The Chief's friends and adventure companions. normal mordheim heroes if you want Smile

Enjoy,

- leonemaster

I like the enslaver. Maybe use similar rules to the swabbies?

That was just a basic idea, that I think shall be applied to many of the bands....

1-Leader
1-Main guy / theonewhowilleventuallybethecoolestone
1-animal tamer
1-special warband character
2-relatively normal warriorsù

- leonemaster

Maybe have it be animal tamer or mage? Not every team really would have animals necessarily.

Magic: well, an easy answer might be: "you can't take academic skills that affect magic". This way it starts strong, but doesn't get too tough.

Likewise, you can offer a weaker version of "Sorcery" : +1 to difficulty rolls, but a natural roll of 2 means he rolls on the BTB misfire table (this means that you can play with the spell-misfire table, but it's not required if a player wants to play it safe.)

It might be smart to merge the "Pre-Sigmar" and "time of hero threads".