Endless Whispers

Welcome back!  Prepare for a brand new campaign!  The sequel to the insanity that was Serene Annihilation.

History has been changed - Magnus the Pious, defeated in THE GREAT REBELLION!  The world is at odds with itself and a new nightmare stirs in the forests surrounding a once-great city.  The Wizard emerges, enslaving those he can - exterminating the rest.  He seeks to build and impossible tower to ascend to the stars from whence he came.

No one can escape him.  Reaching the sea is impossible whilst the Wizard's arcane science confounds the Starlight Forest into a labyrinth of dark trees and darker nightmares.

All images presented without further comment.

Woot!

Rules and pictures are up for the first warband: The Loamhedge Renegades.  A strange variety of beastman indeed...

With the coming of the Wizard, the occupants of Loamhedge Abbey split into two factions.  One continued their worship of the Sky-Father, whilst the other turned to the Old Gods: the Wolf, the Crow, the Serpent and the Hyena.  The faction following the Old Gods lost and were excommunicated.  They wander the Starlight Forest as renegades - hatred fierce for both their old fellows and The Wizard.

More rules and background and pictures HERE.

Hehe, "so fluffy, I'm gonna die" - do they kill with kindness?

Oh man! Great warband

Grimscull wrote:

Hehe, "so fluffy, I'm gonna die" - do they kill with kindness?

Haha, yeah. This campaign, whilst still dark, is more whimsical than the last. Think Over the Garden Wall or Nightmare Before Christmas.

This particular warband was made for a friend who is a huge fan of Redwall.

As a whimsical sort myself, it does look interesting. Who makes the Mice Folk?  

Dark Sword:
http://www.darkswordminiatures.com/shop/index.php/miniatures/visions-in-fantasy-critters.html

Thanks, Grimscull. You are a font of useful information.  

Second Warband, pictures and rules now available HERE! The Viridian Corsairs are a group of aelfs who have turned away from their peaceful, woodland ways and embraced their darker desires - reaving, blood sacrifice, even cannibalism. They have a black hatred for the Wizard for precipitating their fall from grace. They are one of the few warbands who openly turn the strange devices of the Wizard against him.

Nothing says Sweet Elven Maiden like a flame thrower. The white is a nice change from G.W's normal shades. GREAT WORK!

The Flamethrower made me think "wait a minute, this is not a regular MH campaign...". So I actually visited your blog and browsed through the rules you came up with. You are using the AoS rules, so I guess they work out nice for you? Since you do use those, how do you treat advancements of heroes and henchmen? Didn't find anything about that on your blog, though maybe I just overlooked. Anyways, a handful of interesting ideas for campaign-management you have there.

Grimscull wrote:

The Flamethrower made me think "wait a minute, this is not a regular MH campaign...".

Very true... There is more to come which will further make this campaign... unusual. I hope everyone will indulge me, as this one will deviate quite a bit from Mordheim. But, that's been what I've been doing so far anyway haha.

To answer your question, I am using AoS rules with the campaign rules HERE (which I think you read).

My gaming group is short on the attention span and record keeping. For a lot of people, detail and record keeping is the most exciting part of Mordheim. But for us, I think it began to get in the way (ie. remembering skills, EXP points, injuries etc. etc. etc.). It got overwhelming. I wanted more action, less admin - in other words, the difference between Mass Effect 1 and Mass Effect 2 (if that helps).

So, after each battle the players gain Supplies and (possibly) Secrets. Secrets are resources just like anything else; they are an abstraction and do not represent actual "secrets." Once a player gains enough Secrets, he can opt to roll a D6 after the battle and add his Secret total. If it equals or beats 10, that player gains a Presence point which he can give to any warband member (the player then also loses D3 Secrets).

Presence points work like combined might/fate points from the Lord of the Rings game. A model can expend them during the battle to either modify a die roll by +1 (might) or to avoid a wound on a D6 roll of 4+ (fate). Gaining Presence points is the only way models can "level" up. It might not seem terribly detailed, but it actually works very well. Having 3-4 Presence points makes a model significantly more powerful. And this method removes the need to track EXP or profile changes - making record keeping a breeze.

