What We Do in the Realm of Shadows - Episode Six

 While Orion was still in town we got in another episode of our What We Do in the Realm of Shadows campaign...

The characters conti -  ued to wander through the foetid swamps despoiled by Nurgle in an attempt to locate the Maggotkin forces and... somehow... "deal with them" so as not to be a distraction for the Stormcast Eternals that Neferata was trying to convince should aid her in the destruction of the forces of Khorne that have squatter in Angaria for far too long...

They did note the trio of Fell Bats still following them from the distance - sometime "friends", sometimes rivals from the court in Nulhamia - Simone the Deceitful, Count Blandula, and Jarred the Silent. They ignored them and carried on. 

Eventually they started to wonder if they were going in circles, as they were eventually so far into the tainted lands that EVERYTHING looked tainted and they were no longer sure they were heading towards more tainted stuff.. because it was ALL bad... so Lady Esmerelda took on her bat form and with Harald the Spirit torment tried flying ahead to scout things out. 

It was Harald that finally spotted a large concentration of the Maggotkin... and there were a LOT of them... and it looks like they were building something... perhaps a ritual site...?

This could not mean anything good and when Harald reported back what he'd seen... everyone was quite concerned that they'd been sent on a suicide mission. Harald pointed out that there were THREE VAMPIRE LORDS that were also vassals of Neferata following them and perhaps they could be convinced to join them. Lady Esmerelda and Sir Raven said they would rather DIE than owe any of those three any favours or to have seemed so weak as to need their help... especially since the three had boasted that Lady Esmerelda and Sir Raven were no longer in Neferata's favour, having failed to raise the army they'd promised, and that when the Legion of Blood took back Angaria from the Khorne horde, that their keeps would be awarded to those that were in favour Simone and Count Blandula! 

Harald went and tried to convince them anyway... unfortunately Harald, being a Spirit Torment, the only method he really had for trying to convince anyone of anything was INTIMIDATION... and that did not work... 

After returning to the others, Harald pointed out that if they DID NOT secure the vampires aid, they would surely die and then Simone the Decietful and Count Blandula would FOR CERTAIN steal their ancestral keeps! 

And so Lady Esmerelda made a pitiful attempt to ask the trio for their help... and hey declined... 

So it was up to them to stop this ritual on their own.. 

As they approached, most were involved in the ritual or watching the ritual... 

A few Nurglings were capering about, acting as sentries, of a sort. Harald flew up and pulverized a pair of them with his lock and chains. They burst like giant balloons filled with puss and gore.. but not before they squealed (it was unclear if it was terror or delight...?) and alerted the followers of Nurgle of their presence. 

Before they could act, Sir Raven rode down an entire unit of Plaguebearers! Slaughtering the lot of them smashing them to bits and being sprayed with more gore and puss and rancid fluids... 

This got the attention of the Pusgoyle Blightlord who charged Sir Raven, dealing the vampire some serious damage! 

 A Lord of Plagues, the Putrid Blightkings and another horde of Plaguebearers turned and shambled towards the interlopers,

Harald quickly found himself surrounded by Putrid Blightkings! 

He slipped away and attacked a Daemon of to the side that seemed to be directing the Plaguebearers. 

Sir Renmould stood guard, ready to defend Lady Esmerelda. Lady Esmerelda began throwing spells at the Sorcerer leading the ritual...

The Lord of Plagues charged in first bashing Sir Renmould HARD... 

Sir Raven charged down the other group of Plaguebearers, destroying them utterly! 

Then all fell back to try and deal with the Lord of Plagues and Putrid Blightkings first, before trying to assault the Sorcerer and the Lord of Afflictions protecting her... 

The battle was long and savage. At one point Sir Renmould seemed like he might be mortally wounded... and would have surely perished, were it not for the magiks of the Necromancer, Waldron! 

The Lord of Plagues absolutely obliterated the necromancers private guard of Deadwalker Skeletons... then proceeded to smash through all of his zombies... 

At that point the Necromancer cast one more spell healing the damage he could, and then fled! 

Around this time, Sir Raven was cut down by the three Putrid Blightkings he was fighting!

Things looked dire, indeed! 

Luckily, just then, when things were looking super bad... a large Fell Bat swooped in at attacked the Lord of Plagues! 

The bat turned into Count Blandula! He was soon joined by another Fell Bat. 

The second Fell Bat, they had earlier claimed to be Jarred the Silent who had been "stuck" in bat form for some time, was slain by the Lord of Plagues... and turned out to be just a Fell Bat!? WHERE WAS JARRED THE SILENT!? 

After that they were finally joined by Lady Simone the Deceitful, who killed the Pustule Blightlord and helped finish off the Lord of Plagues.

Alas... it was too late... 