Thanks for your detailed reply. The LINK doesn't work (for me) but I think the campaign rules is what I've read. I don't know about LotR might/fate points but the way I understand it, the Presence points "refill" after every game? It still sounds a bit like record keeping but maybe it is all very easy compared to MH and I'm just used to that.

Cool stuff as always. My group is feeling the record keeping crunch too. Mostly its the age of the gamers though...

Grimscull wrote:

Thanks for your detailed reply. The LINK doesn't work (for me) but I think the campaign rules is what I've read. I don't know about LotR might/fate points but the way I understand it, the Presence points "refill" after every game? It still sounds a bit like record keeping but maybe it is all very easy compared to MH and I'm just used to that.

So we tested this out the last weekend and it worked pretty well.

Presence points do "refill" after each game, but across an entire warband you might have only 1-5 Presence points spread out across your heroes, so it's really easy to remember (we mark it with counters) as opposed to Mordheim or even the AoS Borderland Rules - where it is so easy to forget an injury, skill, stat increase etc.

Here is the third warband taking part in the campaign. I never really liked the lazy Aztec aesthetic of GW's lizardmen, so I went more Voodoo/Louisiana. I hope it came across.

More pictures and rules HERE.

The Creole Lizards are LOOKIN' GOOD. Those are some OUTSTANDING Mushrooms. COOL STUFF as always!

I think you got the best out of these age old minis. The WM/H-minis work well with them and the paintjob is fine. The shields turned out especially nice (there are mouldlines all over the models though, sorry for mentioning it). I'd also like to know where the "skull masks" are from.
On the other hand, I wouldn't have found the Voodoo-theme if you hadn't mentioned it. Maybe spread out some more voovoo-dolls and feathers among the Sauruses (these could be sculpted even) and paint them in a brighter colour? And the Skinks could have their faces painted in a skull-like fashion or something like that. I see the minis are quite finished, I just didn't want to "complain" without mentioning possible solutions.

That warband looks great- I like your approach. I agree about GW's "lazy" approach to the Lizardmen range; I feel they could have done better, although I would have liked the Central American Indian aesthetic explored more as opposed to a different direction.

Nice work on the scaled ones.

Enough beating around the bush - THE WIZARD IS COME!!!

Watch the intro video HERE!

See his terrifying forces HERE!



Some more sample rules!

The Adeptus Mechanicus Guy is cool...I love those minis. I do hate the lobotomy idea...their gun barrels could stand the attention of a drill as well & some eye would improve their look. Other than that GREAT WORK!

I'll take your word that they somehow tie into a Mordheim style world, but it does look more like Necromunda.

DeafNala wrote:

The Adeptus Mechanicus  Guy is cool...I love those minis. I do hate the lobotomy idea...their gun barrels could stand the attention of a drill as well & some eye would improve their look. Other than that GREAT WORK!  

Lol.  I know.  I have done eyes on a few models (the elves, for example) and it is always utter hell for me - so I don't do them on all the models.

DeafNala wrote:

I'll take your word that they somehow tie into a Mordheim style world, but it does look more like Necromunda.  

I do think I owe an explanation: the world itself is "feral" or "medieval;" the destroyed city the characters are always referencing may or may not be Mordheim.  The inhabitants themselves are not at much more than a blackpowder level, but the intruder - the Wizard - is full of arcane science.  It is so powerful, most of the inhabitants regard it as magic.  His coming, and his fall from the sky wiped out most of the old order - leaving the survivors bitter and leaderless.  Now the Wizard seeks to rebuild his "tower" to climb back into the sky.

I'll post some pictures to illustrate the difference...

+++FORCES OF THE WIZARD+++

High-tech, but running low on supplies to make the more advanced creations...








+++STARLIGHT FOREST SURVIVORS+++

Medieval and primitive, but aided by ancient gods and their feral servants.

It is all such UBERCOOL stuff. There is a multitude of ideas to steal here. GREAT WORK!