The sorcerer successfully summoned the Great Unclean One into Shyish! 

Simone the Deceitful and Count Blandula looked at each other, then looked over an the other vampires... the simultaneously yelled "BAT!" turned back into their bat forms and flew off... 

Lady Esmerelda did the same... but tried to carry off her sometimes lover and possible sibling, Sir Raven... as awful as her unlife was with him... she could not imagine unlike WITHOUT hime... 

Sir Renmould had to just flee on foot, hoping to keep the vampires in sight as they flew off... 

How would they keep the Stormcast from finding out about the Great Unclean One and pivoting their forces to come and deal with it! How would they explain this all to Neferata!? Could Sir Raven be reanimated!?

find out next month, in the next episode of What We Do in the Realm of Shadows!!

Vengeful Skullroot and Gladewyrm

I finished up the Vengeful Skullroot and Gladewyrm this weekend. Both are endless spells for the Sylvaneth.  

Vengeful Skullroots manifestations of the forests' fury brought to life during the Necroquake. They can be summoned to battles by talented Sylvaneth mages. 

Gladewyrms are subterranean spites of pure life energy that travel along the realm roots and spirit pathways. Like the vengeful Skullroots they can be summoned to aid the Sylvaneth it times of need... 

The Vengeful Skullroot

Not only is it just a cool model that can float about the table bashing into enemies or just denying them movement... it also counts as another Awakened Wyldwood, for he purposes of ‘Endless Growth’ (the ability that heals EVERY Sylvaneth wholly within 6" of an Awakened Wyldwood), and ‘Walk the Hidden Paths’ and ‘Strike and Fade’ abilities (which allow the Sylvaneth to effectively teleport around the table!).

I expect we'll see just how useful it can be in my new game against Amanda! 

The Gladewyrm

The Gladewyrms seem good for going after wizards. They have Anti-Wizard (Rend +1) and a wizard they are in combat with can be given -1 to casting AND BANISHMENT rolls (making it harder to banish the Gladewyrm!) 

There is a third endless spell that came in the box (as there always is with Faction Endless Spells).. but it seems less useful (as one of them usually is...) it is immobile, and no attacks, and gives a unit within 6" +1 to run or Ward 6+... none of which are AMAZING... 

I do have the other endless spell and the five  Gossamid Archers to finish up - and, ideally, I'd like to do that BEFORE next weekend - when I'll be picking up the Outcast Spitegrove Battleforce box and have a new pile of Sylvaneth to paint!! (also I'd like to get the Gossamid Archers finished so I can play a game of Age of Sigmar with Amanda this week!) 

Great Unclean One - Greater Daemon of Nurgle (and Friends!)

I finally finished up the Great Unclean One... 

Great Unclean One! 

Backside of Great Unclean One!  

I took a lot longer than expected to paint. I feel like it's been in a state of "SO CLOSE" for ages... and part of that was the disruption of moving the painting station to another room... but part of that was just it's a big model with SO MANY silly little details, that, every time I THOUGHT I was done, would notice something I'd missed... over and over again. 

Also... all those annoying little nurglings... which I COULD have left off... but in Age of Sigmar, one of the Great Unclean Ones melee attacks is "Host of Nurglings" (which has TEN attack dice!) so I figured I should throw a few on the base with him. Maybe I didn't need to put them ALL in a conga line at the front... Ah, well... 

 I should probably come up with a name for it... like Norgoflathh the Vile... or... Gerald... 

While the model can be used in 40K... and I did ostensibly buy it to partake in Tanksgiving - a mega battle at the Warhammer Store where player pledge to build and paint a tank or MONSTER for 40K and bring it out to battle on the American Thanksgiving weekend - and The Great Unclean one IS playable in 40K... I will probably make far more use of it in Age of Sigmar! 

I also painted this little pair of Nurglings, but put them on individual bases... for funsies... the characters in the role-playing game will probably encounter them some day... and they will learn to FEAR the Nurglings!!!

Maggotkin of Nurgle Force for Age of Sigmar - so far! I do still have most of the Shudderblight Cyst to finish assembling and painting; four more Pusgoyle blightlords, five more Putrid Blightkings, 10  Rotmier Creed, and a Harbinger of Decay... (and will soon have even MORE new Nurgle stuff to paint when Warhammer Quest: Darkwater is released! 

Path to Glory: Ravaged Coast - Blood in the Valley

Rumours of their Hordes hated foe, the Duchess Mircalla, having entered the Adamantine Chain with a retinue of her own minions had reached the ears of Goretim the Reddish. Goretim gathered the horde and prepared to march. The soulblights were despised because they shed not blood to honour Khorne, but rather greedily gorged on it for themselves themselves.  

Slaughterpriest Bob Bloodblob, who had faced her before, advised caution, as the vampires were wily and could be leading them into a trap! Goretim cared not for caution and lead the Blood Siblinghood of the Slaughter-Gut-Pile through a pass in the Adamatine Chain to an adjacent valley filled with ash. 

A great storm whipped down the valley filling the air with ash. Visibility was reduced to zero, but he warlord insisted the horde press one, hoping that their advance would be covered by the storm and it would be them that caught the Soulblights unawares. When the storm lifted, they found the Soulblights arrayed before them... 

But the Horde was split into three separate groups. 

Goretim the Reddish and the Mighty Skullcrushers of the Red Path were in the centre, but further back from the Soulblights. 

On the Hordes left were the Bloodwarriors of the Red Wave. 

On the Hordes right, were the Slaughterpriests and their Bloodreavers and the Khorgorath. 

The Vampires of the Blood Knights mounted their steeds and charged the Blood Warriors. 

The Huscarl Consort Nossos, the Vengorian Lord, flapped and shambled their way, with their fell bat pets in tow, towards Goretim and his Mighty Skullcrushers. 

Duchess Mircalla and her Nulhamian Guard her their ground, but cautiously tried to recover a trover of emberstone that had been revealed by the shifting of the ash in the storm.

Other Deadwalkers advanced between the Vengorian Lord and the Bloodknights. 

the Bloodknights crashed into the Blood Warriors lines! The slaughter was triumphant and the blood flowed... 

though... most of it was the Blood Warriors blood... 

Goretim the Reddish and he Mighty Skullcrushers charged down the Vegorian Lord and laid them low! 

The Slaughterpriests on the right flank advanced cautiously with the Khorgorath and Bloodreavers before them! 

The Blood Warriors fought to the last, and took a few of the Bloodknights down with them! 

Bob Bloodblob summoned a pair of Hexgorger Skulls that surged towards the Soulblights, pouring boiling blood out of their giant eye-sockets and disrupting the stuff of magiks. 

The warriors of Khorne crashed into the Soulblights main line, smashing apart the undead warriors before them and driving away the swarm of Fellbats. 

In the distance, the Bloodknights wheeled about to charge back towards their mistress who was in a bit of distress.. 

The Khorgorath smashed through the lines of the undead warriors ripping and shredding with abandon... though it was eventually brought down by weight of numbers.. 

Duchess Mircalla eventually decided she needed to intervene herself, as the skeletal guard was collapsing and replacements could not be raised quick enough.

She slaughtered the last of the Bloodreavers.  

But was left open to be charged by the Mighty Skullcrushers. 

With the Hexgorger skulls hemming her in and distrupting her magiks, Duchess Mircalla had nowhere to run when the Mighty Skullcrushers charged in to ride her down! 

The Bloodknights return.. but too late... 

The Bloodknights arrive to find the Mighty Skullcrushers lined up and ready for them. 

The Bloodknights retreated and the Mighty Skullcrushers rode down the last of the skeletal guard. 

The Bloodknights charged PAST the Mighty Skull crushers to ride down the Slaughterpriests.

And in turn, the Mighty Skullcrushers rode crashed into the Bloodknights and trampled them into the dirt... 

This was an odd scenario. Once again, there were no objective locations to hold throughout the game, the winner was decided by whoever had the most units left in the Neutral areas of the battlefield (neither sides deployment areas)... I knew there was little chance that was going to happen, as the undead can just keep coming back... in the end the game ended at round four, with two units of undead (skeletons and Fellbats) in neutral territories. All I had left on the table were the Mighty Skullcrushers... Perhaps if I'd had a few more rounds, I could have chased them down...? Probably not... The bats could just keep flying away. 

I only gained TWO Emberstone Shards this game - one for losing (rolled 1 on d3) and on that the Mighty Skullcrushers carried at the end of the game. Orion's Soulblights scored FIVE - three for winning and one for each unit remaining that also carried one that had been recovered from the field. 

We had time, so we set up a SECOND game. I'll do that as a separate game report. 

I spent my two Emberstone Shards on raising Bob Bloodblob to the Elite Rank on the Path of the Invoker. 

Orion spent her Emberstone on gaining an Endless spell in her arcane tome and her faction terrain. 

Half of the scenarios I've played in this campaign, so far, have not had Objective markers... which kind of makes my Battle Formation kind of not-so-useful - as it gives all the bloodbound +1 to hit any enemy contesting an objective that the Bloodbound do not control... Guess I should have read through the scenarios and thought that through! Also, it doesn't help Daemons at all, if I started adding any of those... and I'll probably have to start adding those if I progress much further in the campaign, as I don't have much more Bloodbound (at least not PAINTED ones - I do have another ten Blood Warriors and THIRTY Bloodreavers... but I'm far more interested in painting Maggotkin and Sylvaneth at the moment...).